It’s been over two decades since Evan Dando‘s famed 90’s alternative rock band The Lemonheads have released an album of original material, so for their return, Dando recruited a bunch of famous friends to share the love with Love Chant. The results are whip-smart, tongue-in-cheek, rollicking rock n’ roll songs that were worth the long wait.
There’s a looseness to the songs on Love Chant, uninhibited by a new to write traditional structures and a sign that Dando was clearly following his whims. From the very beginning, there’s a beautiful, almost eerie melody on “58 Second Song”, which quickly shuffles into a rousing power pop track with lovely harmonies. If released back in the 90’s on a major label, this would have been an obvious choice for a first single.
But in true indie rock fashion, Dando chose the chunky, funky “Deep End”. Joined by Juliana Hatfield on harmonies and J. Mascis on guitar, the song is a raw and percussive track, with Dando delivering hypnotically stomping lines like “Going into treatment. Better double down the dose.” The hard slacker rock vibes would get Jay & Silent Bob breaking out their best dance moves in front of the Clerks liquor store.
Riffs are aplenty on Love Chant. They drive the rolling rocker “In the Margin”, and make “Marauders” a choppy, funky blast of fuzz punk (and the horns on the close of the song give that one a soulful denouement). There are also a psychedelic touches the unsettling title track, which feels like something that would have been sung around the campfire of a cult in the 70’s.
Throughout the album, the lyrics are wonderfully clever and incisive. The way Dando tackles a toxic relationship from the point of view of the toxic person on “Wild Thing” (“If you really love me you’ll do this. And you won’t begrudge me if I do that”) is perfectly on point, while the chill, folk rock of “Cell Phone Blues” taps into the listlessness that technology has created, even for creatives (“”I make movies which don’t move me”).
Dando also shows a sweet streak that will bring to mind some of his more moving 90’s tracks like “It’s a Shame About Ray”. The first is “Togetherness is All I’m After”, which begins heavy, before making a 180 into moseying shoegaze, and then evolving into wistful folk that drifts along like a warm fall day in L.A. The other is “The Key to Victory”, where Dando’s deep baritone plays off intricate acoustic melodies, awash in bongos and synths, forming a composition that reminded me of Tom Waits in certain baroque ways.
“The strategy of life is that it’s gone before you know it,” wise words from Dando, which he seems to have taken to heart on this album. He’s made an album that savors songwriting, originality and the passion of making music, finally releasing an album because it was clearly a collection of songs he loved and was (and should be) proud of. There’s no point to make music you don’t love, no matter how long people have been waiting for it. Life’s too short. Fill it with good music, like The Lemonheads‘ Love Chant.
The album is out on October 24th on Fire Records. Listen to the pre-released singles here.
The Indy Review 
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