Nothing if not a model of consistency, Buffalo Tom has been making the same decent-to-great music since 1992’s Let Me Come Over. Actually the Massachusetts trio’s third album, Let Me Come Over feels more like a debut, as it zeroed in brilliantly on the group’s strengths, namely the earnest, imagery-laden, acoustic-gone-electric songwriting of guitarist Bill Janovitz and bassist Chris Colbourn and the propulsive punk undercurrents supplied by drummer Tom Maginnis. Judging by the band’s latest, Skins (Scrawny), it’s a formula that still has legs. Skins is the group’s eighth album and second since reuniting after a 10-year (sort-of) break, and its world-weary lilt and been-there/done-that themes make it the perfect grown-up companion piece to Let Me Come Over’s reluctant coming-of-age angst. It may be the best thing the band has done since that LP. Buffalo Tom will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our new Q&A with Janovitz and Colbourn.
Colbourn: I have a photo of the great Italian film actress Anna Magnani (star of Pier Paolo Pasolini‘s Mamma Roma) on the front of my 1968 Fender Precision bass. It’s all covered with sweat and specs of splattered blood from strumming so hard. When I’m touring, I like to get up very early or stay out late, taking long walks by myself. Pasolini wrote a lot about walking in desolate city streets, late at night. “Solitude: you’ve got to be very strong to love solitude; you need good legs, and uncommon stamina” (from the poem “Lines From The Testament”).
Video after the jump.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiyeNEuRM7s
