The last five years have been a rollercoaster ride for the band Fono. They
came out with a bang and made big waves in the industry. They took their
time coming up with a second album, and after numerous hardships, the band
finally has their second album released independently. Let's hope to hear
more from this breakthrough band in the next several years.

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IT'S THE WAY THAT YOU USE IT - FONO (2004)
by Bert Gangl

While most artists in the music world navigate their share of changing
fortune over the course of a career, Del Currie and his bandmates in Fono
have experienced higher highs and lower lows than most. Shortly after
forming in 1996, Currie, drummer Andy Ridley and bassist Ian Crawford put
together a demo recording. The demo garnered the threesome, who had yet to
even perform live together, an unlikely first gig opening for Bon Jovi
before a crowd of 50,000 people in the group's hometown of Milton Keynes,
England. The band's 1999 debut, goesaroundcomesaround, went on to net the
trio a 30 minute special on the BBC, Best Unsigned Band honors from the
world-famous Kerrang! Magazine, and opening slots for everyone from Tonic
and the Goo Goo Dolls to rock icon Robert Plant.

In early 2002, Currie and Ridley, weary of constant travel between Europe
and the US, relocated to California and enlisted Americans Soren Engen
(guitar) and Cindy Milliman (bass) for work on the follow-up. By October of
2003, work on the second album was completed and master recordings were
carried to the band's studio in San Diego for safekeeping. The next morning,
the studio — along with the group's instruments, equipment and computers,
which contained the tracks for the new record — was burned to the ground by
wildfires that swept through Southern California. Undaunted, the quartet
relocated to a new studio in February of 2004 and completed the sophomore
project in time for an early November release, nearly a year to the day from
the date of the fire.

From the opening strains of It's the Way that You Use It, one can tell that
Currie still favors Bono-esque vocal inflections and slightly oblique
language. The band, likewise, continues to adhere fairly closely to the
U2-meets-the-Goo-Goo-Dolls template laid out on the first release. This time
around, though, Currie and his mates have traded a good bit of their raucous
hard rock for more subtle fare. Guitar textures are lighter and airier;
rhythms are more subdued; and melody lines a bit more meandering than those
of the freshman outing. In the same way, the better portion of the sophomore
effort carries with it a certain feeling of restraint, as compared to its
forerunner which pretty much ran at full throttle from start to finish.

Wordwise, the band is still seeking to make the grand statement. The problem
here, as with the first album, is that phrases like "Have you found the
secret island / Somewhere you can hide away" ("Sunlight Silence") and "The
night and the ultraviolet shines / It takes your heart and puts it all on
show" ("Headlights") sound far deeper and more important than they really
are. Where the musical portion of goesaroundcomesaround largely made up for
its occasional lyrical lapses, the new project lacks the debut's infectious
energy and attention to hook and melody, which only works to pull its
word-related deficiencies into that much sharper focus. Indeed, it is
perhaps telling that the strongest cut on It's the Way... is an acoustic
remake of "Alcatraz" from the first release.

Of course, the fact that the new project pales in comparison to its
predecessor is certainly understandable in light of the circumstances
surrounding its creation. And, truth be told, most up-and-coming artists
would be glad to have their names attached to a record as respectable as
this one. That said, newcomers to the band will still be best served by
picking up the inaugural effort. Existing fans are likewise advised to
approach the latest release for what it is — a listenable, if unexceptional,
offering from a band in the midst of rebuilding. Both parties, though, can
look expectantly towards the third album which, one hopes, will herald a
welcome return to form for the tenacious Fono fold.

Find out more about Fono at cMusicWeb.com:
http://cMusicWeb.com/modernrock/fono


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