Jemina Pearl - 'Break It Up'

2006 saw the self-titled full-length album from Nashville, Tennessee’s Be Your Own Pet, and what an album it was. Consisting of four teenagers, the record was raw, unpolished fun, and the band was fronted by Jemina Pearl, a powerful (although sometimes badly behaved) vocalist who drew ready comparisons to old school female punks like Poly Styrene and many at the forefront of the Riot Grrl movement.

Now, a few years later, Be Your Own Pet is no more, and the band has moved onto other projects. Two members of the lineup are now part of Turbo Fruits, and frontwoman Jemina Pearl has moved onto New York where, with a little bit of polish and some slick production, she seems to be emerging from the recording studios as not much more than the next girly pop star.

I really can’t remember the last solo project from a musician I’ve admired that has left me so disappointed, but with Break It Up, Pearl seems to have left behind all that made her unique and spectacular, and instead seems to be in pursuit of a lucrative career as a slickly produced pop star. It may be that she’s going for the punker side of the pop star sound, but it’s unmemorable pop pablum nonetheless.

It seems like Pearl may be slated to be the next… whomever you want to peg out of the clearly cultivated alternapop stars. Granted, these are singers that sell a lot of records, but on the critical side of things, they’re not that good.

The record is even made more unmemorable by it’s total lack of hooks. While the melodies are pure pop, they flow from track to track without distinction; the lyrics are OK, but not much more, and often it sounds like she is trying to make herself a combo of a singer from a ‘60s girl group and a rock and roll bad girl in the style of Joan Jett – and failing in both respects.

There are shining moments on Break It Up, but they are few and far between. “So Sick!” features the only vocal hook on the record, provided by Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore (Moore actually plays guitar and provides backup vocals on several tracks), “Band On The Run” is a jangly masterpiece (again courtesy of Moore), and “I Hate People” is Pearl’s love song duet with Iggy Pop – but it’s only the fact that Pop is on the song that makes it memorable; without Iggy, it would descend back into the slush that is the rest of Break It Up.

This probably isn’t the last we hear from Pearl, but let’s hope in the future she returns to the raw cheekiness she displayed when she fronted Be Your Own Pet, even with her obnoxiously surly onstage attitude. In the meantime, if you want to feel the energy held by that band, seek out and listen to Turbo Fruits. They definitely are carrying the BYOP torch, and burning it much more brightly.

Release Date: October 6, 2009