Signed to Slash and contemporaries of The Del Fuegos and Beat Farmers, Wisconsin's BoDeans began cutting solid, if unspectacular, roots-rock with 1986's Love & Hope & Sex & Dreams. Despite top-notch producers (T-Bone Burnett, Talking Heads' Jerry Harrison), touring with U2 and a Rolling Stone Best New Band gong, they never quite pulled it off. The tight'n'fast "Wild World" and downbeat ballad "Slipping Into You" apart, their return seems similarly blighted: there's gusto aplenty, but Sam Llanas' and Kurt Neumann's emotive vocal attack and chiming guitars ultimately lack killer hooks or instinct.
Signed to Slash and contemporaries of The Del Fuegos and Beat Farmers, Wisconsin’s BoDeans began cutting solid, if unspectacular, roots-rock with 1986’s Love & Hope & Sex & Dreams. Despite top-notch producers (T-Bone Burnett, Talking Heads’ Jerry Harrison), touring with U2 and a Rolling Stone Best New Band gong, they never quite pulled it off. The tight’n’fast “Wild World” and downbeat ballad “Slipping Into You” apart, their return seems similarly blighted: there’s gusto aplenty, but Sam Llanas’ and Kurt Neumann’s emotive vocal attack and chiming guitars ultimately lack killer hooks or instinct.
