He’s growing up…
[Video][Website]
[3.45]
Micha Cavaseno: 21st Century Professor of Rockist Curatorial Services and Canonical Maintenance, M. Gerard Way strikes out solo, and strikes out. Here’s the thing about having generic store-bought glam riffs, indistinguishable vocals, and no hooks: you can get away with that, if you clean up the mix a little bit.
[0]
Tara Hillegeist: In which no trace of the guy who sang “Helena” shows up. “No Shows” fronts like it’s pretty pleased with itself for getting all the narrative beats of its ’70s-inspired approach in order and forgets to invest its post-pop-punky chatter with any actual feeling beyond an artless enthusiasm; its few desires to seem artful amount instead to so much buzzing, muzzling fuzz.
[2]
Alfred Soto: Listen to the distortion and sweet pop voice — has Gerard been listening to Superchunk? Matthew Sweet? Of course not. Superchunk and Sweet would have ended this show of force at 3:12.
[5]
David Sheffieck: I feel like there’s a decent song lurking beneath the poor mixing/mastering here. But this is a boringly straightforward drumbeat with a load of distortion behind it, a song that attempts to devolve into chaos in its outro but fails because there’s nothing to distinguish it from what came before.
[4]
Mark Sinker: Nice people (probably) have a good (good-bad) time in a nearby room I’ve never entered. I don’t want to stop them; but I don’t feel invited in either, for solace or even curiosity’s sake. This mood may pass, but this isn’t the song to make this happen.
[4]
Patrick St. Michel: You do you, Gerard, but when all the people I knew went through a ’70s phase they just bought an Aladdin Sane poster and that was enough.
[4]
Anthony Easton: I like his comic well enough, and I like when famous rock stars put out back-to-the-basics records slightly better (my favourite continues to be Foxboro Hot Tubs). This is competent, but there is little to grab onto; are they even having fun?
[3]
Dan MacRae: Is this really only four minutes and twelve seconds long? Each time I put “No Shows” on it feels like I’ve been in Gerard Way’s static glam waiting room for like 20 minutes or something. It’s not an awful offering by any means, but this definitely is the sound of a guy that’s enjoying the opportunity to roam around his new surroundings. I can’t see it rebooting Britpop in America, though. (This news will surely be a crushing blow to the Midwest’s 60 Ft. Dolls-based economy.)
[6]
Megan Harrington: Shallow and imitative, I think what most appeals to me about “No Shows” is that it’s an affirmation of my own taste. It assures me that years of cuddling up to the blue light glow of some pockmarked post-punk were time well spent. Deep down I’m not sure I can totally accept the veracity of Way’s solo-mission statement, but I can’t pretend I’d do any better if I was given the world’s stage to live out my teenaged dreams.
[5]
Brad Shoup: The animal band’s so foggy, the whole production’s leaking steam. The fuzzpop riff is “I Will Follow Him” by way of the Flaming Lips’ fuzzpop phase. But the man who was happy to take instrumental-free spotlights is caught in his gears here, a vocal looking to get scratched.
[5]
Katherine St Asaph: This is the worst fucking thing I have heard all year and I am completely unable to articulate why. Around these parts we generally don’t give out a [0] without critical explication, and I’m sure there is something worthwhile to be said about Gerard Way (d)evolving into a nightmare limbo brown note acid trip. But twelve listens in the farthest I’ve gotten is still WHO MADE THIS SHIT
[0]