Rarities, Vol. 5

Album Review

At this point you can pretty much expect Dwight Twilley to be, well, Dwight Twilley. He's been turning out the same brand of the Beatles-meet-Brian Wilson-meet-Tom Petty power pop for a long time now, and he's shown no signs of changing, although now his releases appear on his own or other independent labels. This set of demos and other rarities, the first of four such volumes of Twilley minutiae from Gigatone Records, simply underscores Twilley's immutability — the sound, even if some of these are demos and live tracks, is still the same, and for fans of power pop, that's a very good thing, because Twilley does it very, very well, even if at times he does it so well that it sounds just like the last song he did. Highlights here include the infectious "Sky Blue," the lovely "Prisms and Glass," the lead track, "Sexual," which rides a slowed-down rhythm that reminds one of Twilley's earlier "Looking for the Magic," and an ok cover of "Needles and Pins," and any of these would fit seamlessly on any album Twilley has ever issued. These tracks may be rare, but they're not unusual, at least not for Twilley. This is what he does, turns out power pop love songs and anthems, and he's been doing it at this same level for a very long time now.