With Headlight in the Sun, Joshua Path veers
dangerously close to the kind of prefab pop rock that
floods forth from WB teenie soaps. Close enough to
enjoy both mainstream radioplay while remaining intelligent
enough to garner some college rock radio hype.
The album took three years to emerge and unfortunately the extended gestation
period has left the disc purged of immediacy. Despite a vague aura of distance
throughout, Path proves himself a talented songsmith, easily straddling genres
and diverse tonal shifts (from the Elliot Smithian whisper-folk depths of “Spider
of Love” to the drug-dirge blues of “Devil At My Door”). But Headlight
in the Sun never manages to sustain a meaningful story arc or fully mine
the thematic depths skimmed on many of the disc’s 15 tracks.
Path starts out strong with the grunge-lite melodies of “Sleep In Your
Sunshine” and the stunning title track opener (in which Path attacks whorish
musicians devoid of originality or really, any differentiating features, hence
the stellar couplet, “Everybody said you’d be the one/ But you shine
as brightly as a headlight in the sun.”)
The all too short acoustic-based ditty, “Thief” and the lo-fi spectre-soul
of “All I” provide some mellow highlights, while “Records In
My Mind” and “It Was Over Before It Began” suggest Path could
rightfully inherit the void left behind from power pop groups like the La’s
and the Flamin’ Groovies. And by the time Path croons about “methadone
and the morning chill” on the album’s closing track (“Heroin
Will Bring Us Back Together Again”), you can’t help but hope he’ll
follow up with a more concentrated effort in the near future.
Favorite Track: “Headlight in the Sun”
