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Cobra Starship’s payload gets overheated

“HOT MESS,” Cobra Starship (Decaydence/Fueled By Ramen)

Cobra Starship takes much of what has been over-the-top about rock, dance, pop and urban music in the past decade or so and bashes it into one overstimulated, but catchy, package.

That works for the occasional single — such as the song “Bring It (Snakes on a Plane)” featured at the end of the 2006 movie “Snakes on a Plane” — but in a long succession of songs, it becomes a shock to the system. And that’s the only major drawback of Cobra Starship’s “Hot Mess”: It’s just too much of a mess.

Gabe Saporta is the act’s demonstrative frontman/founder, shouting more than singing his way through every song. Sirens and videogame effects push around the singer and the aggressive chants of opener “Nice Guys Finish Last,” which sounds like what could be an Adam Ant/Black Eyed Peas mashup. Then on the subsequent “Pete Wentz Is the Only Reason We’re Famous,” the act polishes and saddles a runaway modern pop/punk ethos to deliver telling lines such as, “I’m not street, but I do what I gotta do.”

The insanely infectious collection finds Saporta yipping against the bracing electro-jabs and alt-rock thrash of “You’re Not in on the Joke,” singing with exclamation-point exuberance on the twisting/pounding “Living in the Sky With Diamonds” and burrowing into the menacing dance chaos of the title track. Meanwhile, “Gossip Girl’s” Leighton Meester helps Cobra Starship raise a racket on “Good Girls Go Bad,” which is something like an atomic version of an explosive Backstreet Boys song.

Fun as it is in limited blasts, the exhausting aggregate of “Hot Mess” feels that a nuclear meltdown.

Rating (five possible): 3-1/2

‘Horse Meat’ offers taste of real disco

“HORSE MEAT DISCO,” Horse Meat Disco (Strut)

Modern music that wears the “disco” label is generally more sterile, harder edged and faster than the stuff from the ’70s and ’80s. What’s more, the most beloved disco hits from back then — those oft-played songs by the likes of Donna Summer, the Bee Gees, Chic, Village People, etc. — tended to be shinier and more hook-oriented than the rank-and-file disco of the time.

“Horse Meat Disco,” a compilation by DJs James Hillard and Jim Stanton, resurrects some of those forgotten blue-collar songs, and the result is a dirty sound — so dirty you can almost smell the cigarettes, spilled booze and various human-generated aromas. The air feels dank, built on the humidity of collective sweat, and as dark and blurry as a liquor-and-cocaine bender.

If that doesn’t sound pretty, it isn’t. But “Horse Meat Disco” is real and reflective of the redundant, jam nature of true disco.

Organic flurries of percussion, funky guitar riffs and the periodic (though not omnipresent) caterwauling of female singers drive the compilation, sometimes slowly and sometimes just spinning its wheels as songs get stuck in the muck of repetition.

Nevertheless, there are several memorable tracks on this overlong collection of overlong songs. Karen Young’s unhurried “Deetour (Party Mix)” charms with her confident, high-soul strut, Fern Kinney’s “Love Me Tonight” is an offbeat seduction steeped in the most genuine-feeling emotions in the collection, and K.I.D.’s twisting “Hupendi Muziki Wangu (You Don’t Like My Music)” is a glossy break from the general grime of “Horse Meat Disco.”

Other tracks undermine themselves or implode — some are ill-formed, some are too cheesy, and some are simply joyless.

This compilation may capture the atmosphere of disco’s prime, but there’s a good reason these songs weren’t the hits from the era.

Rating: 3

Ali Hoffman’s experiments yield a mixed bag

“THIS SIDE OF MORNING,” Ali Hoffman (Wing Court)

Unlike such U.K. retro-singers as Duffy and Amy Winehouse, American Ali Hoffman feels more like an incidental throwback than a contrived one.

On her debut “This Side of Morning,” the Philadelphia native sounds honest as she brings to mind Janis Joplin. And flawed, which is alternately endearing and tedious. Also, she and producer Joe Rosenthal make a tenacious effort to show diversity and innovation in the arrangements, which is alternately refreshing and frustrating.

At least kudos go to Rosenthal for resisting the temptation of neatly boxing up the singer into a pre-fab package.

After titillating listeners with the modest, bluesy saunter of opener “Roses” and following up with a humble slice of weary soul on “Fantastic,” Hoffman goes on an unexpected and sometimes ill-advised hopscotch through genres.

She’s a tantalizing, weathered-sounding foil to the Latin-feeling flow of “Days Go By,” and in a gamble that pays off, the imperfections in her delivery are actually emphasized to good effect on the bit-too-languid “Go On.” Hoffman also insinuates herself into the natural country swing of “When You Left Me” and makes a striking transition from the subtle, springy jazz of “Two Are Loose” to the husky depth of “You’ll Lose a Good Thing.”

Yet “This Side of Morning” makes costly mistakes. The addled construction of “I’ll Be Around,” with its clunky cadence and clumsy phrasing, is simply unlistenable, and despite the unusual execution of “Impressed,” Hoffman’s excessive repetition of refrains and overall tone unfortunately make her seem as if she’s mentally ill. And when she unsuccessfully strains to fit into the shimmering fluidity of “The Suffering Chain,” a song that’s entirely wrong for the singer, it’s hard to figure what Hoffman’s trying to prove, which muddies her overall mission.

Rating: 3-1/2

© 2009, Knoxville News Sentinel
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