Review Summary: Like candy, Tinted Windows are a taste one would be well advised to enjoy in small doses.
If Tinted Windows was an actual child instead of four men’s mad musical creation, it would no doubt have a very hard time staying still and restraining it’s emotions, not to mention its surefire penchant for sweets. Tinted Windows debut doesn’t come packaged with a free sample of Ritalin, but I wouldn’t have been surprised; this amalgam of power-pop experts keeps the tempos in high gear, the guitars crunchy and sharp, and the vocals full of harmonic “who-wohs” custom-built for infectious sing-a-longs.
Lead-off single “Kind Of A Girl” is a perfect microcosm of the Tinted Windows experience and the album as a whole: a churning, workmanlike guitar line by former Smashing Pumpkins’ and current A Perfect Circle axe-man James Iha, buttressed by the surging drums of Cheap Trickster Bun E. Carlos, framing some deliciously arcing vocals by Taylor Hanson (!), all the product of Fountains of Wayne wordsmith Adam Schlesinger and his deviously simple verse/chorus lyrical machinations. That was a long and complicated sentence, but “Kind Of A Girl” is nothing if not the picture of brevity, ‘60s pop mixed with the electric sensibilities of late ‘90s alternative into the stereotypical 3-minute single. Does it work? As anyone familiar with the band member’s respective histories, it should come as no surprise that it comes off like a charm.
Tinted Windows follows the formula of “Kind Of A Girl” to a tee, with the up-and-down verses and hints of falsetto in “Messing With My Head” leading into the faux-ballad of “Dead Serious” and its stadium-sized hook. After the sugar rush of the relentlessly energetic “Can’t Get A Read On You” and the chiming, echo-laden “I-want-you-back-so-bad” cliché of “Back With You,” however, one begins to wonder if this is maybe the only gear Tinted Windows knows how to roll with.
The songs on Tinted Windows can quite easily be categorized into two genres. The first is the heavily-produced pop/rock ballad, as seen in the aforementioned “Back With You,” “Dead Serious,” or the very ‘90s-sounding “Doncha Wanna.” The rest, and the majority, can only be distinguished by a generally higher tempo and more affected vocals from Hanson (I get nostalgic shivers every time I write that). “Kind Of A Girl” is an admirable, if not earthshakingly great, power-pop gem, and so are many of the following tunes here, but there comes a point where Tinted Windows reaches a clear sugar overload.
One might think this could have been avoided looking at Tinted Windows’ pedigrees, but, like so many “supergroups” before them (Audioslave, Velvet Revolver, A Perfect Circle post-Mer de Noms), they often come off as less than the sum of their parts. Hanson knows his way around a pop song, distancing himself from “MMMbop” while at the same time establishing a modicum of rock credibility, but his material is substandard. Schlesinger, the writer of so many clever turns of phrase and deceptively fluid hooks with Fountains of Wayne and others, too often turns to tired banalities like “nothing’s gonna last / “we’re just going fast” or “when you call my name / it’s like a light out of the blue.” And Iha and Carlos just seems to be going through the motions for much of the album, the occasional lick or solo just seeming out of place. Of course, when Iha actually asserts himself, like on the excellent “Nothing To Me,” it’s a teasing taste of what could’ve been.
For a bit of meaningless springtime fun, Tinted Windows is just the perfect prescription, a melodically accomplished record with a terrific ear for a hook and little substance beyond commonplace boy-girl love. Just don’t take it on a road trip any longer than an hour; like candy, Tinted Windows are a taste one would be well advised to enjoy in small doses.
