Audio By Carbonatix
FlickerstickWelcoming Home the Astronauts
(226 Records)Change, stay the same, sell out: With these three easy steps, you too can become a modern-rock phenom like Matchbox 20…er, Twenty. And Flickerstick’s debut, Welcoming Home the Astronauts, seems to illustrate that the band is willing to give this formula a shot. With the exception of its high points, the album usually sticks to the universally palatable instead of the creatively unique.
Musically, the album seems to have a lot of promise. Some of the best work on the record (“You’re So Hollywood” and “Got a Feeling,” for instance) comes from the songs where the band plugs in and rocks out, period. For the most part, however, the songs drag on forever, simply repeating the same thing until someone gets tired of it. Sure, this tactic can be extremely successful if done in an interesting way–we all love every second of “Hey Jude,” right?–but Flickerstick seems to lack the finesse to pull it off. And while there’s nothing wrong with a friendly looping riff, these should be reserved for pop songs and not so much for four- to six-minute ballads.
It’s the album’s lyrics, though, that really leave a sour taste in the listener’s mouth. With gimmicky formulas, like songs about the irony of media culture (see: “Talk Show Host,” “Coke” and “You’re So Hollywood”), the group hits each and every modern-rock standby that they can think of. Also, Flickerstick comes off as a bit confused, with lines like “I’ll never hear myself just quite the same again,” and “It will never be the same for me again,” followed by “It’s all the same.” (Dude, make up your mind.) And with words like, “Cause you’re so beautiful, beautiful today/You’re so beautiful, beautiful in every little way,” you have to be doing some spectacular work musically, which Flickerstick simply does not do.
At times, however, Welcoming Home the Astronauts does show signs of talent and authenticity, and perhaps Flickerstick has accidently missed the mark on this one album. But, if all they want is to be famous, they might be well on their way. In the sad state of popular rock and roll, record companies are churning out cheap formulaic music like crazy. In other words, a band that sounds like a few other bands stuffed in a blender and poured into a new glass has the best chance of making it onto MTV’s Total Request Live. If that’s Flickerstick’s main objective, then more power to them. Just don’t include lyrics like “Don’t sell out, don’t sell out, don’t sell out” in the deal, OK?
