Add it Up

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Published: Sep 16, 2009

At 19, Gordon Gano was the baby of the band and full of legitimate teen angst when the first Violent Femmes record came out in 1983. By the time it went platinum, he was in his late 20s and still fueled by frustration. Though drummer Victor DeLorenzo took a break for most of the '90s and the trio hadn't made a studio album since 2000, they might've kept touring indefinitely on the strength of their early work. And then bassist Brian Ritchie sued Gano in 2007, forcing the frontman to get a new gig.

Under the Sun (Yep Roc), the singer-guitarist's first collaboration with ex-Bogmen Bill and Brendan Ryan, displays some of the qualities that endeared Femmes fans and annoyed so many others. "Better than You Know" indulges Gano's nervous whine, often kept in check elsewhere on the album; the rollicking "Way That I Creep" and the Biblical taunt "Oholah Oholibah" share the twisted preoccupations we've come to expect from Gano, a terminally conflicted preacher's kid. Whether you're on board with his high-strung delivery or wish he'd tone it down, the clear highlights are "Wave and Water," a taut slice of funk, and the related "Judge to Widow," which lets Bill Ryan cast a spell with his guitar before spinning off into a spoken-word reprise. And if you're a patient sort, the title track grows compelling after four maudlin minutes.

How's this for patience? Violent Femmes took a decade to go platinum without cracking the Billboard 200. It's hard to fathom the mass indifference that greeted songs like "Add It Up" and "Kiss Off," which would become pop-culture staples. By synthesizing Jonathan Richman's naivety and Lou Reed's jadedness, Gano comes off as a true original, while the mostly acoustic arrangements set the band apart from its contemporaries. Notably, Ritchie's exuberant xylophone work transforms "Gone Daddy Gone" from novelty to treasure. In context, even "Blister in the Sun," which enjoyed modest success at the time and later became inescapable, feels like a fresh introduction to Milwaukee's finest. The disc's remaining two-thirds may be a dull mess, but these four songs deserve all the love they've gotten.

(m_fine@citypaper.net)

Test of Time
Fabolous
Gildon Works
Seth Meicht and the Big Sound Ensemble
John Forte
Rhett Miller
Mos Def/Talib Kweli