Review Summary: Sixteen minutes of fun and generic 60s pop with four minutes of independent greatness.
Soup has been one of my favorite bands for a long time, and the reason for that is Doug Yankus. He was a awesome songwriter, albeit a bit more diverse than some of his psychedelic contemporaries, and his guitar playing was legendary. Even his clean singing was some of the best around, powerful and full of range. Alas, things weren’t always like the way they were in Soup. Just two years earlier he formed the group The Private Property of Digil. Back at that time, his songwriting wasn’t entirely developed the way they were two years later, but maybe there was a reason for the lack of complexity, as
The Private Property of Digil EP is sixteen minutes of pure unoriginal fun and joy on record.
It’s true, instead of indulging in guitar oriented masterworks like the stoner anthem “Dance Magic Woman” or progressive build-ups like in “Tennessee”; Yankus has decided to look for influence from the pop scene in Britain. Heck, the album even contains influence from The Beach Boys too. “Jewelry Lady” features the group singing in unison, while the chorus is easily the most sing-a-long tune that Doug Yankus has ever written. Despite that, “Jewelry Lady” is also the most musically technical of the songs, and while that doesn’t say that much at all, it does show a little bit of what the man would become, containing a nice interesting build-up guitar line for the final chorus and a decent solo. The major problem with the record is that the band has to live up to that, and unfortunately nothing ever does. “I’m Looking At You” is about as close as you get, containing some Lennon-esqe singing from Dan Jacklin, and a jumpy and hyper guitar line that catches your ear from second one. However, after “I’m Looking at You”, the songs just plagiarize from all the pop artists that I just mention, bringing nothing else to the table other than that enjoyable, albeit simplistic and unoriginal pop tunes. Doug Yankus would turn out to be an excellent songwriter later in his career, that’s for sure, but on this album he just digs for poppy hooks, and while he does strike gold, the music is simple and rather generic.
Band Members:
- Doug Yankus – Guitar, Songwriting, Vocals
- Dan Jacklin – Bass, Backing Vocals
- Chuck Posniak – Organ
- Steve Gertsch – Drums, Backing Vocals
Disclaimer: You maybe asking yourself this question: why the hell did that idiot SHOOTME/bastard put up the album art for Soup instead of the album art for this album. Well, my simple answer to that is that the album was originally released as a tape in the late 60s, only to eventually be released with the Soup CD later. If you find a copy of Soup's self-titled, you will probably be getting a copy of this with it, so do not fret if you can't find a copy of just this.
