"A thousand words run through my mind, but I only know a dozen..."

     Most of us will understand the feeling Pete is describing as we listen to his new album "Boy Gone Wrong." This is music for the tongue-tied, the antidote to outsider's limp, delivered from a guy who has been there himself and has returned with nine magnificent musical potions for your solace and enjoyment. Rewind to Fall 2001...Pete Galub and his band, the Annuals, are banging away amidst piles of cords, old radios, electronic parts and salvation army furniture in the enormous loft studio of John Gurrin in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Producer Chris Cunningham calls for a run-through, and Chris Moore obligingly pounds the drums from under a red mop of cousin-it hair, propelling and cradling the song at the same time in the way that only another songwriter could do. Bassist Django Haskins complements Pete's angular guitar tightrope act with his melodic glue, and the sound of the Annuals magically comes together to form something more than (and decidedly different from) the sum of its parts. The key is the sympathy that each member brings to each song on this album - they aren't just clocking in with appropriate parts and heading out for another session - they understand why this music has to be made now and why they have to be the ones to do it.

     Through the open windows of the studio, the industrial remnants of Brooklyn past crowd the shore of the East River, just a short (albeit harrowing) swim away from the grime and glamour of Manhattan. The band enters the studio every day via an enormous steel freight elevator and, in between takes, an artist neighbor brings by some homemade brownies especially for Chris, whose flaming red hair has somehow caught her heart. This is not the pampered, high-gloss world of the latest teen pop idols. This is rock and roll as it lives through yet another of radio's dark ages, ready to reclaim its rightful place in the world when MTV's prefab virus finally eats itself.

     From the pastoral longing of "I Will Not Be Denied" to the cathartic bash and pop of "Serving Spoon" and every peak and valley in between, Pete's miniature epics shine with the undeniable power of something true. In his own backhanded way, Pete opens up his world to us - a world of impossible snowmen, crime scene chalk lines, and hidden crumbs. It's a children's story gone wrong, happy endings not included. And somehow we come out of it all with our brains "badly bludgeoned" but feeling just fine.

Dr. Jake McCann, Ph.D.
New York City