9. The Rolling Stones: Their Satanic Majesties Request (1967)

Stupid title. Silly cover. Blatant attempt to steal some thunder from The Beatles, who were possibly at the height of their critical and commercial influence following Sgt. Pepper. So what? The fact of the matter is that this is far from a failure, no matter how many people want to slag off this lesser Stones album. Perhaps time was on its side, or there has been some retribution, equal parts ironic and inevitable, which has seen Sgt. Pepper taken down a few pegs, while there isn’t quite as much venom spewed about Satanic. This was certainly not the Stones effort that spilled over with hits (again, so what?) but taken one by one, there is much to like—or at least defend—in lesser-known tunes like “Gomper”, “The Lantern” and “Citadel” (think Iggy Pop listened to that one a few thousand times?).

And then there are the winners: “She’s A Rainbow” (which gleefully rips off Arthur Lee and Love’s “She Comes in Colors” more than it does anything from Sgt. Pepper) and the band’s unique, convincing and corny stab at psychedelia, “2000 Light Years From Home”. And then the masterpiece that inexplicably brings together both Kiss and Wes Anderson: “2000 Man”. It may not be “A Day in the Life” but if you had to listen to one song once a day for the rest of your life, which one would you pick? I know which one I’d go with (and my kids, they just don’t understand me at all).

The historic import of this one is not inconsiderable, either: up until now The Stones were forever in the Fab Four’s shadow, enjoying (or being consigned to) being bad guys and competing as best they could. This was the last time they played the underdog role and beginning with Beggars Banquet their albums were never compared unfavorably with The Beatles’, or anyone else’s for that matter. On this album, even though it sounded very little like Sgt. Pepper, imitation was still the sincerest form of flattery. Its ostensible failure likely caused the band to realize that the rules they had been following were largely self-imposed, and once they got outside that box nobody could stand in their way. They took their lumps, upped the ante and then gleefully kicked every other act out of the way.

I can’t go on, I’ll go on…

When it comes to The Beatles, I feel obliged to invoke Samuel Beckett.

Everything has been said; enough can never be said.

So let me say this: as long as I have eyes, ears, fingers and a keyboard, I’ll be talking about The Beatles.

And that is just referring to the band’s official discography. What about the incalculable covers of their catalog? With a band as beloved and unavoidable as The Beatles, we’ve heard it all. Especially the stuff we didn’t want or need to hear and, unfortunately, the stuff that can never be unheard (you know exactly what I’m referring to, right?). That said, while nothing, of course, can ever compare to the real thing, there are some amazing tributes out there. Naturally, the more unorthodox ones tend to fare better, if for no other reason because they retain the spirit of the original without drawing an overly direct comparison, which is always a losing proposition.

I can think of several; so can you.

How about Eddie Hazel’s funkadelic deconstruction of “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)”? Or Joe Jackon’s plaintive take on “Eleanor Rigby” (talk about covering the uncoverable: check it out). Or the enchanting Allison Kraus’ version of “I Will”? Or Jimi Hendrix straight-out impounding of “Sgt. Pepper”. Or anything by Electric Light Orchestra…oh wait, those weren’t covers? Nevermind. The best one I’ve seen in ages, and one I suspect I’ll never tire of, is St. Vincent’s stylized, sexy-as-all-get-out take on “I Dig A Pony” which needs to be seen, immediately.

The wise, but not necessarily safe bet is to stick with instrumentals. Think Grant Green’s take on “I Want To Hold Your Hand” or Brad Mehldau’s laconic version of “Blackbird”.

Understanding, then, that there is always room for more Beatles, the question still must be answered: is there really room for an entire album of Beatles covers? Well…

For this to work; for it to even be conceivable, the band would have to be tight, confident and attack the music with a sufficiently appealing combination of purpose and irreverence. Enter Soulive, the funk-jazz (or is it jazz-funk?) trio that has been dropping worthwhile music for more than a decade. If you’ve never checked them out –on record or on stage– their new tribute might be an ideal point of entry. Let’s start with the title: Rubber Soulive. I don’t know about you, but that had me at hello. If you have the ingenuity, or audacity, to come up with a title like that, you better be ready to deliver.

The good news is: they do. The better news is: the high points on this release are quite high indeed. The best news: there are no low points. Wisely, the band keeps it relatively simple, and succinct: clocking in at well under an hour, there is little danger of getting bored, or overwhelmed. It is an impressive, mostly joyful, occasionally eye-opening experience and any Beatles fan should find something to love. Speaking of “Something”, it’s one of the finer moments. Here’s a representative live version:

I feel that. First off, an organ/guitar/drum assault is an ideal way to approach The Beatles with an all-instrumental agenda. The organ takes care of the bass and the second guitar (it has the heft to boost the bottom and the edge to color the lead runs and fill any/all gaps); the drums are solid (they won’t make you think of Ringo, but they won’t make you miss him…what more can you ask for?) and, above all, the guitar shreds tastefully and Eric Krasno joins the select and not necessarily long list of artists who “get” The Beatles.  His playing here is capable of making your heart break (more than a little now that George is gone) while smiling, just like the original. I’m not sure I can think of a more genuine or generous form of praise.

Other winners include their appropriately foreboding take on “Eleanor Rigby” (a perfect song for some brooding organ) and an uproarious rendition of “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)”. There are generous samples on YouTube of the band performing these songs live, so if you’re not yet convinced, take to the Internets and hear what you’ve been missing.

The pinnacle of this effort, for me, is their semi-miraculous rundown of “In My Life”. There are plenty of Beatles songs you just don’t go near unless you can handle it, and Soulive handles it. Once again, Krasno seems to effortlessly manage the MacBook-thin line between reverential and revelatory. Less is more (like the song itself, it is deceptively simple, but it’s power resides in its unadorned statement of purpose, lyrically, vocally and musically: Soulive understands that and conveys it, while putting their own rather indelible signature on one of our best-loved songs).

My work is done here.

Check them out online here and acquire a copy of Rubber Soulive; it will put you in the appropriate state of mind as the cold settles in and you battle the crowds to play Santa for friends and family (if you want to make them believe in Santa again, pick up a copy for their stockings as well).

This is definitely a musical blessing in 2010, and it couldn’t come at a better time.

I don’t even have a question, but here is the answer:

Whenever I listen to Abbey Road, I find myself feeling grateful that the collective world of musicians did not, upon hearing it for the first time, throw up their hands and get day jobs. Why bother? they did not ask, allowing us to remain thankful for everything that keeps filling our ears, all these years later. But what must it have sounded like, to mortals simply trying to occupy the same planet, when this one originally dropped?

Abbey Road is not Revolver, or Sgt. Pepper or even The White Album; it is merely The Beatles’ best album. Ironically, it’s not a perfect album (if such a thing could even be said to exist — a fun debate for another time, although the dicey proposition has been discussed in brief here); like I said, it’s not Revolver. It does what the rarest of artistic creations can do: it is more than that. How, for instance, could any album containing “Octopus’s Garden” possibly, under any circumstances be appraised as perfect? (Well, for starters, two words: “Yellow Submarine”, also, of course, sung by our beloved Ringo.) The point is, an album with such an overabundance of riches (Question: is such a thing possible? Answer: yes) does not only compensate for the sore spots, it overwhelms them with its sheer force of being. You could drop a teardrop in a river and nobody will taste the salt.

And, for the record, I not only unashamedly endorse the much-despised “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer”, I relish it (It’s a sing-along song about a serial killer for Christ’s sake; could anyone pull this off with such aplomb? And if Paul was a tad too sentimental and sappy at times, it helped cut the self-righteous solipsism that Lennon was more than a little guilty of, albeit often in the service of stunning art; consider some of the best and worst tracks from The White Album for examples of each). So suck on this, haters:

Of course, even this album is not without controversy. Even within the band, Lennon (who, let’s not kid ourselves, had a more than moderate envy of Macca’s prodigious and, circa 1969, unfathomable compositional facility) could scarcely stomach the second side (the extended “suite” which certain fans –like this one– consider a towering achievement in any music, ever). It’s hard to quibble with Lennon’s work on “Come Together” and the hopped-up anguish of “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)”, which bookend the first side(and it’s worth noting the latter features astounding bass lines throughout courtesy of The Walrus).

Just as Lennon possibly edges out his mate, song for song, on Revolver and The White Album, Mac is the prime mover on Abbey Road (as he was on Sgt. Pepper). One somewhat overlooked track that continues to intrigue me (aside from the obvious fact that it rules) is “Oh! Darling”. Lennon allegedly was salty that Mac opted to sing lead vocals on this one, since the style of the song was, ostensibly, more suited to Lennon’s skill-set. Well….Paul could scream with the best of them, and while I would love to hear a version of this song with Lennon taking a crack at lead vocals, I think this remains one of Mac’s enduring performances (the entire tune is a tour de force). And, not to mince words, I don’t think even Lennon could have pulled off the last line (I’ll never dooooooooo you no haaarm!!) as indelibly as his partner in crime did.

So why, in the midst of discussing one of the great albums, am I falling into the trap of even entertaining the whole Lennon/McCartney thing?

Well…with the (unimaginable) prospect of Lennon’s death approaching its 30th anniversary (seriously, how is this possible?), get ready for some overly earnest, over-the-top and mostly well-intended attempts to elevate him even higher (is that possible?) into the artistic and human pantheon. I will mostly welcome such endeavors, but some of us will be obliged to inject some perspective on the whole JOHN WAS THE BEATLES! hysteria.

I had a bit to say about this last year, on the occasion of anniversary #29:

I couldn’t deny that this phenomenon was not in play while The Beatles were still a working band, but there is no question that Lennon’s posthumous lionization seemed to separate fans into facile camps of “Lennon people” versus “McCartney people”. You know the drill: if you like “Hey Jude” and “Penny Lane” you are a PM person; if you prefer “I Am The Walrus” and “Come Together” you are a JL person (if you prefer “Revolution 9″ you are a weird person…just kidding –sort of). The implication, of course, is that Lennon was the more serious Beatle, the more witty and acerbic and, therefore, worthwhile Beatle. This whole formula is idiotic, insulting and should really be retired as soon as possible. (Put another way, if you have ever said anything along the lines of “Lennon was the only Beatle that mattered” then you are a poser and quite possibly a hipster, neither of which are anything to be proud of.)

To me, real Beatles fans have always looked at that question the way they would if asked who their favorite parent was. Do you have to decide? And why should you? The bottom line is: as claustrophobic as it got in the Beatles universe post-Ono, it is understandable that Genius of that magnitude would eventually bristle at the compromises required to keep the machine running. Not to mention, quiet genius #3, the increasingly confident George Harrison, resented having his artistic wings clipped and understandably bristled as his (increasingly superb) songs got left on the cutting room floor.

It didn’t need to end; it had to end. How could they keep going; they kept going.

Of course, as the ‘70s showed, (not unlike Cream before them, or Pink Floyd after them) no one amongst the Fab Four came close to making music on their own equal to the work they did together. (The people who think Imagine and Plastic Ono Band are superior to any proper Beatles albums, aside from outing themselves as “John people” — not that there’s anything wrong with that — are arguably not true Beatles fanatics. And there is certainly nothing wrong with that).

In short and in sum: John needed Paul, and Paul needed John. It’s as simple as that, and I’ve yet to hear a compelling argument to the contrary — and I say that as someone who accepts the fact that the break-up was probably inevitable, in the grand scheme of things. Mourning what could or should have been seems churlish, like wishing Shakespeare had lived a bit longer and written another half-dozen plays. With an embarrassment of riches like this, it’s insane to quibble (and, in a confession that marks me, for better or worse, as a Beatles fanatic, I find much to enjoy in all of the solo albums: as always, Ringo is best in small doses and each other member indulges a tad too much in their obsessions for my liking. In closing, they needed each other, perhaps more than they ever realized).

This band is like the mafia was to Michael Corleone; every time I think I’ve said all I can (should) say, they pull me back in. And if I’m going to be pulled back, I’d better Get Back.

More (too much more?) on The Beatles, here and here.

To be continued, I’m sure…

Arthur Lee died almost exactly four years ago (August 3, 2006). I not only am keen to remember –and celebrate– his life and work, I also appreciate the fact that the piece I wrote (below) to commemorate Lee was the first work I published for PopMatters, a relationship that has been incredibly positive and invigorating ever since. For anyone interested (hardcore fans or the unitiated looking to learn more) I wrote a more detailed appraisal of the band, and that piece can be found here. A few key snippets, directly below:

One is tempted to suggest, if sardonically, that now is the time for a reappraisal of Love. But that is unlikely. It’s never been time for Love, then or now, and this one-two punch of bad timing and bad luck tends to encapsulate the band’s maddening legacy. Love could never quite get over, and this certainly contributes to the enigmatic air that hangs over their history.

To a certain extent Lee’s defiant nature is understandable, or at least explicable. When you are that naturally talented, it has to be more than a little challenging to jump through the necessary hoops in order to connect the dots of pop star accessibility. Many years later, Lee acknowledges, and regrets, his self-defeating intransigence. To Holzman’s credit, he flew Lee out to New York City, but the singer was the opposite of Woody Allen in Annie Hall: he was allergic to the big apple and only felt comfortable in L.A. Lee begins to sound like rock music’s Jake LaMotta: he understood the game, but because he saw through it, or felt above it, or was willfully sabotaging himself or—most of all—he simply couldn’t be bothered, he never seized the gold ring that was gleaming right in front of his face.

Lee left his mark, and he knew it; and before he died, he had a decent opportunity to witness the collective appreciation. That he was able to tour the world in his last years is just, that he was taken before he could add to his legacy is regrettable. That old fans and, hopefully, legions of new listeners will continue to discover his work is exactly as it should be.

August 3, 2006.

It’s equal parts ironic and appropriate that Syd Barrett and Arthur Lee, two avatars of what we recall—mostly with fondness—as the Summer of Love, have gone on to that great gig in the sky within a month of each other this summer. Of course, any discussion of 1967 must begin and end with the Beatles: As has been well documented, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band moved the avant-garde to the mainstream at a time when our culture was perhaps most open to receiving it. All of a sudden, albums could—and quickly did—become statements, and rock music was elevated to the status of art seemingly overnight. So while Sgt. Pepper is the alpha and omega, it is as significant for the possibilities it created for others as for its own sake.

But as is always the case, the most interesting and enduring creations occur in the margins. Pink Floyd, darlings of the burgeoning London underground, arrived at Abbey Road studios in early 1967 and began recording their debut Piper at the Gates of Dawn at the same time the Fab Four were assembling the sonic puzzle pieces of Sgt. Pepper. Both masterpieces arrived in time to describe and define the Summer of Love, or at least its distinctly British component. Across the pond, another debut helped capture the sounds of that time: The Doors were to Los Angeles what Pink Floyd was to London, a lean and hungry band that had taken the time to cultivate a cult following and had a breakthrough single (“See Emily Play” and “Light My Fire” respectively) that shot them into the stratosphere. But the band that Jim Morrison hoped to emulate was the then heavyweight champion of the L.A. scene: Love, led by Arthur Lee, who was also a mentor to a young guitarist named Jimi Hendrix.

For a variety of reasons, some typical, some inexplicable, Love seemed to implode just as their ship was set to sail, and they never quite fulfilled their limitless and possibly unparalleled potential. While other bands made history during the Summer of Love, Love was busy living through incendiary months, and on the album that resulted, Forever Changes, Lee documented in real time and in living color the Daily Planet of the hippie scene, or at least its underbelly—which is perhaps the same thing. In other words, the album stands as the most accurate American version of the era, post Monterey and Haight-Ashbury.

Forever Changes failed to connect, though, and the band disintegrated shortly after its completion, with Lee soldiering on in increasing obscurity, his moment come and gone. How then, has his magnum opus, so insufficiently received, managed to inspire such loyalty and enchantment over the decades among its admirers? For starters, it is worthy of repeated listens; it deepens and intensifies well after you’ve made the initial connection. (Quick, when is the last time you listened to Sgt. Pepper all the way through? How deep do “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite” or “Lovely Rita Meter Maid” seem?) Although none of the songs on Forever Changes crept onto the paisley playground of its time, it is impossible to quibble with the confident brilliance of miniature gems like “Andmoreagain” or “The Good Humor Man He Sees Everything Like This”, which showcase Lee’s immutable gift: his voice, which had an almost extraordinary sensitivity and authority.

Sound like a contradiction? That’s the genius of Arthur Lee, plainly put. For all his quirks and contradictions, Lee was a taskmaster in the studio. Listen to the demo version of “The Good Humor Man” and compare the sparse acoustic take with what the song would become with understated brass and strings, and the longing in Lee’s delivery. If you don’t get it, Forever Changes will never speak to you.

But it’s not enough (nor should it be) to merely gesture toward an art work’s ineffable qualities. What makes Forever Changes indelible is first and foremost its unmistakable honesty. The Los Angeles streets that broiled with heat and inspiration brought intimations of a severity largely absent from the rose-colored commentary that emerged from San Francisco. The songs on Forever Changes have a soul and sly élan that most of Love’s contemporaries were incapable of conjuring. Lee described what he saw with deceptively simple, disarmingly straightforward lyrics that always evoked the feelings of an outsider. Lee, a black man, recognized what Chris Rock would later articulate, that no matter how many people profess to admire and envy you, few, if any, white folks would choose to trade places with you. This keeps the distance between what should be and what is foremost in one’s mind; no amount of applause or plaudits or utopian hippie thinking can compensate for that disparity.

But the sad staying power of his somber vision is unassailable. The music on Forever Changes is by no means morose, though the merciful scarcity of saccharine free-love fantasia augments its staying power. Part of the album’s perverse charm lies in its contradictions. For instance, its most assured and ebullient songs are belied by Lee’s lyrics. On this album, Lee—like Barrett on Piper—displays an uncanny facility for concision, capturing a larger truth somehow by not quite saying it. Lee’s audacity, at 22, in employing non sequiturs creates an unfiltered vision, revealing a lack of cynicism and trust in his abilities as well as those of his listeners. “And I’m wrapped in my armor / But my things are material./ And I’m lost in confusions / ‘Cause my things are material ” The lines may not make immediate sense, but Forever Changes is a treatise from the trenches, capturing the dodgy promise that anything is possible. The Summer of Love, after all, was the American Dream redux, replacing all that boring humility, hard work and redemption of the Horatio Alger story with a strategically ingested tab of acid.

Lee not only captured what he saw on the street, he anticipated the darkness around the corner, so it’s understandable that the more starry-eyed in his audience weren’t trying to pick up what he was putting down. Though Forever Changes doesn’t conform to the nostalgic picture of Summer of Love as drug-fuelled ecstasy without consequences, Lee managed to relate the less sexy banality of the morning after before most hippies even knew what was about to hit them. You never know when you might awaken from your reverie with snot caked against your pants, as Lee sardonically sings about in “Live & Let Live”. Lee depicts the big high and the lesser lows—or what the more pragmatic among us might call actual life. And it is this gray middle ground between compromise and revolution that provides Forever Changes its appeal. If it’s hot or you’re hungry or you have the rest of your life to sort out, then a concert or a hit record or the sudden insight to see through the charade may not be enough to get you safely to the other side. “All you need is love / love is all you need.” Okay. “The news today will be the movies for tomorrow”? Ouch.

Stop and think about that, from Love’s “A House Is Not a Motel.” That could well be the most succinct—not to mention prophetic—articulation of the so-called counterculture, circa 1967. Youth protest at Vietnam any made-for-TV melodrama or sentimental movie soundtrack sprung from the money-making minds of Madison Avenue. It’s pretty safe to conclude that the times aren’t a changin’. “And for everyone who thinks that life is just a game: / Do you like the part you’re playing?” This question, from the optimistically named “You Set the Scene,” is directed at the listener as much as the artist, and Lee’s answers, which end the album, reveal he had no intention of turning his back on the promised land, even as it splintered into a billion bad trips. The full orchestral freak out that concludes the album and ushers it into immortality has a classic literary flourish, bringing full circle the motifs introduced with the innovative trumpet stylings that accompany the opening track, “Alone Again Or”.

“The Red Telephone,” which ends side one, is the album’s centerpiece; its brooding, apocalyptic imagery captures that three-month moment of 1967, while remaining possibly more applicable to the here and now: “They’re locking them up today; they’re throwing away the key, / I wonder who it’ll be tomorrow, you or me?” Those creepy chanted lines were prophetic, not only when you consider that Lee, who lived to be neither wealthy nor white, ended up imprisoned in the mid 1990s as a result of his own recklessness as well as California’s controversial third-strike laws. The lyrics anticipate the aftermath awaiting Timothy Leary’s disciples, those that ingested and distributed the chemical vehicles to Valhalla, who would end up pulling harder time than our white-collar charlatans face for fleecing employees and the country out of millions of dollars. The lines are also a commentary on Americans acting un-American, looking back to the internments of Japanese citizens and forecasting the so-called enemy combatants rotting behind bars without formal charges or legal counsel. I read the news today, oh boy. As Lee sings in the same song, “Sometimes I deal with numbers, / And if you want to count me: Count me out.”

If Arthur Lee had been savvy enough to pull the businesslike burn out or the fortuitous fade away or—cleverest career move of all—die in some spectacular fashion in, say, early ‘68, it would be safe to bet that Forever Changes could have become a central part of the collective consciousness. That is the only rite of passage we ask of our best artists: Die so we can wake up and get around to appreciating what you accomplished. It’s what we talk about when we talk about the lack of love and the fact that forever never changes. Hopefully, Arthur and his very American dream now have that chance, for all the right reasons.

The Easy Star All-Stars, to their credit, do not believe in half-measures. In 2003, they introduced themselves to the world with their reggae reimagining of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon, appropriately rechristened Dub Side of the Moon. The results surpassed even the most open-minded fans’ best expectations. Not content to be a one-and-done novelty act and, no doubt, encouraged by the acclaim their first effort garnered, they returned in 2006. Having already tackled the quintessential ‘70s album, they turned heads, again, when they dropped Radiodread, their version of the near-universally worshipped ‘90s classic OK Computer. Incredibly, this release was even more impressive, expertly finding the ideal balance between respectful homage and brazen departure. Displaying an even greater sense of adventure than they demonstrated on Dub Side, the band went several steps further in reimagining Radiohead’s songs, occasionally even (blasphemy alert!) taking them in directions not attained on the original. It was—and remains—an instant and uncanny archetype, in part because it manages to sound so strikingly different while always feeling oddly familiar.

How could they possibly follow this up? Obviously by setting their sights on the most discussed, dissected, and influential album of all time. Simply stated, the chutzpah factor is officially off the charts with the release of Easy Star’s Lonely Hearts Dub Band. The band is now three-for-three in the sense that, before listening to a single note, they deserve substantial credit for even going there. It is, therefore, more than a little disappointing to report that they have saved their sophomore slump for the third album. ESLHDB is not a failure so much as a mediocrity; it’s less a failure of execution than a failure of imagination. How, it seems fair to ask after their previous, almost impeccable track record, could this possibly be? Perhaps they (finally?) bit off more than they could collectively chew, or maybe they have run out of creative steam (temporarily?) this time out. The results would seem to suggest that the band was ultimately reluctant to tinker too much with an album that is so important to so many people. Of course, this timidity tends to obviate the refreshing audacity that made their previous efforts so rewarding.

Obviously, there is a subjective line separating inspiration from appropriation, and while the Easy Star All-Stars need not worry about clueless critics impugning their integrity, this one still feels dialed in. A healthy irreverence is what makes their concept work, and too much of the time, that is what ESLHDB lacks.  Perhaps the clearest, and fairest, way to highlight what is missing here is to consider what worked so wonderfully before. It’s not difficult to recall the ingenious ways they mixed up Dub Side while remaining remarkably true to the letter and spirit of the original. For instance, the coughs and sputtered inhalations alongside the bubbling bong water that replace the cash register at the beginning of “Money”, or the free-form reggae rap substituting for David Gilmour’s immortal (and inimitable) guitar solo in “Time”. Or, later, on Radiodread, the melodica on “Subterranean Homesick Alien” or the brass replacing the guitars on “Paranoid Android”. Then there is the total reworking of “Let Down”, which remains a revelation: not just a left-field, upbeat redirection, but a thorough rethinking, obviously enhanced by Toots Hibbert’s irrepressible vocals. Nothing on ESLHDB is as arresting, or interesting, as the work they did on the first two albums. And that observation is not meant to imply that the random employment of oddball effects or disorienting tactics would necessarily invigorate the results. But by not putting their peculiar imprint on this material they constantly remind the listener of all the ways it fails by comparison with the original.

The opening song sets the tone in a way that is emblematic of the entire album: Junior Jazz sounds fine singing those oh-so familiar words, and the song is a perfectly adequate cover. Therein lies the rub (a dub): that it is merely adequate is at once the best and worst thing that can be said of this effort. The next two songs are pretty much pedestrian reggae remakes: neither offensive nor particularly memorable. Of course, one alternate perspective might propose that there were so many unusual and previously unheard-of sounds on Sgt. Pepper that the more straightforward arrangements represent a kind of ironic alternative. If so, mission accomplished, but that faint praise only underscores the perplexing lack of vision throughout.

Some of the songs are more successful. Max Romeo’s trippy take on “Fixing a Hole” recalls the oddball energy of the previous Easy Star albums: the extended dub outro hits the mark while leaving a mark. “She’s Leaving Home”, featuring Kristy Rock (who did such a stellar rendering of “Paranoid Android”), recalls Radiodread’s “Let Down” in the way it takes a somber song and turns it into a rocksteady romp. This strategy does tend to undermine the original song’s lyrical import, but at least the band is stretching out a bit. It seems a shame that Lee “Scratch” Perry was not spirited into the studio to tackle “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite”—a song that screams out for his outlandish skills (indeed, he was spearheading his own primitive studio innovations at and around the same time George Martin and the boys began breaking the mold at Abbey Road).

The rest? More of the same, mostly. “Within You Without You” is another unremarkable rendition, although Matisyahu’s lugubrious vocals and subdued human beat-boxing are appropriate for the occasion. It is difficult to quibble with Sugar Minott’s ebullient reading of “When I’m Sixty-Four”, and it’s fair to suspect that some of this material might be conveyed more effectively in a live setting where it has room to breathe. Both “Lovely Rita” (featuring U-Roy) and “Good Morning, Good Morning” (featuring Steel Pulse) would seem to provide ample opportunity for interesting departures, but they are uninspired on arrival. Finally, the moment of truth: what will (can?) they do with “A Day in the Life”?  Nothing special, alas. Certainly, it’s a neat moment when we hear the lines “dragged my fingers through my dreads” (in place of “dragged a comb across my head”) but … we need more.

Ultimately, this seems like an extraordinary opportunity missed. Not wasted, necessarily, but in a way, that’s worse, isn’t it? It’s better to shoot for the (dark side of the) moon and fall short than to play it too safe by half and end up with something second-rate. In the end, no matter how iconic its intentions, this release must be assessed for what it is: an underwhelming set of cover tunes that comes entirely too close to sounding like a novelty act—the very fate this band managed to avoid the first two times out.