Make It Mine

Blues, jazz, folk, rock, pop, country, with a little musical theatre, shoved into a blender and frapeed into a smooth, refreshing, 80-proof sipper, with just enough bite to make you shiver a bit. From the title track "Make It Mine" to the final track "3 Letters", Champagne Sunday's debut recording is like taking a guided tour through the ringer. It brings to the foreground, with utmost sincerity, feelings of love, friendship, contempt, abandonment, defiance, despair, hope, and all with at least the hint of a smile . . . or is that a sneer? The album starts off with the hopeful thoughts of "Make It Mine", an ambitious and clarion statement that "The world is my oyster and no one can stop me". That sets the stage for the rest of the album as perhaps phase one of some treacherous quest for personal fulfillment. Standing in the way of that fulfillment are characters like the ever-present asshole of the guitar-driven face-melter "Pretty Boy", and the shameless nay-sayer of the musically schizophrenic "Leery". Songs like the live-for-today anthem "Leather Life", and the love-warmed ballads "With You" and "Blanket" (if you close your eyes, you can hear that L.T.'s guitar solo is actually constellations singing to a pair of lovers) give the listener a gentle hug or a pat on the leg and remind them there's plenty in life to smile about. From "Ventura Sky" (the journey's moment-of-doubt theme song) to the final song, the album gets thematically a little darker as the quest for happiness pushes forward. The driving music of the Beatle-esque "Take Me Down" belies the burden of which it sings. The power-country-ish "Sons of Main Street" portrays a fed-up call girl trying to cut ties with a town that secretly loves yet publicly despises her. Then, quietly, the album culminates in the acoustic tear-jerker "3 Letters", a stark look at a broken father-daughter relationship. With a blend of styles, a roller coaster of emotions, some smoking guitars, and killer vocals, "Make It Mine" is the powerhouse debut of a band with something to say to you.