Disappearing Angels

The off-the-cuff brilliance of the best of Tav Falco's music isn't always obvious even for the initiated. Balancing precariously between irony and sincerity, he has a unique ability at his best to raucously revive the spirit of the past while still sounding modern. His experimentation with styles, ranging from rockabilly and swamp blues to tango and lounge has sometimes resulted in a loose cacophony that his fans know and love — as in his 1980 debut LP Behind the Magnolia Curtain — and sometimes it manages to strike the sweet spot of modern revivalist entertainment, as in 1991's Life Sentence. The brief Disappearing Angels veers closer to the latter, but Falco's offbeat crooning reminds you that while his band — Alex Chilton, Rene Coman, and Doug Garrison — does play the tunes with naturalistic precision, the music herein is far removed from standard fare. His cover of Joe and Audrey Allison's "He'll Have to Go" is closer to Charlie Feathers than Jim Reeves, and if his "don't pity me" refrain from Angel Villodo's "Kiss of Love" doesn't bring a smile to your lips, then you're made of pretty stern stuff. Elsewhere, the Falco originals merge into the whole seamlessly, and overall this short 1996 CD is one of the best introductions to his brand of offbeat entertainment.