Consumer Guide Album

Marshall Chapman: Jaded Virgin [Epic, 1978]
Chapman's voice is even sexier than her looks, she boasts the uncompromising macho ambition of the fanatic rock and roller, and her album is graced with the subtle touches that make fanatic rock and roll come alive. Yet oddly enough it lacks momentum--which I blame not only on producer Al Kooper but on a workaday band and on Chapman's own lingering role confusion. Not one cut sustains. The Bob Seger cover never rocks out, the Hank Williams tribute gets echoed to death, "I Walk the Line" is an elegant false start, and the I-was-born-to-rock-and-roll soliloquy is one of the slow songs--as are too many of the others. C+