The Wichita Eagle from Wichita, Kansas • 49

KANSASCOM SUNDAY NOVEMBER 4 2001 THE WICHITA EAGLE 3E REVIEWS IN BRIEF Backstreet Boys "The Hits Chapter EXCELLENT GOOD FAIR POOR BOSH kkftfjivt The Backstreet Boys have released their Jim greatest hits set-does anyone else find it funny that these guys think going to have enough hits for a second greatest hits set? Admittedly the Boys have several good songs to their name including BadO" "I Want It That "As Long Ai You Love Me" Playing Games" of My Heart" and Than That" But in the past artists had to choose from dozens of hit singles for this type of compilation Now as long as they have at least 12 hits they get to reach this career milestone State" (Atlantic) Bush has always seemed like die shy kid on die bkick trying to be cooL The kid who wears all the cool dothes listens to the cool music and says all the cool things Problem is that kid never really seemed to have his own identity He was a and so was Bush The band arrived near the end of the gnrnge craze Boosted by fixxitman Gavin pretty boy empty gaze Bush came off as a prepackaged Kte" The band's debut was hardly stellar and critics liked it about as much as a grade-school girl likes cooties Nevertheless Bush hung in there through several successful albums and radio friendly singles With State" the fourth release Bush emerges as that cool little kid grown up a bit He still wears all die same cool clothes but been beaten up a few times He's a little rougher around the edges and he's better for it throaty vocals are still running the show here while he moans and groans about love beauty and all that emotional am Mostly though it's tame stuff Only on a few songs as on the single "The People Thai We Love" does Bush crank up the energy too bad the band didn't explore more of its darker side The last few tracks are sullen remorseful stuff and when Rossdale gets to his brooding best Still Bush comes off better when it doesn't worry what the other kids think State" is a step in that direction but not a leap Rod Pocowalchlt Jessica Marshal HIP-HOP DMX Great (Def Jam) The grunting and growling DMX rap fens know and love returns with a fourth currently the No 1 album in the country according to but this time the New York native has switched his style sHghdy With a little more groove a little more swing and a little more insight this disc will either get your party started (TrinaMoe" and "When Tm Nothing" featuring Stephanie Mills) or get you thinking about life Minute For Your Son" Miss You" featuring Faith Evans) While Right Here" and "Number 11" are soon-to-be DMX classics the guitar-laced "Who We Anthem" and Tm A Bang" show another side to Vt skills show that to Mellencamp diversity always mean race relations On his previous albums some of Mellencamp's best songs were cowritten by George Great one of his childhood friends Green didn't have a hand in but die work doesn't suffer from his absence The music is strong and the lyrics show a deft touch Mellencamp may be as he sings on one track "a middle-aged teenager" but that mixture of confused complacency and ire is what keeps him relevant W- wMKnMI NMHIIHn JOHN MELlEHCflMP Heads" kkk ft (Columbia) From authority figures when he was John Cougar to the plight of formers on to dissolving relationships on his eponymous last album John Mellencamp is at his best when angry about something On Heads" Mellencamp focuses on racial tensions and the uneven ground of middle age disparate themes but Mellencamp pulls them together in one of his strongest works in years The first track bolstered by a guest mm from Public Chuck rails against the popularization of racial epithets in marketing The second a duet with India Aire is about the importance of actions over words It also takes aim at the easy target of overly sensitive political cocTectness Mellencamp's duet with Trisha Yearwood signals a turn down the album's second less preachy path a road littered witfi the stylistic remnants of his previous albums The steel-guitar country of the roots rock of "Just Like You" the blues of Same Way I Do" and the calypso touches on ENRIQUE IGLESIAS NEW ORDER SLOAN -Jessica Marshal Bubba Sparxxx Days Bright (Interscoptf ForgaDiity South New South latest category Behind the scenes is producer Tlmbaland and rite man spitting me rhymes is Bubba Sparxxx a 24-year-old ex-football player from rural Georgia Apparently the plight is to rival the success of Dr Due and Eminem which is a goal they won't reach Sure Bubba! got impresavemic skills and Tim can mix a funky beat but that won't be enough to match controversial schemes "Dark Days" which hit No 3 on 200 Album chart has many strong points (namely "Bubba Talk" the Same" and but the first single easily the best song here Marshal (Interscope) Ready" kirk (Reprise) Together" (Murder Records) Enrique Iglesias takes hold of the reigns on his sophomore English language album producing and co-writing every track But one reallybig mistake he he sings on this album The 26-year-old son of the original Latin heartthrob Julio Iglesias has one thing going for him and his he gives us this good looks Unfortunately! Power pop has long been the hard rocking outlet for the sensitive male It takes feelings of longing hurt and rejection and wraps them up in aggressively crunchy power chords and sing-alang melodies Such is the stuffby Sloan On though the group turns in a weak unexciting collection of songs for its sixth album In a way "Pretty Together" is DflPJf an extension of the 1998 release Escape" which which St" even die overall quality of his 1999 debut album that spawned such hits as TBe With You" and Divine" The fust single with an accompanying music video that features Jennifer Love Hewitt is a beautiful and romantic tearjerker but it stand up to how bland and vacuous the rest of die album is Blues" which mined chunky 70s power pop On though Sloan ventures into the self-referential glam rock of bands like KISS The album opens with the tongue-in-cheek arena rock line On Ready" New Order's first album since 1993 the band returns to its early days of moody electronic-based dance songs new though is a pouty confidence a less-glossy production that allows actual feelings into the songs The music is still crafted over a slick wall of sound that quivers and pulsates like a disco dance floor constant DflMf with a guitar drenched over it or a pulsating synth Bek driven by a scatter-brained bass line While such playfulness can easily be regarded as ear candy New Order keeps thingsbrisk and sure-footed Is that experience we smell draped over the beat? Take the first single "Primitive Notion" Singer Bernard Sumner used to seem bored even But now his passive vocals add a calm coolness to the grind covering what is pretty dark stuff at its core New Order even calls in the prince of pout Billy Corgan for guest vocals on Turn My And there's a tender melancholy ballad "Run Wild" Laden with acoustic guitar and strings the song doses the album gently and humbly And refreshing for a pop dance album COUNTRY Gary Allan mH (MCA Nashville) Gary Allan has the voice and good taste to pull off Just about any kind of country He hanky toiiks on The DeviTs Candy" ad mitting to vices and to losing an when a bad girl was He croons the smoky "Adobe where easy to imagine him leaning into the microphone caressing and confessing He rocks pedal guitar style with grit on "Man of Me" He smarts offj with Todd Snider's decidedly uncountry title cut One of the best is "What Would Willie Itis a statement of purpose holding Willie Nelson up as someone stuck to hb guns Allan wrote only one song here but he makes all he touches his own This song is dedicated to you because this song is for people who know what rock and roll is Perhaps die "rock and roll is here to stayl" dam theme is a response to the current triumph of staid pop music in the mainstream The 198(VEuropean vibe of the title track and Night as well as the Ladndisco tune to See You Cry" may make sparks in hometown of Madrid Spain But in America if not a rapper or in a boy band good luck finding main But toward the end of the album synthesizers start creeping in and "PrettyTogether" gels drastically mel-lowa almost as if Sloan gave up on rock The 13-song disc represents an entire cyde of changing mainstream tastes a neat trick if rally Sloan had compelling songs to back that up stream success Iglesias1 teasing and purring vocal arrangements easily become irritating And they help you forget that you're listening to an album foil of thin filler songs' Briin IMhspfhy blgy- Mfhdl Rod PocoNMtchR Jarry Abaio Hewill do anything Romantic And DeuchtfulI to protect his family qiajiy 'UOMifir t3 jgSrssiBsSw 6b wwdomeetlodlaturbwiceTco MttWtt) 9:1511:15 FrSa ClWCOOjOOOJS Mowthwock wovtt rrww PREMIERE PALACE Northrock 14 tDHNZrmVASHINClTON IVES RHOTJVlREa PERFORMAN ShrlclH IMhVvUlil' -HitPanalaman OIBITfoL Horae ii mu iiMi Sitifu iiir MISS IS ONE! 5th WEEK MOOnH IMO-KMaS-TflUSO Northrock Training Day 14 S3S iilivmrMirftf TIB IT At SHIM JUiiJs MNow Snowing! 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