Taylor Momsen's Band - The Pretty Reckless

by **Venice** » Tue Aug 16, 2011 2:33 pm

Listen, I only know who the heck this is because I follow a trash celebrity site called The Superficial. Fairly funny stuff.

The Superficial has been pretty relentless in badgering young Taylor Momsen because I guess she got kicked off of her acting gig on Gossip Girl when she turned to the dark side of metal/gothdom. These kids today. Anyway, she's taken to dressing like a platinum Elvira and getting naked on stage, which, considering she's only 17, is a crime in a lot of places.

Before I get into it, let's first be clear about a few things. This numetal/alternative blend that the kids are playing lately is just not my thing. I find a lot of the work in this genre to be beyond pathetic. It's just turning more and more into scary clown car music for fans of the Saw films. Zero craftsmanship, zero inspiration, zero originality. Just headache inducing murk. Ugh.

So I heard of another incident where this little teen was making out with other girls on stage, so I decided today to finally see just how bad her music was. I mean, it features 3 black leather clad heavy metal crusty old dudes and a teen actress, so without a doubt it's got to be absolutely terrible. I went to Myspace for the first time since 2007 and listened to a few tracks.

Well, I'll get right to it. Fact is, it's good. I mean it's really good. Any musician would be proud to put their name on such a quality product.

The tempo is slowed and the beat stretched for maximum sex appeal. The metal guitar thing has gaps and spaces that bring us back to the more sensible playing of guitar gods of yesteryear. And the real lynchpin is the vocal performance. Taylor grinds and grunts through fairly sophmoric lyrics but makes them really work. Her delivery is spot-perfect.

And her voice itself? It's got to be the best female voice to hit music since Amy Winehouse.

3.5/5 stars, which for me is pretty good (I reserve 4.5 and 5 stars for timeless/groundbreaking classics).

This is simply well crafted rock. Cheesy? yes. Too pop? Maybe. ****? I guess I could see your point if you hate it.

What it isn't is god awful. And in a way, that disappoints me. But in another way, I'm quite pleasantly surprised.

by **avoidingtheclowns** » Tue Aug 16, 2011 3:48 pm

Apparently the key to getting Venice's attention is the involvement of teenage girls making out.

ATC: Hey, Venice, wanna do my taxes?
VENICE: Uh... no, sorry. I already had plans to... umm... braid my hair.
ATC: Pretty sure my W-2 was printed on a photo of two teenage female bass players making out.
VENICE: The itemized deduction limitation is repealed for 2011. So I'll get started on a lengthy workup...

The following user would like to thank avoidingtheclowns for this post
Venice

by **Venice** » Tue Aug 16, 2011 4:08 pm

That's old news, atc! I take it you never saw my two girls kissing thread on PD?

One thing I want to add about The Pretty Reckless: I think I've had my absolute over the brim fill of "indie" electronica. The worst of the worst is this etherial stuff that one of the music bloggers coined "chill wave". The more I hear this stuff, the more I hate it. It's been a solid 18 months of the indie/underground channels and blogs getting run over by Casios and reverb boxes. I've completely had it. "Today's music ain't got no soul".

Will anyone remember The Pretty Reckless? Probably not. But I'm in a mood to give anybody who wants to make rock and roll again an extra star until this Chill Wave/electronica trend ends.