Free Energy: Love Sign (review)

Free Energy: Love Sign (Free People, 2013)

If there was a band that was destined for a hipster backlash, Free Energy would be that band.  Their 2010 debut Stuck on Nothing was pretty widely critically acclaimed and had the kind of back story that sent the hipster music press all a-Twitter: former members of Minnesota indie band Hockey Night uproot to Philly, go all classic-rock, hook up with James Murphy, and release a Murphy-produced record on DFA.  You could have fed this story to certain parts of the blogosphere with a spoon.  Fast forward three years: the band is no longer on DFA (self-releasing the album on their own nascent label, Free People) and Murphy isn’t along for the ride.  And, needless to say, there’s been some backlash.  In a particularly brutal review, Pitchfork critic Ian Cohen notes the songs are “big, dumb, and nothing else” while giving the record a low mark of 3.6.  (The debut scored much higher, an 8.1, reviewed by David Bevan)

Here’s the thing: there’s not a marked difference between the style and content of the two records.  Big, dumb hooks abound, and the influence of pop-leaning 70’s and 80’s rock (Cheap Trick, The Cars and Thin Lizzy particularly) looms over the whole shebang.  Cohen wonders whether any band should aspire to be the new Cheap Trick, given the current state of the music industry, which seems insane.  Cheap Trick made some HUGE records and made a shit-ton of money for Epic Records, but apparently that’s not what record labels are after.  Or something. To each their own, of course, and if Cohen finds the hooks to be empty calories, and lusts for something more filling, that’s fair.  But it seems like Free Energy is getting hammered for making a record that sounds a LOT like the lauded debut, and the hipster crowd is realizing that the beloved mastermind of all things cool, James Murphy, didn’t really add much to their party rock.  I say this, by the way, as fan of LCD Soundsystem.  Murphy makes cool music, but I don’t think his influence is even notably present on Stuck on Nothing. 

So, what’s present on Love Sign?  To borrow a joke from SNL: more cowbell!  The first single from the record, “Electric Fever(which snuck out in early 2011, long before the record), is a rock-party raver, with boatloads of cowbell to satiate that fever you have for, well, more cowbell.  There are some slower tracks, as well, but this a record full of big riffs, danceable rock rhythms, and lyrics about dancing, partying, and electric fevers.  Electric fever, by the way, is apparently a positive thing, in the same way as rockin’ pneumonia and the boogie woogie flu.  The production is handled by the band and rock veteran John Agnello, who has produced folks like Kurt Vile, Dinosaur Jr, and Sonic Youth, but made his name in the 80’s with populist rockers The Hooters and the Outfield (he produced the #2 smash “Your Love”) and, most recently with The Hold Steady, another transplanted bunch of Minnesotans with a classic rock jones.  And it's a perfect fit: clear, loud, punchy.  Modern, but retro. 

In the end, this is a fun record.  It’s something to enjoy while you’re at the gym, or hanging with some friends and beers, or cleaning the kitchen, or whatever.  It’s not full of the kind of insights you’d glean from some rock Poet Laureate.  It’s not full of the weight-of-the-world angst you’d get from The National or Arcade Fire.  There’s no song on the record that laments how the younger generation is cooler than you.  It’s not even full of the existential life affirmations that you’d get from its closest musical analogue, last year’s monster Celebration Rock by Japandroids (my fave of 2012).  It’s just a record about rocking, and drinking, and having fun, and while those records aren’t uncommon, when they’re done well, it’s just nice to have them.  It’s nice to know that somebody, somewhere is slamming back a Jack and Coke and air-guitaring, even if the cool kids are sitting in the corner, pouting because Daft Punk isn’t playing at their house.