Dead Man Shake

Dead Man Shake

Of all the white boy rockers to reach back to the blues in mid-life crisis, none in recent memory succeed as well as Paul Westerberg, a.k.a. Grandpaboy. <I>Dead Man Shake</I> is a ragged, loud, shuffling garage-blues record that reeks of stumbling good times, and the kind of stuff you do and say when you think no one's looking at you, or you're too far gone to care. Westerberg's not making sensitive statements or trying to write a pop song as good as "Alex Chilton" here. As such, it's the best music he's made in years. The originals are bluesy slop worthy of Fat Possum's trademark of quality, while the covers are wild and strange, from a drunken karaoke "What Kind of Fool Am I" to a riotous, slide guitar-fueled "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry." Like the 'Mats themselves in concert, even the bad songs on here are good. "No Matter What They Say" has the line "I went to Madison Square Garden / And I had a terrible time," delivered so <I>Basement Tapes</I>-blankly it redeems the whole song, which you'd swear the band played while passed out. This record teems with one-liners ("I'm just a honky in the parking lot," "Get A Move On") and, against all odds, it just might be one of the year's best. <I>--Mike McGonigal</I>