Quick Spins

Sunday, May 21, 2006

YEAH!

Def Leppard

Releasing an album of cover songs is a defining moment for an '80s arena-rock band like Def Leppard. It's bigger than singer Joe Elliott shearing his flowing mullet. It's possibly more ghastly to fans than drummer Rick Allen losing a limb in an auto accident.

"Yeah!" is a surrender. A penultimate gesture. But it's also the sign of a self-aware career arc from a likable group that still sells concert tickets. Nobody wants to hear a new tune from Def Leppard. Fans want the hits, which the group will dispense in amphitheaters this summer. And what's the next best thing to hits? Other bands' hits! This tribute to 14 influential acts -- British pop-rock mostly from the early '70s -- isn't half bad.

Def Leppard's synthetic vocal harmonies and RoboCop drum sheen upload futuristic vitality into David Essex's minimalist "Rock On," and the quintet enthusiastically captures Sweet's straitjacket swagger on "Hell Raiser" and its heaven-size chorus. Even if you've never heard the groove-stomping "Don't Believe a Word," that wicked twin-guitar riff instantly gives it away as Thin Lizzy.

Wisely, Def Leppard didn't try to reinvent arrangements. But that doesn't save awkward fits like ELO's "10538 Overture" or David Bowie's "Drive-In Saturday." But guitarist Phil Collen atones for all at the hard-charging end, summoning his best Rod Stewart karaoke rasp on the Faces' "Stay With Me."

A good-times throwaway CD? Pretty much, but fans might buy it. And if they don't? Def Leppard has already sold more than 65 million albums.

-- Michael Deeds

Def Leppard is scheduled to play July 7 at Nissan Pavilion. DOWNLOAD THESE: "Don't Believe a Word," "Rock On"

THE DRIFT

Scott Walker

Eccentricity abounds in rock-and-roll, but true enigmas are few and far between.

One of them is the reclusive, self-exiled American singer Scott Walker, who landed a few minor hits in the '60s in England with the Walker Brothers before striking out as an increasingly strange solo act. He has released just three albums over 30 years, with the latest -- "The Drift" -- being typically challenging.

Walker's come a long way since his ornate pop days.

In fact, it's hard to imagine his current music influencing anyone, it's so idiosyncratic and relentlessly imposing.

Disturbing dissonance and droning rule "The Drift," with Walker's distinctive croon still strong but offering melodies as unpredictable as the music, an electronic soundscape that's firmly avant-garde.

The lyrics are by turns horrific and haunting: "I'm the only one

left alive," Walker sings in "Jesse," a 9/11 song that imagines Elvis Presley dreaming of the World Trade Center attacks.

"World about to end!" goes another declaration in "The Escape," a song that concludes with what sounds like a Donald Duck impression.

This is experimental music in the truest sense, a test to see how far an artist can push his vision without simultaneously pushing every potential listener away.

Whether you're one of the few pulled in depends a great deal on your patience and tolerance for discord and pretension, but like climbing a mountain, making it through an album as odd and oppressive as "The Drift" is in a sense its own reward.

-- Joshua Klein

DOWNLOAD THESE: "Jesse," "Hand Me Ups"