CD Reviews

Terry Adams

Rhythm Spell | Clang!

By BRETT MILANO | December 17, 2007

3.0 Stars

NRBQ are still on hiatus, maybe for good, but leader Terry Adams’s latest solo set has the sound and the style of a vintage Q album, harking back to the homemade feel of fondly remembered early-’70s releases like Scraps. (The ecologically themed “Nature’s Gonna Pay You Back” is a close cousin to the great Scraps track “Magnet.”) Working with NRBQ drummer Tom Ardolino and Hall & Oates bassist T-Bone Wolk, Adams uses his trademark Clavinet to cover for the lack of guitar. The mix of sweet ballads, scrappy rockers, and left-field novelties is straight out of the NRBQ playbook — only the groove-driven title track leaves you missing the full band. Read between the lines and there may be some veiled messages to his ex-mates: the love song “Every Thing I Do” announces that “I’m gonna stop hanging round the same old clowns,” and the uncharacteristically pointed “Fake Hug” suggests he’s sure pissed at somebody. But Adams’s good nature wins the day, and songs that at first sound like throwaways find their way under your skin.

Topics: CD Reviews , Terry Adams, Terry Adams

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