Pop rock hit-makers, the Gin Blossoms, return with the release of their highly anticipated new album, NO CHOCOLATE CAKE, featuring the single, Miss Disarray. Known for creating indelibly melodic, Grammy-nominated Top Ten singles and Platinum-selling albums, Gin Blossoms - Robin Wilson, Jesse Valenzuela, Scott Johnson and Bill Leen, are back and in peak form. The eleven new tracks were written, produced and performed by the band with the help of John Richardson (drums) and Danny Wilde on keyboards and additional production (of The Rembrandts). Four years after the critically acclaimed Major Lodge Victory, Gin Blossoms have put together a seamless musical confection. The band continues to benefit from an innate chemistry and inspiration, a dynamic that helped catapult songs such as Hey Jealousy, Found Out About You, Till I Hear From You and Follow You Down into the collective musical consciousness and helped define an era.Says Wilson, There's just something about the way we play and sound together. It's those songs and the sound we make that add up to something indefinable.

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Perhaps it’s the curse of Doug Hopkins, but the Gin Blossoms have rarely been able to strike gold on their own, with most of their biggest hits being written by someone outside of the band. First, there was co-founder Hopkins himself, who wrote “Hey Jealousy” and “Found Out About You” before his alcoholism resulting in his dismissal from the group before either song was released. Then there was Marshall Crenshaw, who co-wrote the band’s first Top 10 hit, “Til I Heart It From You,” in 1995. When the Gin Blossoms returned in 2006 with Major Lodge Victory, they partnered up with the Rembrandts’ Danny Wilde, who wrote several of the album’s tracks. Wilde is back on board for No Chocolate Cake, this time in a more active role that finds him producing, co-writing, and playing on most of the album. That’s not meant to diminish the group’s own contributions, which retain much of the spunk from the Gin Blossoms’ mid-‘90s heyday. Robin Wilson’s voice is strong, if a bit nasal at points, and the songs have a familiar heartland hum to them, with Jessie Valenzuela and Scott Johnson filling each one with jangled guitar arpeggios and tasteful solos. None of these tunes can compete with the band’s singles, of course, but that’s not the point, since No Chocolate Cake sets its sights on maintaining the band’s audience rather than reclaiming a spot in the mainstream.

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Gin Blossoms - No Chocolate Cake
by Dan MacIntosh
Sometimes when bands age, whatever magic they had at the beginning begins to fade away. Not so with Gin Blossoms, however. Skip to nearly any of the 11 tracks on No Chocolate Cake, and it is pop music heaven, "Hey Jealousy", all over again.

And just what is that Gin Blossoms magic? It's Robin Wilson's vulnerable vocals and ever-present tambourine. It's guitars that jangle and create heart-tugging melodies. These songs would still sound good coming over the radio, if radio ever gets the clue that there is more to pop music than just Lady Gaga and Drake.

There are a few exceptions to the Gin Blossoms' regular jangle-pop sound. But even these exceptions are great. "If You'll Be Mine", for example, finds Wilson singing in a beautiful Eric "All By Myself" Carmen ballad mode. Elsewhere, the group is at its lyrical self-referential best during "Dead Or Alive (On The 405)" where Wilson sings: "Going in cold on a pick-up gig/And in between classic STYX," while describing the post-hit song lifestyle. "You play your hit from 89/I'll sing mine from 95," he continues.

"I Don't Want To Lose You Now" is perhaps the most perfect Gin Blossoms moment on the disc. The beat is deliberate and thoughtful, as Wilson pleads, "I don't want to lose you now/I promise I'll make it better."

Wilson may have room for improvement with regard to the specific relationship described in "I Don't Want To Lose You Now". But the Gin Blossoms show they are no worse for wear, or in need of any improvement. And just because they may not be the flavor of the week, it doesn't mean this No Chocolate Cake dessert doesn't taste delicious. If this album is Gin Blossoms' birthday cake, they're only getting better with age.

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Coexisting with the early '90s mania for Nirvana and bubbling up in the wake of that groundbreaking band's demise was the post-grunge jangle and lovelorn alt-rock angst of Gin Blossoms.

They're suddenly back and in the blink of an eye they're offering listeners a refreshing time-travel experience beginning with "I Don't Want to Lose You Now" and the new single "Miss Disarray" (skip over the album opener, which sounds like a Disney pop-punk reject).

Who cares if they can do this melodic stuff in their sleep, when it's this good? Like Rob Thomas in the early days of matchbox 20, Gin Blossoms tug at the heartstrings like few pop bands. Not unlike early Dwight Twilley, there's an electric 12-string guitar or jangling chorused guitar on almost every track, adding bounce to the sadness as on "Somewhere Tonight."

Where Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers aped the Byrds, Gin Blossoms (like R.E.M. before them) modernized the chime. Call it nostalgia, call it a guilty pleasure, call it reliving one's wasted youth, but hang in there until the final track, "Goin' to California," which sounds like the culmination of everything Badfinger, the Raspberries, Flamin' Groovies, Big Star and Twilley were reaching for in the early '70s -- power pop nirvana.
— Hector Saldaña

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1. (00:03:59) Gin Blossoms - Don't Change For Me
2. (00:04:04) Gin Blossoms - I Don't Want To Lose You Now
3. (00:03:23) Gin Blossoms - Miss Disarray
4. (00:04:00) Gin Blossoms - Wave Bye Bye
5. (00:04:15) Gin Blossoms - I'm Ready
6. (00:03:50) Gin Blossoms - Somewhere Tonight
7. (00:04:53) Gin Blossoms - Go CryBaby
8. (00:03:07) Gin Blossoms - If You'll Be Mine
9. (00:02:55) Gin Blossoms - Dead or Alive on the 405
10. (00:03:56) Gin Blossoms - Something Real
11. (00:03:37) Gin Blossoms - Goin' to California

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