Music Everywhere
Monday 11 June @ 11:57:31 |
Music on DVD: Casual Confusion CD release 
by DWIGHT HOBBES
AAs emerging power-trio Casual Confusion continues getting a leg up, they may find themselves in an enviable Catch-22. That’ll happen. A given band hasn’t garnered enough followers to consistently headline-- yet have trouble generating exposure, because name bands, scared of being upstaged, won’t do a gig with ungodly axe-monsters opening the bill. CC’s manager, Dan Batdorf, avoiding specifics, acknowledges, “A lot of [bands] have shied away from doing anything with us.” Small wonder.
Things stand to become reasonably more fluid with this month’s release of Casual Confusion, especially once radio stations pick up on the album. It’s a reviewer’s find, one of those discs that, from opening to closing cut, flat-out nails it all down. “Still Care” leads, a stark, soulful blend of classic rock, reggae and old-school R&B. Establishing signature finesse, the cut delivers pocket-locked drums and bass behind articulate guitar and a rich vocal. “Got It In A Bad Way” comes more out of bluesman Earl King’s scheme of things, still anchored in smoke-it-if-you-got-it, pour-some-more-Jack-Daniels rock. “Future Shock,” about as poignant an anthem as anyone’s heard in a great long while, gives even the greats a run for their money: Consult Trower’s “Hannah” for comparison. The ballad’s dark mood has haunting electric guitar laid over sweet chords on acoustic. Deftly insinuated cymbals and snare accompany. Snaking bass guitar falls in. Hypnosis couldn’t put you in a stronger trance. Get next to the lyrics, “Young man watch him fall to his knees/ Woman you watch her contract a disease/ We’ve gone far to pay the boss/ All our losses seems are gone/Somebody please tell me where did we go wrong/ Its contemplation of your sanity/ Oh, you know blind eludes reality/ Everything else is just a fallacy”
Let Casual Confusion transcend that trick bag of who’s-gonna-let-us-open-where-can-we-close. Then, watch crowds elbow their way into any and everywhere Casual Confusion sets up on stage. Let this album receive due airplay. All hell will break loose in terms of a newly prominent band on the Twin Cities club scene. From there, it shouldn’t surprise anyone to see Casual Confusion follow, for instance, area-based rock ‘n’ soul man Kip Blackshire to far-reaching, ocean-spanning success. Just as Europe welcomed Blackshire with open arms, they will eat Casual Confusion up with a knife and fork.
Frontman Colin Hodges (guitar, vocals, songwriting) basically is the band. That’s no slight to bass guitarist Mike “Haddy” Hayostek or drummer Zach Dennison, both of whom kick ass and take names. But Hodges heads the band up. And, as it was with Jimi Hendrix leading The Jimi Hendrix Experience and with Arthur Lee at the helm for Love (this is, by no means, the last time Casual Confusion will be compared to those bands), well, frontman Hodges is the star of the show. Hodges flat-out kills with scalding, blues-soaked leads and can work the pure hell out of a wah-wah pedal--which unavoidably brings Hendrix to mind. And, reminiscent of Lee, he’s got a smooth voice along with a sweet tooth for major-7 chords (though more sparing), and, all that said, comes with a remarkably original sound. Sensibly, the virtuoso gives credit where credit’s due, noting that, Dennison and Hayostek don’t just do back-up, they contribute to Casual Confusion’s identity.
As for the other two reflecting on what they bring, Zach states, “We work off each other. [For] tempo, rhythm. An emotion for the melody. Hayostek, comments, “We feel it. You have to. That’s the only way to make it real.” Hodges sums up, “We work together. That’s it.”
Give Casual Confusion a good listen and see if you don’t go away profoundly impressed. These guys do damned good things for the genre of balls-to-the-walls power rock.
They're at Dinkytowner Cafe on June 15, doing the CD release thing. That's at 412 1/2 14th Ave. SE, Mpls. 612-362-0437;
www.casualconfusion.com.
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