DISClosure
CD Reviews Of A National Scale
Austin Lounge Lizards
Never An Adult Moment
 The opening track of
Never An Adult Moment immediately clues listeners in to the fact that they are listening to a band formed by a bunch of grinning intellectuals who know music, who know society, and who know how to blend the two with a folksy-country swing. For example, in “Grunge Song,” the Austin Lounge Lizards offer up a satirical song about the structure and simplicity of…grunge music. While this early-90’s music genre is interpreted with a country spin, the lyrics are a witty commentary of grunge song structure: “So we go back to playing loud/It’s like the first time, but slightly louder/This is where the obligatory solo goes/Needlessly repetitive and
self-indlugent.”
The Austin Lounge Lizards are a six-piece country/bluegrass/satirical/folk group based in Austin, Texas that has been picking, strumming and laughing for more than twenty years. The band was basically formed when Hank Card and Conrad Deisler met each other in law school. Over the years, their studies and music has progressed … to the point that Card is a judge in Texas and the band has released eight albums.
Never An Adult Moment is the Austin Lounge Lizard’s eighth album. Luckily, their satire isn’t entirely focused on stereotypical southern culture, shallow music trends and other topical subjects. They also have some creative political commentary. “Rasputin’s HMO” cleverly, and not so subtly, uses the Czarist “prophet’s” life as a metaphor for HMO practices.
Sure satire is fun, but it can only go so far without succumbing to immaturity. It gets kind of tough to immerse yourself in the music when that happens. Fortunately, despite their obvious refusal to grow-up, the Austin Lounge Lizards’ catchy tunes, intelligent lyrics and easy-on-the-soul country-folk musicianship make this disc honest and fun. I hear their live shows are fantastic, too. (Sugar Hill Records)
Poker Face
Sex, Lies and Politiks
 On their latest release, a neat little interactive disc called,
Sex, Lies and Politiks, Poker Face combine pleasant modern rock harmonies with radio ready hooks. The result is a professional sounding disc that could easily steal more than a few Creed fans nationally. But enough about the music. That’s not what this Lehigh Valley band’s about.
Truthfully, I’m not sure what this band’s about. Or this disc. As far as I can tell, Poker Face are angry young men singing about being angry young men but not telling us what exactly it is that they’re so angry about. They have plenty of rousing mob-inducing slogans and their mission is to “expose the lies and scandals coming out of our nations capital.” In the end, they don’t expose anything and the accusations they do make are vague and non-committal.
The fold-out insert to Sex, Lies and Politiks contains a pushpin detail of the “New States Of Amerika” and maps out a series of conspiracy theories that’d make even Moulder and Scully blush. On the reverse side is a Poker Face original essay regarding the idea of freedom. In it, they define freedom as “the ability to express yourself in whatever way, and to whatever level, you desire.” Yet, in their song called “Freedom,” they admit that they will “kick your ass” if you express yourself in a way that they themselves don’t agree with. Uh, guys … whatever happened to that idea of freedom?
It is such inconsistent arguments, and a repeatedly undeveloped political premise, that completely undermines Poker Face’s music. And that’s a shame because their music, it turns out, is actually pretty good.
(Note: This review was not some sort of government plot meant to bring down rock and roll.)
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