Mike Donovan

Tempering the sad news that Sic Alps will no longer grace us with releases was the news that the band's Mike Donovan would continue on in a solo capacity and his first album Wot continues the stripping down of the Alps' sound from a downtempo boogie to a full on folk-blues ramble. "New Fieldhand Blues" opens things up with a spare and honest strummer about technological woes and the album fully embraces this acoustic approach as it wears on with tracks that dip in and out of reverbed caverns and careen down roads littered with the detritus of Skip Spence, Marc Bolan and the blues that ran through their veins. The album is short on noise and packed with bleary-eyed hooks that feel like Sunday morning come downs plowing through regret and acting as a tonic for the day ahead. Only Donovan could take a song cheekily titled "Baroque Ass" and make it a sweet tipped instrumental ramble that brings out his harmonica skills to chase the sun down the horizon. Its good to see Donovan fully embracing his inner guitar hermit and plowing through the Woodland Rock and clean-hued, low strung blues rockers that we always new lurked beneath the scratched surfaces of Sic Alps' catalog. Our world may have just gotten a little less Sic, but knowing that Donovan will keep his skewed sense of pop in print warms RSTB's heart.

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