Album Review: Smith Westerns – Dye It Blonde

Smith Westerns - Dye It Blonde

Album Review: Smith Westerns – Dye It Blonde
by: Evelyn Anne Clausen

Sophomore albums pose a difficult challenge for most bands. If, as in the case of the Smith Westerns, fans and critics praised your first album, the question becomes, do you simply do the same thing again, or do you try to grow and change?

Dye it Blonde, the band’s newest release, avoided that question almost entirely, by playing the same short, catchy songs that won their first album a following, but using their newly acquired studio resources to tighten up the sound and create what is a much more polished product than their self-titled debut.

I’m having a hard time coming to terms with this new album. On one hand, the band sounds much more mature and put together than they did two years ago, but with that said, the scruffy, adolescent sound of their first release was a big part of that album’s charm.

There are some good songs here. “Smile” is sweeping and anthemic, “Dance Away” is gleefully innocent and “Only One” is as wonderfully dreamy and wistful as a garage-pop song should be. The whole album is pitch-perfect as an exercise in sounding like the best of glam/punk/garage from previous decades, but there is nothing new here.

Fans of Smith Westerns’ first album will find much to like on Dye It Blonde, but as the tile suggests, this album is a sanitized and glossy production. With their clear talent for reproducing sounds they admire, the question remains whether Smith Westerns will be able to develop a sound that is truly their own. Let’s hope they let the dye job grow out so those dark roots can show through.

Editor’s Note: Evelyn Anne Clausen is a contributor to DeadJournalist.com. Her reviews will be seen on this site on a regular basis. You can follow her on Twitter @evelynanne or via her Web site easbrain.com.