The first thought that comes to mind when listening to Redondo Beat is, “Hey, this is kind of nice…no one else is really doing this right now.”
…when you hear those opening eighth notes on the piano, you kind of feel like you’ve met already.
[audio:http://www.theinertia.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/01-The-Sweetest-Sound.mp3|titles=The Sweetest Sound|artists=Redondo Beat]These familiar sounds come by way of a little village outside Frankfurt, where a German musician named Roman Aul has been taking in every 45 the Baby Boom Generation ever danced to. The resulting output is his new album Meet Redondo Beat on Dionysus Records, a ten-tune tribute to the classic pop songs of that golden postwar era. Channeling the sounds of SoCal, Detroit, and the UK in the ’50s and ’60s, these tracks present a decidedly vintage feel, and even though production’s a little spiffier in this digital age, all those clean, trebly guitar pickups and tambourines ring true.
The songs will make it clear if the group’s name didn’t: Roman and his backing band would’ve liked nothing more than to have played every sock hop, beach party and variety show from the Redondo Beach Pier to the old Café Frankenstein in Laguna. Cover art by California’s own Damian Fulton drives this point home even further. Right from the start, “The Sweetest Sound” immerses listeners in the Beat’s retro pop-rock fantasy. The arrangement is bouncy, the reverb-saturated harmonies are authentic, and the first thought that comes to mind is, “Hey, this is kind of nice…no one else is really doing this right now.”
But while the opener is one of the record’s strongest tracks, it also begins a pattern that persists for too long. Sweet? Yeah, these sounds are sweet. Like, hope-your-pancreas-can-handle-it sweet. The Frankie Avalon in you may love it, but the Eric Von Zipper in you will find this stuff to be a little on the soft side. The ensuing numbers “The Spell I’m Under” and “My Baby (Knows How to Have a Real Good Time)” are excellent – the latter also appears to give a nod to the Fogerty riff from “Up Around the Bend” – but a little further through the album, it’s easy to get bored as the novelty (ha! irony!) of this music wears off. Nearer the end of the disc, a country-style beat and eerie rotary speaker effects on “Full Moon Child” succeed in rescuing the record by switching gears, and you wish it had only happened a little sooner. Save for maybe “Can’t Wait Until Saturday Night,” the rest of the tunes are just ordinary background music for the high school dance.
There’s always going to be a decent market for nostalgia like this. People love to re-experience their favorite oldies, and right now, Redondo Beat more or less owns their niche. Part of that is because they’re talented, but there also isn’t a lot of competition. At times, these guys may be too focused on recreating a vibe rather than creating a vibe. This release would have benefited from a little more substance, especially in the lyrical department. It seems reasonable that the guy who wrote and recorded this entire record is capable of drawing deeper from his well of influences, perhaps from someone a little more three-dimensional, like an Eric Burdon or an Alex Chilton. When Roman and company have figured out a fresh way to bridge these classic sounds with something that’s more their own, then they’ll really be cookin’ with grease (or whatever old people say).
