Burn Effect, the debut album from the Mississippi-based alternative rock band Linwood, bores listeners. Re-treading ground already traveled more skillfully by R.E.M. and Soundgarden, the band adds nothing new to the music scene, mercifully ending their album relatively quickly.
Linwood tends toward unadulterated electric guitar and uncompressed drums - sounds that have fallen more out of favor in the recent rock years. Bo Lindsey's voice is clear and bright, and sounds a little like Michael Stipe of R.E.M., although he sings more in his chest than Stipe, whose nasal tenor vibrates concrete.
Like the vocals, the lyrics never soar higher than mundane. Women have lied to Lindsey, and he has had hard times and gotten by on the skin of his teeth. Same old, same old. The point of Lindsey's lyrics seems to be to add another instrument to the band's lineup rather than create an interesting intellectual counterpoint to the music.
There isn't much filling the space in songs either. Most of the tracks feature slow, ponderous solos and lots of dead time between words. This is the kind of music a listener whistles or hums along to, inventing the more interesting lines and runs that Linwood should have included themselves.
Burn Effect's first track, "Lie To You," features Lindsey singing, "Lie to me and lie to you, lie to me 'bout something new," more times than are necessary in a two and a half minute song. The refrains of "Believe" and "Your Kind" are just the song titles and a few extra words, repeated ad infinitum.
Comprised of vocalist Bo Lindsey, guitarist Scott Coopwood, (hence Lin-Wood), bassist Barry Bays, and drummer Rick Shelton, Linwood began when Lindsey and Coopwood met at the end of their college careers, reconnecting musically later in life after a three-year musical hiatus by Coopwood.
The alternative-rock sound that Linwood espouses is refreshing, to be sure, but they are cribbing a sound popular more than a decade ago and not bringing a huge amount of energy to the table.
In essence, Linwood is power-chord-heavy filler music, good for long car rides with awkward silence that needs filling, but bad for listening to out of musical interest. This feels more like a facsimile of rock music than the real thing.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
