Music reviews. CD reviews. Critically hip!

It is rock music’s blessing and curse that just about anyone can jump into it and with some practice, fortitude, and equipment form a playing band. A relative few are absolutely great, some are positively awful, and the great majority fall into an uneasy middle from which, like crabs in a barrel, they try to crawl, if not to the top, at least out of the pack. Greatness may or may not be attainable, but they may get within spitting distance of it, if a million different factors break their way. Or not.

Resurrecting the Giants is the sophomore release from The Spoon Benders, a South Florida power trio that just might have the potential to break from the pack. Resurrecting the Giants is an interesting enough disc in that the tracks tend to show The Spoon Benders wearing their influences on their sleeves. This ultimately is both their greatest strength and most telling weakness. This Moment is not unlike U2’s finer moments; Making My Name is a jam band (remember those?) romp not unlike the Spin Doctors; Another Good Hook pays homage to quieter, though no less energetic moments, of David Lee Roth-era Van Halen. I Fell Out of the Van This Morning…well, it’s a ponderous blues tune that is funny once. Most of the tracks on Resurrecting the Giants, however, aren’t bad at all. Generally, the up-tempo numbers, such as Poison The Water, are a bit better, but overall this isn’t a bad disc, not at all. My major --- my only --- objection to The Spoon Benders is that there is nothing especially distinguishable about their material, though it‘s certainly competently performed. To put it another way, I wouldn’t go out of the way to hear them, but if I was in a place and they were playing, I wouldn’t leave.

I’d guess what I would like to hear from The Spoon Benders is material that is a bit more original. There’s a ballad on here, Painted Figurines, that I didn’t especially care for, but that certainly has some promise. They need to sharpen up their songwriting a bit so they don’t sound quite so derivative (what doesn’t these days, though?) but otherwise they’re a group of extremely talented musicians who seem to love what they’re doing. Keep an eye on them.