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Aztec Two-Step

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Aztec Two-Step

 
Aztec Two-Step
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Average: 4.5 (16 ratings)

About as apt a statement on the essential dichotomy of the folk-rock era as has ever existed.

  • We Say...

    One of the darkest light albums in history — and vice-versa — the debut work of Aztec Two-Step, aka Rex Fowler and Neil Shulman, is about as apt a statement on the essential dichotomy of the folk-rock era as ever existed. On the one hand, these two deceptively brilliant musicians spend about half their time wasting their acoustic chops mooning about frilly relationships hardly worthy of a poet's pen or a picker's angst. Yet you can't get the tunes out of your head. The remainder of the album gives starker clues to their secret identities as Simon & Garfunkel's black sheep siblings or the Everly Brothers on acid. Plus, their portrait of Kerouac's beatnik buddy Dean Moriarty (called "Persecution & Restoration of Dean Moriarty") has to rank with Dean Friedman's "Ariel" as the most unlikely lyric ever to reach the Top 100. The duo has been dining out (and paying two mortgages) off that song and this album ever since.

  • They Say...

    A pleasing example of soft singer/songwriter folk-rock from the early '70s, Aztec Two Step is a consistent effort from the duo of Rex Fowler and Neal Shulman that might appeal to fans of James Taylor, Simon & Garfunkel, and Seals & Crofts. Sometimes their pretensions get the better of them (as on "The Persecution & Restoration of Dean Moriarty [On the Road]"), but overall, the album is quite enjoyable.

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