Album Review: Spiders - "Sharp Objects"

It seems like every year in music, we’re forced to grapple with the same question - is something new still good even if it’s a copy of something that has come before?

Not an easy subject to tackle, certainly - especially when digital recording technology effectively ceases the aging process of music - audio recorded digitally from thirty years ago sounds, within reason, just as vibrant now as it did then.  On the off chance it doesn’t, well, time to run it through a re-mix, repackage it, and sell it again as ‘digitally remastered,’ which, coincidentally, just about every rock band from the ol’ analog days has done to gin up some royalties.

Attentive readers can probably already tell where this discussion is headed…yeah. there’s a new Spiders album.

Spiders has been worthy of keeping on the radar ever since their single “Mad Dog” more than ten years ago.  The song was a glimpse of a Swedish rock band on the come up, and every successive album gives these little tastes of the band that Spiders could be.  Cynically, it remains true that they have yet to display the kind of consistency that makes for a transcendent act, but there’s always one or two songs that stand out.

“Sharp Objects,” the band’s newest effort, ends up emerging from much the same mold.  The album begins with great promise with “Rock n Roll Band” (not a cover of the Boston song “Rock & Roll Band,”) with an edgy chorus and bitten verses set against some honest-to-goodness rock riffs.  

That promise comes back toward the end, with “Love Yourself to Death,” which is the best song on the record, and frustratingly exemplifies all the talent and knack that Spiders can bring to bear when the stars align.  These two songs are everything that Spiders can be - high energy riffs, easy choruses, fun themes and lyrics, and good pacing.

Frustrating though, because most everything else on the record sounds like something else, and not in a complimentary way.  “Fun in the Sun” sounds like a Rolling Stones song, “Valentines” wants to be Bob Seger, and “What’s Your Game (Miss Insane)” borrows heavily from the early days of the Clash and the Kinks.

And they’re all fine for what they are - they’re not flawed in any way, except that they don’t exceed the memory of the acts they borrow from.  A Rolling Stones fan might enjoy the bulk of “Sharp Objects” for a while, but before too long, they’re just going to go back to their Rolling Stones vinyl and move on, because those songs are either more familiar, better, or both.

Which loops us back to the question we discussed at the beginning - is something new still good even if it sounds like an imitation of what has come before.  The answer, in the case of “Sharp Objects” is yes, it can be good…but not compelling.

All credit in the world to Spiders for trying their best to keep this particular brand of lighthearted, two-beat rock alive.  There’s a billion bands out there who mistakenly think the world needs another Quiet Riot clone, so it’s refreshing in its own way to hear rock and roll taken, if not all the way back to Elvis and Chuck Berry, at least to its most celebrated form.  Since those celebrated albums still resonate, though, and with bands like countrymen Graveyard advancing the genre…it’s hard to see where Spiders and “Sharp Objects” will have a lasting impact.