GRAHAM PARKER AND THE RUMOUR

Three Chords Good

[Primary Wave]

Reunion albums naturally make listeners nervous. A record might be good, or it might be embarrassingly lame. Or it might be Three Chords Good, the first new record by Graham Parker and the Rumour in more than 30 years. Rich and exciting, it sounds at first like a long-lost gem. Then the words sink in. While the venom of Parker’s punky New Wave-era work hasn’t disappeared, it’s tempered by nostalgia befitting men in their 60s. Still, some songs have a topical bent, and “A Lie Gets Halfway ’Round the World” and the Dylan-circa-’65-esque “Arlington’s Busy” take on warmongers and misery profiteers. The scorching “Coathangers” skewers lawmakers who would tell a woman what to do with her body. But it’s not all finger-pointing. “She Rocks Me” and “That Moon Was Low” are sweet love songs, and a couple  of tunes incorporate kazoo, which immediately strips them of gravity. This is a band most people probably didn’t realize they missed. Good thing they came back to remind us of their greatness. –Jeff Tamarkin