"HAPPY days are here again," sings Steven Adams in his opening pronouncement, sounding as manic as Jack Nicholson in The Shining.
Happy days are not here again: this second full-length album from the Cambridge wing of the Americana Appreciation Society was conceived in the aptly titled Sick Room in the middle of the Norfolk nowhere; the album title is a reference to a friend returning home after abject failure in love. Adams is exorcising demons, stirring the dark stuff on O Princess, Yer Little Bedroom and Last Song.
Yet the off-kilter urban wit cuts through the sarcastic misery on the devilishly mischievous Living In Sin and hillbilly hoedown Honest Man's Blues, and all girls would surely run a mile when Adams demands "come back home" amid the sound of broken glass on Where The Hell Is My Baby? Mid-album, hetakes a weekend time-out on John Belushi, the happiest sad song of the year. Welcome home, winner.
Updated: 08:46 Thursday, April 07, 2005
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