Dragstrip Courage
Echo Rock
Vinyl Richie
Dragstip Courage teeters between decent and irritating, like a pleasant friend who keeps saying the wrong things. It’s a simplistic, light rock, guitar-based outfit with a dash of originality, Americana, and eclectic styles, moving between acoustic, keyboard-backed songs and love-pop rock. There are plenty of guitar effects on here, although distortion isn’t omnipresent, and single-note fiddling constructs the backbone melody of many tunes. While their tempos are chiefly upbeat, the band tries to slow things down occasionally and, instead of something sentimental, ends up producing sluggard and tedious music.
The vocals, which often sound like they’ve been recorded twice for some kind of filled-out mini-chorus of singers, occasionally sing in close to iambic pentameter, which, while it may have worked for Shakespeare, comes across as incredibly annoying in rock. There aren’t too many hooks to keep the album alive after its been played out, but for at least deviating from the straight-rock format with their changing textures and feels, Dragstrip Courage isn’t an awful listen.
