What's Next to the Moon

Mark Kozelek needed a change. Over the course of four years and six albums in the '90s, the Red House Painters frontman penned enough slow, open-hearted tunes to satiate even the most severely-afflicted melancholic patient. But they were so pleasant that most of us were willing to overlook Kozelek's numbing consistency-- or, at least, we couldn't bring ourselves to criticize such an apparently delicate man. Kozelek, after all, was addicted to drugs by the age of ten. Ten, people! I think he has the right to bleed onto every record, if he so desires.

Of course, Kozelek kicked his drug habit before forming the Red House Painters, and in 1992 he began a new love/hate relationship: with London's respected 4AD imprint. The "hate" part came in 1996, when label head Ivo-Watts Russell wanted to edit the long guitar jams on Songs for a Blue Guitar. Kozelek didn't yield, and took the record to Supreme Recordings, which released the album as it was. Unfortunately, not everything was resolved by this maneuver. In 1998, Red House Painters recorded Old Ramon, which will finally see release in late April through Sub Pop after years of being tied to contractual obligations with the now-defunct Supreme.

So Kozelek needed a change. He split off from his band, recorded an acoustic potpourri of covers (John Denver, AC/DC) and original material, and released the album through the Badman Recording Co. in 2000. But Rock 'N' Roll Singer hardly sounded like a change. And while the covers may seem unusual to some fans, they're no surprise to those aware of Kozelek's history with odd remakes; in the past, he's refashioned the likes of Kiss, the Cars, and Yes, to name a few. But something must have really hit home with those three AC/DC covers, because now they've appeared on a whole album's worth of acoustic interpretations of Bon Scott-era AC/DC. Cock rock, meet your new partner: wuss folk.

Admittedly, I've never been a big fan of AC/DC, but I have heard enough of their '70s output-- capped off by 1979's Highway to Hell-- to know that this is a strange marriage. Surprisingly, though, Kozelek makes the hard classics sound introspective simply by placing their lyrics in a plaintive musical context. If there's one positive remark to be made about What's Next to the Moon, it's that it sheds revelatory light on the subjective nature of lyrics. Yet, that might be the only truly positive remark this album deserves. Sure, Kozelek's voice is still smooth and sad, and his guitarwork is still deft, yet modest. But these are standard factory settings.

Once again, he's made music that just about everyone would describe as "pleasant." Except, that is, for die-hard AC/DC fans, who would most certainly be appalled at what Kozelek has done to their sex anthems. Suddenly, "Love at First Feel" isn't about statutory rape, but about a falling in love in spite of reason. And "Bad Boy Boogie" is the fatalistic admissions of a helpless rebel, not the sexual boasts of a misogynist. Fooled me.

Not that some sentiments here don't seem written for Kozelek. The first number, "Up to My Neck in You," begins, "Well, I've been up to my neck in trouble/ Up to my neck in strife/ Up to my neck in misery/ For most of my life." Here, his languid delivery suits the material. But when he exerts the same energy for, say, "Walk All Over You" or "If You Want Blood," he's no longer convincing. And other times, the lyrics just don't fit Kozelek, as hard as he tries to sensitize them. On "Love at First Feel," for instance, he sings, "I don't know what your name is/ I don't know what your game is/ I'm gonna take you tonight, animal appetite." Go get 'em, foxy.

In the liner notes to his latest part-covers album, Johnny Cash wrote, "I worked on these songs until it felt like they were my own." Kozelek doesn't seem to have done this at all. Instead, these tracks seem to have been worked on less than most "MTV Unplugged" sets. There are a couple high points: the bluesy title track, which sounds like a cut from Mark Lanegan's infinitely more successful covers album, I'll Take Care of You. And Kozelek's vocals hit previously uncharted highs on "You Ain't Got a Hold on Me," where he briefly inhabits the ghost of the sane Brian Wilson.

But overall this is Red House Painters lite, with one of Kozelek's most vital assets-- his confessional honesty-- entirely absent. Now he really needs a change if he wants to keep our interest. A big change, like reinterpreting his own songs as testosterone-fueled arena rock.