Gold

Album Review

Trans Am and the F*****g Champs have walked this road before, holding hands on the 2001 EP Double Exposure. That time it was the Trans Champs who got credit for the work, and for Gold they give the other halves of their respective monikers a ride as F*****g Am. Not a name that will sell records in the local Wal-Mart, but from Blind Faith to Minuteflag, supergroups have always relied on their lineage to fuel interest. Those Trans Am/F*****g Champs fans who dip their toes in Gold's precious cargo won't be disappointed. Gold walks a mean line between the Devo-Moroder arm-wrestling of Trans Am, and the economic heavy metal history lessons of the Champs. It starts off with a tug of war, really, with the Champs heaving for the metallic Allman Brothers riffing of the first track, "Bad Leg," and Trans Am picking up the slack for the electro-rock of the second song, "The Gauntlet." They hit their stride about half way through on "Taking Liberties," with guest vocalist Jillian Iva doing her best Lou Gramm impression over a Faces-meets-Free groove and find a common math rock foundation on "Powerpoint" before launching into an epic three-part suite "Acoustico Gomez," "Elastico Gomez," and "Electrico Gomez." The stride on Gold, however, never really breaks into a full run and instead coasts on the same name-cred fumes that gave F*****g Am legs to run on in the first place. That's not bad news for fans of Trans Am or the Champs, but might leave other comers a bit cold.