As evidenced by the woman who screamed "Fuck yeah, bitches" during the band’s last set at Gravity Lounge, it’s safe to say that Charlottesville has its fair share of Old School Freight Train devotees. And so it brings me great pleasure to tell you that I received a copy of the local band’s soon-to-be-released album, Not Like the Others, it’s first record of new material since 2005’s Run. The verdict?
Hard to say. I was turned onto Old School Freight Train both late and through the band’s live act, which I think most fans would argue for as the real OSFT experience—the fiddle and mandolin wars between Nate Leath and Pete Frostic, the excellent choice in cover songs (namely, Jesse Harper’s take on Randy Newman’s "Lonely at the Top"). At least six of the 11 songs on Not Like the Others popped up in live sets dating as far back as 2006, namely the early standouts "Let Me Go" and "Memphis," which means the record sounds immediately familiar. However, this is also the band’s first studio album without banjo player Ben "Benjo" Krakauer, a founding member. So the record also doesn’t necessarily sound like Old School Freight Train.
Bob Dylan reenactors? Not quite: Old School Freight Train readies the excellent new album Not Like The Others.
But Not Like the Others sounds absolutely solid, the type of string-heavy pop record any anti-Guitar Hero strummers should strive for. But there are no extended instrumental tracks like Frostic’s intense Celtic cut-up "Mr. Parshif’s Jig" or Krakauer’s "Tango Chutney." Instead, Leath and Frostic keep their solos trim while vocalist Harper takes up a bit more room (something Frostic told the Washington Post’s Express about the record in May).
Nowhere is this more apparent than on the album opening cover of Blondie’s "Heart of Glass." Live, Leath turns the second half of this tune into a fiddler’s disco. (The good kind, not like "A Fifth of Beethoven.") On Others, however, the band keeps the focus on a strummed mandolin and Harper’s vocals—not a bad choice by any means, but not the choice I expected.
On the other hand, almost every song sounds like a single, which makes me wonder why Red Light hasn’t signed these fellows yet. However, Red Light’s Chris Tetzeli and Ann Kingston get props from the group in the liner notes, so maybe there’s something at work.
Anyways, after a few spins the album is really growing on me, particularly "Millionaires" and "Dunedin"—the first gets a bit wild on the rhythm thanks to the mando-fiddle onslaught and drumming from Richmond’s Brian Jones, who is easily one of the best drummers in the state. I spoke with Frostic via e-mail today and, with any luck, I’ll talk to him more about the album closer to the band’s September 5 gig at Gravity Lounge. To quote that insane lady: "Fuck yeah, bitches."
Speaking of Guitar Hero, you can now buy the latest installments of what you consider either a meta-rock fest or total talent-suck. Both Guitar Hero: On Tour and Guitar Hero: Aerosmith (in which you battle Steve Tyler’s leather lips of doom…kidding) are now on sale. Any of you Guitar Hero fans see this?:
