The River's Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia review

The River 92.5
Thirteen Tales From Urban bohemia
by Perry Persoff
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On the basis of the song Bohemian Like You, I expected this album to be nothing more than a big slab of delicious party rock (not that there is anything wrong with that if you keep it interesting). But the Dandy Warhols appear to have put a lot more thought into 13 TALES than just that...

Hindu-esque orchestration replete with acoustic guitar and trumpet (Godless) or hypnotic electric lead guitar with veiled vocals (Mohammed) begin this somewhat trippy album. The first three tracks of 13 TALES send you off with a feeling of floating, the instruments and orchestration often taking the lead from the vocals in the sound mix. {Headphones, headphones, headphones my friends!}

From Track 4 Country Lever--which could be a fond tribute to the Stones' Country Honk-- you go through "Alt-Country," "Underground Garage," and outright "Hedonistic Joy of Rock" territory. To bring it back 'round to a spiritual loop, the album concludes with the dreamy gospel-surf sounding The Gospel. Almost every song weaves right into the following one. This acts like a "designated vehicle" to safely guide you through the entire album. A lot of thought seems to have gone into 13 TALES' production.

I apologize for using so many "Rock Critic" labels at once. Let's try it this way...

13 TALES FROM URBAN BOHEMIA sounds sort of like: Lou Reed & The Velvet Underground (with Jonathon Richman--who so loves the early Velvet's sound), Rick Ocasek, the Brian Jones-era Rolling Stones, and Wilco after a week in India with the Mahareeshi.

And after giving the entire thing a listen, I still find myself thinking, "wow...that was excellent."

Perry's Pix: Godless, Mohammed, Country Lever, Solid, Sleep, Bohemian Like You, Big Indian, The Gospel. Some of these may work better for you within an album context then as seperate cuts.