Freddie Stevenson All My Strange Companions by: Ed Butler Tue:27-May-08 Label: Juicey Musical Creations Year: 2008 WB rating 53 out of 100

Goo Goo Dolls. Are there three words in our lexicon more inclined to send shivers up the collective spine? They are, more than any other hyper-innocuous band, representative of that most insidious sound – mid-America contemporary rock. Anyone remember ‘Iris’? This sound dragged musical evolution backwards 10 years, much like the Eagles of 20 years earlier, propelling inoffensive, mind-numbing pseudo-rock to the forefront of the public consciousness – but sadly without the Eagles’ skill. Matchbox 20 (‘Push’), Train (‘Drops of Jupiter’), Three Doors Down (‘Kryptonite’), the list goes on ad nauseum.

And now, with far less fanfare, comes the evidence that the malaise has successfully crossed the Atlantic. Freddie Stevenson, a Scotsman, manages to recreate the musical banality that permeated much of the mid 90s. However, he has somehow, inexplicably, avoided the kind of bile-rising fare of the aforementioned culprits. And the chief reason for this is the opening track, ‘Easy Now’. Reminiscent of a forgotten Clash demo – at least the first verse - played acoustically, his three-chord staccato rhythms allow him to name check JK Rowling with impressive chutzpah and not come off like a try-hard.

Then the chorus kicks in. And it’s Goo Goo Dolls territory. And that, in a nutshell, is the story of All My Strange Companions; bursts of quaintly charming pop buried in the graveyard of a dead sound. That said, there’s something to be said for Stevenson’s aforementioned impudence. It’s one thing to rehash a genre that is beginning to re-emerge as the essence of cool, driven by multitudinous faceless bands on MySpace, another thing entirely to stamp your name all over an album of music that everyone’s mum would be happy doing housework to.

So long, that is, if mum enjoys a good down-tempo ballad. Because after ‘Easy Now’, the album’s true colours burst forth in a wash of slide guitar and brushed drums. ‘Alibi Song’ and ‘Czechoslovakia’ are of a vintage that many of us thought was utterly extinct, double-time choruses, gentle, unobtrusive harmonies etc. etc. As if to accentuate the inherent Americana leanings stapled to every spare inch of All My Strange Companions, Stevenson’s vocals are completely devoid of accent, the only hint of his Scottish upbringing being the references to local places and people.

Having now thoroughly disparaged All My Strange Companions, however, it is time to say something important. Had this record come out in 1996, it would have gone to number one across the planet, -- challenging Hootie and the Blowfish for international dominance, and winning a Grammy for best adult contemporary in the process. This is, indeed, damning with faint praise, but it is a superior example of this most vomit-inducing brand of ‘soft-rock’. Stevenson has a wonderful ear for a melody, and his voice, geographically unidentifiable as it most definitely is, is smooth and rich enough to lend some drama to lyrics which can generally be considered on the sweet side of ridiculously saccharine.

And that’s the problem. It’s so nice; so safe. So bland, banal, vanilla, smooth, inoffensive, unobtrusive, innocuous, harmless, innocent, mild and prosaic as to barely leave a real impression on the mind. There’s some talent there, but buried as it is in a mound of acoustic guitars and easy rhymes, it comes across sounding as though it is merely a forgotten relic from a decade ago, re-released for a bit of nostalgia.