Tweaker
The Attraction to All Things
Uncertain

2001 Six Degrees

Tweaker is the latest project
of Chris Vrenna, perhaps best
known for his work on Various
NIN albums as a drummer,
programmer and remixer, and
as the creator of the sound-
track to the deeply creepy
computer game Alice.

The album is actually an
interpretation of a painting
called . Elliot’s Attraction to
All Things Uncertair by Joe
Sorren. The cover of the
album is actually a reproduc-
tion of Sorren’s painting.

No Doubt
Rock Steady
2001 Universal

Rock Steady is the fifth
release of Tom Dumont, Tony
Kanal, Gwen Stefani, and
Adrian Young’s fifteen-year
career together as No Doubt.
After probing the depth of the
human spirit in. Return of
Saturn, No Doubt turned back
to their roots for Rock Steady.
While they didn’t offer any-
thing mind-altering and
provocative, they showed up
what they do best: have fun.
The _radio-friendly tunes
flowed smoothly, and were
varied enough to keep me

Orange County

Motion Picture Soundtrack
2002 Sony

In general, it’s an unexcep-
tional cd. There are some
great songs on it, with a few
distasteful sectors. For exam-
ple, the cd starts out well with
Offspring, jumps into a Pogue
revival with Social Distortion’s
Story of my life, bounces up
and down for a while with
some nicely placed Foo
Fighters, bops with Cake, and
then crashes headfirst into
Bad Ronald’s “1st Time”.
*ouch!* The intro slaps the lis-
tener back into the Beach Boy
era, but quickly recovers in an

Tweaker defies any sort of
classification, but the closest
one could come would be
industrial IDM. The music in
The Attraction to All Things
Uncertian shifts back and forth
between achingly sad vocal
numbers like Linoeum (which
features David Sylvian), and
oddly surreal electronic num-
bers like Full Cup of Coffee.
No matter how different all
the songs on the album are,
they all possess the same sort
of haunting complexity. There
are many layers to songs, yet
they remain beautiful in their
simplicity. Vrenna playfully
sprinkles curious samples
throughout The Aftraction to

interested right up to the emo-
tional high portrayed in the title
track. | especially liked the
Jamacian influence in Hey
Baby and Underneath it All.
The lyrics were dripping with
truth, but the song-writing
team of Gwen Stafani, Tony
Kanal, and Tom Dumont skill-
fully managed to hit home
while maintaining the album’s
overall positivity. In other
words, | wasn’t too depressed
to go on after listening to a few
song.

The current single, Hey
Baby, is a goof reflection of
the entire album: hard-edged
yet totally danceable pop.
Overall, No Doubt did an

easy flip only to fall back to the
Beach Boys impression for the
chorus. The enthusiastic
combination of cheap rhymes
and cheezy lyrics is barely
over-sidden by the easy
danceable beat. Sadly, the
album didn’t pause at this
precipice and recover, but
instead moved on down the
slope with a couple of Brian
Wilson tunes, that may remind
the listener of a combination of
Rocky Horror Picture Show
and Selena. Lit brings the cd
out of this slump with a terrific
song, Everything's Cool, but
not enough to escape 12
Rods’ aptly titled screecher,
Glad That It's Over. The rest

SS BRB BOR USI APSE SRP NAHE REE AS
i) ha i

All things Uncertain but they
never distract from the clean
sounds of the songs. The
vocal tracks, which usually
feel like an intrusion on most
electronic albums are simply
brilliant, from the disturbing
sadness of ‘Happy Child’ to
the powerful emotions of After
All and they blend in seam-
lessly with the rest of the
album. The Aitraction to All
Things Uncertain is a work of
art, and one of the. best
albums | have heard in a very
long while.

-Kathleen

excellent job meshing some-

thing original together with the

tried-and-true. Rock Steady is

full of positive energy, and

proves that No Doubt isn’t

afraid to re-write the rules.
-Steph

of the album was pleasant,
and easily slides into back-
ground music. Overall, at the
movie it was unnoticeable,
meaning it didn’t conflict with
the film, but as the film was
very enjoyable, | would say it’s
okay in the long run. On its
own... blah. Better to leave
the radio songs on the radio
and escape the possibility of
having to endure the rest.
-Amber