Awesome Color - Awesome Color

Oh brother, I really hoped that Thurston Moore's label was above releasing this kind of button-pushing, generic rock stodge. Apparently I was wrong. Awesome Color are a three-piece that clearly own too many records by Black Sabbath, the Stooges and MC5. Tracks lumber along with little or no purpose, propelled by pedestrian drumming and embellished by the kind of by-the-book guitar pyrotechnics that just make you want to weep at the averageness of it all. These people have no ambition, no inspiration, no ideas - in short there is no reason for this record to have been made. Frontman 'Awesome Derek' does a passable Iggy impression, but really, who gives a shit? The occasional bid for quirkiness is made during tracks like Hat Energy, but there's no masking the fundamental and overwhelming blandness of this record. [Jay Shukla]