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'Are You Feeling Anything Yet?' is the title of the former Blue Cartoon
frontman’s solo album, and you’d have to be six feet under to remain unmoved
by this collection of catchy-as-hell pop rock.
Hooks, melodies and yet more melodies burst out of these songs like rapid
fire from an automatic weapon, beginning with 'She’s Gone', a quite
brilliant song McElhenny wrote for Blue Cartoon that sounds better given the
Buzzie treatment.
Songs like 'Beautiful Beautiful', 'My Little World of Love' and 'I’m Inside
You' are like manna from heaven for fans of Elvis Costello, The Loveless or
other such power pop aficionados. Nearly every song is a bright, exuberant
exponent of how music of this genre should be written, performed and
produced, with tunes like the wonderfully upbeat 'A Place To Go' a
particularly good example. The acoustic, understated 'Angela' slows things
down and 'The Same Thing' proves that often the simplest pop melodies work
the best.
Musically, Buzzie have all the depth of a thin and crispy pizza, but the
band never try to be a Radiohead or Ryan Adams equivalent. Instead, with a
pop songwriter as talented as McElhenny at the helm, they wisely stick to
their strengths and the result is an album of sheer pop bliss.
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