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Real rock 'n' roll

Tigerbabies
Tigerbabies
By Alison Pipitone

Slice Records: 2006

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This review first appeared in Turbula in December 2006.

For the past decade, Alison Pipitone has been releasing some of the most melodic alt rock heard anywhere. She writes songs with melodic hooks that grab you by the ear and won't let go, she sings with a sense of abandon not heard since Chrissie Hynde's early days in the Pretenders, and her band is invariably as tight as a snare head.

Her sixth album (they've all been issued in the last decade) is her best.

And yet, unless the music world suddenly becomes a meritocracy you'll not hear her on the radio.

She lives and plays out of Buffalo, N.Y. Puts her records out on indie labels.

The suits in Hollywood apparently have little use for a talent who lives in the sticks and is on the wrong side of 30.

But if you want to hear some of the rawest, most energetic modern rock 'n' roll this side of, well, Joan Jett, check out Pipitone. Her new songs here are absolute classics: "You Can't Keep a Good Woman Down" may be the best of a stellar set, with a hook you'll never get out of your head, great guitar work from Graham Howes, and an insistent rhythm from bassist Rebecca Mercurio and drummer Patrick Shaughnessy.

Look, all the praise heaped on Pipitone in this review won't do a thing to make her rich nor famous.

But if you, the reader, are tired of hearing boring music, want something that will get your blood moving, want some real rock 'n' roll that will get your feet demanding access to a dance floor, you couldn't do much better than Alison Pipitone.