{"id":21460,"date":"2021-08-24T05:30:22","date_gmt":"2021-08-24T09:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=21460"},"modified":"2021-08-24T10:25:11","modified_gmt":"2021-08-24T14:25:11","slug":"album-review-star-collector-game-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2021\/08\/24\/album-review-star-collector-game-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Star Collector \u2013 Game Day"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-21461\" src=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/star_collector_game_day.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"350\" srcset=\"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/star_collector_game_day.jpg 350w, http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/star_collector_game_day-300x300.jpg 300w, http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/star_collector_game_day-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/>Devotees of rock and pop will know that \u201cStar Collector\u201d is a classic Monkees tune from their high-watermark 1967 album <i>Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn &amp; Jones Ltd.<\/i> It\u2019s also the name of a superb melodic rock quartet from Vancouver, British Columbia. Influenced by \u2013 but not aping the sound of \u2013 revered bands like The Who and The Jam, Star Collector makes song that pack a wallop and remain in the listener\u2019s head long after the fadeout.<\/p>\n<p>The band has been making music for quite awhile; Star Collector\u2019s debut, <i>Demo Model 256<\/i> was released in 1999. Other albums followed: <i>Black Eyed Soul<\/i> came out in 2001, followed by <i>Flash-Arrows &amp; the Money Shot<\/i> in 2003 and <i>Hundred-Bullet-Proof<\/i> in 2006. An extended quiet period followed, with the band\u2019s fifth long player, Game Day finally appearing in 2021.<\/p>\n<p>The hiatus (or whatever it was) did nothing to tamp down the energy of the group. Guitarist, lead singer, producer and primary songwriter Vic Wayne\u2019s muse is as strong as ever. Wayne knows how ot craft a chiming melody and place it into a high-energy musical context; \u201cStranger (Renting Space in My Head)\u201d is a case in point.<\/p>\n<p>Wayne handles the lead vocals, but the band\u2019s three other musicians (lead guitarist Steve Monteith, bassist Adam East and drummer Adrian Buckley) all provide harmony and backing vocals. On tunes like \u201cThe Silent Type,\u201d those bgvox conjure the mental image of Monteith and\/or East leaning over to harmonize into a mic; such is the classic (a word used in its best sense) character of the band. Extended \u201cahhh\u201d vocals on the tune\u2019s outro contrast (yet blend) nicely with Monteith\u2019s power-chording.<\/p>\n<p>As a lyricist, Wayne has the demonstrated ability to use familiar phrases in a way that avoids clich\u00e9; he engages in wordplay with songs like \u201cHook, Line &amp; Singer\u201d without ever veering into too-clever-by-half self-consciousness. Listeners who appreciate music that walks the tightrope of power and finesse (see also: Smithereens, Grip Weeds) will appreciate the finely-tuned songs on <i>Game Day<\/i>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Devotees of rock and pop will know that \u201cStar Collector\u201d is a classic Monkees tune from their high-watermark 1967 album Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn &amp; Jones Ltd. It\u2019s also the name [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21461,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49,62,65],"tags":[4623],"class_list":["post-21460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-release","category-rawk","category-review","tag-star-collector","cat-49-id","cat-62-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21460"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21462,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21460\/revisions\/21462"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}