Unpretentious fun from a rare multi-talent

VALLEY LODGE “Shadows in Paradise” (Tee Pee Records)

No. It is not he Dave Hill – the guy in Slade, with rock’s shortest bangs. Here we are talking about the significantly younger and far more American Dave Hill.

And Dave, he’s quite a dude. Many will know the fellow from Cleveland, Ohio as both a writer and stand-up comedian. Some may also want to know that he is behind the theme song for the satire talk show Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.

But too much few know about his band Valley Lodge. Now their fifth album “Shadows in Paradise” is out. Here, Dave and his friends appear as a modernized version of Cheap Trick’s original, ultimate and arch-American happy-gut power pop.

After a decent enough start to the record, with some generic American college rock in “Daylights”, the party is blown proper starting with “I Wrote a Song”. Here we can enjoy a chorus better than any spa treatment or therapy session.

Catchy choruses are something Dave Hill seems to have at least a master’s degree in, throughout the ensuing half hour of pure pop enjoyment. Whether approximately 40 percent is pure plagiarism, I do not know. But I feel pretty confident that this is not something AI has cooked up, after being fed key words like “fun”, “bounce” and “gas balloon”.

Either way, Hill is totally shameless in his desire to stick melodic gum ice to your brain. Valley Lodge creates the sound of the neighborhood party you move into just in order to participate.

At times, the New York-based band sounds like Afghan Whigs on a diet of happy pills and fruity cocktails. Possibly a Dwarves without lots of blood, cocaine and half-naked women. OK, that sounded a bit corny. Valley Lodge is anything but gore.

There is an enormous positive energy in these songs. The only clue is that Dave and the gang don’t give a damn about what kind of niche they are going to apply for.

“Secret Lover” is a disco flirt that makes the earth shake and the curtains flutter. In the funky “Dirty Dishes”, the cake decoration consists of falsetto singing and a synth that oozes Christmas tree party in the 80s. Incredibly, it works perfectly.

The happy-sentimental “Trouble” has all the qualities a good, old-fashioned ballad needs. The pace never drops, and little melodrama is absent. Augmented with strings and sitar (what a combo!) “That Love” becomes, quite literally, a grande finale.

After all 11 songs are finished, it feels as if you have single-handedly eaten all the pieces of the birthday cake. Miraculously, the nausea does not occur. However, one is left with a real good feeling flowing through the body parts.

Valley Lodge’s new record is not a comedy project, but rather a good portion of unpretentious fun performed by a rare multi-talent. And something like that can never go wrong.