The Rentals: Seven More Minutes : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

The Rentals' frontman, Matt Sharp, sounds eager to make everyone forget that he used to be the bassist in Weezer, and maybe that's why he shows surprising signs of pop life in Seven More Minutes. The Rentals expand the prefab, candy-o synth grooves of their 1995 debut, Return of the Rentals, with guest vocals from second bananas like Elastica's Donna Matthews, Lush's Miki Berenyi and That Dog's Petra Haden. While the liner notes proudly proclaim that the songs were composed in Barcelona and recorded in London, the shit sure sounds like L.A.; like Weezer's Pinkerton, Seven More Minutes is clever modern-rock fluff that buries the catchy tunes in concept-album filler, including the latest (last? please?) song about the millennium. But wade through the hour-long Seven More Minutes and you'll find a half-dozen keepers -- especially "The Cruise," a Gary Numan clone that would've been the third-best song on The Pleasure Principle, and New Wave geeks like the Rentals know that's high praise indeed. (RS 811)

ROB SHEFFIELD