Reflections is the de facto solo project of Clint Newsom. Newsom has been in a number of punk bands such as Rhythm of Black Lines and Hades Kick. DOGS WITHOUT FEAR OF DYING is Reflections debut project; hopefully there won’t be another.
Newsom has an interest in anthropology, and it is reflect in DOGS. There’s lots of percussion, lots of chanting. Maybe if I played it often enough, it would rain, but I somehow doubt it. A lot of dogs started howling in my neighborhood whenever I put DOGS on, and I’m not surprised. The chanting is irritating as hell, and for the most part hijacks the songs it is on. The worst offender is “Carmelita,” the only cover on the CD, and yes, it is a cover the Warren Zevon classic. Reflections’ take is even worse than Linda Ronstadt’s; Reflections renders it unrecognizable from the original in particular and music in general. Occasionally a track starts off interesting and then breaks your heart. “Diamond Caverns” goes for almost two minutes before it starts to suck. It bears a faint resemblance to a John Lennon tune, “#9 Dream,” (actually a closer resemblance to that tune than Reflections’ cover of “Carmelita” does to, well, “Carmelita.”
Part of the problem on most of the tracks on DOGS WITHOUT FEAR OF DYING is that there is too much going on. There’s chanting and drums and singing and yelping. On “Washington’s Air,” there’s way too much going on just with vocals and banjo. Then it gets worse. Somebody, God help me, is whistling by the end of it. The ultimate effect is similar to having a musical earwig chewing through your brain.
DOGS WITHOUT FEAR OF DYING? This bad boy is DOA, whether it knows it or not. It’s going right to the top of the skeet file. PULL!!!
