Though they had Bob Rock in the producer’s seat, Tonic really stopped rocking on their third album.

TONIC – Head On Straight (2002 Universal)

This album really should have been their best to date, with talent like Bob Rock at the console.  Instead, it sounds as if Rock was bored or distracted, and there was nobody in quality control for songwriting.  The band sound desperate, chasing hits, and not doing what they used to – rock in their own style with twang and stomp.  The bland cover art belies the faceless music within.

The misleading opener “Roses” is a typical de-tuned early 2000s rock song.  The riff and chorus fail to lift off.  It slams hard, but there’s nothing at all to hook you in.  It’s as if the band have forgotten how to write songs.  You can hear that Jeff Russo is doing some cool stuff on guitar, but you can’t actually hear it!  It’s buried under the uninteresting riff.  It’s like they forgot all that southern charm that made their debut and follow-up both attention-getters.

Second track “Take Me As I Am” is the first ballad, and it’s fine, if a bit cookie-cutter.  It has hooks.  Three more ballads follow, and none are as memorable as anything on the first two albums.  Even the title track, “Head On Straight”, is a ballad.  I was expecting a rocker.  These ballads just don’t have the weight or impact of past albums.  They’re well produced and hefty enough, but they lack that je ne sais quoi they used to have.

“Liar” is the first rocker in a dog’s age, and it’s crap.  Low on melody and high on cliche, it ain’t good.  Then, more ballads!  Songs like “On Your Feet Again” might work a lot better if there were only two.  As it is, the brain just can’t differentiate from song to song.

Fortunately, “Come Rest Your Head” isn’t a ballad, but it also doesn’t really rock.  It has one riff that rocks, but it meanders into the murky swamp of “meh”.  Bet you’ll never guess that “Ring Around Her Finger” is a ballad though, and it’s the sappiest yet.  Singer Emerson Hart affects an annoying falsetto.  This song just stinks.   It’s followed by “Believe Me”, which I guess for lack of better words, we will also call a ballad.  It’s not a rocker, so what is it?  Mid-tempo schlock with xylophone, on an album that needed adrenaline in any form.  It’s atrocious, is what it is.

“Irish” is also embarrassing.  Would you call this a sea shanty?  A rock sea shanty?  I have no friggin’ idea.  Normally I like this kind of thing – rock music with a celtic bent – but maybe I’m just sick of this album and feeling salty.

The album ends on…a ballad.  “Let Me Go”.  It’s so cliche, it could have been music from a Family Guy montage.  Fortunately the song picks up at the end, but until that point, it is the most cliche song on the entire album.  “Let me change my direction, I won’t take their rejection!”  But Emerson…you did change your direction.  You use to have some serious emotion; now you’re punching a clock.  It’s no wonder this was Tonic’s last album before a break up.

The shame of it is, I like these guys.  I adore the first two albums, and I followed Jeff Russo through to his career in TV soundtracks.  The last minute guitar burning on “Let Me Go” is far too little, too late to save this album.

2/5 stars