On the Radio The Upside of Sidecar BY SAM PFEIFLE
	SIDECAR RADIO Release Soundtrack from the Upside | with Paranoid Social Club, Lost on Liftoff, and Animal Suit Driveby | Fri., Oct 28 at the Asylum, in Portland | 207.772.8274

There’s been a self-imposed ban on Rustic Overtones in this column for the past six months or so. Christ, the band’s been done for more than two years, yet, when talking about Paranoid Social Club or As Fast As or Tony McNaboe, there they’d pop up again. So I stopped. Dave Gutter was no longer former frontman of Rustic Overtones, Spencer Albee no longer former keys player, McNaboe no longer the former drummer. They were now just the current whatever they were.

But this week, I can’t help myself. With Sidecar Radio’s debut full-length Soundtrack from the Upside — the closest thing in a little while to a genuinely eagerly awaited debut from a Portland band — we now have something like the next generation of the Portland scene. Principal songwriter Christian Hayes, for whom the Sidecar Radio was once named — i.e., the Christian Hayes Element, until they got sick of being thought of as a religious band and switched to simply the Element, then ran into copyright problems — was in high-school when Rustic were at the height of their popularity and he was clearly a fan. His songwriting smacks of Rustic’s melding of rock, reggae, hip-hop, and soul — along with echoes of Fishbone, Sublime, even Guns ‘n Roses — but, instead of feeling like a ripoff, it’s more of an homage, an updating of a sound that energized Portland with an unprecedented electricity.

Such is the accessibility of the Portland scene that Hayes and company elect to borrow Dave Gutter’s talents right off the bat, leaving no doubt as to their allegiances. He appears as a guest vocalist on the opening "Adrift," a 1:30 number with an echo effect ringing out on a second guitar track and Gutter and Hayes doing a chanting, ethereal thing that merges seamlessly into "Above the Tide," where Hayes and Gutter do more of a duet. "Tide," as the first proper song here, is more of a fitting introduction to Sidecar Radio’s sound. If you’ve heard Grand National, or early Police, you’ve got an idea for the kinds of reggae rhythms they like to indulge in, bright and poppy.

The chorus, especially, shines here, with Hayes and Gutter combining on something close to "Yesterday I found just what I needed/ Yesterday I found the voice of Eden." Hayes’s vocals throughout the disc are hard to discern and it’s possible listeners are missing out on some great lyricism — I can’t say. The "Tide" bridge, featuring all stops leading into Hayes being supported by just bass and drums, and then a distorted guitar lead that could use some definition, leads nicely into a delicate final version of the chorus, with Hayes sounding vulnerable and naked.

On "Sleepwalker," which follows, Hayes does a little bit of Bradley Newell to open, vocals talked quickly over a relaxed guitar that just picks out a few notes here and there while the rhythm section stays relatively active. The Fishbone breakdown for the bridge is all funky and sneering then even hits a Beatles chord ascension that you won’t see coming at all, but you should recognize immediately.

He appears, too, on the standout track here, "Bones," which gets help also from Flaherty, Elyne Kahn, and I-Rates bassist Scott Girouard with backup vocals and handclaps that turn it into a real party number. A halting backbeat morphs into a blues-brothers kind of driving rocker for a bit, then settles back into the verse before the guitar joins the rhythm section for some syncopation and launches into an ascending riff. I just love the building tension around the 2:30 mark, helped much by Albee’s Hammond.

What I’ve described isn’t as derivative as I might be making it out to be. Mostly, it’s exciting to hear one Portland band play with the direction another band went in a few years before them. It’s exciting to see talent of this level collaborating in Portland on new and interesting rock music that really doesn’t sound like much out there in contemporary radio right now. If a listener wants to hear Sublime’s "The Ballad of Johnny Butt" in "Mice and Men," it’s going to be hard to argue. But they should also listen for the spectacular bass work from Corey Tibbetts throughout the disc. He’s lyrical in his lines, incredibly active, and largely responsible for the three-piece putting out such a comprehensive sound.

On the heavier "Devil’s in the Details," Tibbetts is completely out on his own, walking up a repeating riff that doesn’t have anything in Ryan O’Connell’s drum line to hang on to. It’s a difficult pair of parts that could easily fall apart if not done right.

Which is the point here, I guess. If executed poorly, or too soon in Sidecar Radio’s development as a band, this album could have fallen totally flat. Instead, we get a thoughtful and pretty opening to "On the Radio," just vocals over spare guitar chords: "On the radio fading to and fro is the ratio/ Between left and right/ Bass and treble is the level/ Got the changin’ and makin’ the hairbrush seem so right." The hairbrush? Yeah, the hairbrush — as in the thing you hold up to your mouth as you sing along with your favorite band in the mirror.

Christian Hayes and his bandmates aren’t just singing along anymore.

Sam Pfeifle can be reached at sam@phx.com