Christopher Howard

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Royal Trux
3-Song EP
Drag City

After two disappointing major-label albums, the music-noir icon Royal Trux is once again making difficult, challenging, and richly rewarding sounds with intimacy and striking eccentricity. 3-Song EP reflects the Truxters’ enduring classic-rock fascination while revisiting their experimental roots. The oft-misunderstood band takes notice of recent critical backlash against them with the seductively cryptic “Deafer Than Blind.” The guitarist/singer Neil Hagerty laments, “They want respect now for what you do/don’t wanna upset/It’s a different kind of respect than we’re used to.” The former Slint/Tortoise bassist Dave Pajo’s three-note bass line melds beautifully with the vintage synthesizers, noodling guitar, and swirling multitrack vocals of the slowly dissolving mini-epic “The United States vs. One 1974 Cadillac El Dorado Sedan.” Perhaps its recent return to Drag City will prove to be a new birth for Royal Trux.

Originally published in the Orlando Weekly on October 29, 1998.


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