Another couple of trips up and down the I-95 corridor, and another handful of CDs drawn more-or-less randomly from the big green box to talk about:

♦Poison – Native Tongue: Remember those couple of years in the early 90s when it seems that all the big 80s hair metal bands had one of their founding members quit/kicked out? In Poison’s case, C.C. DeVille left for a few years to perfect his Joe Walsh impression, and the band replaced him, temporarily, with Reading, PA guitar wunderkind Richie Kotzen. The result was Native Tongue, which, to be totally honest doesn’t sound a hell of a lot like Poison without CC’s distinctive guitar tone. It’s not a bad record, by any means, but hews closer to white boy blues than the usual trashy glam the band was known for. This is probably Kotzen’s influence propping up Bret Michaels’ individual tendencies toward that end of the musical spectrum, and the results are interesting, but in the end, feature way too many gospel choir backing vocals and too few big guitar hooks.

♦R.E.M.: Out of Time: For many folks my age, this record was the first exposure to R.E.M.; “Losing My Religion” was a monster hit, and made rock safe for mandolin again for probably the first time since Rod Stewart’s “Maggie May.” I didn’t really dig deeply into the band’s excellent back catalog until years after this record came out, but I remember listening to this one a lot. Re-listening to this, I found myself responding most to “Texarkana” and anything with Kate Pierson backing vocals, even “Shiny Happy People.”

♦Riverdogs: Here’s another cut out rack special featuring Vivian Campbell on guitar. As far as I can tell, it’s pretty much the same story as Shadow King, but with fewer famous names (although according to wikipedia, the group put out three records between ’90 and ’93 with various line-ups). This record isn’t bad at all, but kind of all over the place; it can’t figure out what it wants to be musically, and by default falls into a “loud driving guitar on the first eight bars / bass & drum breakdown mellow verse / pick it up a bit on the chorus / rinse / repeat” cycle. Again, this is primarily a studio musician side project, so musically it’s very tight, but lyrically, it’s deep as a puddle and riddled with cliches. That doesn’t mean that “Toy Soldier” isn’t going to take up residence in your earworm synapses for days after you listen to it.

♦Richmond Music Cooperative volume II, Several Dead Presidents are Buried in Our Backyard: I’m pretty sure I remember picking this regional compilation up shortly after moving south at an indie record store just off the William & Mary campus in Williamsburg – I doubt the record store is still there, just as I doubt most of these bands are still together; it’s a great, eclectic mix of tunes from eleven different bands. Stylistically, it’s mostly punk and grunge; I heard a lot of Ramones, Alice in Chains, and a smattering of Weezer and The Smiths in the mix; pretty much what you’d expect from college pick-up bands in 1993/94 when this disc was released. I’ll be honest, though – it was a nice high-energy low-fi pick-me-up on the highway at 7:30am when I listened to it; especially some of the tracks on the latter half of the disc, particularly Pleasure Astro’s “Friendship Game.”

And, that’s the last couple of trips. I grabbed a whole new stack of discs over the weekend for future commuting.