{"id":617,"date":"2013-12-20T17:26:51","date_gmt":"2013-12-20T17:26:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/?p=617"},"modified":"2014-03-20T20:30:28","modified_gmt":"2014-03-20T20:30:28","slug":"rs-427-peter-wolf-sleepless","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/?p=617","title":{"rendered":"RS #427: Peter Wolf, Sleepless"},"content":{"rendered":"

#427<\/h4>\n

Peter Wolf,\u00a0Sleepless<\/em><\/h3>\n
Release Date:<\/strong>\u00a02002<\/div>\n
Previously Owned:<\/strong>\u00a0No<\/p>\n
\"\"
Nice of them to include a pillow with the album in case it’s a snooze.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
First Time Listen:<\/strong> Yes<\/div>\n
\n

Impressions: <\/strong>Peter Wolf,\u00a0<\/strong>former J. Geils Band front man (“Angel Is A Centerfold,”) and WXRT favorite, has never won me over as a fan. Like John Prine<\/a>,\u00a0Warren Zevon, and Boz Scaggs<\/a> for me,\u00a0He falls into that regular guy rock\/blues singer-songwriter category of interchangable white dudes that get mashed up together in my head. Completely unfair of me I know, but let’s put it on\u2026 Opens in kind of a low key sort guitars\/mandolin bluesy shuffle with “Growing Pain.” Wolf’s voice doesn’t excite me but here he seems to be operating in a mature, restrained rock -n’-roll-with-roots-accents mood. With Mick Jagger singing backup, “Nothing But The Wheel” naturally sounds like a newer Stones deep cut, and actually sounds better than most latter day Stones material. Waylon Jennings pitches in on that track too. Age has given Peter Wolf a little more gravitas to his sunglass-wearing bluesy rock guy persona from the ’80s, but still bits of that annoying jivey persona slip into a few songs, like the Tom Waits-lite sounding”Homework” or the swing blues ditty with Keith Richards “Too Close Together.” He seems to fare better on the Latin-tinged “Oh Marianne” or when he performs in a more straightforward way with the title track, but I found myself sort of bored by his vocal style. If you are a fan of this guy, you probably will eat up this tasteful collection of bluesy, rock songs done up with the late-career Van Morrison formula. But for me, while the music is solid, Wolf rarely elevated the material for me.<\/p>\n

Starred Songs:<\/strong>\u00a0“Nothing But The Wheel,” “Sleepless”
\n<\/span>Sneaky Track: “<\/strong>Oh Marianne”
\nWill you listen to this again?<\/strong>\u00a0Naw.
\nShould this album be on the list? <\/strong>Eh, I wouldn’t have put it on there.
\nReplace with: <\/strong>XTC’s\u00a01999 orchestral release\u00a0Apple Venus Vol 1<\/em> is adventurous, quirky, affecting and is a much stronger late-career album than this one.
\nSummary:\u00a0<\/strong>Tasteful blues\/rock\/roots tunes are\u00a0well played with nice guest turns but I had trouble getting past Peter Wolf’s vocals.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Rating:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2605\u26051\/2<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

#427 Peter Wolf,\u00a0Sleepless Release Date:\u00a02002 Previously Owned:\u00a0No First Time Listen: Yes Impressions: Peter Wolf,\u00a0former J. Geils Band front man (“Angel Is A Centerfold,”) and WXRT favorite, has never won me over as a fan. Like John Prine,\u00a0Warren Zevon, and Boz Scaggs for me,\u00a0He falls into that regular guy rock\/blues singer-songwriter category of interchangable white dudes … Continue reading RS #427: Peter Wolf, Sleepless<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13,10,183,9,37],"class_list":["post-617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rolling-stone-top-500-albums","tag-2-5-stars","tag-first-time-listen","tag-peter-wolf","tag-unowned","tag-wxrt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=617"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":716,"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617\/revisions\/716"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/batterymedia.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}