When it comes right down to it, what
Kid Rock attempts is kind of tricky: he's trying to create new classic rock, songs to compete with
Skynyrd and
Seger
as the soundtrack of choice for jukeboxes and pickup trucks across the
country. This is the sound of the white-trash, downriver rocker in him
coming through, triumphing over the jive rapper who brought him his
fame. It was there even when he was aping
the Beastie Boys and yodeling in the canyon, but once the country-rock of "Picture" revived the sales of the flagging
Cocky,
he put all his chips on classic rock, beginning with 2004's eponymous
platter, a good record without a single hit single. That lack of a hit
was enough to scare
Kid, to strip away his few lingering subtleties and turn out an album as big, bold, and brainless as 2007's
Rock N Roll Jesus.
Apart from a drum loop here and a chanted bridge there, this is classic
white-trash rock through and through, but where his heroes were
creating a blueprint,
Kid Rock
is doggedly following their path, and he won't ever let you forget it,
either. He name-drops relentlessly, steals songs titles from both
Alabama and
Billy Squier, cribs rhyme schemes from
Seger and melodies from
Elton John ("Blue Jeans and a Rosary" is straight out of "Levon"), adopts
John Fogerty's fake mushmouth Southern accent for his obligatory Big Easy salute, "New Orleans," and pays homage to
Back in Black
with his cover art. He works hard to evoke the ghosts of the past,
hoping that all his allusions will give him classic rock cred by
association, when it only winds up underscoring the distance between him
and his heroes. Nowhere is this truer than on "All Summer Long," a spin
on "Night Moves" built entirely upon the chords from "Werewolves of
London" with a slight lift from "Sweet Home Alabama" on the chorus,
which only brings to mind how much better those three songs are than
this mash-up.
Kid Rock's problem on
Rock N Roll Jesus
is two-fold: his music is so cluttered with comforting clichés, it
plays like music for a theme restaurant, and his words fall flat. Of the
two problems, the music isn't as serious: splashy and silly though it
may be, at least it gets the basic sound right, even if it's way too
polished and precise.
Kid
chases after shopworn riffs without ever reworking them or infusing
them with enough spirit to make them his own; they just lie there,
crushed beneath the weight of classic rock history. Nor does he goose
his conventional chords with his signature ribald humor, which perhaps
is the most shocking and notable thing about
Rock N Roll Jesus:
he's lost all of his verbal facility, to the point where he can no
longer tell a dirty joke. It's as if by leaving rap behind, he's also
discarded any claims at being clever. The man who once saluted all his
heroes in the methadone clinics now just lazily spits out profanities
and rhymes "things" with "things," telling lowlife tales so generic they
feel invented. It's not that his topics are tired -- easy sex is as
timeless a topic for rock & roll as true love -- but he's no longer
inhabiting a role, he's acting it, which makes his tawdry tales not only
cheap, but disposable. There's one exception to this rule and that's
his nasty, clumsy
David Allan Coe-styled kiss-off to ex-wife
Pamela Anderson,
"Half Your Age," the one song that is truly steeped in the dirty grit
of real life. It may ring true, but it's so mean-spirited, it strips him
of any residual roguish charm -- and when a rogue loses his charm, he
just comes across as a prick, as
Kid Rock does on
Rock N Roll Jesus.
tags: kid rock, rock n roll jesus, 2007, flac,
