Album Review: Colleen Green - Sock It To Me

Sock It To Me, LA's “finest” grunge-pop artist Colleen Green's third release, is made up of disparate elements that are likely to be incredibly divisive. There is something inherently attractive about the simplicity with which the ten tracks on display are laid out – drum machines, easy chords, even easier lyrics (“My boyfriend's got the darkest eyes you've ever seen/Darker than midnight on Halloween” on Darkest Eyes is about as deep as it gets), all delivered with an air of laissez-faire ease and lack of flair. Songs like Yr So Cool and Heavy Shit evoke The Breeders if the Deal sisters were still in high school (albeit transplanted to 2013), packing apple bongs and listening to Best Coast with Nathan Williams posters on the wall. 

But this can also be problematic, such as when Only One continually iterates how much Green loves her boyfriend – it all becomes a little cloying and even idiotic. There are flourishes of interest that delves outside such straightforward posturing – the subdued slink of the title track, the synth-driven naivety of Close To You.  Yet the same things that seem striking (the simple pleasures of a repetitive distorted riff, the sugar-hit melodies) begin to irk, just as the elements that repel (overt candy-cane approach to musicianship, lyricism, melody and affected disdain) begin to strike a chord. Many a track is likely to get the feet tapping, even as you wash your ears out with soap. Sock It To Me then comes on less like a roundhouse right knockout blow and more like a rabbit punch to the back of the head. Inexplicable, even despicable, yet effective nonetheless.