Johnny Marr & The Healers: Boomslang : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Former Smiths guitarist sounds like bad imitation of his old band For most rockers, the past is a dangerous place, because it's all been done before. For Johnny Marr, the trouble is double: The crowning irony of the debut record by his new band, the Healers, is that it sounds like the groups that imitated Marr's old band, the Smiths. The twangy Brit pop of the opener, "The Last Ride," could be something from Oasis, a band that openly adores the Smiths. On "Need It," Marr knocks out a riff that's as spiky as a Joshua tree, then drummer Zak Starkey adds a train-track-clack beat, and all of a sudden Boomslang sounds a lot like a Levi's commercial shot in the Mojave Desert. The album shimmers with elements of T. Rex and traces of the Stone Roses -- it's got all the atmosphere of a great rock record, but not the guts of one. Fine guitarist that Marr is, he and the Healers may simply be too cool for their own good.

PAT BLASHILL
(From RS 916 – February 20, 2003)