Roots-rock rhythms layered with Brit-pop sensibilities that reads like a night long soundtrack to a daydream.

14 MP3 Songs
ROCK: Roots Rock, POP: Beatles-pop



Details:
Ted McCloskeyâs 4th album, Technicolor Thieves, is a superior distillation of all of his previously recorded output into one expertly lobbed, angry, blast of angst, anxiousness, and loud guitars.

The album is a potent slice of not-so-thinly veiled disgust about pop culture, politics and the toll it takes on an observer who happens to write fantastic pop songs. As McCloskey himself explains in the very insightful liner notes;

âTechnicolor Thieves is about imprisonment. Itâs about abandonment and isolationism. Itâs about recognizing a problem and not having the faintest idea how to improve the situation. It loiters between resentment and retreat.â

McCloskeyâs writing has always been full of this sort of tug-and-pull anguish, but over the span of his last album, Whoâs Gonna Listen Anyway and now Technicolor Thieves, The writing has gotten more specific, more pointed, and more undeniably pissed off. Whether heâs tackling the current political malaise on âOut With the Old Queens,â Drinking In Tonight,â or âWait, Wait,â or the state of oneâs own drowsy acceptance in âZombie For Rentâ or the insanely catchy, Maybe Just Maybe, itâs all clearly driven by the familiar clever quirkiness of McCloskeyâs writing and his âbordering on pop encyclopedia levelâ sensibilities.

Technicolor Thieves ranks as McCloskeyâs most consistent CD, AND THAT IS SAYING SOMETHING given the extreme high quality, savvy pop-smarts of his past productions. The guitars bite and snarl as always, and they are layered and in-your-face, while some of the quieter songs have the newly found intricacies that suggest, but donât ape, the great songwriter/guitarists that have influenced him. Truly, on Technicolor Thieves, this musical growth has enabled McCloskey to truly assimilate all of his influences (stones, dylan, replacements, smiths, beatles, xtc, faces, clash, kinks, velvet underground, rem) into his own unique sound and style.

Perhaps McCloskey says it best and most simply in the liner note description for the beautiful âBeing Still:â

âFor some people, remaining still is the hardest thing to do.â

For Ted McCloskey, being still and staying in the same place, musically, is not an option.