Patti Smith

On her second album, Patti Smith lays back, refusing to assert herself as she did on last
year's Horses. The key is in the billing: on Radio Ethiopia, her group dominates. But while
Smith can be an inventive, sometimes inspired writer and performer, her band is basically
just another loud punk-rock gang of primitives, riff-based and redundant. The rhythm is
disjointed, the guitar chording trite and elementary. Even at best ("Distant Finger... More >