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By GREG MAKI
You probably know the story by now. To follow up its American Idol-style contest show that aired in summer 2005, Rock Star INXS, CBS recruited Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee, former Metallica bassist Jason Newsted and one-time Guns N’ Roses guitarist Gilby Clarke to form Supernova. Over the summer, with help from the viewing public, they whittled down a group of 15 finalists, eventually selecting the mascaraed and sometimes mohawked Canadian Lukas Rossi to be their voice. Due to a court ruling that a longtime California punk band has the legal rights to the Supernova name, this self-titled album comes to us under the ungainly moniker “Rock Star Supernova.”
While many music fans and critics have dismissed the band outright due to its manufactured nature (I admit it’s not the most rock n’ roll way for a band to come together), I pushed that aside to judge this disc solely on the music. If you can do that, you will find that most of the 11 songs, while they won’t set the world on fire, are competent rock tunes. The band mixes standard arena rock fare, such as “It’s On,” “It’s All Love” and “Underdog” (the TV show’s theme), with a few songs bearing a strong ‘70s glam influence, such as “Leave the Lights On” and “Be Yourself (And 5 Other Clichés), one R&B-tinged number (“The Dead Parade”) and the only total misfire, a Coldplay-like ballad (“Can’t Bring Myself to Light This Fuse”). Rossi’s “Headspin,” an emotional song inspired by his mother, is the album’s high point, but Lee’s steady drumming ensures no song is completely unlistenable.
If Rock Star Supernova decides to continue with a second album, Rossi needs to be heavily involved in the creative process. He was not my first choice on the TV show, but the album shows the guys could not have made a better decision. He is a versatile, dynamic frontman. His voice is the only thing setting the band apart from almost anything else you can hear on rock radio. On TV, he came up with daring rearrangements of classic songs and he needs a band willing to experiment with him. Lee, Newsted and Clarke know how to play their instruments, but any three veteran rock musicians could have written this album.
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