New Yorkers look to the English for their garage pop references. The English look to southern rock, and the south looks northward to Detroit. Greg Cartwright doesn't need to look outside himself.
The former Oblivian is back with his first proper Reigning Sound record since 2005, and the timing couldn't be better. With all these kids running around biting his sound and bragging about being on In The Red, it deserves to be noted that Mr. Cartwright is the proud releaser of early catalog numbers on ITR as well as seminal labels Crypt, Goner, Sympathy for the Record Industry and Norton.
The new Reigning Sound record, Love and Curses (also out on In The Red later this month), sees Greg exhibiting some of his best songwriting–somewhere between Dylan and the Zombies–giving us the one thing the kids can't: honesty in his stories of pain and sacrifice. It almost makes me proud that the only thing I have in my fridge is a half stick of butter and two cans of PBR.
