Daniel Cartier - Avenue A (1997)

Flat and full of contradictions, this major-label debut from East Village subway performer Daniel Cartier comes off muddled and directionless. With enough ink tattooed on his shaved skull to complete a 300-pound biker's sleeve, the New Yorker might have looked like the menacing "folk-punk" he proclaimed himself to be, but Avenue A's alt-pop is more middle of the white line in the middle of the road than outsider existentialism. Slicker, and with more electric instrumentation than his debut Live from New York: The Subway Session, this follow-up contains none of the sonic grit Cartier's urbanite image forcefully projects. Besides a few drug and specific geographical references (as in the title), the record evokes none of the big city's claustrophobic, brutal complexion, giving Avenue A's grimy taxis-and-street-people artwork the transparency of a calculated put-on. The disc's most surprising (and disappointing) artistic disconnect, however, is Cartier's off-key wailing. Such marginal singing is completely ill-fitted for the songwriter's densely melodic material. While listening to Avenue A, it's hard to imagine the record's producer failing to recognize the songwriter's vocal limitations. Had this most fundamental of problems been identified, perhaps the otherwise decent material would have been given a more realistic vocal treatment. This toning down might have saved the album. Besides his grating howl Cartier does display a confident, passionate style and fine guitar playing, but Avenue A ultimately amounts to a textural mismatch like spreading rose petals with an air rifle; it's neither fierce nor pretty, and the shredded results inspire nothing.