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Album Review

Alex Gomez – “Love, Sex & Drugs”

To get an idea of Alex Gomez’s sound, imagine listening to a country band that’ve taken several tabs of something potent, performing through a heavily muffling wall. There’s something inherently dirty about Gomez’ strained, heavily-accented vocals, which he performs at an ill-defined pitch over the top of guitars that sound like…

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To get an idea of Alex Gomez’s sound, imagine listening to a country band that’ve taken several tabs of something potent, performing through a heavily muffling wall. There’s something inherently dirty about Gomez’ strained, heavily-accented vocals, which he performs at an ill-defined pitch over the top of guitars that sound like they’re reproduced through a 1950s synthesizer, making for a highly distinctive, love it or hate it record.

Gomez clearly goes heavy on the underhand stuff: the album title is arranged so that the letters LSD stand out clearly, while the others are disguised by a picture of a man smoking a distinctly dubious looking cigarette. Second track “Boogaloo” is so full of mumbling, indistinct rubbish that it’s difficult to see how Gomez could possibly have written it sober, and the tendency to shift his vocals up a few bars sporadically is not the music of a clear-headed man. In fact, you probably know a guy in your hometown who sounds a lot like this – you’ll find him busking at the side of a street somewhere. The difference? Gomez is more entertaining, and, of course, produced far more professionally, but you’d arguably still avoid throwing a penny in his hat and try and find somewhere better to stand.

If you wanted to sum up the genre, you’d probably go for something like ‘country-influenced gypsy punk’, not forgetting to mention the fact that the perpetrator sounds like he’s finished his first bottle of whiskey, and has a (deliberate?) old-world recording style that takes any sharpness from the music. There must be some love for this record somewhere, but it’s genuinely hard to think of where it might come from; it’s strange, confused and utterly devoid of highlights. Mercifully, it’s also one of the shortest album’s you’re ever likely to own.  [ END ]

Track Listing:

01. Fuck Around
02. Boogaloo
03. Here For The Drugs
04. What Don’t Kill You
05. Low Self-Esteem
06. Best Friend
07. Naked & Dirty
08. Feel Me There
09. Love Can’t Kill
10. Anytime

Run Time: 26:22
Release Date: 04.09.2009

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