The Slackers

The Slackers seem to have taken a more serious tone on their fifth album, Close My Eyes. With a cover that features a crying woman facing away from images of 9/11, most of the songs on Close My Eyes focus on topics like aging and war, not their traditional topics of lost love and fried chicken. This could be the influence of vocalist/keyboardist Vic Ruggerio who takes on a central role this album, singing on almost every song and firmly transplanting Q Max as the band’s main vocalist. Vic’s New York drawl lends itself to slower, more subdued songs and the two instrumental tracks lean more towards dub than jazz, giving the album a more subdued sound, like on their second album Redlight, rather than the playfulness of their last effort, Wasted Days. There are some definite new classics for Slackers fans out there, and only a few weak tracks. As a whole the album is definitely stronger than Wasted Days, but doesn’t have the overall brilliance that Better Late than Never and Redlight both possessed.