Reeling off the success of Color Green’s last few years, guitarist Corey Madden has set aside the time to assemble a record that embodies the freewheelin’ ethos of the former while propagating a singer-songwriter persona of his own design. Released on the peripatetic Worried Songs, Taste the Hour finds camaraderie in the label’s ever-expanding ilk of freaks, heady rockers, and ardent songcrafters. Sure to stand above the fray in a growing world of blissed-out jammers, Madden has founded a realm where folk-rock grit is further refined in fuzz and adorned with sparks of power-pop benediction.
Delivered deadpan with a dirtbag sweet-heartedness, one can’t help but find an endearing and veritable songwriter in Madden over the course of Taste the Hour’s eight tunes. And lest not one ignore the ace of the project—Madden as architect. “Tumor” begins in ringing 12-string melancholy before building to a false crescendo of feedback, orchestrated layered guitars, and bravado. The whole thing has an air of Dennis Wilson diving a bit too deep into the medicine cabinet—sentimental, pining, yet emboldened by a too-far-gone lack of inhibition. Without a chance to recover, the circuital fuzz of “Free Again” comes knocking like a blow to the sternum. You’re winded but just before incoherence sets in, Madden props you up in locktight groove, taking the wheel for a breakneck drive along a coastal highway. And though the guitarist clearly masters low-key bliss, moments like this and the locomotive brute of “Yellow Rose” demonstrate that there’s serious power left in the reserves when its necessary to get a little further out there.
The subdued moments are equally rewarding. The faux-cowboy novelty of “Two Strangers” provokes serious downer-folk energy. And by bleeding into the slide-induced lullaby “Cig,” listeners are lulled into a false sense of security before a quick reality check by “Gun.” Not quite the heaviest piece on Taste the Hour, it is the most menacing by a long shot. And while an extended guitar workout would be appropriate following the repeated refrain of “Won’t you let me help you load your gun,” Madden shows restraint. Realizing that his work in Color Green offers plenty of time for matters of six-string pyrotechnics, the focus here remains on songcraft. The abrupt crescendo only heightens the righteous lethargy of the closing “Treading”—sending the affair adrift once more to languidly strummed nylon string and hazy slide guitar.
It can be difficult to pin down some moments of this tape. Glimmers of Harry Hosono drift up from the glacial psych of “Color.” John Frusciante’s early drug-addled solo projects are brought to mind at times, through both tone control and instrumental mastery. And to the deep-divers, Andy Zwerling’s bedroom psych-pop might even be recalled in the more solemn moments Madden puts forth. In as much, we’re left with a deeply original project that manages to extrude familiarity in its nuance. A fine introduction to Madden as a sonic pioneer and likely not the last glimpse of a fervidly inventive artist. | j rooney
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