Tinted Windows – Tinted Windows

July 27, 2009 • By Justin Park

Tinted Windows
Tinted Windows
S-Curve

Buddyhead presents to you another album review that should’ve been conducted months ago. Although, by now, I’m sure you’ve already decided whether or not a record consisting of the following individuals was worth an ounce of your time:

Taylor Hanson (vocals): Vocalist/keyboardist for Hanson. Best known for the 1997 jibber-jabber megahit “MMMBop.” Adored by pre-teen girls all over the world, as well as guys who initially thought he was a chick. Taking down my Taylor poster was a dark moment in my life I’d rather forget.
James Iha (guitarist): Former guitarist for Smashing Pumpkins, A Perfect Circle and other bands that hired him for his stellar talents because he’s Japanese. Splits his time between Tinted Windows and working the register at Yoshinoya.
Adam Schlesinger (bassist): Member of Fountains of Wayne and Ivy. A prolific songwriter, having contributed material for The Click Five, Jonas Brothers and other flavor-of-the-month studs your baby sister loves.
Bun E. Carlos (drums): Plays for Cheap Trick. Recruited into the Tinted Windows lineup because Josh Freese had better things to do.

Based on the credentials of these powerpop heavyweights, one can (correctly) imagine this eponymous record being marked by a slew of happy-go-lucky cuts designed for airplay on Radio Disney and MTV’s The Hills. With that in mind, there’s nothing on here that comes close to the critical and infectious heights of “I Want You to Want Me” and “1979.” The band’s inability to accomplish what they’re supposedly good at is a shame as one decent track could’ve garnered a passive recommendation from yours truly who otherwise assumed dogshit before pressing play.

The album is truly a pain in the loins with its verse-chorus-verse-chorus-chorus-chorus structure, repeating song titles for what seems like forever until you realize that bludgeoning yourself with a power tool provides a far greater pleasure than listening to this half-hour debacle. At best, it’s a lot like Weezer’s latter-day discography: appropriate during the summertime or as a gift for your middle school sweetheart who enjoys Red Bull, MySpace and Trapper Keepers.

Granted, pop should more or less conform to the structure mentioned in the previous paragraph. However, there’s one element absent from the Tinted Windows formula: talent. What happened? Some of these guys are more than capable of producing acceptable tunes within the confines of their primary bands. At this point, a rehash of “Someone To Love” would’ve at least exceeded the low expectations attributed to these supergroup projects that always seems to highlight each member’s blandest qualities. Tinted Windows rewards the public with some contrived mishmash of Ms. Hanson’s breathy “oooh whoaaa” vocalizations and Iha’s vanilla guitarwork, completely devoid of personality. Sorry, James. Say hello to D’arcy for me.

This is the part of the review where I recommend a song from the album. Unfortunately, I can’t discern one track from another, so with the foolproof technique of closing my eyes and pointing at the tracklist, that esteemed honor goes to “Dead Serious.” Whatever. Nevertheless, it’s comforting knowing that their own fanbase has mixed feelings about the record, not to mention it should never be dignified with the term “record” and, more importantly, “music.”

If you want pop done right, try some ABBA and Electric Light Orchestra.

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45 Responses to “ Tinted Windows – Tinted Windows ”


  • Mike -- Jul 27th, 2009 at 5:09 pm

    I get bummed out whenever I see this album cover because, with a name like Tinted Windows and that album cover, this should sound like some Nuggets garage rock. I always have to see the “Taylor Hansen from Hansen” tag to realize what this shit actually is.

    And just when I forgot this thing even exists, Buddyhead has to belatedly slag this thing (though the slagging is more than justified).

    Thanks for ruining my evening.

  • davehog -- Jul 27th, 2009 at 5:40 pm

    When I was in high school, there was a couple of band nerds that recruited two of the school’s music teachers to be in their band and this picture is totally what their band looked like: two crusty, old fucks trying to look hip and two young, virginal, French horn dorks with white Levis and Beatle boots.

    James Iha looks rad with a beer belly though.

  • ev -- Jul 27th, 2009 at 7:15 pm

    When your claim to fame was briefly confusing people as to whether you are a guy in a dress or a really ugly girl, can any group you’re a part of really be called super?

  • MmmJulia -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 5:33 am

    Mike: It’s Hanson. With an “o”.

    Davehog: Haha… Taylor Hanson is definitely NOT virginal. He already has 4 kids at the age of 26, the first being born when he was 19 years old. And it was a shot-gun wedding. So… do your research?

    Ev: Your comment doesn’t make much sense… He never wore a dress… It was just people being stupid. Maybe you were one of them…?

    Before you judge Hanson, you should listen to their 2004 and 2007 releases, “Underneath” and “The Walk”. It’s actually surprising how different their current music sounds from MmmBop. And they are actually in the process of releasing an EP “Stand Up, Stand Up.” A new album should be out early next year as well.

    And before you judge Tinted Windows, you should do some research. The songs were MEANT to be shallow and simple. The whole point was to make a pop band with typical pop songs. It’s fun, catchy music. Plain and simple.

  • franklin bluth -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 6:56 am

    stuff like this makes me want to listen to prepared music by john cage or his 4:33.

  • Mike -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 7:51 am

    MmmJulia, I don’t think displaying your vast knowledge of Taylor Hanson comes off very well.

    Do your research? Who in god’s name would actually want to research Hanson? As for the band supposedly “trying” to sound shallow, well that’s just the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. What a novel idea, though! Make a “fake” pop band to write ingratiatingly poppy songs, but then once people realize that it’s godawful, claim that it is supposed to be horrendous because it’s an incisive commentary about the state of music. Lame.

    And I think I speak for pretty much everyone else on the planet when I say that no one wants to hear the newer shit that Hanson had to offer.

  • franklin bluth -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 7:56 am

    i think if i wanted to listen to shallow pop music i would listen to the back catalog from the beatles and beach boys pre drug taking years which is rad no matter how many times they use the word love in the song title or mention surfing. im in california from the 12-17th and you pussy west coast cunts better show me a good fucking time.

  • ev -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 9:18 am

    MmmJulia:
    So James Iha wasn’t wearing a dress in Smashing Pumpkins’ video for Today? Right, I’m just being stupid.

    And I will not check out Hanson’s more recent discography because they’re fucking Hanson.

  • franklin bluth -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 9:32 am

    back catalog for oasis is being released on vinyl august 4th. major boner that just split my pants. now i can play wonderwall finally and mix in blue moon.

  • Eloise -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 9:54 am

    MMMJulia, did you really think that anyone at this blog would listen to reason? These are obviously the same 14 year old boys who posted “EWWWW Hanson sucks becuzz they are gay and they are gurlz!!!” every chance they got back in 1998. They have not advanced beyond that mentality; most of the posts here (including the original one) proudly display the same level of consciousness. Some people never change.

  • franklin bluth -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 11:22 am

    what do any of your posts have to do with the oasis back catalog being put out again on vinyl? if i want to listen to silly music i got the monkees ya know? way fuckin better than this trash.

  • Mike -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 3:16 pm

    Eloise, did you just try to pose the incredibly misguided opinion that liking Hanson is some kind of sophisticated opinion, and that those who bash Hanson (then and now) are at a lower level of “consciousness.” First of all, i don’t think you’re using the word correctly, and please explain which meaning you attach to the word consciousness, because none of them make sense. I don’t see how my level of awareness or how informed I was when I was 14 would affect whether I like Hanson over a decade later… In fact, i would have been more likely to enjoy Hanson at a younger age because I would’ve been less conscious of good music (thankfully I never liked Hanson).

    Perhaps you meant “reason,” as in “it is unreasonable to hate Hanson.”

    The reason no one with opposable thumbs likes Hanson is pretty simple: they’re the antithesis of music. They’re manufactured bubblegum pop with as much personality as the Jonas Brother’s today. Sure, they might have some kind of musical talent hidden deep where their souls should be, but they use that to create mind-numbingly boring pop tunes that couldn’t wipe the shit skids out of Paul McCartney’s (the worst Beatle) trousers.

  • Eloise -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 7:05 pm

    My point is that you, and others here, know nothing about Hanson, and are in fact quite proud of that. You believe that speaking of them out of your supreme ignorance makes you somehow “cooler” than anybody who has actually heard their music, and can therefore talk about it intelligently.

    And no, a vague memory of a song they wrote as children (which topped the most prestigious critics’ poll in America) is NOT the same as actually being familiar with Hanson’s music. Got an opinion on “Great Divide”? Or any other Hanson song released in this decade?

    And by the way, if nobody with opposable thumbs likes Hanson, how did they manage to top the most prestigious critics poll in America in 1998? Do none of the 750 or so critics polled by the Village Voice have opposable thumbs in your universe?

  • Jared Singleton -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 7:53 pm

    @Eloise
    FUCK THE VILLAGE VOICE.
    Also, you seem to confuse good music and art with record sales. Because,trust me, if you see record sales and talent/good music in the same vein, then YOU know nothing about music. You know about money and marketing, not to mention the evil machine that the record industry truly is. 98% of our congress voted for war, but check out how many of them now say it was “a bad judgment call.” Coming to this forum /site and trying to tell people that they should accept the music of corporate puppets, a decade or so down the road; is just not a good argument. The only “supreme ignorance” I see on this page thus far, is your own. In fact, it borders on a communistic thought pattern. People are not going to always like what you like. THIS SITE IS NOT MEANT FOR YOU. Seriously, go bang your clit with a rusty hook, and fuck off.

  • Eloise -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 8:11 pm

    Did I mention record saless at all? No, I did not. Not at all. Not in either of my posts. Not even once. I mentioned critical acclaim. Critical acclaim is actually something different from record sales.

    Also, I’m sure you are aware that Hanson left their major label after a battle about creative freedom, and started their own indie label. I’m sure you further know that they even made a documentary about their tumultuous break with IDJ called “Strong Enough to Break”. That documentary was featured at several indie film festivals, and was even part of the curriculum at a couple of universities. Knowing that… how can you see them as corporate puppets? Wouldn’t corporate puppets have stayed on the major label, or at very least not have embarrassed the label by making a documentary that made the label look bad?

    Or is it possible that you didn’t even know about Hanson leaving IDJ, or their starting their own label, or the documentary, or… ANYTHING? Perhaps I have overestimated you, and you are actually more ignorant than I had originally thought?

  • yoda -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 8:13 pm

    telling anyone who can spell on the Internet to f-off is really uncool, you should calm down

  • Jared Singleton -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 9:44 pm

    @ yoda
    “Did I mention record saless at all?”

    So much for your theory.

    Eloise,
    Who the fuck are you? Hanson’s manager? Their mother? Jesus, I’ve never seen such a robust attack on behalf of Hanson. I’ve got to hand it to you, you must have either nothing to do with your time, or perhaps have the biggest set of roast beef curtains this side of the western hemisphere. Seriously, if you are here to defend Hanson, you’re in need of therapy. They were a horrible gimmick, and thus should be left in the past. No one has to do research on a band to decide if they respect or like their music. And yes, I must admit you said nothing about record sales, but the groups you listed above for the most part, base their opinions on record sales and what is deemed “acceptable” by the American, baby obsessed, dorito shilling public. Don’t you have better things to do like prepare for the inevitable Sarah Palin presidency race in 2012? Go back to your soccer mom mentality. And if you are not a mom, let me apologize for the accusation. No…..not really. Never have children if you’re going to raise them on Hanson…..that would be like lying about the holocaust.

  • apartment -- Jul 28th, 2009 at 9:50 pm

    Eloise, why are you here? Have you been scouring the interwebs for Anti-Hanson paraphernalia? We are all impressed by your super-dooper knowledge of the band, but can you go back to going through Taylor Hanson’s rubbish and leave us all in peace?

  • Eloise -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 5:49 am

    This is not really a defense of Hanson so much as it is an attack on ignorance; something I abhor no matter what it is directed against. Unfortunately, the culture you seem to be a part of celebrates ignorance, and holds it close to your collective hearts. You have created a pre-conceived notion of what this band is, and are emphatically rejecting any fact (and there are certainly many!) that would disprove that pre-conceieed notion. Funny you should mention holocaust denial, since the adherents of that particular theory react to facts with the same sort of willful ignorance.

  • franklin bluth -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 6:49 am

    wot does any of this have to do with the monkees the beach boys the beatles and the oasis back catalog coming out on vinyl?

  • Jared Singleton -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 7:44 am

    *yawn*
    So now I’m ignorant because i don’t like Hanson or Tinted Windows? I’ve actually heard the Tinted Windows album in its entirety, and it blows. I just plain don’t like it! You can call me ignorant and rant all you want; people have a right to their opinion. I don’t care if you love them, that’s fine. But, that doesn’t mean you get to travel all over the internet and tell people that they are “ignorant” for not liking a certain band. That’s just plain sociopathic. We can agree to disagree. This conversation is over, and I’m going to work now. Have a nice day, and please choke on a Tinted Window cd.

    *kisses*

  • Eloise -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:04 am

    Ah, sadly I must conclude that reading comprehension is not one of your stronger points. I never, ever called anyone ignorant over their taste in music. Never. Ever. People like what they like; it makes no difference to me one way or the other. However, when you “try to speak for everyone on the planet” to say that nobody wants to hear Hanson’s newer music, I call that ignorant. When you further want to comment on the quality of this music despite never having heard it, that is a somewhat more deplorable form of ignorance. When you ignore a band’s entire recent history and refer to them as “corporate puppets” despite the fact that they are self-releasing all their music and spent a lot of time speaking out on college campuses against the corporate music industry, I consider that ignorant too. Go ahead and hate the band all you like; it means less than nothing to me. However, you should at least know what you’re talking about before you hate, because ignorance and hatred are a volatile combination.

  • Ev -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:31 am

    Hey Eloise, do you have any idea how “ignorant” you are for coming onto the Buddyhead comments section and trying to defend Hanson?? That’s like showing up at a black panthers rally dressed in klan attire.

  • Eloise -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:38 am

    Calm down, Ev. I know that it is very, very important for people like yourself to believe that Hanson sucks. And I can’t say I don’t find this all very amusing. It’s certainly easy to rile you guys up!

  • Fiona -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:44 am

    This is amazing. I remember at school there were a group of about 4 or 5 posers (the kind of people who now “ironically” wear those Kanye West glasses) who in took it upon themselves to defend Hanson and talk about their amazing and worthy later albums. They got really irate when anyone mentioned mmmshlock and went on to form a bitch rock group that did covers of alanis morrisette. I think they called themselves “the plug” or something equally shite and listening to them made me want to stab my brain through my ear. I totally forgot about that until reading this technofight. Maybe repressed it, I dunno. But reading the above gave me the overwhelming urge to share…

    I feel like I should now make a relevant comment to justify my story but I really have no desire to construct an informed opinion on Tinted Windows. I can offer an uninformed one though but apparently that’s no longer okay.

  • Eloise -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:49 am

    I don’t know, Fiona. The Buddyhead community seems prepared to fight to the death for your right to say anything you want about anything you want, whether you know anything about it or not. I’m obviously a minority of one in disliking ignorance; the rest of you embrace it vehemently.

  • Fiona -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:51 am

    Yeah I fucking love ignorance.

  • Eloise -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:52 am

    Well, you should fit right in, then.

  • Fiona -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 8:58 am

    ooooooh touche!! haha, lame. Take a joke and stop getting your knickers in a twist about Hanson, I mean, come on… HANSON? If you want to defend the traditional and ancient art of debate then join the UN and achieve nothing, in the mean time, let us have fun at a shitty band’s expense. it’s not like anyone’s making unsubstantiated claims against anything that actually matters.

  • Eloise -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 9:07 am

    Thanks, but my knickers, to quote you so eloquently, are untwisted. I’m actually having fun watching the lengths to which everyone here will go to keep anyone from poking holes in their deeply dogmatic belief that “Hanson SUX!” I have already been compared to the Ku Klux Klan, a holocaust denier, and a Sarah Palin supporter because I dare to think differently about this band. How dangerous am I, for failing to believe in the infallible doctrine of Hanson Sux! ;-)

  • Fiona -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 9:18 am

    wow, you’re a shitstorm of fun. no, don’t reply, I’m going to do something else now as you’ve managed to make buddyhead boring. congratulations.

  • 1985 -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 11:23 am

    wait wait wait, so you mean to say that there are oasis vinyl reissues?

  • franklin bluth -- Jul 29th, 2009 at 12:01 pm

    there are man. all of them. fuckin masterplan the b sides. fuckin wots the story morning glory, deff maybe. boner! top. stop argueing lads and lasses. summer isnt over yet and i’ll dj your fuckin lame party for some beer and weed and make it better by ending the night with slide away and throwing in some supersonic along the way. we’ll dance, get naked, maybe you’ll fuck someone you are into or not into but i wont be playin any of this silly shit. no harm meant, i have no problem with these little kids who are no longer little kids. they are completely harmless and i honestly thought they lived in a bunker in utah with mormons or something like that now.

  • Chloe -- Jul 31st, 2009 at 1:34 am

    I haven’t listened to any of Hanson’s newer stuff, and back in the 6th grade, when Hanson had their hit song I was too much of a nerd to actually listen to top 40s music of any sort…I will say this however, the Hanson brothers seemed like they were in their early-mid teens when they blew up. You can’t really blame them for making the kind of music they did at that age, and who knows, with time they might have actually gotten some sort of positive influence from REAL music, and made some substantial music of their own. I don’t really care either way, but I think that there is always room for artists/musicians/etc to grow.

  • Ryan R. -- Jul 31st, 2009 at 10:44 am

    i walked blindly into their first show at sxsw a few months back. the only person i recognized was the silver fox james iha. dude can not sing live. this shit is awful. it’s already in the “send back to distributors” pile at the record store i work at, which is not a good sign.

  • Rob -- Aug 1st, 2009 at 12:03 pm

    I bought this when it came out cos I was led to believe it was going to be some kind of cool, catchy “power-pop” like redd kross or early cheap trick or something, luckily I haven’t heard it yet, because of my ridiculous backlog of new music, apparently just about everyone but a hanson fan thinks it sucks (this will delay my first listen further and surely make me biased). Anyway, people who love music are great, even if it is hanson or hiphop or some other mainstream or obscure shit, if the person loves their music and it brings them joy then only a hipster bigot would give them grief for it…

  • -P -- Aug 1st, 2009 at 12:51 pm

    I hear that half of the “super group” Chicken Foot, and half of the “super group” Tinted Windows are forming a super-dooper group named Best Buy.

  • tim k. -- Aug 2nd, 2009 at 12:39 pm

    “My point is that you, and others here, know nothing about Hanson, and are in fact quite proud of that. ”

    you’re godamn right!!!!!!!!! i pride myself on not knowing a fuckin’ thing about those twats and their shit-based garbage pop. do you pride yourself on having some sort of intimate Hanson knowledge? do you study Miley Cyrus as well? how have things been going for that little fruitcake who hangs around with Usher? WHERE IS LIL BOW WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!?!?!

    p.s you suck at life.

  • Eloise -- Aug 5th, 2009 at 9:58 am

    I pride myself on not talking about anything unless I know at least a little bit about it. If a topic isn’t worth my knowing anything about, it’s certainly not worth my displaying my ignorance about it online. Obviously, you feel differently, tim k.

  • franklin bluth -- Aug 6th, 2009 at 11:49 am

    you should check out my cd “franklin comes alive” it’s probably in the top 10 records of all time.

  • Travis Keller -- Aug 8th, 2009 at 7:21 am

    Whoa…. how did I miss this shitstorm in the comments… Eloise… email me at travis@buddyhead.com you just won a free buddyhead t shirt for being the biggest moron I’ve run across on this site in a long time! Congrats!

  • Eloise -- Aug 8th, 2009 at 7:57 pm

    Who on earth would want a Buddyhead t shirt?

    I tell you what: donate it to charity in my name.

  • sean -- Aug 11th, 2009 at 10:28 am

    I don’t know why anybody expected anything from this. Bun E. is a great drummer, but Rick Nielsen writes the songs for Cheap Trick, and Billy wrote the songs for the Pumpkins. Hanson hardly even writes on this album. So you bascially have a Disney-pop dude steering the ship.

  • Eloise -- Aug 11th, 2009 at 1:55 pm

    I see your point, Sean, but when you look over everything that Adam Schlesinger has done in his career, I think it might be a bit unfair to dismiss him as just being a Disney-pop dude. At the same time, I must congratulate you on actually knowing something about this band before responding.

  • kurt cobain was a quitter -- Oct 10th, 2009 at 7:59 am

    I “checked out” Tinted Windows at SXSW out of pure morbid curiosity. I feel bad for James Iha. I think the years of being browbeaten by a 6′4, deathly pale, moon-headed, man child with a funny voice has desensitized him from the surrounding world. I don’t think he realizes that he’s in a band with Taylor Hanson.

    James Iha looks like an old teenager in person, whatever that means.

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