Word: tear
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Floyd Lloyd, a Jamaican singer working with several different bands, has tried to create just that: ska for the subdued. This is an interesting proposition, but one which, unfortunately, requires more talent to be implemented successfully than the singer/writer is able to demonstrate. His new CD, Tear It Up: The Ska Album, consists of a collection of tunes that, for the most part, try to be to ska what soft rock is to rock and roll. But while the album offers a few songs with fair instrumentals, the CD does not succeed, lapsing into tedious and uninteresting music backing repetitive...
Only two of the songs on the album, "Big City" and "Tear it Up," come close to expressing the energy characteristic of ska. Though somewhat subdued by comparison to the work of other bands, the tunes have, at least, enough of a bouncy quality to make them passably diverting in spite of their incredibly repetitive lyrics. Take these two songs, reduce their lengths by a third, add some meaningful lyrics, and "Big City" and "Tear it Up" will be lively enough to be worth listening to. But then, the songs will also be closer to the mainstream of ska than...
...though "Big City" and "Tear it Up" approach pass ability, it would be inaccurate to say that Floyd Lloyd's strength lies in "traditional" ska. The album's two other attempts at this more lively variety of music, "Ska Party" and "Mr. Yo Yo," are incredibly tired, depressingly sucking the bounce out of a bouncy kind of song. The music drags and the lyrics are unimpressive. "Ska Party," for example, uses such convincing arguments as "You're on the guest list;/ You won't have to pay," to persuade listeners to "come to the party tonight." Very uninspiring...
...happily reject oceanic representation for unadorned raucousness and personal sentiment. "The Blarney Stone" is an Irish pub romp of sex and drunken chicanery ("Who's that girl, that pretty young thing/After I fuck her she'll get up and sing/Sharpen your boot, bludgeon your eye/The Blarney Stone brings a tear to me eye") that sticks out like a sore thumb. Tapping into a similar stylistic tradition, "Waving My Dick In The Wind" hastily ponders loneliness in a humorous jaunt...
...first the sheriff's deputies lobbed a tear-gas canister into the house. But Allen was prepared. The former nurse had apparently covered herself with petroleum jelly and a wet towel to prevent the skin irritation that comes with the gas. Then they tried to stun Allen by firing some beanbag-like projectiles at her, but she was ready for that too, having armored herself in several layers of clothing. The gathering crowd of militiamen stand in awe and see her expertise as proof of a survivalist sensibility. Says Glad Hall, president of the Southern Illinois Patriots League...