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Squirrel Nut Zippers Reviews | |
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Hot:
When their 1995 debut The Inevitable Squirrel Nut Zippers received an somewhat apathetic reception from radio programmers, the Chapel Hill sextet (since bolstered to a seven-piece) reconvened in New Orleans, the hot jazz Holy Land they'd seen in photos but never visited. To coax the ghosts of Crescent City out of the moldy woodwork, the band held a seance at the studio of producer Daniel Lanois, where over 10 days they recorded Hot, their second album and one of 1997's unlikeliest commercial breakthroughs.
Jazz hadn't sounded this unschooled and this much fun--and this punk rock--since the kids at the orphanage brought the house down. And couldn't those modern rock ne'er-do-wells could use a solid jolt of this kind of soulfully non-ironic music-for-music's-sake? Sure, the Zips' mid-tempo jazz moments drag a bit, but vocalist Katharine Whalen's imitation of Billie Holiday after drinking a glass of milk (not an insult) is easily endured to dig into Hot's new bag of tricks. There we'll find the old time calypso of "Hell" and a swing instrumental, "Memphis Exorcism." And lest we forget, there's some Charleston, lots of Dixieland, and a dose of that old Cab Calloway strut left over from last time. It's a gimmick alright, but can you remember one so happily thrust upon us?
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The Envitable:
Maybe the founding members of Squirrel Nut Zippers (Jim Mathus and Katharine Whalen) were predicting the giant sucking-sound that would follow grunge when they decided to toss away their rock bands, move from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to a small town nearby, and pick up banjos and trumpets in 1993. Whatever it was that motivated the pair--plus the other quartet of guys who became the Zippers--to shun the pervasive crunchy power-pop-punk sound of Chapel Hill, it's worked out well for them; since the 1995 release of the band's debut, The Inevitable, kids all over the country have been pogo-ing to swing music. While The Inevitable isn't charting super-fresh musical territory, the Zippers' vivacious take on the Big Band sound of the 1920s and '30s has the nutty appeal of a vintage dress worn with Doc Martens. Reviews Copyright Amazon.com
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