Archive Review: Leisure McCorkle’s Jet Set Baby (2002)

The missing ingredient in much of today’s “modern rock”(aside from talent) is humility, the ability of the artist to reveal their emotional wounds to the world and share the pain with an appreciative audience. The best rap music has humility aplenty, though it’s hard to tell, hidden underneath all the sexual braggadocio, while folk rockers have always worn their wimpy hearts on their sleeves. Not since the early efforts of Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, and Joe Jackson – the “angry young men” of the ‘80s – has rock ‘n’ roll enjoyed such freedom. In this aspect, Leisure McCorkle is a welcome throwback to an earlier era, an anomaly in an age that champions marketability and profit over sincerity and talent. Jet Set Baby shows both in abundance, McCorkle’s finely-tuned, guitar-driven, three-minute pop/rock treasures drenched in sincerity and delivered with no small amount of talent.
 
On Jet Set Baby, McCorkle throws away memorable lines that lesser songwriters could build entire careers around, verses like the defiant “I don’t wanna spend anymore time making records for the popular crowd/I don’t want to be the sound that’s underground” from “In Touch With My Own Sound.” The precocious “jam the radio satans cause we don’t like their stations/we don’t dig their sounds” from “New York Eyes” has the antagonist chasing a girl, “she’s got Chicago style/but New York Eyes.” Unlucky in love, yet a hopeless romantic, McCorkle bleeds for us on Jet Set Baby, but don’t you know that rock ‘n’ roll cures all, so let’s fall in love for a night and the morning will bring another heartbreak. It’s okay, though, ‘cause “there’s a spirit who’s soared through the universe/some say he’s a master of the lyrical cha-cha-cha/you can’t erase his lyrical masterpiece” sings the great McCorkle and I, for one, believe him. 

Leisure McCorkle is the MAN, a new wave fury with a heart of glass and a bag full o’ manic musical hooks. The Reverend has heard the gospel according to McCorkle and now I’m going to “LA-La-La-La-La my way through life!” In a perfect world, Leisure McCorkle would rule the airwaves; as it is, Jet Set Baby will have to remain our dirty little secret. The Rev sez “check it out!” (MoRisen Records, released November 5th, 2002)

Review originally published by Jersey Beat music zine...