The Grouchy Gaijin's Thoughts on Music and Such

Radio Friendly

You can give a listen for yourself at his website:  http://pilesarmusic.com

He also has his stuff on Bandcamp (http://pilesar.bandcamp.com) as well as Soundtrack (http://www.soundclick.com/pilesar)  Since Pilesar asked me to review  Radio Friendly, he has also released an EP which you can check out on his website.

So, what kind of stuff is this?  I think of it as weird camp-rock.  Pilesar describes it as playful, to me it is strange.  Nina Hagen, Bauhaus and Frank Zappa were also strange.

I need to make clear that I don't think Pilesar is in the same league as any of those three.

Both Nina Hagen and Peter Murphy have great voices; in fact the stunning quality of Nina Hagen's voice combined with the utter strangeness of her music is what makes her magical.  Frank Zappa was one of the most accomplished players in music, not just rock.  I could see Zappa jamming with Yo-Yo Ma and pulling it off.

Pilesar is on his way, but he's not quite there yet.  While he does have some chops, and is without a doubt a creative guy (not to mention, based on the live tracks probably a lot of fun to party with) his voice is not that good.  At times the tracks on this album seem to have been thrown together in an effort to make the album longer than it should have been.

Several of the tracks seem disjointed and the album as a whole lacks cohesiveness.  During several of the songs, I found myself thinking "OK, now this is just annoying."

That reads a bit harsher than I mean it.  On the plus side, Pilesar is a young guy who doing his own thing - that needs to be applauded and encouraged.  There are some standout tracks that really made me smile.

My favorites are:

Umbrella:  In this song he seems to acknowledge that his voice it not that great and sings in an odd pitched psycho voice.  It works though because the underlying synthesizer rhythm section provides a truly funky bottom while some really nice cutting guitar plays over the top.

Gator Wrasslin':  Again the hard edged guitar is back, while the drums pound out a simple but intense beat.  Pilesar does his best Bauhaus tribute on the vocals and it works.  I dig the line: "Loving you is just like Gator Wrasslin'"  Who among us hasn't been in that kind of relationship?

Perhaps my favorite song is the live track Much Obliged fer Diggen Taters with You.  I love this song.  It's a quaint little hillbilly jam with REALLY funny lyrics.  The fact that it is a live track and we can hear the audience cracking up adds to the appeal.  It sounds to me like they were having a blast at that show.  I wish I'd been there.

Pilesar gets two and one half scowls on the Grouch scale.  If the album had actually been shorter and less of a jumble of songs the rating would have been higher.  All in all, this is a good effort from a young performer.  I'm sure that he will grow and mature with time.