On the Break

Placing Greg Parker's EP in the CD player is a little bit like taking a trip back in time, musically speaking. While Parker appears with an acoustic guitar on the front cover, acoustic guitar never seems to make much of an appearance until the forth cut. Instead, Parker and company sound somewhere between rockabilly and Roy Orbison, singing about heartbreak to the sound of an electric guitar. At 13 minutes, On the Break only gives a small idea of Parker and what he might be capable of. While there are promising moments on the EP, the overall results are tentative. While "Get in Line Caroline" has a nice, dreamy quality, the chorus verves off course and breaks the spell. "Disaster Waiting to Happen" is a fairly straightforward bit of rock with a nice harmonica solo, but the song nonetheless grows monotonous, even though it's only two-minutes long. The acoustic "Molly Dear" attempts to change the pace, but it lacks the energy of the electric pieces. The EP finishes with "Kathleen" and it's a nice closer as well as one of the more interesting songs on the album. It once again combines Parker's romantic vocals with electric guitars, and at two minutes and fifteen seconds, seems to pull things together. While On the Break doesn't completely work, Parker clearly has a unique gift that will hopefully be more fully exploited on later recordings. ~ Ronnie D. Lankford, Jr., Rovi