Deckard lacks musical, lyrical inventiveness

By Kelly Lucas
Summer Reporter

If you're going to rely on three chord melodies, you'd better have some damn good lyrics to back them up. Deckard, however, does not.

On Deckard's fourth album, "Stereodreamscene," the first three being EP's, the band sounds like the typical alterna-rock band — nothing new, innovative or exciting.

Deckard, a quartet from Scotland, has already had its first single from the album, "What Reason," played on radio stations in the United States, mainly on the east and west coasts. Deckard's music is exactly what radio stations, which don't seem to be too choosy these days, want — something to fill dead air.

Songs such as "Conversation" exude Deckard's lyrical stupor. Chris Gordon, vocalist and guitarist, sings "I didn't make this conversation for the sake of conversation/But for the sake of our relation and because my heart is racing/I just don't make conversation for the sake of conversation."

That same lyrical ineptness is echoed throughout the album on tracks such as "Christine" and "Remain this Way."

Although, most of the tracks aren't exemplary, there are a few that are enjoyable. Tracks like "Still" and "Sycamore" show a more creative and promising side of Deckard.

However, the most potentially popular song on the album may in fact be "Christine." On "Christine" Gordon sings of his longing to be a girl.

"It isn't easy being a girl like me/One who's still a boy on the outside/See it's hard enough to fit into my girlfriend's clothes/When I'll get my own only heaven knows/It isn't easy being a girl like this/Society would laugh when I take a piss/But I laugh too 'cause it's pretty lame/Yeah I laugh hard 'cause I'm not ashamed."

The music on "Christine" is mundane, but I wouldn't be surprised if this is the song that starts appearing on radio stations across the United States, since Americans just can't seem to get enough of quirky songs such as the Bloodhound Gang's "The Bad Touch," Eminem's "The Real Slim Shady" and Sisqo's "The Thong Song."

But I doubt Deckard, who took their name from a character in the sci-fi movie "Blade Runner," will even make it to be a one-hit wonder like Sisqo. On the other hand, they do have a set of pretty attractive mugs, at least they have that to fall back on.