Bob Seger: Mongrel : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

When viewed in the context of his two previous albums, Bob Seger's Mongrel fares very favorably. It's easily his best over-all work to date, but there are still some crucial musical problems he must come to grips with if he is to realize the tremendous potential he displayed on his earlier Cameo-Parkway singles (most notably "Heavy Music" and "Persecution Smith").

Seger's most immediate asset is his soul-searing vocal style. He has been tearing his tonsils out in this manner for years now (despite those who contend he is merely a Robert Plant imitator), and why recognition has been so long coming to one so obviously talented is beyond me. He also writes marvelous rock and roll songs in the virile 1965 mold, somewhat of a lost art these days. The major problem, then, must lie in the band's execution.

Instrumentally, the System lacks a stylistic understanding of Seger's material. Like Mountain, they appear to have an overblown sense of their musical proportion and, consequently, their music all too often degenerates into "heavy" overstatement of the most clichéd sort.

"Lucifer" is easily the strongest cut on the record, and a great song in its own right. It's simple, straightforward rock: the band (especially the organ) shows a clear comprehension of the song's rhythmical movement. If the Bob Seger System would focus their musical attention on Seger's 1965 sense of dynamics and forget their 1970 pretensions, then perhaps they would finally begin to fulfill the promise of "Lucifer" and those dynamite Cameo-Parkway sides.