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Tasty sour-mash rock

Glossary - For What I Don't Become
(Undertow Music)
3 1/2 stars (out of 5 stars)
Reviewed: Aug. 15, 2006
Glossary

Review by Tony Bonyata

On Glossary's fourth full-length effort, For What I Don't Become, the Murfreesboro, TN sextet delivers a pleasing platter of Southern-fried indie-rock that is at times joyous and hopeful, bittersweet and melancholy at others, and almost always filled with a raucous, rebellious spirit.

The band wastes little time setting the tone of the album, as they kick up a dust storm with the opening double whammy of the rollicking "Shaking Like a Flame" and "Poor Boy," where singer/guitarist Joey Kneiser's drawl (which occasionally hearkens back to Dinosaur Jr's J. Mascis) coolly hangs over these spirited guitar driven rockers. The reckless, ramshackled abandon continues through the punchy "Devil's In The Details" and "Days Go By," complete with a delicious guitar line that's punctuated by a driving rhythm section.

Pulling in the reigns a bit on the graceful southern rock balladry of "Headstones and Dead Leave" and "Breathe Life Into Me," (the latter which eventually swells into an epic and euphoric conclusion), as well as the gorgeous melodies of "Time Rolling" and "The Reckless," the band channels the more introspective sides of both The Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd. And unlike The Black Crowes' direct aping of The Rolling Stones, Glossary distills only the sour-mash from The Stones on a couple of other numbers. Without catering to any current agenda in Southern rock, their marriage of Americana roots music, pop hooks that stick to the roof of your mouth and unabashed admiration for southern '70s rock ultimately yields a more timeless effort.

You can call it Southern indie, Americana power-pop, alt-country or roots rock. I call it a winner.

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