King Cannons
The Brightest Light
EMI
I was somewhat shocked to hear that this was a Kiwi band – albeit one (of many) based in Melbourne. You see, I figured they’d formed in the UK, right when Bruce Springsteen started opening his shows with London Calling. The sound of The Brightest Light is so obviously taken from those two ideals/idols: Bruce and The Clash. Well, that’s not always true. The second track is so bad as to suggest a bizarre and unwanted collaboration between Billy Bragg and Jim Steinman.
They’ll tell you this is blue-collar/good-time stuff; they might even tell you that it’s a little bit Green Day-esque but what they won’t tell you is that this is horrible. And that’s really what you need to know, because this is. Really, really horrible. Where some of the other Springsteen-aping bands get by because of a handful of pretty good songs and a committed performance style/energy (The Holdsteady) or a rabid fan-base (The Gaslight Anthem) King Cannons simply has a bubble of hype. And I really don’t know where it’s come from.
This album sounds like Joe Strummer alive and on welfare unless he agrees to a winery tour; this album sounds like sub-par Springsteen. And that’s not an easy sell these days. Check out the last two Bruce albums: he’s got the market for sub-par Springsteen material all sewn up.
Bubble burst.