Gold Chains, with Stars as Eyes and Notes

Saturday, June 21

A A A Comments By Mikael Wood Thursday, Jun 19 2003

Topher Lafata has the same bright idea lots of other former indie rockers are riding these days: Ditch the electric guitars, mopey breakup songs and human drummers, and feed all that pent-up postgrad angst into the computer instead, sharpening a horny, corny electro-rap that addresses the confused twentysomething condition in a vocabulary anyone with a butt can understand. Like his peers Peaches, Har Mar Superstar and Cex, Lafata plays it both satirical and straight up, offering earnest sociocultural commentary alongside self-conscious admonitions to shake what our mamas gave us.

Gold Chains wires in to a question: How do you make a point about pointlessness?

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On Young Miss America, his debut full-length as Gold Chains after a series of well-received EPs, Lafata demonstrates how effective this approach can be, but he also reveals its built-in limitations. His prowess with his chosen hardware and software is indisputable: The tracks here are built on a standard booty-bass foundation of digital boom-bap, but nearly every one deviates from form in some ear-catching way, be it a ribbon of electric piano hung over a slithering bass line, a sudden interlude of ye olde music-hall bounce or a menacing blast of those outmoded electric guitars. But as a persona, Gold Chains is hard to take for an entire album. His winking delivery and gravel-gargling flow, so singular in small doses, become as exhausting as Ja Rule in this setting. Lafata's is the same dilemma faced by Prince Paul and Majesticon Mike Ladd on their recent discs: How do you make a point about pointlessness -- even if that's your point?

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