FREE DOMESTIC SHIPPING ON ORDERS OVER $75! *TERMS APPLY

ROCK-N-RAMA

PATTI SMITH—Radio Ethiopia (Arista):: Horses was almost too skeletal; Ethiopia is almost too meaty. I personally have never listened to an Aerosmith album beyond a few bars, but this guy Jack Douglas sure knows how to get a drum sound. Too bad Patti gets treated like another instrument in the mix...

March 1, 1977

ROCK N RAMA

PATTI SMITH—Radio Ethiopia (Arista):: Horses was almost too skeletal; Ethiopia is almost too meaty. I personally have never listened to an Aerosmith album beyond a few bars, but this guy Jack Douglas sure knows how to get a drum sound. Too bad Patti gets treated like another instrument in the mix... is that why she nearly delivers a lyric sheet with this LP? Picturing Harry Crosby's opium pipe could be looked at either as a departure (from Crosby's self-destruct coy posturing), or as an indulgence (in the worst sense of Crosby's "legacy"). Given the 14-odd minutes of "Ethiopia/Abyssinia", the latter would seem to be the sad fact...redeemed, with too-brief, glory, but the all-out BLAST of the rockers that lead off sides one and t\yo; nothing has kicked me in the teeth so hard since "Search and Destroy." Patti's got the notion and the capability (and the band) to draw blood from stones; when she takes full rein of it, you're gonna swim or drown, believe me. Maybe third time out. P.L.

Sign In to Your Account

Registered subscribers can access the complete archive.

Login

Don’t have an account?

Subscribe

...or read now for $1 via Supertab

READ NOW