MISH MASH Mandate: Flaming Flamenco

Sali Hagan is a sensitive female singer/songwriter with an edge. Think Sarah McLaughlin meets Janis Joplin, in the vein of Fiona Apple or Nikka Costa, if you really need a comparison. She approaches each song with an aggressive spirit, pouring herself into each track with enthusiasm, all the while exploring a variety of styles and genres in her music.

Hagan opens the album with Destruction, where she growls with soulful stride. The loose structure of Love keeps the groove alive by avoiding the traps of a standard pop song, whereas Trace embraces a pop-friendly, Beatlesque feel. The centerpiece strings and piano lines of JW takes the album briefly into another direction, where Hagan shows her softer side. This is softness juxtaposed against the quirky, hard beats of The Lift.

It's a wide range of musical styles, but Hagan pulls it off with grace and focus. The end result is a suprisingly tight effort which showcases a heck of a lot of talent.

MISH MASH Mandate: Soulful Strut

Emo goes prog-rock in this dynamic album from this mostly instrumental quintet The Coma Lilies. Shunning all pop structure, the songs twist and turn with reckless abandon, all wrapped up in an acidic teen angst. The overall atmosphere is created by a barrage of guitars and layered synths, which are held up by a bruising rhythm section of bass and drums.

Highlights include the dizzying intro track Grab A Fork Micron, and the derranged mix of sound effects and electronic moods of The Antibody. The beauty here is in the darkness, and these songs are quite dark and mysterious.

MISH MASH Mandate: Dynamic Noir

What happens when you take Buddy Holly's original backing band and 13 different popular artists to cover some of Holly's hit songs, along with some other early rock "classics"? You get something along the lines of this hit-and-miss collection, which features cameo performances from Eric Clapton, Waylon Jennings, Graham Nash, Johnny Rivers and Vince Neil.

At times this collection is fairly interesting and a pleaure to listen to, like the quiet take on Someone, Someone by Clapton, and the country-shuffle of Bobby Vee's version of Blue Days, Black Nights. But, I do have some issues. My first complaint would concern the overall sterile sound, which is way too slick in many places. And, there is simply no excuse for the pitful cover of I Fought The Law, featuring the aforementioned former Motley Crue frontman. Vince Neil does best when surrounded by overdriven guitars and garage-rock production---not clean guitar riffs and spotless sound. This song is sheer sonic poison, and should be avoided at all costs.

MISH MASH Mandate: Buddy's Buddies