TWO ANGELS AND A DREAM
I'm puzzled. Perhaps you can help. You see, usually when a band loses a spot on a major tour like OZZFEST, fails to sell a significant number of records, or has their tour support yanked by their label (at least that's the current story), as was the case with DEPSWA... there's some indication as to WHY. Maybe their songs suck. Maybe the singer has a penchant for sodomizing chickens (not that anyone necessarily DOES, but if I owned a record label and I found out one of the guys in one of my bands was fucking chickens, I'd be less inclined to throw money their way... but I digress).
I'll fully admit that I heard all the gritty stuff about DEPSWA before I heard their music, so I assumed there was some big festering reason for them getting yanked from Ozzfest. Their name doesn't mean anything (it's taken from a Sean Connery film,
Medicine Man, so it's not like there was some huge pre-existing stigma attached to them (although the name is a far cry better than their original, CARCINOGEN...talk about negative). I just finished listening to
Two Angels and a Dream all the way through... twice... and I can't figure out why these guys aren't selling records, and why Geffen pulled their tour support. The songs are hooky as hell, and there's at least three or four singles on this disc, most notably "This Time", "Let It Go", and "From The Inside". Some Freddy Mercury-ish vocals even poke through on the eclectic "Traveler's Song" which closes out the disc, so there's no shortage of musical ability.
Howard Benson (P.O.D., LESS THAN JAKE, SYTEMATIC, BLINDSIDE, MOTÖRHEAD, HOOBASTANK) produced their CD, so there's a real emphasis on vocal melody and harmonies, and production is very punchy. You'd THINK these guys would be all over rock radio and MTV...but they're not.
...and WHY?
You got me, man. I'm stumped. If you take a listen to and look at every other young rock act being peddled on radio and television, they're not doing anything drastically different than Depswa is. Maybe that's why. Maybe their sound is SO in line with a lot of other bands cluttering up radio, that they don't stand out enough...and that's a shame. Hear that, kids? You can start a band, write your ass off, get signed to a major label, and STILL not catch a break! The music business is fun, isn't it? Now, who wants to go broke, tour the country in a shitty van, and eat cold cereal?! Show of hands! anyone? Anyone? Hmm...
Depswa is a prime example of a great band who (apparently) isn't being given a fair shake at making their mark. They're definitely
worth the twelve bucks to hear some great tunes.
