TAKES OFF

Takes Off ? 1966 (2.5/5) 9 ? Best Song: Let Me In It turns out that the band sounds absolutely nothing like the Byrds. There's the tambourine (who didn't rock out to a goddamn tambourine back then? Take them Limp Bizkit albums, all of them, and add a tambourine, and they become instant Sgt. Peppers, I swear that's the only thing they're missing), there's the pulsing, incoherent bass guitar throb, and there's the jangly guitar. This is most likely the point of similarity that most would draw to. The singing this early on is faceless and unprecedentedly awful without Grace Slick making things all idiosyncratic and such. It's all just a hobgob of boring, competent acid rock songs that sound mystically as if they were recorded in an airplane engine (and as if they were written in one, too).

It's not that dark, and it's not coherent half the time. Oh 'Let Me In' has that fuzzy, tinny solo to it, but it's a wet noodle compared to what would come right around the corner. I can't be too hard. You can see the Beatles influences a mile away, and the harmonies fall absolutely flat on 'Bringing Me Down'. With all that, I still can't be too harsh. I mean, it's better than listening to someone cutting wood. Oft times there'll be a catchy melody to grace your ears, or the guitarist (what's his name? Micky Rourke?) will play something above pleasant, but for me, this is just another (gratefully) lost mid-1960's album that belongs where it is, in the shadows. And whoever said San Fran was the place to be?