Glimpse by Triangle Paradise (Review)
I never had MTV growing up, so it wasn’t until my freshman year in college that I was able to experience all of those ’80s videos that I’d missed in my formative years. One thing I noticed was that many of these videos consisted of nothing more than gangly, awkward guys cavorting with hot chicks. Case in point: look at the J. Geils Band. They were certainly no prize, but they had a video that consisted of nothing but nymphets prancing around in lingerie for crying out loud. Listening to Triangle Paradise reminds me all of those early 80s videos, but not in a good, nostalgic way.
Glimpse fits nearly every bad ’80s new wave pop stereotype to a T, especially in the lyrics. Glimpse’s view of male/female relationships is about as deep as, well… they’re not deep. Combine that with fairly poor production, and you’re left with an EP that sounds like nothing more than a bar band covering old ’80s classics.
Glimpse sounds tired and forced, and though Triangle Paradise certainly strives for it, there’s no magical pop spark to be found. All of the songs on Glimpse average around 4 minutes in length, but nothing happens during the course of the song. The guitars start up, the drums kick in, and I listen to a guy doing his best Tom Petty impersonation sing insipid lyrics about love and heartbreak.
According to the little press packet I received with the CD, Triangle Paradise (which consists of Marco Kinsley and Mike Carrothers) “mold melodic rhythm, dynamics and finesse with true to life lyrical qualities of expression, ending with the simple goal of making your soul feel.” Unfortunately, I didn’t feel much of anything while listening to Glimpse.
If making my soul feel requires a guy singing “I’m tired of laying my heart on the line/Again and again, time after time/I only wanted to make her mine/But now she’s proved to me that love is unkind,” well… I think you know where I’m going on this one. I can understand lyrics like that from a punk band whose average age is 16, but when matched up with Triangle Paradise’s tired take on ’80s pop, it’s no J. Geils Band. Heck, it’s not even Tommy Tutone.