Verbena - La Musica Negra

Clearly still trying to live down the promise of a terrific indie debut and the Dave Grohl-inflated hype of the major release that followed, Verbena’s ill-titled new album, ‘La Musica Negra,’ finds the band attempting to resolve the Mick Taylor-era Stones homage of their 1997 debut ‘Souls for Sale’ against the more contemporary Afghan Whigs-meets-Queens of the Stone Age sound the band (along with producer Dave Grohl) toyed with on 1999’s major label debut ‘Into the Pink.’ To that end, they’ve enlisted the services of artist-friendly producer Rob Schnapf (Vines, Elliott Smith, Beck).

Although the album’s first single rocks better than anything else you’re going to hear on the radio these days, 'La Musica Negra' is best (“All the Saints” “Me and Yr Sister” “Ether,” and even the closing piano ballad “Dirty Goodbyes”) when the band resists the temptations to deploy the stock modules of post-grunge rock that dominated their last album. With the recently departed Anne Marie Griffin absent, ‘La Musica Negra’ is not as strong vocally as Verbena’s previous records (except perhaps on “Camellia” where singer/guitarist Scott Bondy is accompanied by Shivaree's Ambrosia Parsley), and the band is not as effective instrumentally as a power trio—too lyrically and stylistically referential, too quick to lock onto stiff, over-produced, and overblown rawk riffs.

‘La Musica Negra’ sounds like a band headed in the right direction but just not quite there yet.

Matt Parks (September 28, 2003)