GALACTIC COWBOYS - "AT THE END OF THE DAY" (METAL BLADE)
GALACTIC COWBOYS - "AT THE END OF THE DAY" (METAL BLADE)
"At the End of the Day" is filled with over an hour of rock and rock ballads, but always with a bit of an unusual twist - such as use of a lil' blues harp or guitarist Wally Farkas pulling off a really weird guitar sound.
"At the End of the Day" leaves a lot of space for singing. Apart from main vocalist Ben Huggins, bassist Monty Colving sings a handful of tunes, whereas drummer Alan Doss also performs vocal duties on one. More often than not, however, the guys go at it together and insert accessible vocal harmonies.
Vocal harmonies? Lil' blues harp? Rock ballads? Galactic Cowboys are a band with tremendous commercial potential. They're a tad less heavy than labelmates King's X, and personally I think their tunes are a bit less catchy. Exceptions to this are the groovy-sounding "Ants" and the generally excellent "Bright Horizons" and "Puppet Show". Odd one out is the melancholic closing tune, "At the End of the Day", which sounds like a "Twin Peaks" kind of sound track with elements of Enya and Jean Michel Jarre thrown in.
For those not into too much balls'n'chunks, this latest Galactic Cowboys offering is a fine album, if perhaps a bit inconspicuous.
Sixteen songs are to be found on "At the End of the Day", eight of which belong to "The Machine Fish Suite". It is obvious these guys like what they're doing, and their image certainly makes them stand out of the rest in a positive way.
RK
Written November 1998