I hear rootsy R&B; is in this year, along with equestrian-style boots. I just bought some nice zip-up knee-lengths myself, and now spend my days on the streets comparing them to those of other girls. Did I get the right pair, with buckles in just the right place? Will they become spring fashion castaways? Could all that money have gone to more superfluous records with which I could compare this album? Probably not, 'cause I got 'em all: the Stooges, the Modern Lovers, the Velvet Underground (in their first wave), and all those second-generation rip-offs I wholeheartedly love, against my better judgment.

Vue appeared in the late 90s amidst the quote-unquote glam revival which you may recall as a media conspiracy centered around Ewan MacGregor's final stab at babeness, Velvet Goldmine. At that time, the shoes were platforms (mid-calf and often more round at the tip, unless chased with mod, in which case, we went for the Beetle-boots). Vue's riding rigs were a bit more glittery back then-- their 1999 debut EP for Gold Standard Laboratories, The Death of a Girl, and their self-titled Sub Pop releases frequently garnered comparison to Pulp or Jonathan Fire*Eater. Lots of people ate it up, but of course, the contrarian types at Pitchfork smelled a sequin-studded rat and slid both efforts into the pan.

Well, now's now and everybody like the Strokes, the White Stripes, et al. Detroit will save America with its big, bad rhythms and no one cares how contrived the lot is. Enter the new Vue album, a slam-damned, roots rockin', acoustic growlin' Jaggermonica explosion of the righteous past. But let's be honest here: all those words I just reeled off mean absolutely nothing. That's the point. This is rock!

From the border-skipping ruse of "Hitchhiking" to "Do You Think of Him Still?," there's that heavy-handed sexuality, and that grotesque pout so associated with collagen-laden chic types and yesterday's real deal (ahh, glam again). These moments are certainly shameless, but nothing compared to "People on the Stairs," which shivers from its naked exposure as a cosmetically lifted "Sister Ray."

Still, they're pretty good at it. Frontman Rex John Shelverton, a guy who must sleep in a proper little tie, appropriates Jagger in much the way Christian Slater copped Nicholson's trademarks. It's locked in. Distortion prevails, mixing keys and blues guitars in that perfect blend of mud to snazz. It's so real I want to go up to it in a lobby and touch its leaves just to be sure, or scratch it along a window like a shady fiancée. But I know, as far as anything goes, that the appearance of "authenticity" is a construct (any time spent reading about Lou Reed's supposedly beat life will tell you that) and perhaps all this tittering about sonic opportunism is just so much revisionist righteousness. What? I mean to say, this album rocks shamelessly in this autumn's boots and cares not. That's just what they do. I guess this makes me a contrarian's contrarian, or perhaps just another fashion victim.

-Daphne Carr, October 12th, 2001