{"id":4471,"date":"2016-03-16T11:21:24","date_gmt":"2016-03-16T15:21:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/?p=4471"},"modified":"2016-03-22T14:21:09","modified_gmt":"2016-03-22T18:21:09","slug":"violent-femmes-we-can-do-anything","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/violent-femmes-we-can-do-anything\/","title":{"rendered":"Violent Femmes <br>We Can Do Anything"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Violent_Femmes-We_Can_Do_Anything.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-4473\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-4473\" src=\"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Violent_Femmes-We_Can_Do_Anything.jpg\" alt=\"Violent Femmes, We Can Do Anything\" width=\"250\" height=\"250\" srcset=\"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Violent_Femmes-We_Can_Do_Anything.jpg 250w, https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Violent_Femmes-We_Can_Do_Anything-150x150.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 250px) 100vw, 250px\" \/><\/a>If you\u2019ve ever been into so-called alternative music, at some point you\u2019ve probably played the printing off the Violent Femmes\u2019 self-titled debut. It\u2019s like the evergreen starter kit for odd kids. For the band, it must be a blessing and a curse to have an album so ubiquitous; everyone knows and loves that record but forgets they released another seven after that one. Minus a brief hiatus in 1987, the band chugged along until 2009 when they split up. However, two out of three members\u2014singer and guitarist Gordon Gano and bassist Brian Richie\u2014buried the hatchet and hit the road again in 2013. It seemed like they were content to gig playing the hits and not worrying about making a new record, but then a four-song EP, <i>Happy New Year<\/i>, appeared last year for Record Store Day. With the stage set, the Femmes have released <i>We Can Do Anything<\/i> (PIAS Recordings), their first full-length since 2000\u2019s <i>Freak Magnet<\/i>.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s an odd position to be in. Having gone so long without anything new, there\u2019s an element of reintroduction. Towards that end the band has returned to basics. If you dig into the Violent Femmes\u2019 catalog, you\u2019ll see various attempts by the band to diversify their sound, but nothing really stuck. <i>We Can Do Anything<\/i> unapologetically leans into nostalgia for the first record. Although it was former Dresden Dolls\u2019 drummer Brian Viglione joining Gano and Richie (he has since left the band), the classic Violent Femmes formula is intact: acoustic guitar, stand-up bass, and a snare drum getting the beejesus beat out it with a pair of brushes. There\u2019s some additional instrumentation\u2014a little accordion, a flash of electric guitar, and a grab bag of instruments from the band\u2019s live auxiliary unit, the Horns Of Dilemma\u2014but it\u2019s generally the sound you know and love.<\/p>\n<p>Surprisingly, though, the album sometimes skews a bit too young. There\u2019s nothing particularly wrong with a song rife with masturbation double entendres (\u201cFoothills\u201d), but it seems like someone might pop out and ask, \u201cYa get it?\u201d Then there\u2019s \u201cI Could Be Anything,\u201d which feels like a strange demo for a discarded children\u2019s album. But <i>We Can Be Anything<\/i> gets it right when it taps into universal longing. Songs like \u201cWhat Do You Really Mean\u201d wouldn\u2019t sound out of place alongside a classic Brian Wilson composition. Not every song hits that mark, and some songs seem like throwaways, but one could imagine that with some slightly different sequencing the weaker songs might have been masked. Overall, it\u2019s a respectable return from a band that could easily have rested on its laurels.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you\u2019ve ever been into so-called alternative music, at some point you\u2019ve probably played the printing off the Violent Femmes\u2019 self-titled debut. It\u2019s like<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[34,1294,1637],"class_list":["post-4471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-reviews","tag-album-review","tag-pias-recordings","tag-violent-femmes"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Violent Femmes We Can Do Anything - The Agit Reader<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/violent-femmes-we-can-do-anything\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Violent Femmes We Can Do Anything - The Agit Reader\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"If you\u2019ve ever been into so-called alternative music, at some point you\u2019ve probably played the printing off the Violent Femmes\u2019 self-titled debut. It\u2019s like\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/violent-femmes-we-can-do-anything\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Agit Reader\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheAgitReader\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-03-16T15:21:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-03-22T18:21:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/Violent_Femmes-We_Can_Do_Anything.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dorian S. Ham\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@agitreader\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@agitreader\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dorian S. Ham\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/violent-femmes-we-can-do-anything\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/agitreader.com\/wp2\/violent-femmes-we-can-do-anything\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Dorian S. 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