Alien Alright (http://www.alienalright.com) operates as one-man band with the balls of late '60s-early '70s hard-rock royalty, everyone from Led Zeppelin to T. Rex to Deep Purple, whose undying "Smoke on the Water" is paid tribute to on "Vintage Music." Even from the cover photograph I can't tell if Alright is a musician old enough to recall and miss that era or if it is somebody who wishes he did.
"The Exodus Is Here" acts as both homage and makeover of classic-rock cliches. "Out of Tune" whips out the Queen hardware, layers of stadium-sized sonic shrapnel that then abruptly shifts tempo midway through as if it had morphed into another song on a different record. It's a trick that the Beatles had mastered so effortlessly but to unelightened disciples of cookie-cutter rock they're going to think this project is really daft. "Record Store Blues" opens with an appropriately dirty guitar intro that suddenly cuts away to a storm of crunchy, smashing riffs, paving way for a very long "L.A. Woman"-esque jam.
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"Make Some Noise" and "Unsigned and Proud" deliver some garage-rock wallop; there's enough distortion on those cuts to chop off trees. Alright's soloing is pretty impressive like on "Vintage Music" and "Underdog Appeal." Probably the biggest difference between Alright and his aging (or dead) idols is that he's not trying to sell millions of albums here, which explains the in-your-face no-frills production. It is rock at its purest.
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