Among this summer’s most anticipated music releases was Hard Candy, the newest artistic endeavor from the Counting Crows. The Counting Crows were originally formed during the grunge-dominated early 1990s. What set them apart from the rest of the crowd at that time was their refusal to adopt the punk influences, which were dominating much of the music at the time. Over the last decade, they have managed to produce four successful albums and to find their niche in today’s music scene with a catalogue of elaborately orchestrated songs, which serve as a fitting backdrop to the lyrical styling of front man Adam Duritz.
In Hard Candy, the Counting Crows have once again established themselves as the masters of sophisticated pop music, distinguishing them from the sea of generic flavor of the month bands, which come and go seemingly overnight. With Hard Candy, they have produced what is possibly their best work since 1993’s August and Everything After. The album was produced by Steve Lillywhite, whose body of work includes releases by U2 and The Dave Matthews Band. Lillywhite’s influence is very evident in the album, which is much more focused than the group’s last two releases, This Desert Life and Recovering the Satellites. The album distinguishes itself in that it focuses on the passion of Durnitz’s lyrics while not wandering off into the mundane.
“Hard Candy,” the album’s title track, comes across as a tight pop song, while “American Girls,” the first single off the album, is a skillful stylistic union of Big Star and Tom Petty. The balance of the album is filled out with poetic songs and punctuated with climactic guitar playing. Similar to their previous albums, the Counting Crows give the feeling that their songs are written around their lyrics with the instrumentals being merely an extension of Durnitz’s linguistic mastery.
Overall, Hard Candy will please both seasoned Counting Crows fans and newcomersalike. Local tour dates include an October 4 stop at the RPI Field House. Tickets for the show are available at the Field House box office for $20 with an RPI ID and a four-ticket limit per student. The Field House show should be a good one because the Counting Crows are known for their quality performances in smaller venues. Having only seen the Crows once in August 2000 headlining with Live, I personally am eagerly anticipating this event which hopefully will cater to RPI students more than last year’s concert which featured the overrated Grateful Dead tribute band, The String Cheese Incident.
