RED TANDY EP
Album Review
by Jeff Elbel

The Mother Hips crashed following 2001's engaging but ignored Green Hills of the Earth. Four years later, the band reconvened to release this EP in advance of a full-length. The band's "B" influences resurface: Byrds, Buffalo Springfiled, and Beach Boys. "Red Tandy" suggests the band also steeped itself in the Beatles' Naked reissue of Let it Be. The single finds the Hips swinging, with no trace of the bitterness expressed before their hiatus. Unforced California harmonies by Tim Bluhm and Greg Loiacono elevate "Blue Tomorrow." The song's bass bounces effortlessly along, as if Paul Hoaglin just left Paul McCartney's school of bottom-end countermelody. "Colonize" criticizes the advertising community's proclivity for co-opting and destroying the appeal of anything original. If the band needed a breather, their music is better for it. Welcome back.