Marty Balin - Balin
#210
By Stephen Romone Lewis
May 11, 1981
Marty Balin
Balin
Genre: Soft Rock
Allen’s rating: 2.5 out of 5
Stephen’s Rating: 3.5 out of 5
Highlights:
Tell Me More
Hearts
I Do Believe In You
Am I psychic? No. Well, probably not. You decide.
What I’ve discovered writing these reviews is that they take a lot of time. Writing’s easy. Listening takes time. If I was psychic, I figured, I wouldn’t need to listen to Balin; the universe would connect me to the collective subconscious, and I wouldn't just know everything about Marty Balin; I would BE Marty Balin.
So I drank this tea my buddy Brody takes to realign his chi, and I massaged my third eye with a ball-peen hammer. When I got back from the hospital, there were Post-It Notes everywhere (And I do mean everywhere; the cat’s still skittish). I harvested the Post-Its and discovered that during the week I was unconscious, the universe and I had reviewed Marty Balin’s solo album and doodled dozens of flipbooks showing a horse doing a high dive into a bathtub (Or, if you flip it backward, a horse jumping from a bathtub to a diving board.)
I’ve included the Post-it transcription here, but because I don’t think I’m as psychic as Brody insists I am, I listened to Balin and wrote a second review unassisted by the universe. The universe’s review is in all caps, and my subsequent one isn’t. If you feel they’re similar enough, Allen could save a lot of time by letting the cosmos take over.
MARTY BALIN HAD A WONDERFUL LIFE. HIS MUSTACHE WAS MARLIN BRANDO’S MUSTACHE’S STUNT DOUBLE IN GODFATHER THREE. HE WON A GOLD MEDAL IN BALL FONDLING AT CALGARY IN ‘88 AND HE MANAGED THE BAND GROOTNA.
HIS FIRST SOLO ALBUM, BALIN, WAS DESTINED TO CLUTTER CUT-OUT BINS WHEN THE SINGLE “BITE MY HEAD OFF, WHY DON’T CHA” TOOK OFF! IT TOPPED THE ADULT CONTEMPORARY AND ARMPIT FART CHARTS FOR 6 WEEKS THANKS TO THE PUBLICITY OF NATIONWIDE PROTESTS FROM THE DECAPITATED COMMUNITY. THE HEADLESS FELT THAT THE SONG WAS CULTURALLY INSENSITIVE, DEPICTING THEM AS BRAINLESS AND LAZY BECAUSE OF THEIR HABIT OF NOT BREATHING.
OTHER THAN THE SINGLE, WHERE BALIN’S VOCALS SOUND LIKE DONNA SUMMERS IF SHE REPLACED HER LIPS WITH LAWNMOWER BLADES, THE ALBUM PAYS HOMAGE TO THE UKRAINIAN NICKLEBACK COVER BANDS THAT FLOODED THE AIRWAVES AND THE MISSISSIPPI DELTA IN THE LATE ‘40S BY INCORPORATING SLIDE WHISTLE AND PAN FLUTE ON EVERY CHORUS.
REQUISITE 80’S COVER: PENGUIN ATTACK BY GWAR
RATING: A MILK CARTON WITH MY FACE ON IT
Okay, here’s what I wrote after the hallucinations tapered off.
Marty Balin had an amazing career. He founded Jefferson Airplane, played Woodstock, was knocked out by Hell’s Angels at Altamont, wrote a rock opera, was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, was given a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and produced and managed the band Grootna. That turned out to be true. Weird.
Balin got into health food about the same time the rest of Jefferson Airplane got into cocaine. He left for a few years but came back to create Jefferson Starship with a few of his old bandmates.
If you know any of Starships’ laid-back AM hits (“Miracles,” “Runaway”), then you have a good idea of what Balin, Marty’s first solo album, sounds like. It’s pleasant and listenable in a David Gates/Stevie Winwood sort of way. If you’ve been to the dentist since 1981, you’ve heard “Hearts,” the hit off this album. Dentists want us good and relaxed when their hands are in our mouths and play only the calmest retro hits.
The band on Balin is tight. The arrangements are strong. Distorted guitar fills dance over acoustic strumming and Fender Rhodes. Yes, there’s distortion, but it’s mellow distortion. Your dentist’s fingers are safe! The singing is croontastic! Marty croons more than Tony Bennett. His diction is perfect, but his voice swoops and dives like a wasted hummingbird.
One disappointment is that Marty, who wrote big hits for Jefferson Airplane/Starship like “Volunteers” and “With Your Love,” co-wrote only 1 of Balin’s 9 songs. The covers are all well crafted, mature examinations of personal relationships, but they are not memorable.
Even though I can’t find anything about Balin to complain about, I gave it a 3.5 because it sounded more at home in a dentist’s office than in my den.
https://open.spotify.com/album/1qIyjl3oGyc4zBvBFFTJUu?si=5qhN0RTkQum_yzSAD0CrhA
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