Clarion-Ledger du lieu suivant : Jackson, Mississippi • Page 63

Thursday, October 3, 1991 The Clarion-Ledger 15E New discs show Guns has talent to last long haul RECORDS In brief By Jeff Edwards Special to The Clarion-Ledger I RECORD REVIEW dangerous edge. (The song was written as the theme to a James Bond film.) The other cover, Bob Dylan's Knockin On Heaven's Door, doesn't work quite as well, due to Axl's vocal gymnastics. The group really stretches it out and strays into unfamiliar territory with You Ain 't the First and My World II). The former is a strange little ditty with a country tinge, because of the use of a slide dobro and acoustic guitar. My World, a weird but intriguing rap song, wraps up And while II gets Civil War, it also contains the worst song of the lot.

Axl's nine-minute, inconsistent Estranged is an exercise in patience. If the language and sexual themes (try Pretty Tied Up don't stir up enough controversy, Get in the Ring should do the trick. The brash, vulgar rocker takes on "all those opposed" to Guns N' Roses, especially the "punks in the press." Several, like Spin's Bob Guccione are ripped by name. The song ends with a dedication to the fans. Those fans have lined up for the long-awaited Use Your Illusion I and II.

Fortunately, Guns N' Roses finally delivered two high-quality, highly explosive products. Now, if these guys can stay alive, sober or out of jail, maybe we won't have to wait four years for the next great album (or two). From staff and wire reports Bad English, Backlash The members of this demi-super group seem incapable of delivering more than the middling rock-pop of Journey and the Babys. Like their thin debut, Backlash dishes out strident ballads and faceless rockers that fail to cover the band in glory despite Neal Schon's credible guitar and John Waite's wasted tenor. Jethro Tull, Catfish Rising Some may call it retro- or dinosaur rock.

It is, in facta heartening return to the group's early folk and blues-rock form, heavy on flute, mandolins and acoustic guitars. There are shades of classic Tull records like Stand Up, Benefit and Aqualung here and it's as appealing as ever. Stevie Nicks, Timespace: The Best of Stevie Nicks A Guns N' Roses' well-publicized appetite for self-destruction, drugs, booze and controversy can't dim the band's latest accomplishment: an incredible, incendiary 2V4 hours of new music. In an unprecedented move that had hungry fans lining up at record stores, N' released two new CDs Use Your Illusion I and 77 at the same time. But the overall strength and length (each is more than 75 minutes) of the two albums makes it difficult to accuse the group of blatant greed.

In the 30 new tracks, the band mixes up manic metal rockers, moody ballads, a couple of well-chosen covers and enough four-letter words to drive Tipper Gore into a rage. But Guns N' Roses, as proven by the two Illusion albums and 1987's Appetite for Destruction, comes with a difference. Unlike many of their high-decibel peers, GN'R has ample talent to go along with that explosive energy. Axl Rose is a fine vocalist with a broad range (although he sometimes over-sings). Slash can alternate from soaring passion to crunching power with his guitar work.

Axl, Slash and company got their you-know-what together in the studio, finally, to produce albums that stand on equal footing, seems to rock a little harder, thanks to fran- tic numbers like Right Next Door to Hell, Perfect Crime and Garden of Eden. But II is more interesting lyrically. Its opening song, CjVj7 War, is the best from either album. Strother Martin's memorable lines from Cool Hand Luke we've got here is a failure to communicate kick off the thoughtful and moving anti-war song, which basically says that no war is "civil." GN'R loosen things up throughout the two albums with some honky-tonk piano playing, usually by Dizzy Reed. This takes some of the heavy-metal edge off of songs like Bad Obsession (I), which has an almost boogie-woogie, TumMrT Dicequality.

And GN'R can slow it down altogether. Don't Cry (which appears on both and 17, with different lyrics) is a pretty and earnest love song, marked by Slash's wailing guitar. Of special interest are the two cover songs. features a stirring, trashed-up version of Paul McCartney's Live and Let Die. N' R's guitar-based approach to the originally orchestrated song lends an appropriate, 1 1 a i i- Top singles Country singles naii-ueueiit lumpiiaiiuu oi Nicks' numerous solo hits timed for maximum holiday sales.

Her biggies like Stop Draggin My Heart Around, Talk To Me and Edge of Seventeen are all here, padded out with a couple of borderline new tunes that suffer badly by comparison. Motley Crue, Decade ofA Decadence Judging by this hits set, the inexplicably popular hard rockers have no tunes to match their talent. The titles fill in the blanks: Dr. Feelgood, Girls, Girls, Girls. It's all third-rate the drumming, the guitars, the singing.

Public Enemv. Annralvnst' 1 Where Are You Now? Clint Black 2. Leap of Faith Lionel Cartwright 3. Rodeo Garth Brooks 4. Thought It Was You Doug Stone 5.

The Walk Sawyer Brown 6. Mirror Mirror Diamond Rio 7. We Way to Light Up an Old Flame Joe Diff ie 8. Ball and Chain Paul Overstreet 9. Keep It Between the Lines Ricky Van Shelton 10.

Your Love is a Miracle Mark Chesnutt 1. Good Vibrations Marky Mark and The Funky Bunch 2. 1 Adore Mi Amor Color Me Badd 3. Emotions Mariah Carey 4. Do Anything Natural Selection 5.

Love of a Lifetime Firehouse 6. Romantic Karyn White 7. Something to Talk About Bonnie Raitt 8. Motownphilly Boyz II Men 9. Hole Hearted Extreme 10.

Shiny Happy People R.E.M. Source: Billboard Publications.lnc. Rhythm blues singles Top albums '91: The Empire Strikes Black: The "prophets of rage" skewer black radio for not playing enough rap and eviscerate malt liquor companies for targeting hlarks. Shards of sound swirl in 1 Running Back to You Vanessa Williams 2. 1 Adore Mi Amor Color Me Badd 3.

Romantic Karyn White 4. It's So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday Boyz II Men 5. O.P.P. Naughty By Nature 6. Gett Off Prince and the N.P.Q.

7. Emotions Mariah Carey 8. Keep On Loving Me 0' Jays 9. Never Stop The Brand New Heavies 10. Save Me Lisa Fischer 1.

Use Your Illusion II Guns N' Roses 2. Use Your Illusion I Guns N' Roses 3. Ropin' the Wind Garth Brooks 4. Emotions Mariah Carey 5. Metallica Metallica 6.

Unforgettable Natalie Cole 7. No More Tears Ozzy Osbourne 8. The Commitments Various artists 9. Luck oftheDraw Bonnie Raitt 10. C.M.B.

Color Me Badd a dissonant vortex; samples are pummeled into deformity. The result keeps the listener off balance, the best perspective for this topsy-turvy slant on life. Rickie Lee Jones, Pop Pop A sweet little set of Jones-defined standards like I Won't Grow Un (from Peter Pan Carey's singing can't fatten thin tunes on 'Emotions' By Kim Willis Clarion-Ledger Entertainment Editor RECORD REVIEW From the Skies (Jimi Hendrix) and My One and Only Love (Frank Sinatra). The pretty arrangements are acoustic to the degree of being nearly non-existent; regrettably, Jones opts to undersing to match. Harry Connick Blue Light, Red Light The boy singer's hair is fair.

His notes are true and the love he sings of never dies. Neat trick, since Connick was born in 1967. He pulls it off with a voice that sounds more like Frank Sinatra than Frank Jr. on these stylish originals. Roy Rogers and sidekicks, Tribute A tribute that's long overdue.

To the tunes of Tumbling Tumbleweeds and Happy Trails, the lords and ladies of country Clint Black, Randy Travis, Willie Nelson, K.T. Oslin, Emmylou Harris humbly bow and curtsy as they sing with the cowboy king. pel-styled If It's Over, written with King, and the 1950s jazz-blues instrumental The Wind. Carey outfits the tentative torch tune with do-it-herself lyrics about a young man who dies without knowing he's loved. Even the album's most promising songs are undermined by the abysmal production.

You 're So Cold is launched with the impressively belted "Lord only knows why I love you so You're a heartless man," but rapidly disintegrates into dance-floor treacle. There are, of course, those impressive pipes. Carey has world-class proportion and precision, but even these flimsy tunes can't be crushed by the weight of her passion. When called upon to hit a high note, Carey instead emits one of those canine-audible shrieks, inspired by Minnie Riperton, or maybe Minnie Mouse, substituting technical ability for emoting. Hopefully, she'll have something worth screaming about on her next album.

Listeners who grudgingly recognized Grammy golden-girl Mariah Carey as a gifted Whitney Houston mimic are in for a real shock. Because Carey is a virtual diva out of her genre on Emotions, a new collection of overproduced, underwritten and relentlessly dull hankie-wringers and dance tunes. Taking a more active role on this second album, Carey sings, writes, produces and arranges with the able assistance of producers David Cole and Robert Clivilles (of CC Music Factory) and co-writer Carole King. Carey writes her own lyrics (she employs co-writers for the music), which are rendered in the vocabulary of a grade school student. Emotions is peppered with cloying rudi-mentations on love like "you were mine forever, for eternity" and "looking inside you, my world is complete." Multi-syllable words are in slim supply.

When she's writing about a topic with some universal identification as on And You Don't Remember, about a love that's twice-lost because her once-significant other emerged from the relationship without any memories her wordplay is too listless and unevocative to have any emotional impact. The beats are only slightly more impressive. The mix is perfunctory a couple of glossy ballads And You Don't Remember, Till the End of Time an inspirational showcase Make It Happen a few dance tunes To Be Around You, the title track), and some pat examples of "artistic growth." These take the form of the dramatic, gos.