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The Curious Case of the Stereophonic Cast Recording
Paying homage to a band without catalog access is usually a recipe for terrors. Will Butler’s Fleetwood Mac experiment is an impressive exception.
Adjmi’s succession of in-studio bon mots and benders dramatizes the toxic interplay between ego and surrender that makes for great music, while composer and former Arcade Fire member Will Butler and the Stereophonic cast (all of whom play their own instruments) conduct daring time travel experiments. It delivers finished versions of the songs sparking intense power struggles on stage — which you learn throughout the course of the play are being relegated to album outtakes — offering breathing room to the tantalizing bits of the story that beg for more attention: The strutting “Masquerade,” an ominous rocker by the Buckingham analog, Peter (Tom Pecinka), a singer and guitarist striking the perfect balance between egomania and blues-rock excellence; the chugging “Bright,” a catchy folk-pop tune by Diana (Sara Pidgeon), our Stevie, a raspy singer-songwriter who joined the band with Peter, her insecure boyfriend; or the galloping “Drive,” by Holly ( Succession ’s Juliana Canfield), a British blues rock vet, like Christine McVie, now in retreat from her band and also her marriage to Reg (Will Brill), the bass player. It’s a shame that Stereophonic doesn’t play up its clear-and-present influence; the Mac is the elephant in the room in interviews with Butler, who has said he was making music a young Kurt Cobain might love – a chuckle since the Nirvana front man was more into the KISS wing of ‘70s rock – and Adjmi, who was first thinking about Led Zeppelin when the studio concept came to him.
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