Note: This review originally appeared in the March, 2009 edition of the Illinois Entertainer. That was the issue that featured the crowning achievement of my journalistic endeavors: An interview with Graham Nash. I also had an extended piece on The Bee Gees’ Odessa album, and Around Hear reviews of Hired Goons, a band that combines The Ramones with The Simpsons; and the hard-hitting trio, Bruiser.
The March 2009 cover story was a profile of Fleetwood Mac, written by Janine Schaults, who would later go on to become IE’s editor .
I had mixed emotions about the Meet Ellie CD, but a year later, I would express more positive things about Ellie Maybe’s punk/pop band, The Maybenauts, and their high-speed and infectious Big Bang EP.
As introductions go, Meet Ellie is more of an extended middle finger than a handshake. The Ellie Maybe Experence (yes, it’s intentionally misspelled) revels in matching R-rated insults to a variety of arrangements. That singer-songwriter Ellie Maybe delivers even her raunchiest material in a sweet, folk-singer style voice is initially ironic, but the novelty doesn’t always pay off.
She does spin some clever scenarios, like the woman in “Rufus,” who likes her ex-boyfriend’s dog so much she sneaks biscuits under the guy’s door. On the catchy “I Thought I Could Love You,” she’s hot for a guy until she sees him performing with a third-rate rock group. By contrast, “Hacks Of The Heartland” is an overly bitter swipe at Midwestern copy bands. “Carcinogens” is a generic hard rock song about giving up smoking, but on “The Clap” and “Cum On Baby,” The Ellie Maybe Experence backs illicit desires with energetic melodies.
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