Piece of Work

Album Review

The Brain Surgeons are Peter Bohovesky, Albert Bouchard, Deborah Frost, Billy Hilfiger, and David Hirschberg. Crispin Cioe, Merrill Clark, Soozie Tyrell, and Ace Bouchard join them on this album. This album really seems to show that this band is not content to be working in one particular style. Indeed, the modes on this double-CD release range all the way from jazzy barbershop singing to hard rock through ballads, also including prog-ish material. All of it is performed quite well. Many of the songs showcase different elements of this group's talents. One cut, in the aforementioned barbershop mode, shows off the fact that this group is capable of incredible harmonies. Other sounds that make appearances here are modes that seem influenced by such people as Janis Joplin, Led Zeppelin, Hawkwind, and Blue Oyster Cult. The BOC leanings come naturally, as drummer Albert Bouchard was a long time member of the Cult, but those sounds do not dominate the disc. The group even covers a Lynyrd Skynyrd cut, and in a way that almost feels like what Eric Clapton might do with the piece. All these elements combine to form what is probably Brain Surgeons' strongest work to date.