If you're one of those people who tune in to classic rock radio and get a warm, fuzzy feeling from the rock anthems of Styx or the sound of Elton John's "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road," then Doug Powell's debut CD, Ballad of the Tin Men is perfect for you. Powell's assortment of engaging lyrics, melodic hooks and lush vocal harmony are a throwback to the days when pop music became synonymous with fully fleshed-out songs and big production numbers.
It's no secret that Powell's cultural roots lie in the music of the late '60s and '70s-- a mixture of Todd Rundgren with Styx, Queen, Elton John, and a healthy dose of the Beatles, along with social commentary by Ray Davies, stirred vigorously and voila-- Doug Powell straight up.
There's nothing new or cutting edge about this album. It resonates as a homage to pop music of an earlier time, when the buying public still hungered after well-crafted songs over big hair and posturing. But the band whose style most often comes to mind is Jellyfish, who owes its layered harmony to the baroque excess of Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody." For me, listening to Doug Powell is like going back into the past to get to the future. As punk brought rock out of the arena back into the bars and dives of its youth, Powell's lyrical integrity brings the song back to rock.
He's a man out of step with his time, but he knows the boundaries of his craft. He seems to have bypassed completely the spandex dance scene of the '80s, along with the postmodern angst driven fervor of today's angry young man. What remains are the essential ingredients of good pop songs, driven by an intelligence which demands longer attention spans than Metallica or Madonna are likely to possess. Avoiding cliches and fads with equal abandon, Doug Powell is a man whose vision of the possible remains securely anchored in the present - as he sings on the track "My Goodbyes", "I have tried to live the lies of tomorrow / Now I just try to be faithful to today."
Although his best songs - "Return to Sender," "It's Not the Weather," "My Sweet Revolver," and "My Goodbyes," - look more often to where we have been than to where we are going, one finds, after much struggle and heartache, a faint hope for the future, whose dim light is found in the bad memories and old flames that never quite die out...
For Doug Powell, the only possible illumination comes from the light of experience and the truth of a good song.
