Review: Sugar Ray plays too safe

Geoff Carter

Monday, Feb. 8, 1999 | 11:15 a.m.

Sugar Ray ought to be more careful. Naming their latest album "14:59" - yet another reference to Andy Warhol's too-often invoked 15 minutes of fame - may prove to be more prescient than ironic, if their middling, overloud Feb. 5 performance at the Hard Rock Joint is any indication of where the Orange County alt.pop band is headed. The clock is tick, tick, ticking ...

It was opening night of the Sugar Ray's tour, which admittedly may have compelled the five-piece outfit to overshoot their marks. But that can't explain away the needless heavy hand they applied to "Falls Apart" and "Glory," the cover of the Steve Miller Band's "Abracadabra" (track eleven on the new disc - please, God, make it disappear) and an overeager stage manner that more becomes group of insecure outsiders desperately trying to get into Delta House.=20

All of which left me wondering - who the hell are they? "14:59" isn't half-bad. The crotch-grabbing and bumbling appropriation of gangsta lingo they parrot on stage doesn't fit a band capable of the catchy radio hit "Every Morning" at one extreme and the wicked garage metal parody "New Direction" at the other pole.=20

Oddly enough, the latter song proves a ripping parody of their stage manner: Over rapid-fire, distortion-heavy guitars, a gravelly vocal exhorts the "kids" to "become better citizens," by "being nice to cops" and "not playing ball in the house."=20

Sorry, boys. To keep the kids interested, you gotta play ball in the house. You have to break that family heirloom on the mantel. That's rock and roll, dammit.

As unsure as Sugar Ray were of their identity, Everlast displayed an equal amount of confidence and poise. The former House of Pain rapper and Ice-T prot=E9g=E9 has traded in his loutish, stereotypical white b-boy affect (dru= nk and disorderly arrests, caught with a gun at the airport, etc.) for a low-key approach resembling that of celebrated crossover whiz Beck.=20

His solo debut, "Whitey Ford Sings The Blues" wraps blues and fraternity rock around live-action hip hop beats, and the songs translate well to the stage despite Everlast's deficiencies as a vocalist (if he can't shout it, he can't sing it, either). Still, his heart seems to be in the right place and it's always nice to see a better citizen rise from the ashes of their former life. Reset the timer for fifteen more minutes!