Cobra Verde Reviewed On Pitchfork.

Cobra Verde:
Haven't Slept All Year
[Scat; 2008] Rating: 7.0
Original post

For a band of middle-aged Cleveland art-punk misfits born of record-collector rock tradition, Cobra Verde have adapted rather well to the new-school indie economy, turning themselves into a TV-licensing machine and landing plum placements on "Entourage" and "The O.C." But if Cobra Verde's eternally youthful swagger belies their almost two-decade pedigree, the story of the band's sixth album provided a sad reminder that you can't be a kid forever-- upon its initial completion in summer of 2007, frontman John Petkovic was forced to care for his cancer-stricken mother, who passed away that December. The album, and the band, were put on ice for over a year-- during which Petkovic through suffered severe, prolonged bouts of insomnia.

So that album title is no exaggeration. But if the songs contained within predate Petkovic's breakdown, they suggest that, even before his familial trauma, the singer was well-accustomed to an after-hours regimen of strip clubs and booze. Cobra Verde's music has always simmered with nocturnal menace and seedy suggestion, but on Haven't Slept All Year, there's a greater awareness of the price for staying up all night: Having to make amends in the morning. The result is an album plays out in a binary sequence of comically over-the-top drunk-rock benders and sincere, open-hearted pleas for forgiveness.

But until the morning comes, Cobra Verde are happy to appeal to the most base-ic of instincts: "Entourage"-approved opener "World Can't Have Her" is essentially a rewrite of AC/DC's "Girls Got Rhythm". But as certified students of rock'n'roll mythology (Petkovic is a journalist by trade; guitarist Frank Vazzano teaches pop-music history at Cleveland State University), Cobra Verde project a keen self-awareness: the Clash-city rocker "Riot in the Food Court" climaxes with a deadpan declaration of "I'm in love with strippers on drugs," while the Replacements-styled nightclub jitters of "Wasted Again" carry the admission that "drinking songs are so typical." The implication is that Cobra Verde aren't playing around with hard-rock conventions merely for populist appeal and easy soundtrack money, but because it's precisely the sort of music that you'd hear blaring in the peeler bars and neon-lit corner dives that Petkovic's protagonists inhabit.

Cobra Verde also realize their "drunken sex addict" anti-heroes are not the sort of people you want to spend an entire album hanging out with-- particularly when they start leaning too heavily on the bar-band swing ("I Could Go to Hell for You"). So for every time Petkovic is called on to play the sleazeball, there's a chance to redeem himself as the sweetheart, and for the band to apply the more expansive approach that marked 2005's Copycat Killers all-covers collection: "Home in the Highrise" colors in its sketch of skyscraper-living sterility with rich Byrdsian harmonies; the turn-a-new-leaf anthems "Something About the Bedroom" and "Run Away" outfit Pavement with skinny ties and keytars. By penultimate acoustic ballad "Can't Believe", Petkovic is seeking forgiveness for all his sins-- á la Lou Reed on the Velvets' "Jesus"-- from a god he doesn't believe in, at which point he's sentenced to an afterlife in the "Haunted Heavens," where he's surrounded by devils and dead lovers, but where-- judging by the pristine jangle-pop presentation-- they're spinning the Flamin' Groovies for all eternity. In light of Petkovic's annus miserablis, that's the kind of hell he can certainly deal with.

- Stuart Berman, February 27, 2009

Cobra Verde Reviewed On Dusted.

Dusted Reviews
Artist: Cobra Verde
Album: Haven’t Slept All Year
Label: Scat
Review date: Dec. 5, 2008

Ostensibly nothing more than a solid mid-western rock band from the indie underground, Cobra Verde has always been about much more than the sum of its deceptively simple parts. Rising from the ashes of Cleveland’s Death of Samantha in the early 1990s, Cobra Verde puts an arty, glam-tinged spin on bad-ass bar rock. And quite frankly, no one does it better.

The group’s latest, Haven’t Slept All Year, works as an interesting companion piece to its previous release, 2005’s Copycat Killers. The latter album is a strangely brilliant collection of covers that runs the gamut from the Easter Monkeys’ “Underpants” to a deliciously menacing recasting of Pink’s dance-pop anthem “Get This Party Started.” Haven’t Slept All Year is all new original material, yet it exhibits the same willingness to tackle any genre with both a dead-on stare and an arched eyebrow that made Copycat Killers so much twisted fun.

Establishing the album’s carefree romanticism is the opener "Riot in the Food Court, " which features a gargantuan hook for a chorus and plays like a lost track from the soundtrack to Fast Times at Ridgemont High. This may seem like an unlikely pose for a bunch of middle-aged rust belters to strike, yet not only does it works, it’s quite contagious. Frontman John Petkovic croons like he’s getting ready for the prom on the synth-poppy “Something About the Bedroom” and contemplates being stuck “between a boy and a man” on “Freeride,” evoking a genuine sweetness that should play well with any post-OC fans the band may have made.

Cobra Verde have always been stylistically restless and unpredictable, but never to such a degree over the course of a single album. While this is a rock album first and foremost (see “World Can’t Have Her”), there are touches of country (the aforementioned “Freeride”), debauched beat cabaret (“Wasted Again”), synth anthems (“Run Away”) and subtly swingin’ acoustic numbers (“Together Alone”).

The only thing more surprising than Cobra Verde’s existence this far into the new millennium is the quality of its recordings. Fifteen years since Viva La Muerte, their debut on Scat Records, Petkovic and Co. continue to rock hard in the face of the impending cultural apocalypse. With that in mind, Haven’t Slept All Year is an ideal soundtrack for the current trash heap that is our society. Cobra Verde cast their net wide and work with whatever comes slithering back, compressing it all into a weighty chunk of glittering pop-rock smite to be hurdled at whoever needs a knock on the head.

By Nate Knaebel