New Lou Reeds

For the record, the New Lou Reeds sound nothing like Lou Reed ever did, unless you count one of these dozen tracks ("Hometown Hero”) that starts off sounding a little like something the Velvets might have jammed on. Rather, this Cleveland-based trio specialise in fuzzed-out, lo-fi blues rock with first-take, devil-may-care vocals and plenty of "art-cohol” flourishes. There is some versatility at work here, though, like the edgy, ska’d-up track "The Foreigner,” a brief affront to hip-hop simply called "Interlude” and the acoustic guitar-powered ballad "Peter Laughner,” which respectfully tells the story of one of Cleveland’s legendary proto-punk pioneers. Even despite that particular content, Pere Ubu comparisons are basically inevitable, given the band’s experimental penchant and vocalist Stephen DK’s not-quite-falsetto microphone attack, which comes off sounding like a stylistic combination of Ubu front-man David Thomas and Stooges-era Iggy.