CD Review

For the better part of the last two decades, a plethora of all female bands have followed the same recipe to success: combine 4-5 girls who can play their own instruments and sing, add catchy and contrite lyrics of a nonsensical nature, mix in the current popular music trend, and in no time you have a one (and sometimes two!)-hit wonder - while getting more press and airplay than they deserve. Sahara Hotnights prove that the girl band novelty has worn out its welcome with their third release Kiss &Tell.

Kiss &Tell is a collection of simple and unimaginative radio friendly tracks that don’t share an underlying theme or concept. From the opening “Who Do You Dance For?” to the closing “Hangin’,” Sahara Hotnights do little to set themselves apart from the girl band stereotype that was first made fashionable by the Bangles and the Go-Go’s in the early 80s. The only difference between the aforementioned bands and Sahara Hotnights is that the latter has managed to fuse the current garage rock trend with its stale pop ancestry.

At no point during Kiss &Tell do Sahara Hotnights take any chances with their music or lyrical content. The first single “Hot Night Crash” is a microcosm for the album as a whole as it painfully and methodically drags on for 2:41. If David Spade were reviewing Kiss &Tell, he’d say it sounded better the first time he heard it when it was called Spend the Night by The Donna’s. The problem with Kiss &Tell is that it packs no punch and lacks anything resembling creativity. Our only course of action is to pray that unlike previous incarnations of female bands, Sahara Hotnights’ Kiss &Tell does not get the same amount of airplay.