{"id":6957,"date":"2019-07-26T05:00:15","date_gmt":"2019-07-26T05:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/?p=6957"},"modified":"2019-07-24T22:25:30","modified_gmt":"2019-07-24T22:25:30","slug":"rod-melancon-pinkville-blue-elan-records","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/?p=6957","title":{"rendered":"ROD MELANCON – \u2018PINKVILLE\u2019 (Blue Elan Records)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The\u00a0<\/span>newie from the S<\/span>outhern US songwriter, storyteller and actor is a concept record broadly inspired by the horrors of the Vietnam war and its ongoing impact. Vintage rock\u2019n\u2019roll sound that nods to<\/span>\u00a0Tom Petty, The Rolling Stones,\u00a0<\/span>Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Like the soundtrack to a movie that doesn\u2019t yet exist, Rod Melancon\u2019s ‘Pinkville; whips up a world filled with shellshocked war veterans, gun-wielding rock & rollers, and other down-on-their-luck characters, mixing cinematic details and electric guitars into its own version of greasy, gothic Americana – Well, that’s what the PR blurb wanted us to believe and to be fair Gothic Americana is a new genre on me.<\/div>\n
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His songs are indeed dark and his voice which swings from a spoken-word to a croon to a rough-edged howl.\u00a0 It’s every bit as diverse as the material it delivers. ‘Pinkville’, is his fourth album. You’ve got something approaching psychedelic soul, Traditional Rolling Stones good-time rockers and tributes to the likes of\u00a0 Tom Petty, and if that’s not enough there is even time for a cover of Bruce Springsteen\u2019s ’57 Channels (And Nothin\u2019 On)’.<\/div>\n
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‘Pinkville’ draws on personal memories from back home in Louisiana. It was there, that Melancon grew up. During these visits, he’d see this guy who is the central theme for the opening spoken words track that clearly left a mark on Melancon. then to follow it up with a dark bruising number that’s part Alice Cooper part voodoo swamp rocker is a real toe-tapper.<\/div>\n
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Melancon, uses\u00a0 Will Walden, as the album\u2019s lead guitarist and co-producer. The son of Emmy-winning composer Snuffy Walden,\u00a0 In ‘Pinkville’ his tremolo guitar rustles up images of a platoon on patrol, while the Keith Richards-inspired playing of \u201cWestgate\u201d draws on his teenage memories of getting stoned and just being a teen. Its got a similar feel to a lot of the work of John Cougar where he draws on his memories for his subject and sways from Americana to rock and roll and its a really well-constructed song that you just want to nestle near the speaker and let the story wash over you.\u00a0 The solo is pretty cool on this one as well like he’s riding the volume and trying to soothe the savage feedback and to be fair he succeeds.\u00a0 ‘Corpus Christi Carwash’ tells the true story of Freddy Fender\u2019s former gig at a car wash, is all 1950s pop ballad with a great traditional progression on the muted chords, while ‘Lord Knows’ gets a groove on like it was still the 1970s.<\/div>\n
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‘Heartbreakers’ celebrates the influence of Tom Petty \u2014 a songwriter who, like Melancon, who came from the South before moving to the city of Angels. He turns his own struggles into a roadhouse rocker with ‘Manic Depression’ a little understated when up against some of the other tracks on the record but all good albums have light and shade. Then to end the record\u00a0Melancon turns it up during the loud, ‘Cobra’ whilst it’s not racing away more purposeful with the part sung part spoken lyrics again its got light and shade and a decent closing number on an altogether impressive album.\u00a0A real melting pot of an album to be fair and one I found myself getting lost in and enjoying revisiting it time after time.\u00a0 If this is Gothic Americana then I’m on board and highly recommend it.\u00a0 Fill yer boots, my friends,\u00a0 ‘Pinkville’ was a very pleasant surprise.<\/div>\n
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Author: Dom Daley<\/div>\n
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Website<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
Facebook<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
Twitter<\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The\u00a0newie from the Southern US songwriter, storyteller and actor is a concept record broadly inspired by the horrors of the Vietnam war and its ongoing impact. Vintage rock\u2019n\u2019roll sound that nods to\u00a0Tom Petty, The Rolling Stones,\u00a0Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.\u00a0 Like the soundtrack to a movie that doesn\u2019t yet exist, Rod Melancon\u2019s ‘Pinkville; whips up a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6998,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[2830,262,1818,2829,1930,495],"class_list":["post-6957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-review","tag-blue-elan-records","tag-bruce-springsteen","tag-new-album","tag-pinkville","tag-rolling-stones","tag-tom-petty","post_format-post-format-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6957"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6957\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6999,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6957\/revisions\/6999"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rpmonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}