THE GOLDEN BREED
Glass Eye World (Career)
Reviewed by Alan Wright

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This is a new group Deniz Tek (Radio Birdman, etc) formed with the former rhythm section - Steve and Art Godov, who are twins - of the Exploding Fuckdolls. Deniz and Art split the vocal duties, and they get some support from Dave Weyer and Ron Sanchez (Donovan's Brain) on organ and piano. Deniz's wife Angie Pepper also chimes in on backing vocals along with Jeff Arntsen. It's probably the rawest, punkiest thing he's done of late, even more so than Deep Reduction, his collaboration with the Stump Wizards. Kicking off with "Always Out Of Reach," you know this is gonna be a fun ride. I'm not sure what it is about this, whether it's the production or a more conscious effort on the part of the players, but this has a real '70s punk/powerpop sound to it. All the songs are really catchy and ballsy at the same time. There's lots of cool guitar riffs going on, especially on songs like the CD opener "Always Out Of Reach" and "Let's Go." Yet, on "Flight 19," a mostly blazing punker, the band slows down mid-way thru and Deniz adds some amazing slide guitar work, then a bunch of fuzz, and the song turns into this psychedelic freakout. "2 Pam Chloride," a song recorded live somewhere, is really cool with it's '60s organ embellishing it. "1 Eye Sam" is a real corker, with its shouted chorus from which the CD gets its title "It's a glass-eye world!" The closing quasi-psychedelic surf instro, "Baja Confidential," is really cool, too.

© 2003 - Alan Wright