Released: 1995
Tracks: Used Car Blue; Mexico; Free Yourself; Magnetized; (Interlude); Don’t Really Mind; No Rainy Day; Steam Train; Ride With Me; (Appendix)
Best track: No Rainy Day
Track to skip: if you have to, skip Free Yourself
Mmmm, groovalicious. The trick to listening to this one is to not compare it to the live versions of these songs. If you do that, this album would get a 45 or something since Citizen Lane’s live shows are AMAZING. This CD is average compared to a live show. And honestly, when I hear these songs it’s way hard to not have the live versions running through my head. The CD is just so…restrained.
There are some nice grooves on here and the songs are great. Well, as for a definition of the sound of the group, I’d go for “groovy-poppy-jazzy-doublegroovy”. All 5 are great players and they each had such distinctive characteristics when playing live. CL was one of the best live bands I saw while living in Austin.
Citizen Lane is the brainchild of Lane Eubank, a talented guy who not only writes all (most?) the material, he also plays some guitar, trombone and sings. After dropping out of the music school at Univ. of North Texas (he went back in a few years and finished), he moved to Austin and started playing on the street. Lotsa people liked his songs, so he decided to get some of the best jazz and groove musicians in town for his group. He did. Soon they were playing gigs and destroying every audient in the room, including yours truly. After toiling around Austin for a few years, Lane relocated to Dallas, finished school and formed a new lineup with UNT jazz and groove guys. I think now they’ve moved up to Portland.
Anyway, nuff of the history, you want to know if you should buy this CD. Yeah, you should. Just keep in mind that the live shows blow this thing out of the water. And that is exactly why it’s hard, actually impossible, to review this CD without comparing it to a live show. Impossible. Like I said, the songs are mostly really good, and the playing is really good, it’s just the studio atmosphere isn’t the most comfortable place for the group (they fix that little problem by the 3rd album).
I’m not that big of a fan of the studio versions of Free Yourself or Steam Train, but the live versions of both are (of course) jaw dropping. During Steam Train the band would go into a fun and grooving version of Ozzy’s Crazy Train. Great stuff. It’s hard to choose the ‘best’ track on here, since most of the tracks are great songs. I’d go with No Rainy Day, it’s just got that something. Actually, it grooves like a mother and has a great chorus.
The two unnamed tracks, Interlude and Appendix are just short versions of Used Car Blue. The former is a trad jazz version and the latter a punk version. Interesting stuff, but they don’t add much and make this only an 8 song CD. They probably couldn’t afford more, so I can totally understand that. Anyway, if you can find this lurking around some Texas CD stores pick it up. Otherwise get from the band at a live show or from their website.
Rating: 81 (live versions of the songs would make this 14 pts. higher)
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