Is this for real? No seriously, because I really don’t know. Somewhere between a mockery of country music and some genuinely good lyricism is ‘Alcohol Tobacco Raygun?’.
Apart from the artwork which actually really irritates me, with ‘Mr. Jones’ talking about himself in the third person in hilariously unfunny descriptions of each song e.g. ‘Mr Jones vs Sun City (rock legend embarks upon misguided road trip), there’s everything else. Take this line from ‘Mr Jones skips town’: ‘You’ll be seeing Mr Jones on Top of the Pops, and the rest of you losers can stay here and rot’. As if mate.
…But then maybe I’m missing the point altogether. Perhaps that was irony? To be honest, before I totally slate the guy, he’s got some good lyrics with brilliant moments of dry humour, and the acoustic guitar on the album opener is more to my liking.
Maybe I’m judging a book by its cover – actually yes I probably am (even the press release put me off). But getting down to the actual music…well I just have more to say about the artwork because, I found the album wholly uninspiring and confused, with vocals on the first track that seem to veer towards punk, before a complete u-turn into a track called ‘Death in Dixie’, which just says it all.