The Secret's Out (Tom Racer, 1998)

The sole album by Tom Racer, The Secret's Out, is cocksure and sharp, but the band ultimately did no more than than single album. According to the encyclopedia anyone can edit, they folded in 2001 when the band's founder joined the military. Perhaps it was a 9/11 thing, I don't know.

The two "hit" songs from the album, "I Don't Know" and "Never Make a Sound" are actually the really good ones here. Most of the songs are rent with distortion throughout, so if you've never heard the melodies before and you have this one on while driving, it will mostly sound like white noise. Some of the the songs veer into grunge nostalgia territory, but other than "Never Make a Sound" pretty much every song here until the last one runs between two and three and a half minutes.

About that last song. Sigh. Needless to say, it's NOT a 17-minute epic song. Why why why why why (yes, five of them) did so many bands need to put 10 minutes of silence on the last track with a not-so-hidden (except for the title) track lurking somewhere after the 10 minute mark. It may have been cool in 1988 when the whole "CD" thing was fresh and new but by 1998 (actually by 1989) it was more irritating than anything else. And if that wasn't annoying enough the hidden song ends with a feedback tone that last about as long as the entire song. Seeing that this is not a Brian Eno album, I really don't think anyone was writing thank you notes to the band about their classy avant-garde ending. The final insult is another minute of silence that rewards you with the album ending.

All in all this was a good album, but in hindsight there was nowhere left to go afterward. Sometimes this happens, when a band burps out all their best riffs and hooks in one climactic event. Then the patient dies (or goes to Afghanistan).