JOHN DOE
Forever Hasn’t Happened Yet
Yep Roc
· Former Blaster and X-member Dave Alvin, Neko Case, Grant Lee Phillips and John Doe’s daughter, Veronica Jane, play cameo roles on this album.
Fifteen years after John Doe exited X’s highway of curvy punk for a pothole-punctuated countrified solo sound, he’s still veering about making breathtaking musical lane changes. Trouble is, on Forever Hasn’t Happened Yet, some of those changes jar you away from the best part of the trip – just when you’re strapping yourself in for a heartbeat cruise through cool scenery and a sweet radioload of tunes.
Album opener "The Losing Kind" is a hypnotic heart’s-eye view of hindsight, but it gets knocked out of the groove by the next song. There are some really sweet and simple drifty songs like "Twin Brother" and "There’s a Black Horse," which feel as if they were recorded in some softer time or place, but too many others fall flat, as if Doe found a line and is still searching for a song to hang it on.
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