Transcendence

One is barely able to suppress nausea when taking in the expansive package that is Sleep with You, the new album from Miami's ever-blustery Ed Hale and Transcendence. The costly and glossy gatefold sleeve is as lavishly appointed as a Carl's showroom and every bit as tasteful. "I can give you money/I can buy you a car/I can call my agent/And he'll make you a star," Hale promises on the title track. "Just let me in your pants/I'll give you anything." And those lines come not even two minutes into the first song! Boy, we're sure off to a great start. Even more repulsive than the prehistoric rhyme scheme is the cover photo: a naked lady on the bed, emotionlessly overseen by Hale, dressed in what looks like silk PJs. Someone with shitloads of cash and not a splinter of tact built this edifice to self-congratulatory overindulgence. The music -- "hook-driven pop rock," they're calling it -- is utterly generic crap, although the appearance of Miami guitar hero Fernando Perdomo somewhat elevates it. Still, Sleep with You is more bloated than Marlon Brando after a 12-pack of Schlitz Malt Liquor. The songs keep coming with stomach-churning regularity, like dry heaves: "Girls" is a laundry list of sexual dalliances; "Minnie Driver" fantasizes a fuckfest with the titular babe; and "Vicodin" documents Hale's fun times with his favorite dope. That theme perseveres on the following track, "Junkie," which begins with the opening line, "Pass me another Percocet." Here's wishing Hale a wonderful overdose.