Pernice Brothers: Yours, Mine And Ours : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Singer-songwriter Joe Pernice knows how to write a unique, evocative lyric: Offering himself to a lover, he's "as willing as the sand." To the one who left him behind, he asks, "Did you have to be as typical as a tragedy?" Yours, Mine and Ours, his ensemble's third album, doesn't quite have the ragged charm or the wry humor of 2001's outstanding The World Won't End; the occasional dose of guitar bombast ("One Foot in the Grave") doesn't serve Pernice well. He's far better on the cruel, mellow kiss-off "Number Two" and on the blissful, ethereal "Judy." Best of all is "Waiting for the Universe," which delivers dreamy Sixties pop with the dry eye of an Eighties Brit post-punker: "With a kiss that was heaven-sent/And a look of ambivalence/Slouching off to find a brand-new fascination."

JON CARAMANICA
(RS 926, July 10, 2003)