Event
CHUCK PROPHET and special guest JOHN POWHIDA
Tuesday 3/2 - The Lizard Lounge is proud to present...
CHUCK PROPHET
and special guest JOHN POWHIDA
$12 advance / $15 at the door
7:30 doors / 8:00 show
HARP Magazine - November, 2007
****
Pure, guileless rock abandon.
Chuck Prophet's genius lies in assimilating a wide variety of genres into his essentially Stonesy architecture ahead of the standard curve. From the seminal '80s alt-country shimmer of Green on Red to his incredibly diverse solo sonic quilt - early Americana rocker/mid-period electronic folkie/latter-day style hybridist - Prophet has engagingly exemplified his surname. On Soap and Water, his Yep Roc debut, Prophet continues to defy easy categorization, seamlessly weaving together his myriad roles: chunky rocker ("Freckle Song"), sensitive pop balladeer ("Would You Love Me"), sonic dabbler ("Doubter Out of Jesus (All Over You)"). For his considerable talents as performer/arranger/stylist, the ribbon that neatly ties the package is Prophet's lyrical gift, as his beat story-songs pulse with novelistic detail, noirish humor and poetic ambiguity and bristle with pure, guileless rock abandon. Originality is not easy in the derivative rock world but Chuck Prophet has blazed genre trails for over two decades with no signs of running out of inspiration or desire.
--Fred Mills
The Village Voice - October 2nd, 2007
Smart-ass rocker crafts another No.1 Record
Every aspiring guitarist who taped a copy of Big Star's Radio City went on to start his own band. That's conventional wisdom, but what about the misfits who scrounged a burn of Alex Chilton's Like Flies on Sherbert or treasured a bootleg LP of his late-'70s Elektra demos? On Soap and Water, former Green on Red guitarist Chuck Prophet answers that question. It's a catchy, accurate recasting of Chilton's terrified insouciance and sickening pop modulations, and if it occasionally descends into pastiche, it scrubs behind Chilton's ears with a loving touch. Prophet might not sing as snidely as the Memphian did on such numbers as Sherbert's "Hey! Little Child" (referenced here on "Heart Beat"), but he adds complaisant female vocals to an ingenious series of mocking guitar moves.
"Down Time" rocks along in the jaunty manner of the Sir Douglas Quintet's "She's About a Mover" and fades before it has time to gather momentum. Intelligent enough to take pleasure in the basics but too impatient to stick with anything for very long, Prophet sounds like the kind of smart-ass who doesn't worry about earning your respect. This means he gets away with lines like "The women threw their panties/And the women threw their bras/Elvis hung his head/And said, 'They'll forget me when I'm gone.' " He affects wisdom on "Small Town," a gorgeous meditation on big-city temptation's specifically, Prophet doesn't want anyone to mess with his sister, who leaves town with only "a Realistic stereo and a phone that doesn't ring" for evidence. Best of all is the title track, a two-chord stomp that finds Prophet trafficking in the cheap oppositions big brother Alex perfected 30 years ago. "Dry hump/Wet nurse/Loose change/Tight purse," he sings, sounding like a man who wears clean underwear but is scared to change his dirty socks.
-- Edd Hurt
Entertainment Weekly.com - 09/27/07
Chuck Prophet soaks up the Stonesy vibe on his excellent new CD Soap and Water
Though the guitarist's narco-blasted days in indie-rock band Green on Red are long behind him, there's still something elegantly and acerbically wasted about Chuck Prophet. This collection of roots rock is Stonesy loose, which is also to say that it's Stonesy tight. The lumbering ''A Woman's Voice'' aside, Soap and Water's tracks impress from the sex-drenched ''Freckle Song'' to ''Let's Do Something Wrong,'' where his Tom Petty-ish vocals are puckishly augmented by a kids' choir on the lyrics ''Let's do something wrong/Let's do something stupid.'' A-
-- Clark Collis
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LocationThe Lizard Lounge
1667 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02138
United States
Categories
| Kid Friendly: No |
| Dog Friendly: No |
| Non-Smoking: No |
| Wheelchair Accessible: No |
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