If you are new to Marina Rocks, the album title should give you insight into her ability to blend the bigger picture into intimate narratives. The S.O.S. part of it stands for both Same Old Shit, perhaps, and also echoes the international distress call; make of that what you will.
She kicks off the album with the current single, “It’s All Messed Up,” a bluesy-country-rocker that grabs your attention right from the first few bars and she proceeds to regale us with a strange narrative about a girl with “ a squirrel in her purse and evil in her eye.” However, as we ride with her along Highway 225, the overall nuance of the song seems to be more relevant in describing state, national, and world affairs day by day.
The titular “S.O.S” is actually a swipe at the music industry and the cliched nature of country songs; how many more tunes about beer and trucks and lonesome cowboys riding off into the sunset, or in the case of this track, tequila lovesongs, do we need? It’s a fair comment and a sonically brilliant song, subtle, seductive, soulful, and sensitively done.
For every funky groover, like “Slap Happy,” there is a drifting, ambient, atmospheric Tex-Mex spoken word ballad such as the personal near-death experience of “Hollywood Sign.” And for every country-ska rhythm (if that is even a thing) of “Mind’s Eye,” songs like “One More Song” head for the sonic border in style.
Despite the titles found here, S.O.S is not an album in distress, or indeed full of the same old…same old, and it is anything but messed up, and Marina is far too poised and purposeful in her songwriting to be accused of a slap-happy approach. This is the sound of Marina Rocks doing what she does best: taking the sounds of her Texas home for a spin all around the musical landscape, coming back with brand-new takes on familiar styles, and then using those as vehicles to deliver poetic lyrics full of messages and meanings that work on numerous levels.
It’s, quite frankly, an incredible album, but would you have expected anything else?
