Blake Babies

There's something about the Blake Babies' music that's as fresh as a whiff of just-mown hay
at eight o'clock on a summer's morning. The dew is not yet dry on this Boston band's back;
the trio's music is chock-full of a sense that the days to come will be rife with adventure
and hope. Sunburn, the band's second record, exudes youthfulness and charm, a gaiety of
spirit that despite, or perhaps because of, its occasional lapses into amateurishn... More >

Sure this trio has its own sound, kind of--jagged, perky, sprung. And more important, songs. But so many indie bands have sound and songs that they flop or fly on content anyway, and here content means Juliana Hatfield. For their varying gender-based reasons, some men and some women find her too cute, but I say she's a former girl who's willing to be winsome and has her gender-based beefs regardless, e.g. "I'm not your mother." Later, probably with a different guy, she pops the big question: "If I called on you from far away/Would you say the things I want you to say?" I would, Juliana, I would, whisper a million (or anyway a couple thousand) lonely fellows. But when it came down to cases they probably wouldn't. (Grade: A-)