Search - Secret Machines :: Road Leads Where It's Led, The (EP)

The complete

alexander laurence | Los Angeles, CA | 07/22/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The New York City zeitgeist has come and gone. Once the dust has cleared one

of the best bands is The Secret Machines. We have had five years of bands who

think they are the Velvet Underground or Joy Division. People want more than

retro rehash. People who don't live in NYC don't relate to these cool bands

that sing about cops, gutters and subways. Who cares? The Secret Machines are

definitely are the leaders of the second wave of New York based bands who have

been playing more musical and difficult songs. Whether you want to call it

"progressive" or "Psychedelic Music" it doesn't matter. This EP is really a long

single with some cover tunes. "Better Bring Your Friends" is a song they

have been playing live recently. Then there are songs by Van Morrison, Bob Dylan,

and Harmonia. There is even a Motown song by Barry Gordy Jr. I couldn't

imagine any of the cool NYC bands playing any of this stuff. I don't think that

most of them would be capable. Only maybe Mercury Rev or Arcade Fire could pull

off this sort of record. I look forward to their next record. The Secret

Machines could be a band that could put out four or five great albums in the next

ten years.

"

Worth the cover charge...

The Swift Runner | Carmen Santiego, USA | 06/07/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I'm not one who usually responds favorably to covers. Everyone has been to the pub/bar down the road and had to endure that awful cover of Have You Ever Seen the Rain, which somehow manages to completely remove all semblance of what made the song great (anyone ever seen the band Blueshammer in the movie Ghost World?). Sometimes, if you are lucky enough, a band will even lay the song down on record, so you can take it home with you to use the following morning when you need to induce vomiting. Occasionally, though, a great band will take hold of a great song and make it all their own. The Beatles, The Stones and Bob Dylan were all masters of this. Of course, the father, the son and the Holy Ghost can bless not every band, so, most covers are simply bad homage. When I saw the new Ep by the Secret Machines yesterday at my local record store, I was hesitant. I enjoyed the self-titled second record, but didn't think it was worth $10 to buy an Ep of only six songs that were mostly covers. Then I turned the CD over to reveal that the Machines had chosen to cover one of my favorite not-as-well-known golden nuggets in Van Morrison's Astral Weeks. The song comes from my personal favorite album of the same name. I got to thinking, what is a band like the Secret Machines doing covering Van Morrison? I then looked further down at the track listing and found that they also had chosen Girl From the North Country by Bob Dylan. Girl From the North Country? That is a folk song, a country song (see the version with Johnny Cash) and one of my favorite songs of all time. My intrigue was too great, and I had to buy it. I immediately threw the CD in my player and skipped to song three. While the cover of Astral Weeks was certainly different, it really didn't capture any of the mystiques that the original so greatly conveyed. I liked it, but didn't think that I would find myself hitting repeat over and over again. Girl From the North Country, however, struck me like an hour-long sunrise. It sounds like the Johnny Cash version sung in outer space and quite possibly, may lay claim to being a quintessential version of the song. It is not better than the original and never could be, but it certainly can stop your thoughts in traffic. If you take that with the already worthwhile original songs, you have an Ep that certainly will be one of the year's true unexpected surprises."

So THIS is how they got the psychedelic rep...

Tim Brough | Springfield, PA United States | 08/10/2005

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I think Secret Machines may be the next great band to rise from the New York scene. Forget all these fashion poseurs and retro-bands that can't seem to make the leap past 1999. The Secret Machines delivered the goods on "Now Here Is Nowhere," and this time filler EP will have to do till the next album arrives.



It starts off with a trimmed down version of "The Road Leads Where It's Led" (I guess radio still fears intros longer than 20 seconds) and features a new song that is about on a par with the debut album's material. Then things take a left turn near Saturn and veer into space mode. Four covers that dissect their originals and unearth the origins of SM's undeserved comparisons to Pink Floyd (frankly, I still think Secret Machines is a gutsier version of Wilco). They saturate Van Morrison's mystical "Astral Weeks" with reverberated metallic atmosphere. They slow down the classic Motown oldie "Money (That's What I Want)" so much that you'd never recognize it except for the lyric.



Then they all but eclipse Bob Dylan by turning "Girl From The North Country" into some kind of cosmic freaky nine minute dirge. It completely transforms the song and claims it. To me, that's a skill to hallmark a great band. Just when you think it couldn't get any weirder, they follow that with an obscure German electronic band, Harmonium, and cover "(De Luxe) Immer Wieder" in its original German. It's a novel and risky move, and Secret Machines pull it off. It makes this EP a worthy collector's piece, and whets my appetite for the next album."