CROSSCUT SAW

By Crosscut Saw Tony McPhee was the only remaining member of the band responsible for cutting such brilliant albums as Split and Hogwash. Whether this made a difference or not is open to debate but this line up certainly lack the fire of his earlier incarnations of the band. Of course this is also down to the material they have to work with which is simply not in the same league. There's no Split Part 3 or I Love You Miss Ogyny here for example. They were also now a 4 piece with Dave Wellbelove helping McPhee out in the guitar department; a little unnecessary I would say.

Crosscut Saw lacks for the most part the more experimental aspects of the band which are replaced with a fairly pedestrian selection of straightforward rock songs in the main and while far from being bad don't shout out for repeated plays. There's the odd nod to the past however like in McPhee's extended fuzz guitar solo that ends Fulfilment. He also uses synths on a few tracks but at best they're unnecessary, at worst annoying like on Live A Little Lady. Three Way Split is probably the nearest they come to recreating past glories with an unexpected and total change of tack from its mid tempo no nonsense beginnings into a heavily accented (from the band) guitar solo towards the end.

As often is the case on Groundhogs albums there's the nod to the blues with the acoustic Mean Mistreater which while totally acceptable is not as good as something like Ground Hog off Split. Album closer Eleventh Hour is another track that benefits from an extended guitar solo and not a bad way to end.

By no means a bad album then but with so many better ones from the band this record is pretty much for completionists. 2 ½ stars.