“It feels like we’re heading the same way we came / Everything is changing and everything’s the same.” Preach, Dicky, preach. In a time when “jangle pop” and “post-punk” are the two most overused descriptors in indie rock, Dick Stusso looks back to the ’50s— even if he gets there via Elvis Costello, not Presley. This approach shirks nostalgia for simplicity: just as My Aim Is True stripped down when the punks were turning up, In Heaven flourishes under constraints. Forget Les Pauls and Marshall stacks: there’s no sound more elemental to rock & roll than a Telecaster through a combo amp (see James Burton, Luther Perkins, Steve Cropper, Keith Richards), and Nick Russo— the man behind the tongue-in-cheek persona— knows it. Backed by his no-bullshit band (briefly known as the Dick Dazzlers), Stusso marries wry wit with reckless abandon. He’s got the boozy, swagger-stagger charm of a ‘70s country singer, but none of the toxicity you see on Tales from the Tour Bus. Who cares if it’s all an act? The Stetson-hatted jester on stage and the polite, hard-working guy at the merch table have every right to remain separate entities. It’s the sound that matters most, and for all his anxiety about “Modern Music,” Dick’s doing his part to keep it honest.
