Yawn
I'm a great fan of G.Love and absolutely loved his first album, and I suppose therefore my dissapointment in this one was the bigger. This just feels like a tired attempt to copy his own brilliance, having forgotten what that brilliance consisted of. Uninspired is the word that comes to mind. Alright, not all tunes are boring. "Sweet Sugar Mama" is actually in old brilliant G.Love-style, "Kiss and Tell" and "Tommorow Night" are ok, but that's about it. If you're going to buy one of G.Love's albums, don't buy this one. I'm happy to say, though, that his latest - "Yeah, it's that easy" is as good as the first album, although different in style and not as innovative
The Blues Man Cometh
Wassup? I am a G. Love & Special Sauce fan and I love everything by them. "Coast To Coast Motel" is hard for me to decribe though. It was recorded in New Orleans and has a real nice bluesy feel, similar to some songs in G. Love's first album. There are some songs like "Kiss and Tell" that have a nice feeling to them, but if you want my honest opinion... when I first bought the album when it was released, I found it kinda dry and not until recently have I grown to appreciate the tracks more. But, there is alot of talent here and a nice laid-back easy feeling. My recommendation is that if you are a new fan of G's, don't start with this CD, but give it a chance once you have tried his other stuff. Peace and One Love!
More Folk Oriented, But Still Very Good
The droll humor and wistful breeziness flaunted on G's first release is transformed into a more subdued, folk-oriented follow up album. After first listen, I didn't think much of this release, but it grew on me in time. The singles Sweet Sugar Mama and Kiss and Tell are equally enticing, but other tracks like the optimistic Leaving the City, the dreary Sometimes, and the brilliant, big band foray of Bye Bye Baby are the best songs, making up the foundation of the record. Although it's quite disparate from the band's other releases, Coast to Coast Motel is nearly paramount in quality to G's other releases, and it will definately start to rub off on you after a few listens.
From Joe Pops with Love, G. Love
Wow, this is a great album, I can't believe it got a negative review. "Small Fish" is da bomb.
Just excellent music
I can't believe this album got a negative review. Neither can I believe G. Love is getting negative press in other reviews...This is what this album has to offer: it's got its own unique, creative sound - as every G. Love album - and it will grow on you like pleasure. I've had this album for several years, and I still get so down into it every time I hear it.
If you like artists from all walks of music because they create their own vein of music without fitting in an easy box ( e.g. B. Harper, Morcheeba, Sublime, M. Ndegeacelo, J. Buckley, GURU, Albert King, the Beatles and M. Davis), this will undoubtedly satisfy you. It took a few listening to grow on me, as I had other G. Love albums which sound a bit rawer.
Discovering G. Love is one of those rare times when you think: damn, I found an incredible artist with a new sound. A sound that's not just new, but simply feels so good you can't quite believe it. Perhaps playing everyday since childhood and growing up in a musical environment helped, but this is someone with immense raw talent.
The sound bites help, but are not sufficent to get a real feel for this sound. Hey G. Love, may you keep putting out this quality and variety for many years!
Modern-day bluesman G. Love, known to more skeptical ears as 23-year-old blue-eyed devil Garrett Dutton, shone briefly as hip-hop's great white hope when he released a debut record that paired blues-based playing with vocals that approximated rap. Though he was initially grouped with acts like Beck and Soul Coughing--pale faces who flirted with hip-hop but stuck to rock esthetics--we know now that young Master Dutton has far less in common with those inventive postmodernists than he does with, say, Jamie Walters, the pretty-boy pop dullard of Beverly Hills 90210 fame.
Coast to Coast Motel, the singer/guitarist's second shot with his bass and drums ensemble Special Sauce, does not even grant us the minor pleasures of his debut's "blues rap" novelty. This time, Mr. G focuses primarily on the R&B sounds of New Orleans, where the band recorded the album. That G. Love counts John Hammond Jr. an inspiration is telling: What Coast to Coast Motel offers is bratty suburban recreations of Hammond's competent but uninspired blueblood appropriations of classic blues music. New Special Sauce tunes like "Kiss & Tell" and "Bye Bye Baby" are absolutely fine but inauthentic and unnecessary given the breadth of great blues already available to motivated listeners. And any college-educated kid, like Garrett, who insists on singing with the slurred drawl of elderly sharecroppers needs to be slapped silly. --Roni Sarig
