Better Can't Make Your Life Better

Personnel: Michael Deming, Kurt Heasley, Thom Monahan, Aaron Sperske, David Shuman.
Recorded at Forty-Five, Hartford, Connecticut.
Another new record, another new sound: on Better Can't Make Your Life Better, the Lilys hop into the time machine and travel back to the mid-'60s, immersing themselves in the style of the British Invasion. And while tracks like "Cambridge California," "Shovel into Spade Kit," and "Can't Make Your Life Better" certainly bring to mind the timeless pleasures of early Kinks, Stones, and Who, the record's easy appropriation of a 30-year-old sound underscores the Lilys' big problem: Kurt Heasley is a gifted chameleon, but until he comes up with an original identity all his own, his music will remain merely a pale imitation of its superior source material. ~ Jason Ankeny