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EMA

The Future's Void

Rock

Mark Richardson

A line on a short a capella song called “Coda”, from EMA’s 2011 album Past Life Martyred Saints, goes like this: “I looked on the computer/ And it just was an emptiness that/ Made me want to throw up on the spot.” On Past Life, Erika M. Anderson sings noise-drenched songs about grey ships and blue scars and red pants that hide menstrual blood and drugs that make her so sad that she can’t stop taking them, but that brief moment is slightly jarring because you don't necessarily picture the narrator in these visceral and harrowing scenes sitting in front of a computer. But the line is that much more striking because of the contrast; in hidden bedrooms where goth kids cut their arms with butterfly knives, there’s also, of course, a laptop. And even an act as banal as cracking it open and browsing the web might lead you to confront loss and take stock, and that moment could actually make you ill. On an album with many great images, “Coda”’s moment of digitally-invoked despair stood out, and that anomalous line effectively serves as a portal into another world, the one of EMA’s second album, The Future’s Void. The key track on Past Life Martyred Saints, and the one that gave the album its name, was its first single, “California”. On it, Anderson sang-spoke lines about splitting from her home in South Dakota and leaving behind friends, who we assume are still there, in order to make her mark as an artist out West. However much of the impressionistic “California” was literally true, it certainly felt like autobiography, and it was emblematic of a record packed with details both personal and universal. The Future’s Void is presented as a different kind of record, one that’s about things and issues instead of people. One of those things is the state of our lives as lived online, with thoughts about Big Data, and, yes, the spiritual vacuum of media-saturated culture. There’s more to the record than that, but given the title, the Oculus Rift headset on the cover, and the content of the two lead singles, “Satellites” and “3Jane”, the initial encounter with it happens within this framework. Digital culture is tricky to write about, because so much of what we’re used to hearing is delivered as a polemic without complexity. On one side you have people talking about disconnect and loneliness and the deterioration of human interaction, basically saying we’ve changed for the worse, and it’s hopeless. On the other, you have the digital utopians—most of whom make their living from the online world, not coincidentally—and they’re telling us that people are more connected because of technology. Writing about what is almost certainly the truth—that contemporary life is a messy, ever-shifting mix of good and bad, and that generalizations about large groups of people are impossible—is hard enough to do in an essay, never mind a four-minute pop song. So you have to hand it to Anderson for addressing such a difficult subject. Even the songs here that are not about the media per se have it lurking somewhere in the background. There are lines like “when you click on the link” and “makin a living off of takin selfies” and “feel like I blew my soul out across the interwebs and streams,” and it’s hard not to cringe just a little, because they seem so on-the-nose. I sense judgement in these lyrics, and even if the judgement feels accurate, it’s a point of view we're bombarded with every day, one that is hard to say something new about. Anderson has indicated in interviews that she's aware that she was taking a risk writing about technology, knowingly using phrases that could seem clumsy as a way to push against limtations. But for me, when the record falters, it’s often because these moments take me out of it; they come over as too easy. Which is not to say that they aren't also used in songs that resonate. “3Jane” is the perfect representation how the album’s awkwardly delivered details can take on serious power when considered whole, and it also seems like the successor to the pairing of “Coda” and “Marked” on Past Life Martyred Saints. The first thing to note about “3Jane” is that the arrangement and melody are absolutely gorgeous, the delicate piano and ghosted synths and thumping tom-toms and shimmering cymbals combine into a ballad that moves with tremendously emotional force. And while lyrics like “it’s all just a big advertising campaign” and “it doesn’t seem like it was only yesterday when you wandered out on superhighway” are iffy, the song ultimately comes over as honest and moving. “It left a hole so big inside of me,” recalls the fantasy of trepanation from “Marked”, and the way Anderson sells it, you feel what she’s feeling. The aching beauty of “3Jane” is found elsewhere on The Future’s Void, on the sing-song organ that half-quotes the melody from “Taps” (Anderson is a genius at making obvious musical references sound strange) in “Dead Celebrity” and on the mid-tempo acoustic lilt of “When She Comes”—the easiest song on the album, catchy and instantly appealing, with lyrics that feel like an evocative puzzle you don’t need to solve. “100 Years”, a song about history and industrialization, is striking most because of the nakedness of Anderson’s vocal, both fragile and strong; after years of being subjected to Auto-Tune and processing and reverb, hearing a flawed human voice this close to the microphone, outlining a melody and cracking subtly here and there, is so real it’s an almost psychedelic experience. “So Blonde”, the album’s most obviously personal song, crackles with memorably imagery (“her pills are shakin in her bag”) and evokes the alt-rock 90s and the era’s interrogation of cultural iconography, with Anderson’s Courtney Love-like scream on the title refrain driving it home. There are moments of brilliance here. There are also songs that are easy to skip. Anderson in industrial rock mode just doesn’t work for me this time, and some of that might be up to the production. The album was recorded simply, in her basement, often alone, and sometimes, especially during its quieter moments, that works to its advantage. But the noisy “Cthulu”, “Smoulder”, and “Neuromancer” never hit the intensity they’re going for, and these three songs in sequence in the middle of the record drag it down big time. There are no memorable hooks during this run, and the pinched filter applied to Anderson’s voice wants to evoke a Nine Inch Nails-style blown-out intensity, but it never reaches that pitch. Still, despite the lyrical clunkers and ill-advised production choices, The Future’s Void has the feel of a real statem

Artist: EMA, Album: The Future's Void, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.4 Album review: "A line on a short a capella song called “Coda”, from EMA’s 2011 album Past Life Martyred Saints, goes like this: “I looked on the computer/ And it just was an emptiness that/ Made me want to throw up on the spot.” On Past Life, Erika M. Anderson sings noise-drenched songs about grey ships and blue scars and red pants that hide menstrual blood and drugs that make her so sad that she can’t stop taking them, but that brief moment is slightly jarring because you don't necessarily picture the narrator in these visceral and harrowing scenes sitting in front of a computer. But the line is that much more striking because of the contrast; in hidden bedrooms where goth kids cut their arms with butterfly knives, there’s also, of course, a laptop. And even an act as banal as cracking it open and browsing the web might lead you to confront loss and take stock, and that moment could actually make you ill. On an album with many great images, “Coda”’s moment of digitally-invoked despair stood out, and that anomalous line effectively serves as a portal into another world, the one of EMA’s second album, The Future’s Void. The key track on Past Life Martyred Saints, and the one that gave the album its name, was its first single, “California”. On it, Anderson sang-spoke lines about splitting from her home in South Dakota and leaving behind friends, who we assume are still there, in order to make her mark as an artist out West. However much of the impressionistic “California” was literally true, it certainly felt like autobiography, and it was emblematic of a record packed with details both personal and universal. The Future’s Void is presented as a different kind of record, one that’s about things and issues instead of people. One of those things is the state of our lives as lived online, with thoughts about Big Data, and, yes, the spiritual vacuum of media-saturated culture. There’s more to the record than that, but given the title, the Oculus Rift headset on the cover, and the content of the two lead singles, “Satellites” and “3Jane”, the initial encounter with it happens within this framework. Digital culture is tricky to write about, because so much of what we’re used to hearing is delivered as a polemic without complexity. On one side you have people talking about disconnect and loneliness and the deterioration of human interaction, basically saying we’ve changed for the worse, and it’s hopeless. On the other, you have the digital utopians—most of whom make their living from the online world, not coincidentally—and they’re telling us that people are more connected because of technology. Writing about what is almost certainly the truth—that contemporary life is a messy, ever-shifting mix of good and bad, and that generalizations about large groups of people are impossible—is hard enough to do in an essay, never mind a four-minute pop song. So you have to hand it to Anderson for addressing such a difficult subject. Even the songs here that are not about the media per se have it lurking somewhere in the background. There are lines like “when you click on the link” and “makin a living off of takin selfies” and “feel like I blew my soul out across the interwebs and streams,” and it’s hard not to cringe just a little, because they seem so on-the-nose. I sense judgement in these lyrics, and even if the judgement feels accurate, it’s a point of view we're bombarded with every day, one that is hard to say something new about. Anderson has indicated in interviews that she's aware that she was taking a risk writing about technology, knowingly using phrases that could seem clumsy as a way to push against limtations. But for me, when the record falters, it’s often because these moments take me out of it; they come over as too easy. Which is not to say that they aren't also used in songs that resonate. “3Jane” is the perfect representation how the album’s awkwardly delivered details can take on serious power when considered whole, and it also seems like the successor to the pairing of “Coda” and “Marked” on Past Life Martyred Saints. The first thing to note about “3Jane” is that the arrangement and melody are absolutely gorgeous, the delicate piano and ghosted synths and thumping tom-toms and shimmering cymbals combine into a ballad that moves with tremendously emotional force. And while lyrics like “it’s all just a big advertising campaign” and “it doesn’t seem like it was only yesterday when you wandered out on superhighway” are iffy, the song ultimately comes over as honest and moving. “It left a hole so big inside of me,” recalls the fantasy of trepanation from “Marked”, and the way Anderson sells it, you feel what she’s feeling. The aching beauty of “3Jane” is found elsewhere on The Future’s Void, on the sing-song organ that half-quotes the melody from “Taps” (Anderson is a genius at making obvious musical references sound strange) in “Dead Celebrity” and on the mid-tempo acoustic lilt of “When She Comes”—the easiest song on the album, catchy and instantly appealing, with lyrics that feel like an evocative puzzle you don’t need to solve. “100 Years”, a song about history and industrialization, is striking most because of the nakedness of Anderson’s vocal, both fragile and strong; after years of being subjected to Auto-Tune and processing and reverb, hearing a flawed human voice this close to the microphone, outlining a melody and cracking subtly here and there, is so real it’s an almost psychedelic experience. “So Blonde”, the album’s most obviously personal song, crackles with memorably imagery (“her pills are shakin in her bag”) and evokes the alt-rock 90s and the era’s interrogation of cultural iconography, with Anderson’s Courtney Love-like scream on the title refrain driving it home. There are moments of brilliance here. There are also songs that are easy to skip. Anderson in industrial rock mode just doesn’t work for me this time, and some of that might be up to the production. The album was recorded simply, in her basement, often alone, and sometimes, especially during its quieter moments, that works to its advantage. But the noisy “Cthulu”, “Smoulder”, and “Neuromancer” never hit the intensity they’re going for, and these three songs in sequence in the middle of the record drag it down big time. There are no memorable hooks during this run, and the pinched filter applied to Anderson’s voice wants to evoke a Nine Inch Nails-style blown-out intensity, but it never reaches that pitch. Still, despite the lyrical clunkers and ill-advised production choices, The Future’s Void has the feel of a real statem"

The-Drum

Contact

Pop/R&B

Miles Raymer

When Chicago electronic musicians Jeremiah Chrome and Brandon Boom began making music together as the-Drum towards the end of 2010, it was with the express purpose of emulating the eccentric R&B super-producer Terius “The-Dream” Nash: from their spare, syncopated beats all the way down to the hyphen in the project’s name. When they released Sense Net last year, Nash’s presence still loomed large, even amidst the influence of vintage avant-electronic acts and industrial bands. Since then, however, the pair have struck out on a far more idiosyncratic course. Contact, their first full-length, abandons Sense Net’s gently psychedelic R&B bump, along with anything resembling traditional pop song structure. Maybe those things are still there somewhere, just radically mutated, rapidly evolved into unrecognizable new shapes. Contact opens with a short sound effects vignette where someone enters a high tech enclosure and connects to a data network using a computer that offers roughly digital voice prompts. Having successfully logged in, we encounter reverb-rich pads, synthesized nonsense vocal sounds, and finger snaps that lead in a beat that skitters and booms and refuses to settle into one steady pattern. Instead, it flickers between drum & bass, Chicago footwork, two-step, and, during a couple of moments, the kind of R&B the pair were doing back on Sense Net. The rest of the songs operate in a similar fashion, with the pair establishing a sonic premise, then giving it a gentle push and following where it rolls. “Narco” begins with metallic-toned synth arpeggios, a minimal but vaguely menacing kick drum part, and a sprinkling of aquatic-sounding digital blips. Over the next eight minutes, it touches on everything from turn of the millennium radio rap to VHS-era action movie soundtracks, and includes a frantic digital slap bass solo and tones that sound like they could have been sampled from a vintage PC operating system. Many of the songs float off into full-on ambience at some point in their journey. “Arcadia” actually begins there, with long, leisurely stretches of blissed-out synth pads decorated with little scraps of sound-- a heavily manipulated vocal sample or a brief keyboard figure-- that float leisurely by. Every once in a while a little bit of structure creeps in and the song drifts almost to the point of something that could pass for R&B, but only briefly, and then it drifts gently back. It’s an intensely dreamy record, and a very futuristic one too. It’s a slightly dated brand of futurism though, full of sounds lifted from primitive early samplers, organic percussion sounds that suggest a particularly 90s “tribal” aesthetic, and low-resolution computer voices that say things like “data connection” and “systems online.” It’s the sound of 2013, but more specifically of 2013 as it looked in the early days of Wired magazine, when digital culture was first starting to emerge. Contact seems like the type of thing the fringier characters from a William Gibson cyberpunk novel would put on when they want to kick back and smoke a spliff. It’s kind of a bummer to see two producers who were so good at making a particular kind of music essentially leave it behind with barely any finished recordings to show for it (although they still dabble in R&B with the Chicago vocal trio JODY), but that’s really the only disappointing thing about Contact. It may not offer pre-existing the-Drum fans what they may have thought they wanted from the group’s first album, but what it delivers is powerful stuff. The pair only recently started performing outside of Chicago, and last week I saw them play one of their first shows in New York City. No one was dancing, which is usually a huge problem for a concert of what’s ostensibly dance music, but the two didn’t seem concerned in the least bit as they built up, warped, and tore down one richly textured sonic structure after another. And they shouldn’t have been. No one was dancing, but everyone was mesmerized.

Artist: The-Drum, Album: Contact, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "When Chicago electronic musicians Jeremiah Chrome and Brandon Boom began making music together as the-Drum towards the end of 2010, it was with the express purpose of emulating the eccentric R&B super-producer Terius “The-Dream” Nash: from their spare, syncopated beats all the way down to the hyphen in the project’s name. When they released Sense Net last year, Nash’s presence still loomed large, even amidst the influence of vintage avant-electronic acts and industrial bands. Since then, however, the pair have struck out on a far more idiosyncratic course. Contact, their first full-length, abandons Sense Net’s gently psychedelic R&B bump, along with anything resembling traditional pop song structure. Maybe those things are still there somewhere, just radically mutated, rapidly evolved into unrecognizable new shapes. Contact opens with a short sound effects vignette where someone enters a high tech enclosure and connects to a data network using a computer that offers roughly digital voice prompts. Having successfully logged in, we encounter reverb-rich pads, synthesized nonsense vocal sounds, and finger snaps that lead in a beat that skitters and booms and refuses to settle into one steady pattern. Instead, it flickers between drum & bass, Chicago footwork, two-step, and, during a couple of moments, the kind of R&B the pair were doing back on Sense Net. The rest of the songs operate in a similar fashion, with the pair establishing a sonic premise, then giving it a gentle push and following where it rolls. “Narco” begins with metallic-toned synth arpeggios, a minimal but vaguely menacing kick drum part, and a sprinkling of aquatic-sounding digital blips. Over the next eight minutes, it touches on everything from turn of the millennium radio rap to VHS-era action movie soundtracks, and includes a frantic digital slap bass solo and tones that sound like they could have been sampled from a vintage PC operating system. Many of the songs float off into full-on ambience at some point in their journey. “Arcadia” actually begins there, with long, leisurely stretches of blissed-out synth pads decorated with little scraps of sound-- a heavily manipulated vocal sample or a brief keyboard figure-- that float leisurely by. Every once in a while a little bit of structure creeps in and the song drifts almost to the point of something that could pass for R&B, but only briefly, and then it drifts gently back. It’s an intensely dreamy record, and a very futuristic one too. It’s a slightly dated brand of futurism though, full of sounds lifted from primitive early samplers, organic percussion sounds that suggest a particularly 90s “tribal” aesthetic, and low-resolution computer voices that say things like “data connection” and “systems online.” It’s the sound of 2013, but more specifically of 2013 as it looked in the early days of Wired magazine, when digital culture was first starting to emerge. Contact seems like the type of thing the fringier characters from a William Gibson cyberpunk novel would put on when they want to kick back and smoke a spliff. It’s kind of a bummer to see two producers who were so good at making a particular kind of music essentially leave it behind with barely any finished recordings to show for it (although they still dabble in R&B with the Chicago vocal trio JODY), but that’s really the only disappointing thing about Contact. It may not offer pre-existing the-Drum fans what they may have thought they wanted from the group’s first album, but what it delivers is powerful stuff. The pair only recently started performing outside of Chicago, and last week I saw them play one of their first shows in New York City. No one was dancing, which is usually a huge problem for a concert of what’s ostensibly dance music, but the two didn’t seem concerned in the least bit as they built up, warped, and tore down one richly textured sonic structure after another. And they shouldn’t have been. No one was dancing, but everyone was mesmerized."

Jess Sah Bi, Peter One

Our Garden Needs Its Flowers

Global

Madison Bloom

In 1985, Jess Sah Bi and Peter One’s debut album, Our Garden Needs Its Flowers, launched the two Ivory Coast musicians into regional stardom across greater West Africa. Like many recordings of its era and location, Our Garden eventually went out of print, available only to determined collectors and scavengers. Finally, reissue label Awesome Tapes From Africa has given Sah Bi and One’s folk masterpiece its first official re-release. Thirty-three years later, this unusual recording of Côte d’Ivoire country ballads still sounds like a work of pure joy. There is an innate sense of travel in Our Garden; it is an album of journey music that gallops all the way from the Ivory Coast to the vast expanses of the American Southwest. In a way, Sah Bi and One’s bridging of musical genres and disparate continents foretold their own separate voyages to the United States: Today Peter works as a nurse in Nashville, while Jess teaches African music to children in San Francisco. Though Our Garden is heavily steeped in Americana, it retains sonic stamps of its original geography. Early song “Katin,” for instance, is more reminiscent of 1980s Afro-pop than it is 1970s country, and it is one of the record’s most buoyant offerings. Its muted scrapes of electric guitar and peppering of drum machine make for a cheerful rhythm that carries Sah Bi and One’s entwined vocals. Like most of the LP, “Katin” is sung in Gouro, a Mande language of the Ivory Coast; even without understanding that tongue, listeners will pick up on the music’s abundant bliss. If songs like “Katin” and “Kango” successfully transmit a sense of celebration across language barriers, lullabies such as “Clipo Clipo” and the title track paint the album with rich scenery. The former glides to the pace of a slow-rolling car on a leisure cruise. Papery taps on tightly drawn drum skins hover overhead while Sah Bi and One’s harmonies sound like well-tuned, exquisite instruments of their own making. “Our Garden Needs Its Flowers,” meanwhile, is a steady amble through desert plains. Its rattling percussion sounds like spurs clicking across a dry stretch of earth, and a howling harmonica calls to mind Townes Van Zandt’s “Like a Summer Thursday.” Sung entirely in English, “Our Garden” is an entreaty for “peace on Earth,” using flowers as the metaphorical core of the song. It is a masterful rendition of languid country and western, brightened by Sah Bi and One’s synchronized, Simon & Garfunkel-like harmonies. “Our Garden” isn’t the only song on the album that wraps political idealism in the silken fabric of Sah Bi and One’s vocals. The upbeat “Apartheid” calls for an end to the horrific racial segregation laws in South Africa, nine years before they were eventually abolished, while “African Chant,” and “Solution” (the latter sung in French) ponder notions of freedom and unity. Perhaps what’s most astonishing about Our Garden Needs Its Flowers is how well its songs have endured. The album has traveled a long way in the past three decades, and it arrives now like a delightful gift.

Artist: Jess Sah Bi, Peter One, Album: Our Garden Needs Its Flowers, Genre: Global, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "In 1985, Jess Sah Bi and Peter One’s debut album, Our Garden Needs Its Flowers, launched the two Ivory Coast musicians into regional stardom across greater West Africa. Like many recordings of its era and location, Our Garden eventually went out of print, available only to determined collectors and scavengers. Finally, reissue label Awesome Tapes From Africa has given Sah Bi and One’s folk masterpiece its first official re-release. Thirty-three years later, this unusual recording of Côte d’Ivoire country ballads still sounds like a work of pure joy. There is an innate sense of travel in Our Garden; it is an album of journey music that gallops all the way from the Ivory Coast to the vast expanses of the American Southwest. In a way, Sah Bi and One’s bridging of musical genres and disparate continents foretold their own separate voyages to the United States: Today Peter works as a nurse in Nashville, while Jess teaches African music to children in San Francisco. Though Our Garden is heavily steeped in Americana, it retains sonic stamps of its original geography. Early song “Katin,” for instance, is more reminiscent of 1980s Afro-pop than it is 1970s country, and it is one of the record’s most buoyant offerings. Its muted scrapes of electric guitar and peppering of drum machine make for a cheerful rhythm that carries Sah Bi and One’s entwined vocals. Like most of the LP, “Katin” is sung in Gouro, a Mande language of the Ivory Coast; even without understanding that tongue, listeners will pick up on the music’s abundant bliss. If songs like “Katin” and “Kango” successfully transmit a sense of celebration across language barriers, lullabies such as “Clipo Clipo” and the title track paint the album with rich scenery. The former glides to the pace of a slow-rolling car on a leisure cruise. Papery taps on tightly drawn drum skins hover overhead while Sah Bi and One’s harmonies sound like well-tuned, exquisite instruments of their own making. “Our Garden Needs Its Flowers,” meanwhile, is a steady amble through desert plains. Its rattling percussion sounds like spurs clicking across a dry stretch of earth, and a howling harmonica calls to mind Townes Van Zandt’s “Like a Summer Thursday.” Sung entirely in English, “Our Garden” is an entreaty for “peace on Earth,” using flowers as the metaphorical core of the song. It is a masterful rendition of languid country and western, brightened by Sah Bi and One’s synchronized, Simon & Garfunkel-like harmonies. “Our Garden” isn’t the only song on the album that wraps political idealism in the silken fabric of Sah Bi and One’s vocals. The upbeat “Apartheid” calls for an end to the horrific racial segregation laws in South Africa, nine years before they were eventually abolished, while “African Chant,” and “Solution” (the latter sung in French) ponder notions of freedom and unity. Perhaps what’s most astonishing about Our Garden Needs Its Flowers is how well its songs have endured. The album has traveled a long way in the past three decades, and it arrives now like a delightful gift."

Grimes

Art Angels

Pop/R&B

Jessica Hopper

"I'll never be your dream girl," sings Claire Boucher on "Butterfly", the final song on Art Angels, her most audacious album to date. Perhaps she's just being coy, because for many she is exactly that. In the age of the female pop auteur, Boucher's work as Grimes is a glorious addition to the canon, someone who beckons us to the dancefloor with big ideas and bigger beats, and resists simplistic notions of who she can be on a record or a stage. Art Angels is a gilded coffin nail to outmoded sexist arguments that women in pop are constructed products, a mere frame for male producers' talents—that because their music is immaculate, they are somehow not authentic. These 14 tracks are evidence of Boucher's labor and an articulation of a pop vision that is incontrovertibly hers, inviting the wider world in. Grimes shows that Boucher is the ultimate fangirl study: a D.I.Y. musician whose love of Mariah, Katy Perry, and K-pop has expanded her palette, driven by her fascination with the possibilities of the synthetic and unreal, and ultimately given wings to Art Angels. Here, she closes the gap between the pop she's idolized and the pop she is capable of. Boucher has claimed that the record has two halves, and indeed, the songs line up most easily into beginning- and end-of-the-night dancefloor jams. The former is exemplified by the bright, anxious "Kill V. Maim", with its mocking cheerleader chant over blown-out beats and Boucher working both ends of her register in a propulsive celebration of vocal fry. Same for "Flesh Without Blood", which is the sweetest fuck-off of 2015, one that highlights that there is much more to Boucher's voice than Visions ever had a chance to reveal. The song is Boucher eating the lunch that Miley packed, may it be #blessed with infinite stadium-EDM remixes. Post-Art Angels, it's hard to imagine anyone will reject a Boucher-penned cut: This is an album, but it's also a resume, and someone who made "California" could certainly be making crossover hits for any marquee Nashville name, while "Easily" suggests that Kesha co-writes should be in Boucher's future. The late-night closers and their arrangements are where Boucher shows her mastery and discipline as a producer. "Realiti", "Venus Fly" with Janelle Monáe, and "Butterfly" give her a new set of peers: Sure, she's there with collaborator Monáe and Annie Clark as an auteur, but purely as a pop producer she's as deft and clever as anyone we consider a master of Top 40 craft—be it Greg Kurstin or Diplo. The songs are graced with small details: curious skeets of beats, buried samples that only appear once, toxically cute '90s pop guitar. The songs build in unexpected ways, but explode and gratify in the way we hope pop always will. "Butterfly" is a let-tonight-last-forever mutant bruiser with roiling sub-bass, the chorus's side-chained pulse making it like an uncanny valley version of Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out of My Head". All of this might seem as if Boucher has fashioned a whole-cloth reinvention and is gunning for the Top 40, but neither of these things feel true. Art Angels is a natural progression from Visions; if you strained out some of the processing and murk of the latter, you would find these structures lurking. Boucher's voice is recognizable and familiar, but it's bigger and has more range and depth than on "Oblivion". This album foregrounds her, samples her, piles tracks of her half a dozen high to form melodies and countermelodies. One of the most notable and striking differences between Art Angels and its Top 40 kin is that these are not love songs. The album is an epic holiday buffet of tendentious feminist fuck-off, with second helpings for anonymous commenters and music industry blood-suckers. Her conflicted, vertiginous relationship with the fast fame that followed Visions seems to have led her to a place of DGAF liberation. Some songs, like "Kill V. Maim", course with a thrilling rage, even a casual misandry. ("I'm only a man/ I do what I can," she sings on the hook). Yet, what's most exciting within Art Angels is the sheer will and fearlessness of Boucher's fight to be heard and seen on her own terms. She's not a human Tumblr, as we called her (somewhat humiliatingly) in 2012; she's a human zeitgeist, redrawing all the binaries and boundaries by which we define pop music and forcing us to come along.

Artist: Grimes, Album: Art Angels, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 8.5 Album review: ""I'll never be your dream girl," sings Claire Boucher on "Butterfly", the final song on Art Angels, her most audacious album to date. Perhaps she's just being coy, because for many she is exactly that. In the age of the female pop auteur, Boucher's work as Grimes is a glorious addition to the canon, someone who beckons us to the dancefloor with big ideas and bigger beats, and resists simplistic notions of who she can be on a record or a stage. Art Angels is a gilded coffin nail to outmoded sexist arguments that women in pop are constructed products, a mere frame for male producers' talents—that because their music is immaculate, they are somehow not authentic. These 14 tracks are evidence of Boucher's labor and an articulation of a pop vision that is incontrovertibly hers, inviting the wider world in. Grimes shows that Boucher is the ultimate fangirl study: a D.I.Y. musician whose love of Mariah, Katy Perry, and K-pop has expanded her palette, driven by her fascination with the possibilities of the synthetic and unreal, and ultimately given wings to Art Angels. Here, she closes the gap between the pop she's idolized and the pop she is capable of. Boucher has claimed that the record has two halves, and indeed, the songs line up most easily into beginning- and end-of-the-night dancefloor jams. The former is exemplified by the bright, anxious "Kill V. Maim", with its mocking cheerleader chant over blown-out beats and Boucher working both ends of her register in a propulsive celebration of vocal fry. Same for "Flesh Without Blood", which is the sweetest fuck-off of 2015, one that highlights that there is much more to Boucher's voice than Visions ever had a chance to reveal. The song is Boucher eating the lunch that Miley packed, may it be #blessed with infinite stadium-EDM remixes. Post-Art Angels, it's hard to imagine anyone will reject a Boucher-penned cut: This is an album, but it's also a resume, and someone who made "California" could certainly be making crossover hits for any marquee Nashville name, while "Easily" suggests that Kesha co-writes should be in Boucher's future. The late-night closers and their arrangements are where Boucher shows her mastery and discipline as a producer. "Realiti", "Venus Fly" with Janelle Monáe, and "Butterfly" give her a new set of peers: Sure, she's there with collaborator Monáe and Annie Clark as an auteur, but purely as a pop producer she's as deft and clever as anyone we consider a master of Top 40 craft—be it Greg Kurstin or Diplo. The songs are graced with small details: curious skeets of beats, buried samples that only appear once, toxically cute '90s pop guitar. The songs build in unexpected ways, but explode and gratify in the way we hope pop always will. "Butterfly" is a let-tonight-last-forever mutant bruiser with roiling sub-bass, the chorus's side-chained pulse making it like an uncanny valley version of Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out of My Head". All of this might seem as if Boucher has fashioned a whole-cloth reinvention and is gunning for the Top 40, but neither of these things feel true. Art Angels is a natural progression from Visions; if you strained out some of the processing and murk of the latter, you would find these structures lurking. Boucher's voice is recognizable and familiar, but it's bigger and has more range and depth than on "Oblivion". This album foregrounds her, samples her, piles tracks of her half a dozen high to form melodies and countermelodies. One of the most notable and striking differences between Art Angels and its Top 40 kin is that these are not love songs. The album is an epic holiday buffet of tendentious feminist fuck-off, with second helpings for anonymous commenters and music industry blood-suckers. Her conflicted, vertiginous relationship with the fast fame that followed Visions seems to have led her to a place of DGAF liberation. Some songs, like "Kill V. Maim", course with a thrilling rage, even a casual misandry. ("I'm only a man/ I do what I can," she sings on the hook). Yet, what's most exciting within Art Angels is the sheer will and fearlessness of Boucher's fight to be heard and seen on her own terms. She's not a human Tumblr, as we called her (somewhat humiliatingly) in 2012; she's a human zeitgeist, redrawing all the binaries and boundaries by which we define pop music and forcing us to come along."

Tom Carter, Pat Murano

Four Infernal Rivers

Experimental,Rock

Grayson Haver Currin

Four Infernal Rivers, the second album of side-length improvisations by guitarist Tom Carter and synth controller Pat Murano, takes its title from a particularly foreboding passage of John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Milton lists and explains the rivers of hell and the woeful lake into which they empty—the black Acheron and the hate-filled Styx, the aggressive Phlegethon and the gripe-choked Cocytus. In other collaborations and in their respective solo work, Carter and Murano have often plundered such fables and symbols for fodder. Here, they not only attach the names of those mythic flows to each of these tracks but also use them as spirit guides; these 20-minute pieces are singular rushes of gathering and often-ferocious sound, built with guitars that scream and then scatter the blues and electronics that wade through fluid distortion and oscillation. “Phlegethon,” for instance, goes from eerie to irate, “Acheron” from quiet and pensive to clipped and impenetrable. Despite the doom and the din, Four Infernal Rivers is a wonderfully conversational album, a partnership between two restless improvisers locked deep inside these moments. Carter and Murano are comfortable with one another’s styles and instincts, and they respond to one another as old friends. In fact, for all this talk of fire, these instrumentals feel rather like a set of late-night fireside chats, full of gripes and wit, opinions and ideals. When these four sides have all been flipped, you get the sense that you’ve outlasted the night with these two, aggravated and excited by their strange companionship. The pair recorded their only previous release, an eponymous two-piece LP issued in 2012, at Black Dirt Studio, a comfortable space where each of their better-known outfits—Carter’s Charalambides and Murano’s No-Neck Blues Band—have previously worked. For this one, though, they met at Carter’s Long Island City house for several sessions early last year, congregating around his four-track. Aberrations that might’ve been buffed out in a studio, like the un-grounded amplifier hum at the start of “Acheron”, become subtle charms, intimate moments that put the listener in the living room as a kind of witness. Carter and Murano move past the hesitant and inchoate atmosphere of their earlier work into an unflinching, boisterous dialogue. Passing musical ideas, like the flickering tones that begin “Cocytus”, are taken to their extreme ends. Murano’s gloaming synth morphs into a sheet of caustic noise, while Carter’s shimmering notes spiral into a veil of high-end abrasion. Nearly 20 minutes later, when the track slow-fades into distant silence, you can hear echoes of that introduction, outlasting the intervening squall. That narrative quality makes Four Infernal Rivers particularly magnetic. These four improvisations evolve and surprise, but they move through their 20 minutes with a sequential logic that resembles thoroughly arranged pieces. During “Phlegethon”, they harmonize, Carter’s piercing, acid-lead guitar slicing through Murano’s sympathetic synthesizer line; it’s almost as if they’ve agreed to meet at this specific place but made a game of choosing their own routes to that intersection. When they split apart, Murano chases a set of decaying beats with damaged industrial tones; Carter, meanwhile, pursues a circular guitar moan, suggesting an incensed Loren Connors. They meet again at the end, steadily settling into stillness like the autumn dusk. Although they play different instruments across Four Infernal River**s, Carter and Murano allow the sounds of guitar, synthesizer and drum machine to dissolve into one another, often to the point where they seem to come from the same mercurial source. And in a way, they do—from two experienced instrumentalists setting up shop at home, drifting into the same space and coming up for a break only when one side of the record is full.

Artist: Tom Carter, Pat Murano, Album: Four Infernal Rivers, Genre: Experimental,Rock, Score (1-10): 8.0 Album review: "Four Infernal Rivers, the second album of side-length improvisations by guitarist Tom Carter and synth controller Pat Murano, takes its title from a particularly foreboding passage of John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Milton lists and explains the rivers of hell and the woeful lake into which they empty—the black Acheron and the hate-filled Styx, the aggressive Phlegethon and the gripe-choked Cocytus. In other collaborations and in their respective solo work, Carter and Murano have often plundered such fables and symbols for fodder. Here, they not only attach the names of those mythic flows to each of these tracks but also use them as spirit guides; these 20-minute pieces are singular rushes of gathering and often-ferocious sound, built with guitars that scream and then scatter the blues and electronics that wade through fluid distortion and oscillation. “Phlegethon,” for instance, goes from eerie to irate, “Acheron” from quiet and pensive to clipped and impenetrable. Despite the doom and the din, Four Infernal Rivers is a wonderfully conversational album, a partnership between two restless improvisers locked deep inside these moments. Carter and Murano are comfortable with one another’s styles and instincts, and they respond to one another as old friends. In fact, for all this talk of fire, these instrumentals feel rather like a set of late-night fireside chats, full of gripes and wit, opinions and ideals. When these four sides have all been flipped, you get the sense that you’ve outlasted the night with these two, aggravated and excited by their strange companionship. The pair recorded their only previous release, an eponymous two-piece LP issued in 2012, at Black Dirt Studio, a comfortable space where each of their better-known outfits—Carter’s Charalambides and Murano’s No-Neck Blues Band—have previously worked. For this one, though, they met at Carter’s Long Island City house for several sessions early last year, congregating around his four-track. Aberrations that might’ve been buffed out in a studio, like the un-grounded amplifier hum at the start of “Acheron”, become subtle charms, intimate moments that put the listener in the living room as a kind of witness. Carter and Murano move past the hesitant and inchoate atmosphere of their earlier work into an unflinching, boisterous dialogue. Passing musical ideas, like the flickering tones that begin “Cocytus”, are taken to their extreme ends. Murano’s gloaming synth morphs into a sheet of caustic noise, while Carter’s shimmering notes spiral into a veil of high-end abrasion. Nearly 20 minutes later, when the track slow-fades into distant silence, you can hear echoes of that introduction, outlasting the intervening squall. That narrative quality makes Four Infernal Rivers particularly magnetic. These four improvisations evolve and surprise, but they move through their 20 minutes with a sequential logic that resembles thoroughly arranged pieces. During “Phlegethon”, they harmonize, Carter’s piercing, acid-lead guitar slicing through Murano’s sympathetic synthesizer line; it’s almost as if they’ve agreed to meet at this specific place but made a game of choosing their own routes to that intersection. When they split apart, Murano chases a set of decaying beats with damaged industrial tones; Carter, meanwhile, pursues a circular guitar moan, suggesting an incensed Loren Connors. They meet again at the end, steadily settling into stillness like the autumn dusk. Although they play different instruments across Four Infernal River**s, Carter and Murano allow the sounds of guitar, synthesizer and drum machine to dissolve into one another, often to the point where they seem to come from the same mercurial source. And in a way, they do—from two experienced instrumentalists setting up shop at home, drifting into the same space and coming up for a break only when one side of the record is full."

Hiss Golden Messenger

Southern Grammar EP

Folk/Country

Stephen M. Deusner

When Hiss Golden Messenger made their network television debut back in November, David Letterman introduced the band as a duo, but what appeared onstage looked more like a collective: a double-digit lineup that included bass, guitar, back-up singers, a bass sax, brass, and a particularly excitable drummer. The group’s membership has always been in flux: It began life as a duo (M.C. Taylor and Scott Hirsch), then shrank to a solo project, then ballooned into a full band. With Paul Shaffer playing along, the new line-up turned "Southern Grammar" into something similarly unrecognizable. On last year’s Lateness of Dancers it was a languid number, with a laidback tempo and a wistful ambience that hid darker depths. On Letterman’s stage, however, the song got up out of its rocker and danced in the yard. The band goosed that mathematical guitar riff to make it sound spiky and insistent, transforming the song from an interior monologue into an extroverted Southern rocker. It’s a testament to the mutability of Taylor’s songwriting that "Southern Grammar" can sound so remarkably different with just a few tweaks, but the song supports both interpretations: the nodding reverie and the waking celebration. The live version that anchors Hiss Golden Messenger’s new EP is not the Letterman performance, but a similar recording from WXPN in Philadelphia that features yet another lineup. The band’s touring roster includes Hirsch, Phil Cook of Megafaun, Matt McCaughan of Bon Iver, Alexandra Sauser-Monnig of Mountain Man, and saxophonist Matt Douglas of the Small Ponds. Playing loosely, they quickly establish a stuttering groove that’s ultimately more Allmans than Appalachian. The sax is crucial: When the song opens, Douglas plays that riff just behind the beat, ghosting Taylor’s guitar and making the song crackle precariously, opening it up in a way that belies its cry for simplicity. This take on "Southern Grammar" may not be quite as startlingly exclamatory as the television version, but the band sounds grittier, more animated, more volatile than you might expect. Southern Grammar, however, is not a rousing live EP, as its title track might suggest; instead, the remaining two songs are studio-bound and downtempo—the band at its most contemplative. "He Wrote the Book" may be the most Bible-bound song Taylor has written, which is saying a lot. Especially after "Grammar", the pace plods, but the arrangement is gently lush, founded on a churchly piano, a rattling snare, and a gathering of reeds that transforms this sunny Sunday morning hymn into a slow-burn soul number. It conveys the contentment that comes at the end of a long journey, yet the next song, "Brother, Do You Know the Road?" fades in like we’re catching up to Hiss Golden Messenger in the middle of an especially arduous trek. The rhythm section lopes along, trudging yet determined to make the next ridge, and Taylor coaxes a tremulous solo out of his guitar—short but powerful. This sojourner’s dirge is a call-and-response between the songwriter and his band, who answer only, "Yes, my brother, I know the road," to convey a palpable world-weariness that is less physical than spiritual. To their credit, Hiss Golden Messenger never sound weary. In whatever form the band might take, they convey too much joy and direction in creating the music and making the journey. Despite its subdued momentum, Southern Grammar still sounds like an exclamation point at the end of Lateness of Dancers, echoing that album’s celebratory cry while also warning of all the miles that lay ahead of this band. "What are you worried about?" Letterman asked the band, only somewhat rhetorically. "We’re not worried about anything," was Taylor’s apt answer.

Artist: Hiss Golden Messenger, Album: Southern Grammar EP, Genre: Folk/Country, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: "When Hiss Golden Messenger made their network television debut back in November, David Letterman introduced the band as a duo, but what appeared onstage looked more like a collective: a double-digit lineup that included bass, guitar, back-up singers, a bass sax, brass, and a particularly excitable drummer. The group’s membership has always been in flux: It began life as a duo (M.C. Taylor and Scott Hirsch), then shrank to a solo project, then ballooned into a full band. With Paul Shaffer playing along, the new line-up turned "Southern Grammar" into something similarly unrecognizable. On last year’s Lateness of Dancers it was a languid number, with a laidback tempo and a wistful ambience that hid darker depths. On Letterman’s stage, however, the song got up out of its rocker and danced in the yard. The band goosed that mathematical guitar riff to make it sound spiky and insistent, transforming the song from an interior monologue into an extroverted Southern rocker. It’s a testament to the mutability of Taylor’s songwriting that "Southern Grammar" can sound so remarkably different with just a few tweaks, but the song supports both interpretations: the nodding reverie and the waking celebration. The live version that anchors Hiss Golden Messenger’s new EP is not the Letterman performance, but a similar recording from WXPN in Philadelphia that features yet another lineup. The band’s touring roster includes Hirsch, Phil Cook of Megafaun, Matt McCaughan of Bon Iver, Alexandra Sauser-Monnig of Mountain Man, and saxophonist Matt Douglas of the Small Ponds. Playing loosely, they quickly establish a stuttering groove that’s ultimately more Allmans than Appalachian. The sax is crucial: When the song opens, Douglas plays that riff just behind the beat, ghosting Taylor’s guitar and making the song crackle precariously, opening it up in a way that belies its cry for simplicity. This take on "Southern Grammar" may not be quite as startlingly exclamatory as the television version, but the band sounds grittier, more animated, more volatile than you might expect. Southern Grammar, however, is not a rousing live EP, as its title track might suggest; instead, the remaining two songs are studio-bound and downtempo—the band at its most contemplative. "He Wrote the Book" may be the most Bible-bound song Taylor has written, which is saying a lot. Especially after "Grammar", the pace plods, but the arrangement is gently lush, founded on a churchly piano, a rattling snare, and a gathering of reeds that transforms this sunny Sunday morning hymn into a slow-burn soul number. It conveys the contentment that comes at the end of a long journey, yet the next song, "Brother, Do You Know the Road?" fades in like we’re catching up to Hiss Golden Messenger in the middle of an especially arduous trek. The rhythm section lopes along, trudging yet determined to make the next ridge, and Taylor coaxes a tremulous solo out of his guitar—short but powerful. This sojourner’s dirge is a call-and-response between the songwriter and his band, who answer only, "Yes, my brother, I know the road," to convey a palpable world-weariness that is less physical than spiritual. To their credit, Hiss Golden Messenger never sound weary. In whatever form the band might take, they convey too much joy and direction in creating the music and making the journey. Despite its subdued momentum, Southern Grammar still sounds like an exclamation point at the end of Lateness of Dancers, echoing that album’s celebratory cry while also warning of all the miles that lay ahead of this band. "What are you worried about?" Letterman asked the band, only somewhat rhetorically. "We’re not worried about anything," was Taylor’s apt answer."

Lykke Li

Wounded Rhymes

Pop/R&B

Stephen M. Deusner

To date, Lykke Li's biggest exposure was her song "Possibility" appearing on the Twilight: New Moon soundtrack. From a producer's standpoint, her inclusion was a no-brainer: Not only was her debut titled Youth Novels, but it captured the intense yearning of youth, which is also an aim of the Twilight series. Few indie artists seemed as well poised as Li to vocalize Stephenie Meyer's heroine's point of view. As the singer herself told Pitchfork recently, "I like that age when you feel misunderstood and still believe in the pure idea that love conquers all"-- perhaps the most concise and astute explanation of that franchise's appeal. That is, however, only one aspect of Li's considerable appeal. As vampire franchises go, she has much more in common with Buffy Summers than the shrinking Bella Swan: Li can kick serious ass, yet even at her toughest, she nurses a persistent desire for a normal and secure life, which-- if her second album, Wounded Rhymes, is any indication-- involves intense love, great sex, and weird dance moves. Li proves a rich and compelling character in her songs, which are dark but also complex, contradictory, and, thank goodness, still rough around the edges. Like Joss Whedon's show, Wounded Rhymes is an album of stark, scintillating contrasts: between fantasy and reality, between the powerful and the vulnerable, between the brash and the quiet, between the rhythmic and the melodic. Audacious anthems jostle next to heartbreak ballads like "Unrequited Love", with its simple guitar and shoo-wop backing vocals. Dense, busy numbers give way to emotionally and musically stripped tracks like "I Know Places". "I'm your prostitute, you gon' get some," she sings on "Get Some", a come-on so blunt that it's become the talking point for this album. As a single, the song brazenly grabs your attention, but in the context of this album, alongside such forlorn songs, it becomes a desperate statement, disarmingly intimate in its role-playing implications but also uncomfortably eager to shed or adopt new identities to ensure a lover's devotion. Rather than adjust or reconcile them, Li lets all those contradictions ride, having grown more comfortable in her musical skin. While there are no highs here quite as high as Youth Novels' "Little Bit" or "Breaking It Up" (and no low nearly as low as "Complaint Department", though "Rich Kids" comes pretty damn close), there is a sense of cohesion missing from that debut, as well as an understanding that a record can be a document of a particularly tumultuous time and place. To write these songs, Li spent long months in New York and Southern California, spending a great deal of time alone in the desert. The result is depressive without being depressing, dark without being bleak, as it rejuvenates, refines, and redirects her eccentricities. The biggest moments on Wounded Rhymes take the form of slower ballads, whether stripped down like "I Know Places" or grandiose like "Sadness Is a Blessing". But they gain their power in contrast to the more upbeat tracks like opener "Youth Knows No Pain". Dropping some of the coy affectations of Youth Novels, Li proves a surprisingly dramatic singer with a powerful voice and strong phrasing, able to render the emotional pain of "Sadness Is a Blessing" as somehow exultant-- a transcendent state of being. Like any good vocalist, she knows when to bow out and let the music speak for her. "I Know Places" cuts off early to set up a long, dreamy coda that acts as both a quiet promise of escape and an album intermission that sets up the penultimate "Jerome", which seems to synthesize every single emotional and musical urge on the album. Both ballad and banger, the song sheds its elements until only the thunderous heartbeat rhythm remains. That moment bleeds into the finale, "Silent My Song", a nearly a cappella closer that swells and fades dramatically. "No fist needed when you call," Li sings. "You silent my song." It's a devastating statement, yet ultimately an untrustworthy one: She has harnessed her heartache and her happiness to amplify her voice, not to lose it.

Artist: Lykke Li, Album: Wounded Rhymes, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 8.3 Album review: "To date, Lykke Li's biggest exposure was her song "Possibility" appearing on the Twilight: New Moon soundtrack. From a producer's standpoint, her inclusion was a no-brainer: Not only was her debut titled Youth Novels, but it captured the intense yearning of youth, which is also an aim of the Twilight series. Few indie artists seemed as well poised as Li to vocalize Stephenie Meyer's heroine's point of view. As the singer herself told Pitchfork recently, "I like that age when you feel misunderstood and still believe in the pure idea that love conquers all"-- perhaps the most concise and astute explanation of that franchise's appeal. That is, however, only one aspect of Li's considerable appeal. As vampire franchises go, she has much more in common with Buffy Summers than the shrinking Bella Swan: Li can kick serious ass, yet even at her toughest, she nurses a persistent desire for a normal and secure life, which-- if her second album, Wounded Rhymes, is any indication-- involves intense love, great sex, and weird dance moves. Li proves a rich and compelling character in her songs, which are dark but also complex, contradictory, and, thank goodness, still rough around the edges. Like Joss Whedon's show, Wounded Rhymes is an album of stark, scintillating contrasts: between fantasy and reality, between the powerful and the vulnerable, between the brash and the quiet, between the rhythmic and the melodic. Audacious anthems jostle next to heartbreak ballads like "Unrequited Love", with its simple guitar and shoo-wop backing vocals. Dense, busy numbers give way to emotionally and musically stripped tracks like "I Know Places". "I'm your prostitute, you gon' get some," she sings on "Get Some", a come-on so blunt that it's become the talking point for this album. As a single, the song brazenly grabs your attention, but in the context of this album, alongside such forlorn songs, it becomes a desperate statement, disarmingly intimate in its role-playing implications but also uncomfortably eager to shed or adopt new identities to ensure a lover's devotion. Rather than adjust or reconcile them, Li lets all those contradictions ride, having grown more comfortable in her musical skin. While there are no highs here quite as high as Youth Novels' "Little Bit" or "Breaking It Up" (and no low nearly as low as "Complaint Department", though "Rich Kids" comes pretty damn close), there is a sense of cohesion missing from that debut, as well as an understanding that a record can be a document of a particularly tumultuous time and place. To write these songs, Li spent long months in New York and Southern California, spending a great deal of time alone in the desert. The result is depressive without being depressing, dark without being bleak, as it rejuvenates, refines, and redirects her eccentricities. The biggest moments on Wounded Rhymes take the form of slower ballads, whether stripped down like "I Know Places" or grandiose like "Sadness Is a Blessing". But they gain their power in contrast to the more upbeat tracks like opener "Youth Knows No Pain". Dropping some of the coy affectations of Youth Novels, Li proves a surprisingly dramatic singer with a powerful voice and strong phrasing, able to render the emotional pain of "Sadness Is a Blessing" as somehow exultant-- a transcendent state of being. Like any good vocalist, she knows when to bow out and let the music speak for her. "I Know Places" cuts off early to set up a long, dreamy coda that acts as both a quiet promise of escape and an album intermission that sets up the penultimate "Jerome", which seems to synthesize every single emotional and musical urge on the album. Both ballad and banger, the song sheds its elements until only the thunderous heartbeat rhythm remains. That moment bleeds into the finale, "Silent My Song", a nearly a cappella closer that swells and fades dramatically. "No fist needed when you call," Li sings. "You silent my song." It's a devastating statement, yet ultimately an untrustworthy one: She has harnessed her heartache and her happiness to amplify her voice, not to lose it."

King Tuff

Was Dead

Rock

Evan Minsker

Kyle Thomas is King Tuff. He's been using that name on-and-off for a long time, but pre-2007, he was Kyle, one-eighth of the freak folk band Feathers, who made gentle, Eastern-tinged acoustic tracks. With J Mascis, he was in Witch, which had jammier, stoner rock leanings. But Thomas needed another outlet, one that was truer to his own rock'n'roll tastes: He had been writing songs since he was about 10, obsessing over guitar heroes and bands like Green Day. So he revived King Tuff, having released a few CD-R albums in the early 2000s, and turned a batch of songs written between 2003 and 2006 into the project's proper debut album, 2008's Was Dead. It's a tight, consistent, and unbelievably catchy rock album that quickly and effectively defined who and what "King Tuff" was, stuffed with killer guitar solos, infectiously sunny hooks, and lyrics that come off like personality-defining mantras. If you were at all familiar with Thomas' other work, the immediacy of Was Dead probably came as a surprise. But this was the album he'd been hoping to make all along: "There’s been a few diversions into other types of music, but I’ve pretty much always had a rock'n'roll heart." The LP certainly made the rounds with garage heads, and eventually grabbed the attention of the Sub Pop offices. But by the time King Tuff was released last year, Was Dead was already out-of-print and had become a collector's item. After an initial run of CD-Rs in 2007, it came out on Colonel Records in 2008, was pressed four times, and eventually showed up on eBay for exorbitant costs. Even if it was just a couple of years old, owning a copy of Was Dead became something tangibly special. It initiated you into a club with a bunch of other weirdos, and the one thing you all had in common was one weird, great power pop album. Its greatness definitely felt like a secret. While the garage focus at the time was on King Khan, the Black Lips, and Jay Reatard, Was Dead didn't exactly make a splash in the larger critical conversation. Thomas, of course, doesn't care about maintaining any sort of cult status he might have accidentally developed; he just wants people to hear it: "It’s really flattering to be thought of as so ‘collectible,’ but you’d much rather that just everyone could have it.” A new reissue on Burger Records proves that, as power pop-leaning rock'n'roll albums go, Was Dead is a front-to-back masterwork. While a lot of these kinds of records work under the "peaks and valleys" principle (because even the Ramones had songs like "Here Today Gone Tomorrow" and "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend"), this thing is almost all peaks, one exhilarating hook after another, making for an album that begs to be blasted in a four-door with the sun shining and the windows down. It's got the hit-after-hit sequencing of Boston minus the proggy extravagance. It's legitimately tough to peg "best songs" on this album: "A Pretty Dress" and "Just Strut" are easy contenders with their saccharine melodies and fiery electric guitars, but about half a dozen others could easily be tapped as favorites. The album's pace slows down exactly once during "Stone Fox", but even that track is fueled by a steady electric guitar churn, and ultimately, it's a much-needed cool-down to springboard into the choogle of killer closer "So Desperate". The album's final stretch offers some of its best moments. Thomas delivers a simple, triumphant melody, which seems to trigger an instant dopamine release. He caps the song's chorus with a set of "woooooooooo WOO WOO!" vocals and rounds the track out with a brief but point-perfect guitar solo. It's a very satisfying cap to an impressive album. As a whole, Was Dead paints a portrait of the man behind King Tuff. "Freak When I'm Dead" is all about wanting to be buried in all his rings and favorite clothes. ("Everything with patches and everything with holes.") "Sun Medallion" paints a portrait of a man who drinks black coffee, drives a standard transmission green Chevrolet, smokes pot, and won't go anywhere without his sun medallion. There are songs about love ("Connection") and lust ("Animal"). The world of Was Dead is attainable, warm, familiar, fun, and catchy as hell-- "Alone and Stoned" from King Tuff is a worthy successor. These are the songs that people scream back at him, word-for-word, in concert while he shreds, wearing all his rings and his sun medallion. Without the adornments, the guitar solos, and these songs, he's Kyle. This is the album that made him King.

Artist: King Tuff, Album: Was Dead, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 8.4 Album review: "Kyle Thomas is King Tuff. He's been using that name on-and-off for a long time, but pre-2007, he was Kyle, one-eighth of the freak folk band Feathers, who made gentle, Eastern-tinged acoustic tracks. With J Mascis, he was in Witch, which had jammier, stoner rock leanings. But Thomas needed another outlet, one that was truer to his own rock'n'roll tastes: He had been writing songs since he was about 10, obsessing over guitar heroes and bands like Green Day. So he revived King Tuff, having released a few CD-R albums in the early 2000s, and turned a batch of songs written between 2003 and 2006 into the project's proper debut album, 2008's Was Dead. It's a tight, consistent, and unbelievably catchy rock album that quickly and effectively defined who and what "King Tuff" was, stuffed with killer guitar solos, infectiously sunny hooks, and lyrics that come off like personality-defining mantras. If you were at all familiar with Thomas' other work, the immediacy of Was Dead probably came as a surprise. But this was the album he'd been hoping to make all along: "There’s been a few diversions into other types of music, but I’ve pretty much always had a rock'n'roll heart." The LP certainly made the rounds with garage heads, and eventually grabbed the attention of the Sub Pop offices. But by the time King Tuff was released last year, Was Dead was already out-of-print and had become a collector's item. After an initial run of CD-Rs in 2007, it came out on Colonel Records in 2008, was pressed four times, and eventually showed up on eBay for exorbitant costs. Even if it was just a couple of years old, owning a copy of Was Dead became something tangibly special. It initiated you into a club with a bunch of other weirdos, and the one thing you all had in common was one weird, great power pop album. Its greatness definitely felt like a secret. While the garage focus at the time was on King Khan, the Black Lips, and Jay Reatard, Was Dead didn't exactly make a splash in the larger critical conversation. Thomas, of course, doesn't care about maintaining any sort of cult status he might have accidentally developed; he just wants people to hear it: "It’s really flattering to be thought of as so ‘collectible,’ but you’d much rather that just everyone could have it.” A new reissue on Burger Records proves that, as power pop-leaning rock'n'roll albums go, Was Dead is a front-to-back masterwork. While a lot of these kinds of records work under the "peaks and valleys" principle (because even the Ramones had songs like "Here Today Gone Tomorrow" and "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend"), this thing is almost all peaks, one exhilarating hook after another, making for an album that begs to be blasted in a four-door with the sun shining and the windows down. It's got the hit-after-hit sequencing of Boston minus the proggy extravagance. It's legitimately tough to peg "best songs" on this album: "A Pretty Dress" and "Just Strut" are easy contenders with their saccharine melodies and fiery electric guitars, but about half a dozen others could easily be tapped as favorites. The album's pace slows down exactly once during "Stone Fox", but even that track is fueled by a steady electric guitar churn, and ultimately, it's a much-needed cool-down to springboard into the choogle of killer closer "So Desperate". The album's final stretch offers some of its best moments. Thomas delivers a simple, triumphant melody, which seems to trigger an instant dopamine release. He caps the song's chorus with a set of "woooooooooo WOO WOO!" vocals and rounds the track out with a brief but point-perfect guitar solo. It's a very satisfying cap to an impressive album. As a whole, Was Dead paints a portrait of the man behind King Tuff. "Freak When I'm Dead" is all about wanting to be buried in all his rings and favorite clothes. ("Everything with patches and everything with holes.") "Sun Medallion" paints a portrait of a man who drinks black coffee, drives a standard transmission green Chevrolet, smokes pot, and won't go anywhere without his sun medallion. There are songs about love ("Connection") and lust ("Animal"). The world of Was Dead is attainable, warm, familiar, fun, and catchy as hell-- "Alone and Stoned" from King Tuff is a worthy successor. These are the songs that people scream back at him, word-for-word, in concert while he shreds, wearing all his rings and his sun medallion. Without the adornments, the guitar solos, and these songs, he's Kyle. This is the album that made him King."

Charlemagne

Charlemagne

Rock

Joe Tangari

I don't care what you think of Charlemagne's music; you have to dig the handlebar moustache. It's small on your screen, perhaps difficult to see in that tiny representation of the sepiatone album cover photo, but Charlemagne's sole operator, one Carl Johns, sports, in addition to antlers, a perfect handlebar, waxed up into sinister hooks flanking his nose and conferring order upon his bedhead. So, congratulations, Charlemagne, your record is guaranteed a solid rating of 1.0, regardless of its content. Thankfully, there's enough quality content encoded on the disc behind the moustache and its constituent face to render a rating that low unfathomable. Rather, Charlemagne's debut (Johns also has three albums out with his left-field country project NoahJohn-- Charlemagne appears to be his pop outlet) is a fine one-man-band effort bursting at the seams with glowing harmonies and spry pop that suggests a more caffeinated Kingsbury Manx. Johns' impressive texture of subtle, chiming synth, acoustic guitar and downplayed drums reaches apotheosis on "Holland Daisy", opening with a whistled melody and proceeding through a catchy verse to a prechorus that actually outdoes the chorus itself with its serpentine melodic twists. "How Could He?" is nearly as good, buoyed by a brilliantly simple bassline and a modest guitar solo, the vocals billowing in big, pillowy clouds of honeyed harmony. Though the record never quite reaches the high of these two songs again, the rest of the album is solid nonetheless: Slower numbers like "Autumn Evenings" and the watery epic "Portrait with No Shortage of History"-- the latter a poem by Tenaya Darlington set to music by Johns-- unveil expertly crafted melodies over spare backing featuring puttering programmed percussion, electric piano and droning organs. Johns uses a limited tonal palette to achieve numerous effects over the course of the album, blanketing "Prisoner Of..." in a shroud of melancholy with the same ingredients that make "How Could He?" and "Dawn Upon" unmitigated blasts of sunshine. Of course, that limited tonal palette also means that the album as a whole is somewhat monochromatic, which is really the chief failing of Charlemagne. With all those too-genetically-perfect Carolingian harmonies slathered all over everything, it's easy for things to blur a bit, no matter how airtight the melodies are. Still, Johns has put together an engaging record all by his lonesome, which isn't terribly common in the realm of singer/songwriters.

Artist: Charlemagne, Album: Charlemagne, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: "I don't care what you think of Charlemagne's music; you have to dig the handlebar moustache. It's small on your screen, perhaps difficult to see in that tiny representation of the sepiatone album cover photo, but Charlemagne's sole operator, one Carl Johns, sports, in addition to antlers, a perfect handlebar, waxed up into sinister hooks flanking his nose and conferring order upon his bedhead. So, congratulations, Charlemagne, your record is guaranteed a solid rating of 1.0, regardless of its content. Thankfully, there's enough quality content encoded on the disc behind the moustache and its constituent face to render a rating that low unfathomable. Rather, Charlemagne's debut (Johns also has three albums out with his left-field country project NoahJohn-- Charlemagne appears to be his pop outlet) is a fine one-man-band effort bursting at the seams with glowing harmonies and spry pop that suggests a more caffeinated Kingsbury Manx. Johns' impressive texture of subtle, chiming synth, acoustic guitar and downplayed drums reaches apotheosis on "Holland Daisy", opening with a whistled melody and proceeding through a catchy verse to a prechorus that actually outdoes the chorus itself with its serpentine melodic twists. "How Could He?" is nearly as good, buoyed by a brilliantly simple bassline and a modest guitar solo, the vocals billowing in big, pillowy clouds of honeyed harmony. Though the record never quite reaches the high of these two songs again, the rest of the album is solid nonetheless: Slower numbers like "Autumn Evenings" and the watery epic "Portrait with No Shortage of History"-- the latter a poem by Tenaya Darlington set to music by Johns-- unveil expertly crafted melodies over spare backing featuring puttering programmed percussion, electric piano and droning organs. Johns uses a limited tonal palette to achieve numerous effects over the course of the album, blanketing "Prisoner Of..." in a shroud of melancholy with the same ingredients that make "How Could He?" and "Dawn Upon" unmitigated blasts of sunshine. Of course, that limited tonal palette also means that the album as a whole is somewhat monochromatic, which is really the chief failing of Charlemagne. With all those too-genetically-perfect Carolingian harmonies slathered all over everything, it's easy for things to blur a bit, no matter how airtight the melodies are. Still, Johns has put together an engaging record all by his lonesome, which isn't terribly common in the realm of singer/songwriters."

Sufjan Stevens, Nico Muhly, Bryce Dessner, James McAlister

Planetarium

Folk/Country,Electronic,Experimental

Thea Ballard

Planetarium began in 2011 when Muziekgebouw Eindhoven in the Netherlands commissioned a new work from composer Nico Muhly. He, in turn, brought in the National’s Bryce Dessner and Sufjan Stevens, who invited collaborator James McAlister to contribute beats. It was last year that Stevens and McAlister revisited these performances in a studio setting, building them out to this 76-minute, seventeen-track album. What results is an outsized project whose concept is worn loosely. Each track is named for a celestial entity, and most thematically evoke their namesake through mythic associations—“Venus” twists lore out of summer-camp lust (“Crazed nymphomania/Touch me if touching’s no sin”), while “Mars” considers the relationship between war and love (“I’m the producer/I’m the god of war/I reside in every creature”). Whether through Greek and Roman mythology or contemporary practices of astrology, the stories we build out into our incomprehensible cosmos become a way of accessing our analogously sprawling inner lives; starting from this notion, Planetarium’s lyrics ricochet from micro to macro focus—not infrequently at the expense of clarity. Given that Stevens’ own work can race between styles, the album feels musically familiar to his catalogue, though Muhly’s arrangements lend distinctive muscle to its orchestral underpinnings. Songs are lush, lilting instrumentals unfurling from Stevens’ tightly-wound pop choruses; Dessner’s polished guitar adds a stadium-sized layer that nods more to the rock opera than the sci-fi soundtrack. But some digressions are less effective than others. About four-and-a-half minutes into “Jupiter,” for example, a cinematic interlude of piano, strings, and trombone fades, and Stevens’ voice interjects, processed such that it feels very intentionally like a radio communiqué from a vintage spacecraft: “Father of light, father of death/Give us your wisdom, give us your breath/Summoner says that Jupiter is the loneliest planet.” Stevens is no stranger to this practice of gravely summoning opaque imagery, but the outer-space literalism of his delivery makes this evocation of the isolation inherent in mortality feel light years more distant than usual, which, as far as I can tell, was not the desired effect. And despite the occasional urgency of the narratives drawn here, Planetarium is sonically luxurious to the point of sometimes sounding bloated (as such big-ticket pop-classical commissions are wont to be). The four musicians’ amalgam of prog rock, Laurie Anderson-indebted angles, and blockbuster soundtracks nods to a now-retro futurism, but renders it in a smooth, expensive-feeling HD, out of step in an unproductive way. When these songs devolve into clattering piles of space-age electronics, or Stevens messes around with vocal processing and repeating phrases until they become droning refrains, it feels like affect without experimentation—a project that’s interested in styling itself after something avant-garde without much of the curiosity that can make such messes somehow inspiring. Even with a certain kind of over-the-top Bush-years indie aesthetic long-shelved, excess has worked well for Stevens. His music has a wide-eyed, ecstatic quality that energizes the listener, but here it becomes tiresome. Instead, it’s the slowest and least cluttered instrumentals that feel here the most effectively expansive, capturing the scope of the quartet’s chosen themes without collapsing beneath symbolism and meaning-making. “Sun” gently builds up from a series of uncertain notes to feel unflinchingly hopeful, and the crisp instrumentation of the first passage of “Earth” is a skillful marriage of styles. Singles like the album closer “Mercury,” in which Stevens’ untreated vocals soar above a simple, glistening pop structure, are lovely in their own right, but never quite reconcile with the darker textures found in Muhly’s compositions. Much of the press narrative around this album has centered the idea that these immense cosmic themes have become increasingly relevant in the last five years of global tumult. Perhaps it’s because of the lack of a center to all this big-question reaching, or perhaps it’s because of its absurd detours, but I found much of Planetarium difficult to get close to. By contrast, an album like Stevens’ excellent 2015 Carrie and Lowell, written after these songs were first composed, can approximate the universal through a series of images that feel both violently proximal and achingly vast. It may make more sense to start with what appears deceptively small: to plumb myth from everyday detail, rather than projecting humanity onto myths.

Artist: Sufjan Stevens, Nico Muhly, Bryce Dessner, James McAlister, Album: Planetarium, Genre: Folk/Country,Electronic,Experimental, Score (1-10): 6.0 Album review: "Planetarium began in 2011 when Muziekgebouw Eindhoven in the Netherlands commissioned a new work from composer Nico Muhly. He, in turn, brought in the National’s Bryce Dessner and Sufjan Stevens, who invited collaborator James McAlister to contribute beats. It was last year that Stevens and McAlister revisited these performances in a studio setting, building them out to this 76-minute, seventeen-track album. What results is an outsized project whose concept is worn loosely. Each track is named for a celestial entity, and most thematically evoke their namesake through mythic associations—“Venus” twists lore out of summer-camp lust (“Crazed nymphomania/Touch me if touching’s no sin”), while “Mars” considers the relationship between war and love (“I’m the producer/I’m the god of war/I reside in every creature”). Whether through Greek and Roman mythology or contemporary practices of astrology, the stories we build out into our incomprehensible cosmos become a way of accessing our analogously sprawling inner lives; starting from this notion, Planetarium’s lyrics ricochet from micro to macro focus—not infrequently at the expense of clarity. Given that Stevens’ own work can race between styles, the album feels musically familiar to his catalogue, though Muhly’s arrangements lend distinctive muscle to its orchestral underpinnings. Songs are lush, lilting instrumentals unfurling from Stevens’ tightly-wound pop choruses; Dessner’s polished guitar adds a stadium-sized layer that nods more to the rock opera than the sci-fi soundtrack. But some digressions are less effective than others. About four-and-a-half minutes into “Jupiter,” for example, a cinematic interlude of piano, strings, and trombone fades, and Stevens’ voice interjects, processed such that it feels very intentionally like a radio communiqué from a vintage spacecraft: “Father of light, father of death/Give us your wisdom, give us your breath/Summoner says that Jupiter is the loneliest planet.” Stevens is no stranger to this practice of gravely summoning opaque imagery, but the outer-space literalism of his delivery makes this evocation of the isolation inherent in mortality feel light years more distant than usual, which, as far as I can tell, was not the desired effect. And despite the occasional urgency of the narratives drawn here, Planetarium is sonically luxurious to the point of sometimes sounding bloated (as such big-ticket pop-classical commissions are wont to be). The four musicians’ amalgam of prog rock, Laurie Anderson-indebted angles, and blockbuster soundtracks nods to a now-retro futurism, but renders it in a smooth, expensive-feeling HD, out of step in an unproductive way. When these songs devolve into clattering piles of space-age electronics, or Stevens messes around with vocal processing and repeating phrases until they become droning refrains, it feels like affect without experimentation—a project that’s interested in styling itself after something avant-garde without much of the curiosity that can make such messes somehow inspiring. Even with a certain kind of over-the-top Bush-years indie aesthetic long-shelved, excess has worked well for Stevens. His music has a wide-eyed, ecstatic quality that energizes the listener, but here it becomes tiresome. Instead, it’s the slowest and least cluttered instrumentals that feel here the most effectively expansive, capturing the scope of the quartet’s chosen themes without collapsing beneath symbolism and meaning-making. “Sun” gently builds up from a series of uncertain notes to feel unflinchingly hopeful, and the crisp instrumentation of the first passage of “Earth” is a skillful marriage of styles. Singles like the album closer “Mercury,” in which Stevens’ untreated vocals soar above a simple, glistening pop structure, are lovely in their own right, but never quite reconcile with the darker textures found in Muhly’s compositions. Much of the press narrative around this album has centered the idea that these immense cosmic themes have become increasingly relevant in the last five years of global tumult. Perhaps it’s because of the lack of a center to all this big-question reaching, or perhaps it’s because of its absurd detours, but I found much of Planetarium difficult to get close to. By contrast, an album like Stevens’ excellent 2015 Carrie and Lowell, written after these songs were first composed, can approximate the universal through a series of images that feel both violently proximal and achingly vast. It may make more sense to start with what appears deceptively small: to plumb myth from everyday detail, rather than projecting humanity onto myths."

Cheveu

1000

Electronic,Rock

David Raposa

I'm basing the following assertion more on a feeling than actual research, but I think it's safe to say Cheveu's 1000 will be the highest-rated album on Pitchfork to feature a Vanilla Ice song, never mind the Vanilla Ice song. Until vocalist David Lemoine starts spitting out the lyrics, though, Cheveu's version sounds more like a Pee-Wee's Playhouse outtake than a faux-ghetto "Under Pressure". He doesn't fight the beat so much as belly-flop on top of it, his nasal vocals doing their damnedest not to sync up with the backing track's stiff and chintzy rhythm. 1000 is only the group's second proper album but this sort of odd musical digression seems to be a Cheveu staple. For their debut, the group took a simpering, sex-fixated Philip Seymour Hoffman monologue from Todd Solondz's Happiness and set it to grocery-shopping Muzak, with Lemoine offering a scarily accurate PSH impersonation. While Cheveu's music can be described as "odd" even at its most approachable, these tracks push the envelope further than required. That said, if this sort of taste-flaunting exhibition is necessary for Cheveu to produce the mind-boggling, post-everything music they're good at making, then it's a small price to pay. In a genre where the word "angular" is used with alarming frequency, Cheveu's take on post-punk is obtuse in the best possible sense. When not setting fire to pop-rap or psychosexual film dialog, these frenetic Frenchmen take their sonic and spiritual cues from all sorts of musical pranksters: fellow countrymen and proto-industrial noiseniks Metal Urbain, British New Wave chuckleheads bIG fLAME and Family Fodder, and even good ol' American Captain Beefheart. Calling Cheveu eccentric only scratches their idiosyncratic surface. There's the eerily prophetic "Charlie Sheen", a track whose flip-flopping between loping synth tones and digital hardcore breakdowns mirrors the actor's current manic state. There's "Sensual Drug Abuse", a spoken-word/rap on the titular subject set over chiming hip-hop groove burbles. There's "Impossible Is Not French", in which an Iggy-Poppish Lemoine repeatedly sneers variations on the lyric, "French know how to do what you don't know what to do," through his usual pedal-distorted setup. Nothing from Cheveu sounds quite like anything else, but there's no mistaking who's making this noise. And then there's the string section. While touring Israel in early 2010, Cheveu spent some studio time recording shockingly normal-sounding string arrangements with composer Maya Dunietz. If you're wondering how Cheveu feel about this surprising development, check out their 90-second Israel travelogue on YouTube. What's even more surprising is how well these cultured bits of music fit into Cheveu's distinctively uncultured songs. On 1000's lead-off track, "Quattro Stagioni", the strings add an air of stately elegance to the tune's spy-movie milieu. For "No Birds", their measured swooning provides a grounded counterpoint to the song's ramshackle textures. And on the Middle-Eastern-flavored "Bonne Nuit Cheri", they join forces with an economy-sized hallelujah chorus to provide a oddly stirring end to this beautiful mess of an album. I'd hesitate to say that 1000 is proof that Cheveu are "growing up," but if their songwriting chops can mature enough to make room for honest-to-goodness orchestration and equally honest emotion, there's no telling what sort of trouble they'll get themselves into.

Artist: Cheveu, Album: 1000, Genre: Electronic,Rock, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "I'm basing the following assertion more on a feeling than actual research, but I think it's safe to say Cheveu's 1000 will be the highest-rated album on Pitchfork to feature a Vanilla Ice song, never mind the Vanilla Ice song. Until vocalist David Lemoine starts spitting out the lyrics, though, Cheveu's version sounds more like a Pee-Wee's Playhouse outtake than a faux-ghetto "Under Pressure". He doesn't fight the beat so much as belly-flop on top of it, his nasal vocals doing their damnedest not to sync up with the backing track's stiff and chintzy rhythm. 1000 is only the group's second proper album but this sort of odd musical digression seems to be a Cheveu staple. For their debut, the group took a simpering, sex-fixated Philip Seymour Hoffman monologue from Todd Solondz's Happiness and set it to grocery-shopping Muzak, with Lemoine offering a scarily accurate PSH impersonation. While Cheveu's music can be described as "odd" even at its most approachable, these tracks push the envelope further than required. That said, if this sort of taste-flaunting exhibition is necessary for Cheveu to produce the mind-boggling, post-everything music they're good at making, then it's a small price to pay. In a genre where the word "angular" is used with alarming frequency, Cheveu's take on post-punk is obtuse in the best possible sense. When not setting fire to pop-rap or psychosexual film dialog, these frenetic Frenchmen take their sonic and spiritual cues from all sorts of musical pranksters: fellow countrymen and proto-industrial noiseniks Metal Urbain, British New Wave chuckleheads bIG fLAME and Family Fodder, and even good ol' American Captain Beefheart. Calling Cheveu eccentric only scratches their idiosyncratic surface. There's the eerily prophetic "Charlie Sheen", a track whose flip-flopping between loping synth tones and digital hardcore breakdowns mirrors the actor's current manic state. There's "Sensual Drug Abuse", a spoken-word/rap on the titular subject set over chiming hip-hop groove burbles. There's "Impossible Is Not French", in which an Iggy-Poppish Lemoine repeatedly sneers variations on the lyric, "French know how to do what you don't know what to do," through his usual pedal-distorted setup. Nothing from Cheveu sounds quite like anything else, but there's no mistaking who's making this noise. And then there's the string section. While touring Israel in early 2010, Cheveu spent some studio time recording shockingly normal-sounding string arrangements with composer Maya Dunietz. If you're wondering how Cheveu feel about this surprising development, check out their 90-second Israel travelogue on YouTube. What's even more surprising is how well these cultured bits of music fit into Cheveu's distinctively uncultured songs. On 1000's lead-off track, "Quattro Stagioni", the strings add an air of stately elegance to the tune's spy-movie milieu. For "No Birds", their measured swooning provides a grounded counterpoint to the song's ramshackle textures. And on the Middle-Eastern-flavored "Bonne Nuit Cheri", they join forces with an economy-sized hallelujah chorus to provide a oddly stirring end to this beautiful mess of an album. I'd hesitate to say that 1000 is proof that Cheveu are "growing up," but if their songwriting chops can mature enough to make room for honest-to-goodness orchestration and equally honest emotion, there's no telling what sort of trouble they'll get themselves into."

Hanna

Demur EP

Electronic

Ben Cardew

House music lyrics, with the odd notable exception, tend to be light, functional affairs, full of incitements to dance and enjoy the good times. “Game of Tragic,” the final track on Cleveland house producer Warren Harris’ Demur EP, is talking about suicide. “Take away, the smell is foul/Put the flesh in the ground/Suicide,” Harris sings, his untampered, soulful voice duetting with a separate vocal line that is sandpaper rough and reeks of desperation. Harris, who records as Hanna and under his own name, does admittedly have a history of producing deep house that mixes the stately smooth with the immaculately melancholy. His 2017 EP The Never End housed one of the most moving summer laments in electronic music in “July”, while “Wayfaring Man,” from the inappropriately named Bounce EP, sounded like the work of someone who wanted to get well away from the troubles of the world. All the same, “Game of Tragic” goes further than Harris—or pretty much anyone else in house music—has gone before in its embrace of mortality, the contrast between the skipping house beat and morbid lyrics both eye-opening and brave. Harris has explained that the song is about a person who lives with the body of their best friend after they have killed themselves and there is something rather punk in the way “Game of Tragic” rejects what house music should be about in favor of following its own emotional instincts. This would mean little, though, were the lyrics not backed by Harris’ poignant songwriting, the winding chords, meandering bass line and mournful vocal melody proving one in the eye for those who feel that electronic music can only deal with shallow emotions. The other four tracks on Demur see Harris swap lyrical experimentation for musical exposition, as he loosens his rhythmical swing to a point where his productions feel on the verge of falling apart. “Finger of Love,” for example, features a disco-influenced pattern of bass drum, hi-hat, and snare that, on the face of it, sounds fairly standard. But each instrument hits in a way that feels a fraction away from going out of time, like a jazz drummer playing around the beat rather than square on the four. The effect, for an audience raised on the rhythmical perfection of electronic music, is of unease, fascination, and frenetic excitement. “The Sacred” takes things even further by threatening to pull the whole fabric of the song out of time. The bass drum only just connects with the hi-hat, which is on nodding terms with the piano, while a vocal loop pulls fractionally behind the rest of the song as the ensemble hangs on by the skin of its teeth. Experimentation in electronic music is full of flash and bluster. But Harris favors progression by stealth, his productions on Demur pushing the deep house sound into rhythmical challenges and brilliantly gothic alcoves with the apparent nonchalance of someone barely breaking a sweat. You have to lean in to discover the wonders of Demur. But the reward is one of the most quietly brilliant, viscerally exciting and humanly funky house records of 2018.

Artist: Hanna, Album: Demur EP, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "House music lyrics, with the odd notable exception, tend to be light, functional affairs, full of incitements to dance and enjoy the good times. “Game of Tragic,” the final track on Cleveland house producer Warren Harris’ Demur EP, is talking about suicide. “Take away, the smell is foul/Put the flesh in the ground/Suicide,” Harris sings, his untampered, soulful voice duetting with a separate vocal line that is sandpaper rough and reeks of desperation. Harris, who records as Hanna and under his own name, does admittedly have a history of producing deep house that mixes the stately smooth with the immaculately melancholy. His 2017 EP The Never End housed one of the most moving summer laments in electronic music in “July”, while “Wayfaring Man,” from the inappropriately named Bounce EP, sounded like the work of someone who wanted to get well away from the troubles of the world. All the same, “Game of Tragic” goes further than Harris—or pretty much anyone else in house music—has gone before in its embrace of mortality, the contrast between the skipping house beat and morbid lyrics both eye-opening and brave. Harris has explained that the song is about a person who lives with the body of their best friend after they have killed themselves and there is something rather punk in the way “Game of Tragic” rejects what house music should be about in favor of following its own emotional instincts. This would mean little, though, were the lyrics not backed by Harris’ poignant songwriting, the winding chords, meandering bass line and mournful vocal melody proving one in the eye for those who feel that electronic music can only deal with shallow emotions. The other four tracks on Demur see Harris swap lyrical experimentation for musical exposition, as he loosens his rhythmical swing to a point where his productions feel on the verge of falling apart. “Finger of Love,” for example, features a disco-influenced pattern of bass drum, hi-hat, and snare that, on the face of it, sounds fairly standard. But each instrument hits in a way that feels a fraction away from going out of time, like a jazz drummer playing around the beat rather than square on the four. The effect, for an audience raised on the rhythmical perfection of electronic music, is of unease, fascination, and frenetic excitement. “The Sacred” takes things even further by threatening to pull the whole fabric of the song out of time. The bass drum only just connects with the hi-hat, which is on nodding terms with the piano, while a vocal loop pulls fractionally behind the rest of the song as the ensemble hangs on by the skin of its teeth. Experimentation in electronic music is full of flash and bluster. But Harris favors progression by stealth, his productions on Demur pushing the deep house sound into rhythmical challenges and brilliantly gothic alcoves with the apparent nonchalance of someone barely breaking a sweat. You have to lean in to discover the wonders of Demur. But the reward is one of the most quietly brilliant, viscerally exciting and humanly funky house records of 2018."

Sondre Lerche

Heartbeat Radio

Rock

Zach Kelly

Heartbeat Radio is the sixth proper album from Norwegian transplant Sondre Lerche, following 2007's soundtrack album for the Steve Carell sapfest Dan in Real Life. As much as that film deserves to be looped infinitely in In-Flight Movie Hell, it kind of made perfect sense to peg Lerche to handle the tunes, most of which happily remained congruent with his ever-wistful, singer-songwriter romanticism. True, this stuff can get downright schmaltzy at times, but there's such a genuineness in his music that it's hardly worth aggressively faulting the guy for it-- cynics: take heed. Nevertheless, he has the good sense to pay close attention to arrangements and general songcraft on Heartbeat Radio, reinforcing his pleasant earnestness sufficiently enough that the heartsick sunniness sticks with you all afternoon, even when the actual songs themselves don't always do the same. What saves most of Heartbeat Radio from becoming too aware of itself is Lerche's deft ear for composition that, when he sticks to the script, often benefits him greatly. Grandiose opener "Good Luck" wouldn't be much more than half-assed Coldplay bombast, but the wild strings egg on a fortuitous build that sets an exciting tone for the rest of the album. Title track "Heartbeat Radio" follows, confirming Lerche's fondness for Belle and Sebastian-- unfortunately, the energy isn't channeled properly, leaving the track sounding like a spazzy Dear Catastrophe Waitress outtake. But cuts like the following "I Cannot Let You Go" are so crisp and immediately tuneful it's easy to ignore the quirkier missteps. Shakers, bright acoustic guitars, and great little piano accents play so simply and delightfully on "Let You Go", you wonder why the guy even bothered to hire all those viola and cello players. Still, those string accompaniments are pretty sharp. Not only are the players solid, but Lerche knows just where to place them. "Like Lazenby"-- an ordinary little ballad with a strange "take me back" metaphor involving "the second James Bond" George Lazenby-- successfully morphs into a lush slice of garden pop with the addition of those swooning strings. Even on such well rounded, unapologetically Beatles-indebted fare like "Words & Music" and "Guess It's Gonna Rain Today", the strings are what you end up taking away with you. (There's nothing coy about Lerche's Fab Four flirtations-- most of the songs found here owe a great deal to the band's mid-to-late-1960s studio output.) Not everything here is salvageable, like the irritatingly sugary "If Only" and the meandering closer "Goodnight". When there is no melodic hook and arrangements become prototypical, all you are really left with is Lerche himself and his Confessions of a Teenage Romantic thing. It nearly tarnishes the stronger cuts on repeat listenings, his cutesy, dry delivery drawing further to the front, his lyricism more apparently banal and dopey. Even if a lot of Heartbeat Radio is affable and politely poppy, a lot of it is so pointedly bland that you can't help but wonder if the good stuff stands out only because of the beige filler around it. That, or you've let your inner-cynic get the best of you. So if it seems to be a nice enough day outside and you're not feeling particularly sinister, Heartbeat Radio should suffice nicely for a little while.

Artist: Sondre Lerche, Album: Heartbeat Radio, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.1 Album review: "Heartbeat Radio is the sixth proper album from Norwegian transplant Sondre Lerche, following 2007's soundtrack album for the Steve Carell sapfest Dan in Real Life. As much as that film deserves to be looped infinitely in In-Flight Movie Hell, it kind of made perfect sense to peg Lerche to handle the tunes, most of which happily remained congruent with his ever-wistful, singer-songwriter romanticism. True, this stuff can get downright schmaltzy at times, but there's such a genuineness in his music that it's hardly worth aggressively faulting the guy for it-- cynics: take heed. Nevertheless, he has the good sense to pay close attention to arrangements and general songcraft on Heartbeat Radio, reinforcing his pleasant earnestness sufficiently enough that the heartsick sunniness sticks with you all afternoon, even when the actual songs themselves don't always do the same. What saves most of Heartbeat Radio from becoming too aware of itself is Lerche's deft ear for composition that, when he sticks to the script, often benefits him greatly. Grandiose opener "Good Luck" wouldn't be much more than half-assed Coldplay bombast, but the wild strings egg on a fortuitous build that sets an exciting tone for the rest of the album. Title track "Heartbeat Radio" follows, confirming Lerche's fondness for Belle and Sebastian-- unfortunately, the energy isn't channeled properly, leaving the track sounding like a spazzy Dear Catastrophe Waitress outtake. But cuts like the following "I Cannot Let You Go" are so crisp and immediately tuneful it's easy to ignore the quirkier missteps. Shakers, bright acoustic guitars, and great little piano accents play so simply and delightfully on "Let You Go", you wonder why the guy even bothered to hire all those viola and cello players. Still, those string accompaniments are pretty sharp. Not only are the players solid, but Lerche knows just where to place them. "Like Lazenby"-- an ordinary little ballad with a strange "take me back" metaphor involving "the second James Bond" George Lazenby-- successfully morphs into a lush slice of garden pop with the addition of those swooning strings. Even on such well rounded, unapologetically Beatles-indebted fare like "Words & Music" and "Guess It's Gonna Rain Today", the strings are what you end up taking away with you. (There's nothing coy about Lerche's Fab Four flirtations-- most of the songs found here owe a great deal to the band's mid-to-late-1960s studio output.) Not everything here is salvageable, like the irritatingly sugary "If Only" and the meandering closer "Goodnight". When there is no melodic hook and arrangements become prototypical, all you are really left with is Lerche himself and his Confessions of a Teenage Romantic thing. It nearly tarnishes the stronger cuts on repeat listenings, his cutesy, dry delivery drawing further to the front, his lyricism more apparently banal and dopey. Even if a lot of Heartbeat Radio is affable and politely poppy, a lot of it is so pointedly bland that you can't help but wonder if the good stuff stands out only because of the beige filler around it. That, or you've let your inner-cynic get the best of you. So if it seems to be a nice enough day outside and you're not feeling particularly sinister, Heartbeat Radio should suffice nicely for a little while."

Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs

Trouble

Electronic,Rock

Larry Fitzmaurice

The name's a lark, kind of. When Oxford-based pop-infused house producer Orlando Higginbottom uploaded some rough demos to MySpace back in the pre-Soundcloud days of 2007, he attributed them to the rather ridiculous-sounding moniker of Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs. His reasoning, as he told former Pitchfork contributor Philip Sherburne over at SPIN, was that he was looking for a name that "couldn't be cool, couldn't be put into some kind of scene that gets hip for six months and then falls out of fashion." Many discerning listeners still put plenty of stock into what artists call themselves, but in an age of music culture that favors layers of extra-musical imagery (or lack thereof) as key to an artist's narrative, such nomenclatural recklessness as Higginbottom's actually comes across as fairly brilliant. The deeper joke: Despite the goofy name and Higginbottom's preferred costuming (huge feathered wings, huge feathered headdresses, stegosaurus spines, headgear that resembles glued-together mosquito nets), TEED's proper debut LP, Trouble, isn't incredibly showy. That much is obvious as soon as Higginbottom's voice drifts into his self-programmed rhythmic fray. If we're talking about octaves, he's got range-- his ability to slip into a soft falsetto is something that other mid-level electro-pop crooners should work hard to emulate-- but overall, he sounds shy and reserved vocally, in a way not totally dissimilar to fellow multitasking countryman Kwes. Trouble is Higginbottom's Polydor debut, but he's previously released music on Greco-Roman, the reliable label run by Hot Chip's Joe Goddard (who himself turned in an astounding remix of early single "Garden"). The connection makes sense, since TEED's approach to dance-pop, much like Goddard's main act, sounds especially everyguy. The project's live show provides plenty of evidence that the stuff pleases crowds, but you get the feeling that he's doing this for himself more than anyone else. While Hot Chip's lyrical focus has turned toward a beatific and universal mindset, Higginbottom's subject matter is more introverted. Mostly he sings about girls-- about how they don't pay him much mind and about how much mind he pays them, with a few heart-on-sleeve pleas for mutual appreciation sprinkled throughout. Trouble's production is top-notch, with some sweaty club heartstoppers (the bouncing bass of "Solo", "Your Love"'s euphoric vocal-house vibes), but Higginbottom's work never really sounds sexy, precisely because he's not trying to make it so. Even though his guise has appeared on a Crosstown Rebels single, TEED ditches the sultry vibes of his contemporaries and embraces his inner nerd. "Household Goods" is an on-your-knees beg for attention directed toward someone preoccupied with someone else, but when all's said and done, Orlando's fairly noncommittal about the whole thing: "Give me a shot/ 'Cause I could be the dog to your bone/ Or something." On "Stronger", he delivers devotionally, "The feel I love in you is making me stronger," the kind of accidental play on words that spills out when you're keyed up on whatever's available-- or, when you're making hay out of a loveless situation by trying to siphon euphoria from future heartbreak. Those sensitive, vaguely bookish tendencies definitely lend Trouble a distinctly indie pop appeal-- a Junior Boys for the sexually frustrated, perhaps, a comparison that builds steam when noticing the comparability between Higginbottom's vocals and those of Junior Boys' Jeremy Greenspan circa Last Exit. But anyone with a pocket-protector-protected heart knows that even nerds have wandering minds. Besides slightly overdoing it on track-by-track rhythmic similarities and sounds shaded with warm reds and blacks, Trouble is a hair or two too long, which makes it all the more ironic that some of its strongest moments take place when its creator is content to let his short hair down and escape to the comforts of his own mind. The vocal-skipping echoes of "Closer" move at their own pace, while "Shimmer" seems less concerned with a conclusion than finding a way to stick its head further into the clouds, as Higginbottom wistfully exhales, "If you mean it, if you mean it, if you really do/ Right on." The exclamation comes across more like a sigh, but feeling good often feels bad, too.

Artist: Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, Album: Trouble, Genre: Electronic,Rock, Score (1-10): 7.3 Album review: "The name's a lark, kind of. When Oxford-based pop-infused house producer Orlando Higginbottom uploaded some rough demos to MySpace back in the pre-Soundcloud days of 2007, he attributed them to the rather ridiculous-sounding moniker of Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs. His reasoning, as he told former Pitchfork contributor Philip Sherburne over at SPIN, was that he was looking for a name that "couldn't be cool, couldn't be put into some kind of scene that gets hip for six months and then falls out of fashion." Many discerning listeners still put plenty of stock into what artists call themselves, but in an age of music culture that favors layers of extra-musical imagery (or lack thereof) as key to an artist's narrative, such nomenclatural recklessness as Higginbottom's actually comes across as fairly brilliant. The deeper joke: Despite the goofy name and Higginbottom's preferred costuming (huge feathered wings, huge feathered headdresses, stegosaurus spines, headgear that resembles glued-together mosquito nets), TEED's proper debut LP, Trouble, isn't incredibly showy. That much is obvious as soon as Higginbottom's voice drifts into his self-programmed rhythmic fray. If we're talking about octaves, he's got range-- his ability to slip into a soft falsetto is something that other mid-level electro-pop crooners should work hard to emulate-- but overall, he sounds shy and reserved vocally, in a way not totally dissimilar to fellow multitasking countryman Kwes. Trouble is Higginbottom's Polydor debut, but he's previously released music on Greco-Roman, the reliable label run by Hot Chip's Joe Goddard (who himself turned in an astounding remix of early single "Garden"). The connection makes sense, since TEED's approach to dance-pop, much like Goddard's main act, sounds especially everyguy. The project's live show provides plenty of evidence that the stuff pleases crowds, but you get the feeling that he's doing this for himself more than anyone else. While Hot Chip's lyrical focus has turned toward a beatific and universal mindset, Higginbottom's subject matter is more introverted. Mostly he sings about girls-- about how they don't pay him much mind and about how much mind he pays them, with a few heart-on-sleeve pleas for mutual appreciation sprinkled throughout. Trouble's production is top-notch, with some sweaty club heartstoppers (the bouncing bass of "Solo", "Your Love"'s euphoric vocal-house vibes), but Higginbottom's work never really sounds sexy, precisely because he's not trying to make it so. Even though his guise has appeared on a Crosstown Rebels single, TEED ditches the sultry vibes of his contemporaries and embraces his inner nerd. "Household Goods" is an on-your-knees beg for attention directed toward someone preoccupied with someone else, but when all's said and done, Orlando's fairly noncommittal about the whole thing: "Give me a shot/ 'Cause I could be the dog to your bone/ Or something." On "Stronger", he delivers devotionally, "The feel I love in you is making me stronger," the kind of accidental play on words that spills out when you're keyed up on whatever's available-- or, when you're making hay out of a loveless situation by trying to siphon euphoria from future heartbreak. Those sensitive, vaguely bookish tendencies definitely lend Trouble a distinctly indie pop appeal-- a Junior Boys for the sexually frustrated, perhaps, a comparison that builds steam when noticing the comparability between Higginbottom's vocals and those of Junior Boys' Jeremy Greenspan circa Last Exit. But anyone with a pocket-protector-protected heart knows that even nerds have wandering minds. Besides slightly overdoing it on track-by-track rhythmic similarities and sounds shaded with warm reds and blacks, Trouble is a hair or two too long, which makes it all the more ironic that some of its strongest moments take place when its creator is content to let his short hair down and escape to the comforts of his own mind. The vocal-skipping echoes of "Closer" move at their own pace, while "Shimmer" seems less concerned with a conclusion than finding a way to stick its head further into the clouds, as Higginbottom wistfully exhales, "If you mean it, if you mean it, if you really do/ Right on." The exclamation comes across more like a sigh, but feeling good often feels bad, too."

Surfer Blood

Tarot Classics EP

Rock

Paul Thompson

"I'm not ready to look the other way," Surfer Blood frontman John Paul Pitts lets loose halfway through "I'm Not Ready". So it would seem. "Ready" launches Tarot Classics, Surfer Blood's first proper release since early 2010's Astro Coast. Title aside, it's a modest effort, four sturdy pop-rockers, 15 easy minutes. Blithely confident, Astro Coast's sunsoaked power-pop found Surfer Blood blowing through one breezily bulbous hook and escapist lyric after another. Tarot Classics finds Surfer Blood throwing a little shade. With its so-bright-you'll-squint melody and bummer-in-the-summer vibe, "I'm Not Ready" would've fit just fine almost anywhere on Astro Coast. But its crisp handclaps and neon guitars belie a serious compositional sophistication, a seemingly endless string of bridges charting the path to the song's bounding hook. "Your mouth is running off now that you've seen a few things," Pitts admonishes, and "don't get too big for your britches" seems in some ways Tarot Classics' guiding principle. As on Astro Coast, they seem confident in their every move but unwilling to take on more than they can handle. First single "Miranda" is a bit of a blur, highlighted by its a rousing guitar break, its one-word chorus (hint: it's a girl's name), and a more-than-passable Morrissey impression from Pitts. The hints of Anglophilia that emerge on "Miranda" and through the rest of Tarot Classics are, in many ways, their biggest step away from the distinctly American roots (Beach Boys, Weezer, Cheap Trick) of Astro Coast. Pitts' voice wears this somewhat dolorous tone every bit as well as he did Astro Coast's shouty Brian Wilsonisms, and the band follows suit, lending a richly textured, slightly overcast New Romantic lean to the proceedings that feels deeper-- if a bit less retina-searing-- than the brasher Astro Coast. "Voyager Reprise" takes off slowly, eventually settling into a shuffly, somewhat morose melody and dance-night-at-the-pub groove pitched somewhere between the Strokes and those early Cure singles. It's aching melody amplified by that newfound gravity in Pitts' voice, "Voyager" certainly feels like Surfer Blood's first truly sad song, the longing in its simply stated chorus impossible to miss. Closer "Drinking Problem" is alternately Tarot Classics' highlight and its least characteristic track, a lush, staggering bit of New Romantic pop that finds Pitts switching out the Moz for a Bernard Sumnerian swoon not unlike that of Kisses frontman Jesse Kivel. A shimmering synth melody buoys the aching Pitts, reassuring himself with, "at least I know who my friends are," every utterance sounding less and less convinced of itself. A year and change on the road finds Pitts seeming a bit guarded, picking at the long-term scars of short-term affairs, questioning everyone's motivations, starting with his own. But if he's undergoing some crisis of confidence, it's not shared by his bandmates; like Astro Coast, Tarot Classics' popcraft proves well beyond promising, and these songs are certainly sturdy enough to handle their lusher productions and knottier sentiments. Tarot Classics once again fixes the spotlight on Surfer Blood's insidious melodies, refining-- rather than reconfiguring-- their self-possessed sound. It's still summer where Surfer Blood come from, it's just a little colder there now.

Artist: Surfer Blood, Album: Tarot Classics EP, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: ""I'm not ready to look the other way," Surfer Blood frontman John Paul Pitts lets loose halfway through "I'm Not Ready". So it would seem. "Ready" launches Tarot Classics, Surfer Blood's first proper release since early 2010's Astro Coast. Title aside, it's a modest effort, four sturdy pop-rockers, 15 easy minutes. Blithely confident, Astro Coast's sunsoaked power-pop found Surfer Blood blowing through one breezily bulbous hook and escapist lyric after another. Tarot Classics finds Surfer Blood throwing a little shade. With its so-bright-you'll-squint melody and bummer-in-the-summer vibe, "I'm Not Ready" would've fit just fine almost anywhere on Astro Coast. But its crisp handclaps and neon guitars belie a serious compositional sophistication, a seemingly endless string of bridges charting the path to the song's bounding hook. "Your mouth is running off now that you've seen a few things," Pitts admonishes, and "don't get too big for your britches" seems in some ways Tarot Classics' guiding principle. As on Astro Coast, they seem confident in their every move but unwilling to take on more than they can handle. First single "Miranda" is a bit of a blur, highlighted by its a rousing guitar break, its one-word chorus (hint: it's a girl's name), and a more-than-passable Morrissey impression from Pitts. The hints of Anglophilia that emerge on "Miranda" and through the rest of Tarot Classics are, in many ways, their biggest step away from the distinctly American roots (Beach Boys, Weezer, Cheap Trick) of Astro Coast. Pitts' voice wears this somewhat dolorous tone every bit as well as he did Astro Coast's shouty Brian Wilsonisms, and the band follows suit, lending a richly textured, slightly overcast New Romantic lean to the proceedings that feels deeper-- if a bit less retina-searing-- than the brasher Astro Coast. "Voyager Reprise" takes off slowly, eventually settling into a shuffly, somewhat morose melody and dance-night-at-the-pub groove pitched somewhere between the Strokes and those early Cure singles. It's aching melody amplified by that newfound gravity in Pitts' voice, "Voyager" certainly feels like Surfer Blood's first truly sad song, the longing in its simply stated chorus impossible to miss. Closer "Drinking Problem" is alternately Tarot Classics' highlight and its least characteristic track, a lush, staggering bit of New Romantic pop that finds Pitts switching out the Moz for a Bernard Sumnerian swoon not unlike that of Kisses frontman Jesse Kivel. A shimmering synth melody buoys the aching Pitts, reassuring himself with, "at least I know who my friends are," every utterance sounding less and less convinced of itself. A year and change on the road finds Pitts seeming a bit guarded, picking at the long-term scars of short-term affairs, questioning everyone's motivations, starting with his own. But if he's undergoing some crisis of confidence, it's not shared by his bandmates; like Astro Coast, Tarot Classics' popcraft proves well beyond promising, and these songs are certainly sturdy enough to handle their lusher productions and knottier sentiments. Tarot Classics once again fixes the spotlight on Surfer Blood's insidious melodies, refining-- rather than reconfiguring-- their self-possessed sound. It's still summer where Surfer Blood come from, it's just a little colder there now."

Nick Lowe

Labour of Lust [Reissue]

Rock

David Bevan

Deep into "Born Fighters", a 1979 BBC documentary on the simultaneous recording of Nick Lowe's Labour of Lust and Dave Edmunds' Repeat When Necessary that year, the two Rockpile bandmates are arguing on either side of a kitchen table. Lowe, pub rock pioneer, is trying to express just how much everyman gloom and despair plays a part in his songwriting, going so far as to compare himself to "Joe Blow," the guy who delivers the milk. "I supposedly write the theme music for 'Coronation Street', for life," he says. "That's what I set myself up to do." Edmunds isn't having it. The Welsh rocker lets his friend know that a) he doesn't have anything at all in common with Joe Blow; and b) he thinks what Lowe just said is "stupid, really stupid." Lowe replies with the sort of twinkling deadpan that's defined so much of his pop music: "That's why I think you and me are friends." It's a great scene captured during the making of a great album. Lowe and Edmunds had become friends a few years earlier, when the latter, a guitar-wielding, rock'n'roll purist from Cardiff, helped produce 1974's The New Favourites of Brinsley Schwarz, the final album from Lowe's legendary pub-rocking outfit. After that band dissolved, Lowe also took to production (nicknamed "Basher," he helped shape the roughly-hewn sounds of Elvis Costello's first five LPs as well as the debut from pop-punk blueprinters the Damned) and joined up with Rockpile, Edmunds' tireless touring band. That's who we hear behind him in Labour of Lust, his follow-up to solo debut/masterpiece, 1978's Jesus of Cool. Out-of-print since its last CD run in 1990, it's an album far more cohesive and contained than its eclectic, bursting-at-the-seams predecessor. What it lacks in variety or ragged kineticism, it makes up for in the kind of thorough, clock-punching craftsmanship you'd expect from a guy who sees some of himself in a milkman. And Rockpile-- what a perfect name for a rock band. Though Yep Roc's re-mastered re-issue of Labour of Lust doesn't include a DVD of "Born Fighters", it does a fine job of highlighting the many muscular moving parts of Lowe's songwriting at the time, as they were bashed out by professionals just like those Lowe describes in the hard-charging song of the same name. A bassist, he insisted that every one of his songs rely on rhythm first. So whether it's the devilish basslines of "Big Kick, Plain Scrap" or the galloping snap of Terry Williams' drumwork in opener "Cruel to Be Kind", a converted Brinsley Schwarz song and Lowe's lone U.S. chart hit, the foundational tracks sound golden in mp3 or vinyl format. The latter is pure pop and pure Lowe, a typically self-deprecating gem whose vocal hook is inescapable. Even more satisfying is "American Squirm", a sweeter number that features a spritely Costello on back-up vocals. Layer by layer, it showcases even further that Lowe was as sharp a producer as he was a songwriter. There's as much warmth as there is punch. Both lyrically and sonically, you'll find a lot of that again from top to bottom, the Dire Straits-alluding "Cracking Up" or coal-miner's ache of "Endless Grey Ribbon" being two fine examples. Yep Roc didn't go overboard in the way of (often) unnecessary extra material, a decision that befits the no-nonsense feel of the record itself. The quiet bonus B-side "Basing Street" is a country-inflected folk number that hints at Lowe's later work, but was rightly left off the original playlist, if only because there's enough of that to chew on as is. At the halfway mark rests "You Make Me", a similarly hushed love tune in which Lowe is alone with just a guitar and some reverb. It's short and plain and startling in its vulnerability. But the crackle of the original recording is still there. It's not hard to imagine Lowe putting up a fight to keep it that way.

Artist: Nick Lowe, Album: Labour of Lust [Reissue], Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 8.4 Album review: "Deep into "Born Fighters", a 1979 BBC documentary on the simultaneous recording of Nick Lowe's Labour of Lust and Dave Edmunds' Repeat When Necessary that year, the two Rockpile bandmates are arguing on either side of a kitchen table. Lowe, pub rock pioneer, is trying to express just how much everyman gloom and despair plays a part in his songwriting, going so far as to compare himself to "Joe Blow," the guy who delivers the milk. "I supposedly write the theme music for 'Coronation Street', for life," he says. "That's what I set myself up to do." Edmunds isn't having it. The Welsh rocker lets his friend know that a) he doesn't have anything at all in common with Joe Blow; and b) he thinks what Lowe just said is "stupid, really stupid." Lowe replies with the sort of twinkling deadpan that's defined so much of his pop music: "That's why I think you and me are friends." It's a great scene captured during the making of a great album. Lowe and Edmunds had become friends a few years earlier, when the latter, a guitar-wielding, rock'n'roll purist from Cardiff, helped produce 1974's The New Favourites of Brinsley Schwarz, the final album from Lowe's legendary pub-rocking outfit. After that band dissolved, Lowe also took to production (nicknamed "Basher," he helped shape the roughly-hewn sounds of Elvis Costello's first five LPs as well as the debut from pop-punk blueprinters the Damned) and joined up with Rockpile, Edmunds' tireless touring band. That's who we hear behind him in Labour of Lust, his follow-up to solo debut/masterpiece, 1978's Jesus of Cool. Out-of-print since its last CD run in 1990, it's an album far more cohesive and contained than its eclectic, bursting-at-the-seams predecessor. What it lacks in variety or ragged kineticism, it makes up for in the kind of thorough, clock-punching craftsmanship you'd expect from a guy who sees some of himself in a milkman. And Rockpile-- what a perfect name for a rock band. Though Yep Roc's re-mastered re-issue of Labour of Lust doesn't include a DVD of "Born Fighters", it does a fine job of highlighting the many muscular moving parts of Lowe's songwriting at the time, as they were bashed out by professionals just like those Lowe describes in the hard-charging song of the same name. A bassist, he insisted that every one of his songs rely on rhythm first. So whether it's the devilish basslines of "Big Kick, Plain Scrap" or the galloping snap of Terry Williams' drumwork in opener "Cruel to Be Kind", a converted Brinsley Schwarz song and Lowe's lone U.S. chart hit, the foundational tracks sound golden in mp3 or vinyl format. The latter is pure pop and pure Lowe, a typically self-deprecating gem whose vocal hook is inescapable. Even more satisfying is "American Squirm", a sweeter number that features a spritely Costello on back-up vocals. Layer by layer, it showcases even further that Lowe was as sharp a producer as he was a songwriter. There's as much warmth as there is punch. Both lyrically and sonically, you'll find a lot of that again from top to bottom, the Dire Straits-alluding "Cracking Up" or coal-miner's ache of "Endless Grey Ribbon" being two fine examples. Yep Roc didn't go overboard in the way of (often) unnecessary extra material, a decision that befits the no-nonsense feel of the record itself. The quiet bonus B-side "Basing Street" is a country-inflected folk number that hints at Lowe's later work, but was rightly left off the original playlist, if only because there's enough of that to chew on as is. At the halfway mark rests "You Make Me", a similarly hushed love tune in which Lowe is alone with just a guitar and some reverb. It's short and plain and startling in its vulnerability. But the crackle of the original recording is still there. It's not hard to imagine Lowe putting up a fight to keep it that way."

Purified in Blood

Reaper of Souls

Metal,Rock

Cory D. Byrom

Over its decades-long existence, heavy metal has undergone several transformations, at times fading into the background, biding its time before emerging again as something new and refreshing. Throughout the early 1990s, bands like Death and Deicide seemed to inspire every longhair with a guitar to write blurred, panic-stricken riffs, and then growl painfully bleak lyrics about demonic possession or involuntary surgery. That's cool, though; there were some great bands back then. But just as with thrash metal a few years earlier, before death metal's initial light began to fade, critical mass was achieved. Too many bands were doing the same thing, forking every devil horn in the same manner, every head banging to the same beat. A few years later, though, things were looking up as a new breed emerged, blending old-school death metal mentality with an increased emphasis on melody as well as hardcore's muscle and groove. But now here we are again, with Norway's Purified in Blood, whose Reaper of Souls tries its hardest to drive listeners to sacrifice a potato or something (the band are staunch vegans), but in the end just ends up sounding like a rote hardcore-influenced thrash band. The riffs are mighty, the tempos are appropriately blazing, and the vocals growl and screech with an admirable amount of bestial rage, but in the end there's not a lot to set the band apart from their peers. That's not to say this is a bad album. On "Gates of Gehenna", the bridge riff is at once so familiar and exciting that if I didn't know better, I'd swear it was lifted from somewhere else. But it's just the bridge, a few seconds out of a four-minute song. The mid-section of "Venom" is also striking when the pounding double bass drops to a slow throb before launching into one of the album's most melodic riffs. It's a build up Dave Lombardo would be proud of, but it seems like Slayer-aping is the band's go-to trick to mix things up. Unfortunately, not every song houses even these minor moments of individuality. These tracks are so uniform that it becomes hard to tell them apart. The length of each track falls within a minute of the others, and every moment is relentless with guitar-noodling and vocal barking. Over a year ago, in a review of the Black Dahlia Murder's Miasma, I commented on how that band was able to take many of death metal's characteristics and update them without sounding derivative. It's disappointing that while Purified in Blood attempts the same feat, they rarely sound all that inventive. Frankly, they just end up sounding a little too much like the Black Dahlia Murder.

Artist: Purified in Blood, Album: Reaper of Souls, Genre: Metal,Rock, Score (1-10): 5.8 Album review: "Over its decades-long existence, heavy metal has undergone several transformations, at times fading into the background, biding its time before emerging again as something new and refreshing. Throughout the early 1990s, bands like Death and Deicide seemed to inspire every longhair with a guitar to write blurred, panic-stricken riffs, and then growl painfully bleak lyrics about demonic possession or involuntary surgery. That's cool, though; there were some great bands back then. But just as with thrash metal a few years earlier, before death metal's initial light began to fade, critical mass was achieved. Too many bands were doing the same thing, forking every devil horn in the same manner, every head banging to the same beat. A few years later, though, things were looking up as a new breed emerged, blending old-school death metal mentality with an increased emphasis on melody as well as hardcore's muscle and groove. But now here we are again, with Norway's Purified in Blood, whose Reaper of Souls tries its hardest to drive listeners to sacrifice a potato or something (the band are staunch vegans), but in the end just ends up sounding like a rote hardcore-influenced thrash band. The riffs are mighty, the tempos are appropriately blazing, and the vocals growl and screech with an admirable amount of bestial rage, but in the end there's not a lot to set the band apart from their peers. That's not to say this is a bad album. On "Gates of Gehenna", the bridge riff is at once so familiar and exciting that if I didn't know better, I'd swear it was lifted from somewhere else. But it's just the bridge, a few seconds out of a four-minute song. The mid-section of "Venom" is also striking when the pounding double bass drops to a slow throb before launching into one of the album's most melodic riffs. It's a build up Dave Lombardo would be proud of, but it seems like Slayer-aping is the band's go-to trick to mix things up. Unfortunately, not every song houses even these minor moments of individuality. These tracks are so uniform that it becomes hard to tell them apart. The length of each track falls within a minute of the others, and every moment is relentless with guitar-noodling and vocal barking. Over a year ago, in a review of the Black Dahlia Murder's Miasma, I commented on how that band was able to take many of death metal's characteristics and update them without sounding derivative. It's disappointing that while Purified in Blood attempts the same feat, they rarely sound all that inventive. Frankly, they just end up sounding a little too much like the Black Dahlia Murder."

Patti Smith

Horses [30th Anniversary Legacy Edition]

Rock

Chris Dahlen

Patti Smith sounded both young and old on her 1975 debut, Horses: young because only a young punk can slink into the spotlight and sell an opening line like, "Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine"; old, because she was dead serious and sophisticated, an ur-punk but also a poetess and a singer who knew to stop this close to overindulgence. Like her hero Jim Morrison she wrote absurd verses more fit for a diary than a rock 'n' roll record, but could also follow them with lines that genuinely terrified. Smith is the fountainhead for the punks, grrrls, rockers, and artists that have worn the shit out of this record in their most raw, needy hours, and who study and mimic everything she does with that voice-- which is all rends, tears, and bite marks, and no clean cuts. So it feels cheap not to put this fully on a pedestal, even if "Land"'s meandering free verse makes a poor bookend for the enraged lust of "Gloria", and "Elegie" is a turgid closer. The flaws don't matter: Horses is an album of its time-- not because it's dated, but because it precariously captures a phase in Smith's life, and when all the raw elements fall in place, it feels miraculous. Take "Birdland". Just like in a jazz ballad, you can practically hear the band breathing in sync, and the slightest misjudgment would screw up the flow of Smith's surreal-- but straightforwardly powerful-- poem. But Lenny Kaye's guitar stretches effortlessly from post-funeral ballad to ecstatic, crazy fury, and Smith's performance is fierce and horribly unbeautiful. "It was as if someone had spread butter on all the fine points of the stars/ 'Cause when he looked up they started to slip." Holy God is she a poet, and she hurls those words so accurately you want to scream and give up too. That was 30 years ago. Today, Smith is unavoidably grown up, stuck in the canon, and well defined, and that's the artist we hear on the bonus disc in this package, a live track-by-track recital of Horses from the Meltdown Festival in London, this past June. She took the stage with old friends Tom Verlaine and Lenny Kaye on guitar and Jay Dee Daugherty on drums. They knocked the roof off-- but they don't match the original. "Birdland" is fitful and noisy, the segue from "Lands" back to a "Gloria" reprise seems like a cop-out, and Smith's wild poetess thing has settled into something a little more, hey, settled, like when she complains about how much time we spend on email and Blackberrys. "Elegie" takes far more meaning now that she has a list of loved ones to commemorate, like Robert Mapplethorpe, or her own husband. But play it back to back with the debut, and instead of a transformative force, you hear an old familiar voice cranking about George Bush. Here's the thing about growing up: You don't know when it happens until later, but if you could catch it, it would be an amazingly quick moment-- like the point where you toss a ball in the air and it comes to a complete halt before it starts to fall to the ground. When we talk about youth and rock and roll, we're looking for that moment, of not being one thing or the other but of straddling both, of making mistakes that are above and beneath us, of a crest of energy as the ball gets ready to stop. We're talking about Smith changing from the twentysomething poet who decided to add guitar to her readings, and about an artist who can ape the last generation even as she spawns the next one. Or a performance like her old take of "My Generation", where she and John Cale knock the shit out of the by-then-ancient Who classic and Smith wraps with the wail, "I'm so young, I'm so goddamn young"-- and she's still, barely, right.

Artist: Patti Smith, Album: Horses [30th Anniversary Legacy Edition], Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 9.4 Album review: "Patti Smith sounded both young and old on her 1975 debut, Horses: young because only a young punk can slink into the spotlight and sell an opening line like, "Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not mine"; old, because she was dead serious and sophisticated, an ur-punk but also a poetess and a singer who knew to stop this close to overindulgence. Like her hero Jim Morrison she wrote absurd verses more fit for a diary than a rock 'n' roll record, but could also follow them with lines that genuinely terrified. Smith is the fountainhead for the punks, grrrls, rockers, and artists that have worn the shit out of this record in their most raw, needy hours, and who study and mimic everything she does with that voice-- which is all rends, tears, and bite marks, and no clean cuts. So it feels cheap not to put this fully on a pedestal, even if "Land"'s meandering free verse makes a poor bookend for the enraged lust of "Gloria", and "Elegie" is a turgid closer. The flaws don't matter: Horses is an album of its time-- not because it's dated, but because it precariously captures a phase in Smith's life, and when all the raw elements fall in place, it feels miraculous. Take "Birdland". Just like in a jazz ballad, you can practically hear the band breathing in sync, and the slightest misjudgment would screw up the flow of Smith's surreal-- but straightforwardly powerful-- poem. But Lenny Kaye's guitar stretches effortlessly from post-funeral ballad to ecstatic, crazy fury, and Smith's performance is fierce and horribly unbeautiful. "It was as if someone had spread butter on all the fine points of the stars/ 'Cause when he looked up they started to slip." Holy God is she a poet, and she hurls those words so accurately you want to scream and give up too. That was 30 years ago. Today, Smith is unavoidably grown up, stuck in the canon, and well defined, and that's the artist we hear on the bonus disc in this package, a live track-by-track recital of Horses from the Meltdown Festival in London, this past June. She took the stage with old friends Tom Verlaine and Lenny Kaye on guitar and Jay Dee Daugherty on drums. They knocked the roof off-- but they don't match the original. "Birdland" is fitful and noisy, the segue from "Lands" back to a "Gloria" reprise seems like a cop-out, and Smith's wild poetess thing has settled into something a little more, hey, settled, like when she complains about how much time we spend on email and Blackberrys. "Elegie" takes far more meaning now that she has a list of loved ones to commemorate, like Robert Mapplethorpe, or her own husband. But play it back to back with the debut, and instead of a transformative force, you hear an old familiar voice cranking about George Bush. Here's the thing about growing up: You don't know when it happens until later, but if you could catch it, it would be an amazingly quick moment-- like the point where you toss a ball in the air and it comes to a complete halt before it starts to fall to the ground. When we talk about youth and rock and roll, we're looking for that moment, of not being one thing or the other but of straddling both, of making mistakes that are above and beneath us, of a crest of energy as the ball gets ready to stop. We're talking about Smith changing from the twentysomething poet who decided to add guitar to her readings, and about an artist who can ape the last generation even as she spawns the next one. Or a performance like her old take of "My Generation", where she and John Cale knock the shit out of the by-then-ancient Who classic and Smith wraps with the wail, "I'm so young, I'm so goddamn young"-- and she's still, barely, right."

Filastine

Loot

Electronic

Jess Harvell

Dubstep may have conquered the world, but at what cost? It began as a London-centric exploration of bass, but like most victims of globalization, any local identity has been slowly bled out to make it palatable to a worldwide audience. That focus on visceral and universal low-end thrills may have made for some good dumb pop tunes, but it also strips away the vital stamp that comes from an invested audience with ties to a community. This blanding in the name of branding isn't specific to dubstep, of course. It's just that baile funk and reggaeton and soca and all the other idiosyncratic community-based tweaks to beats-and-bass never impacted heartland America enough to be so ruthlessly exploited. Not that this has stopped many underground beatheads from plundering them, sometimes with honorable intentions and sometimes not. One thing that makes Filastine's Loot so good is that it presents a vision of worldwide bass culture that acknowledges both the importance of context and the problematic and positive ways global connectivity changes things by bringing far-flung sounds together. It's not an academic record. Filastine understands the visceral impact of this stuff, even as the overall mood of Loot can get pretty laid-back. But it's clear he's thought hard about how to both honor and mutate music that's not necessarily "his." It's the inverse of Diplo's context-free mash of whatever regional sounds have currently caught his ear, those squeaky clean thrill rides around a spotless global amusement park. Loot is more like the everyone's-an-immigrant visions of city life that cyberpunk once presented, outsiders and insiders thrown together, an ongoing experiment in technology and tradition finding new ways to inhabit the same space, glittering and futuristic but with plenty of ineradicable human grit, learning, ingenuity. Like those polyglot sci-fi visions of culture-mixing, and maybe like the better parts of our own world now, Loot doesn't smooth away those rough and personalized edges from individual cultures into a palatable mush of clichés that'll go down as easy in Dubai as Dubuque. Instead, Filastine revels in the edges, the way some blur together and some never will, as evidence of the jigsaw quality of modern living, urban and otherwise. In any big city, all this stuff does exist in one space, pockets of fierce traditionalism and a technology-enabled feeling of placelessness, different worlds webbed together as much by wires as one-on-one interaction. Loot also feels like the work of someone who's actually traveled to, rather than simply dropped in and downloaded from, what writer/musician Matt "Woebot" Ingram has called the "shanty house" circuit, groups of producers and players far outside of the Western entertainment industry, who mix the traditional sounds of their region with the seemingly post-geographic dance sounds that swept the planet after rave and hip-hop culture went viral. One tune here is a mix of wildly shuffling electronic rhythms that you can't peg to one location and (possibly) processed brass instruments that sound as much like mournful Ethiopian jazz as the nagging synth-oompah hooks from reggaeton. Filastine calls it "Shanty Tones", with what you have to assume is equal parts respect and knowing cheekiness. Because like Filastine, those "shanty house" artists share both an intense interest in localism and the same access to worldwide grooves we all enjoy through our very telephones these days. And so while you can hardly call Loot a dubstep record, it plays throughout with dubstep's form and sonics, whether it's "Colony Collapse" looking back to the grim caverns of bass of the original Forward>> crew or "Skirmish" losing itself in the current vogue for video game madness. It's also not a "Jamaican record" or a "Middle Eastern record" or a "Latin American record," though it bears influences from visits to (or infatuations with) sounds from those wildly varied and impossible-to-sum-up regions. Filastine knows the long, sad string melody on "Sidi Bouzid" is beautiful enough to be played straight, as tribute to the country where he first heard such music or homage to those who taught it to him. But maybe that would simply be flexing his learning, rather than staying true to Loot's overall project. So soon enough he introduces a gurgling, lurching computer groove into this analog and ancient-sounding tune, and it's the third invented world he creates out of these two distinct sounds that takes "Sidi Bouzid" somewhere unexpected, and maybe more gripping than either would have been on their own. Filastine has clearly taken the time to learn what makes his sources tick rather than slapping awkward "ethnic" samples over bought-by-the-yard grooves. But he's never so reverent that he refuses to inject any of his own personality into the mix, which I take to be a drummer's a sensitivity to making looped rhythms dance in off-kilter ways, the mark of someone who knows his way around a physical kit but also grew up in a world reshaped by rap, dancehall, et al. Maybe I'm wrong to single out one element of this equally borrowed and invented brew as the "personal" one, but there's a recurring hip-hop bump that acts as anchor on Loot, one that lopes more like Jay Dee than baps like NYC. It's a beat that might be the audible American contribution to this cross-cultural mix-and-mash. But it's still the mix, rather than the personal stamp, that drives Loot. It's a mix that's political in the low-key and non-dogmatic way of someone open to new experience in a world ever-hostile to difference. Someone less interested in colonizing "exotic" sounds for profit as simply sharing what's moved him, making no claims of ownership on a unique culture while acknowledging that in 2012 everyone has the opportunity to draw on sounds from just about every corner of the planet. Everything is jumbled into a glorious whole that somehow finds room for parts that were never designed to fit together. And if these dozens of inputs seem both disorienting and natural when they come together, it might just be that, in Loot's vision of the world, where international connection is not just possible but impossible to ignore, all this musical information crush feels hospitable rather than chaotic because that's just how we live now.

Artist: Filastine, Album: Loot, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 7.0 Album review: "Dubstep may have conquered the world, but at what cost? It began as a London-centric exploration of bass, but like most victims of globalization, any local identity has been slowly bled out to make it palatable to a worldwide audience. That focus on visceral and universal low-end thrills may have made for some good dumb pop tunes, but it also strips away the vital stamp that comes from an invested audience with ties to a community. This blanding in the name of branding isn't specific to dubstep, of course. It's just that baile funk and reggaeton and soca and all the other idiosyncratic community-based tweaks to beats-and-bass never impacted heartland America enough to be so ruthlessly exploited. Not that this has stopped many underground beatheads from plundering them, sometimes with honorable intentions and sometimes not. One thing that makes Filastine's Loot so good is that it presents a vision of worldwide bass culture that acknowledges both the importance of context and the problematic and positive ways global connectivity changes things by bringing far-flung sounds together. It's not an academic record. Filastine understands the visceral impact of this stuff, even as the overall mood of Loot can get pretty laid-back. But it's clear he's thought hard about how to both honor and mutate music that's not necessarily "his." It's the inverse of Diplo's context-free mash of whatever regional sounds have currently caught his ear, those squeaky clean thrill rides around a spotless global amusement park. Loot is more like the everyone's-an-immigrant visions of city life that cyberpunk once presented, outsiders and insiders thrown together, an ongoing experiment in technology and tradition finding new ways to inhabit the same space, glittering and futuristic but with plenty of ineradicable human grit, learning, ingenuity. Like those polyglot sci-fi visions of culture-mixing, and maybe like the better parts of our own world now, Loot doesn't smooth away those rough and personalized edges from individual cultures into a palatable mush of clichés that'll go down as easy in Dubai as Dubuque. Instead, Filastine revels in the edges, the way some blur together and some never will, as evidence of the jigsaw quality of modern living, urban and otherwise. In any big city, all this stuff does exist in one space, pockets of fierce traditionalism and a technology-enabled feeling of placelessness, different worlds webbed together as much by wires as one-on-one interaction. Loot also feels like the work of someone who's actually traveled to, rather than simply dropped in and downloaded from, what writer/musician Matt "Woebot" Ingram has called the "shanty house" circuit, groups of producers and players far outside of the Western entertainment industry, who mix the traditional sounds of their region with the seemingly post-geographic dance sounds that swept the planet after rave and hip-hop culture went viral. One tune here is a mix of wildly shuffling electronic rhythms that you can't peg to one location and (possibly) processed brass instruments that sound as much like mournful Ethiopian jazz as the nagging synth-oompah hooks from reggaeton. Filastine calls it "Shanty Tones", with what you have to assume is equal parts respect and knowing cheekiness. Because like Filastine, those "shanty house" artists share both an intense interest in localism and the same access to worldwide grooves we all enjoy through our very telephones these days. And so while you can hardly call Loot a dubstep record, it plays throughout with dubstep's form and sonics, whether it's "Colony Collapse" looking back to the grim caverns of bass of the original Forward>> crew or "Skirmish" losing itself in the current vogue for video game madness. It's also not a "Jamaican record" or a "Middle Eastern record" or a "Latin American record," though it bears influences from visits to (or infatuations with) sounds from those wildly varied and impossible-to-sum-up regions. Filastine knows the long, sad string melody on "Sidi Bouzid" is beautiful enough to be played straight, as tribute to the country where he first heard such music or homage to those who taught it to him. But maybe that would simply be flexing his learning, rather than staying true to Loot's overall project. So soon enough he introduces a gurgling, lurching computer groove into this analog and ancient-sounding tune, and it's the third invented world he creates out of these two distinct sounds that takes "Sidi Bouzid" somewhere unexpected, and maybe more gripping than either would have been on their own. Filastine has clearly taken the time to learn what makes his sources tick rather than slapping awkward "ethnic" samples over bought-by-the-yard grooves. But he's never so reverent that he refuses to inject any of his own personality into the mix, which I take to be a drummer's a sensitivity to making looped rhythms dance in off-kilter ways, the mark of someone who knows his way around a physical kit but also grew up in a world reshaped by rap, dancehall, et al. Maybe I'm wrong to single out one element of this equally borrowed and invented brew as the "personal" one, but there's a recurring hip-hop bump that acts as anchor on Loot, one that lopes more like Jay Dee than baps like NYC. It's a beat that might be the audible American contribution to this cross-cultural mix-and-mash. But it's still the mix, rather than the personal stamp, that drives Loot. It's a mix that's political in the low-key and non-dogmatic way of someone open to new experience in a world ever-hostile to difference. Someone less interested in colonizing "exotic" sounds for profit as simply sharing what's moved him, making no claims of ownership on a unique culture while acknowledging that in 2012 everyone has the opportunity to draw on sounds from just about every corner of the planet. Everything is jumbled into a glorious whole that somehow finds room for parts that were never designed to fit together. And if these dozens of inputs seem both disorienting and natural when they come together, it might just be that, in Loot's vision of the world, where international connection is not just possible but impossible to ignore, all this musical information crush feels hospitable rather than chaotic because that's just how we live now."

Creepoid

Cemetery Highrise Slum

Rock

Zoe Camp

Midway through their new album, Creepoid's Pat Troxell proclaims that he is "So sick, so worthless" before waiting a beat and offering: "What you see is what you get." It scans as the Twitter bio of an ornery teenager, but this Savannah-via-Philadelphia band are well-versed in the art of translating "the feels" into a dissonant mix of grunge, psychedelia, and shoegaze, a chameleonic sound that's enabled them to tour with everyone from alternative rock bands (the Kills, Balance and Composure) to spacey outfits (Wooden Shjips, Marriages) to punks (Against Me!, Refused). Misery loves company, after all. Creepoid's first two albums, 2011's Horse Heaven and 2014's self-titled LP, revealed a heavy debt to '90s alt-rock—particularly Sonic Youth and Garbage, thanks to the shared vocal duties of Sean Miller and bassist Anna Troxell. The former's scratchy coo provides counterpart to the latter's airy moans, and by matching those subtle harmonies to seething, grungy backgrounds (as well as employing sonic quirks, like using a reel-to-reel tape machine from the '50s to record their debut EP), Creepoid have heretofore been able to avoid the paint-by-numbers redundancy suffered by similarly nostalgic peers such as Superheaven. It's a shame, then, to see them regress on their newest record, Cemetery Highrise Slum: a set of depressive shoegaze tunes that captures the sound without catching the spirit. Creepoid's exodus from Philly's DIY punk scene to one of the nation's most infamous sludge-metal strongholds bears the expected sonic hallmarks: swampy, heavy bass, percolating guitars, slower tempos. On tracks like "Here" and "Calamine", the foursome surrender to their own plodding grooves, coasting along on waves of reverb and letting the notes fall as they may. They're not averse to earworms: With its mournful guitars and Pumpkins-reminiscent churn, opener "American Smile" sounds tailor-made for coasting down roads on a summer's night; its chorus' directive to "cough at the moon" provides a welcome touch of morbid humor. Miller's drowsy tenor suits itself well to the band's lazy-river tempos, but the frequency and insistence with which he slides around the melody grows wearisome by the third track, and downright annoying by the end. Coupled with the meandering nü-gaze of "Tell the Man" and "Eating Dirt" (the latter of which swipes from Nirvana's "Very Ape"), Miller's disdain for a solid, sustained lead vocal translates into a vague, often directionless listening experience, as well as an act of overcompensation for an unremarkable voice (though it bears mentioning Troxell's high, clean soprano provides welcome, but infrequent relief). And then there are the lyrics—for every "cough at the moon," there's a muttered clunker like "you shake my heart" right behind it, indifferently delivered, an aural  ¯\(ツ)/¯. There's something to be said for the band's devotion to disorientation: it's a fucked-up record for fucked-up people, and its inherent queasiness is a part of its charm, not unlike Title Fight's similarly-woozy Hyperview. But whereas that band used shoegaze and sludge as references and jumping-off points, Creepoid treat it like the whole point, and the album grows wearying long before it's over.

Artist: Creepoid, Album: Cemetery Highrise Slum, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 5.0 Album review: "Midway through their new album, Creepoid's Pat Troxell proclaims that he is "So sick, so worthless" before waiting a beat and offering: "What you see is what you get." It scans as the Twitter bio of an ornery teenager, but this Savannah-via-Philadelphia band are well-versed in the art of translating "the feels" into a dissonant mix of grunge, psychedelia, and shoegaze, a chameleonic sound that's enabled them to tour with everyone from alternative rock bands (the Kills, Balance and Composure) to spacey outfits (Wooden Shjips, Marriages) to punks (Against Me!, Refused). Misery loves company, after all. Creepoid's first two albums, 2011's Horse Heaven and 2014's self-titled LP, revealed a heavy debt to '90s alt-rock—particularly Sonic Youth and Garbage, thanks to the shared vocal duties of Sean Miller and bassist Anna Troxell. The former's scratchy coo provides counterpart to the latter's airy moans, and by matching those subtle harmonies to seething, grungy backgrounds (as well as employing sonic quirks, like using a reel-to-reel tape machine from the '50s to record their debut EP), Creepoid have heretofore been able to avoid the paint-by-numbers redundancy suffered by similarly nostalgic peers such as Superheaven. It's a shame, then, to see them regress on their newest record, Cemetery Highrise Slum: a set of depressive shoegaze tunes that captures the sound without catching the spirit. Creepoid's exodus from Philly's DIY punk scene to one of the nation's most infamous sludge-metal strongholds bears the expected sonic hallmarks: swampy, heavy bass, percolating guitars, slower tempos. On tracks like "Here" and "Calamine", the foursome surrender to their own plodding grooves, coasting along on waves of reverb and letting the notes fall as they may. They're not averse to earworms: With its mournful guitars and Pumpkins-reminiscent churn, opener "American Smile" sounds tailor-made for coasting down roads on a summer's night; its chorus' directive to "cough at the moon" provides a welcome touch of morbid humor. Miller's drowsy tenor suits itself well to the band's lazy-river tempos, but the frequency and insistence with which he slides around the melody grows wearisome by the third track, and downright annoying by the end. Coupled with the meandering nü-gaze of "Tell the Man" and "Eating Dirt" (the latter of which swipes from Nirvana's "Very Ape"), Miller's disdain for a solid, sustained lead vocal translates into a vague, often directionless listening experience, as well as an act of overcompensation for an unremarkable voice (though it bears mentioning Troxell's high, clean soprano provides welcome, but infrequent relief). And then there are the lyrics—for every "cough at the moon," there's a muttered clunker like "you shake my heart" right behind it, indifferently delivered, an aural  ¯\(ツ)/¯. There's something to be said for the band's devotion to disorientation: it's a fucked-up record for fucked-up people, and its inherent queasiness is a part of its charm, not unlike Title Fight's similarly-woozy Hyperview. But whereas that band used shoegaze and sludge as references and jumping-off points, Creepoid treat it like the whole point, and the album grows wearying long before it's over."

Tim Buckley

The Best of Tim Buckley

Rock

Stephen M. Deusner

Maybe you picked up The Best of Tim Buckley because the fawning cult has made you curious, or perhaps you're intrigued by the many ways his life eerily mirrors that of his son, Jeff, or perhaps while perusing the B's in your local music store you came across the handsome autumn-gray slipcover packaging with a photograph of an afro'd James Franco and just had to find out what this guy sounded like. However you come to the elder Buckley, don't let The Best of be your introduction. Or, if you do, be prepared to exercise a great deal of patience. If this isn't your first exposure to Buckley, you might consider giving The Best of a pass altogether. This new single-disc compilation of the singer's decade-long career, which was marked by critical praise but little commercial success, is marred by a choppy tracklist and a scribbled portrayal of the singer and his output. You could call it merely Some of the Good of Tim Buckley. Buckley's first two albums-- Tim Buckley (1966) and Goodbye and Hello (1967)-- are represented by six tracks that showcase his powerful vocals and his and Larry Beckett's literary songwriting (they allegedly drew inspiration from ancient Greek poetry), but these songs in this order don't hold together very well. You'll admire "Aren't You the Girl" and "Song for Janie" for their almost naïve pop economy before realizing that's the first thing he jettisons on his second album, Goodbye and Hello. In fact, you'll likely grow fatigued listening to the run of songs from that release, which have aged poorly, weighted down by the excesses of the era. The cumbersome string arrangement and Buckley's solemn performance on "Morning Glory" sound silly when you realize how earnestly he's emphasizing the word "hobo." "Carnival Song" is a dated 60s folk theatre-piece, and "Goodbye and Hello" is a nine-minute, multipart epic about America written in impenetrable Dylanspeak and reaching ridiculous melodrama well before the halfway point. There have to be better songs from this period, you think. But if you persevere, you'll be rewarded. As if apologizing for the overindulgences of "Goodbye and Hello", the relatively minimalist "Sing a Song for You (Take 11)" (never released during Buckley's lifetime but compiled on Rhino Handmade's Works in Progress) proves that Buckley worked best in Spartan settings. He's accompanied only by two guitars, one strumming folk acoustic and the other darting jazz electric. You'll immediately note that his singing has become more fluid and free-flowing, less tied to traditional structures and more improvised. This is the beginning of Buckley's most creatively fertile period-- Happy Sad (1969), Blue Afternoon (1969), and Starsailor (1970)-- which forms the bedrock of his legacy. You'll hear him incorporate more styles and sounds into his music, with varying degrees of success. On these later songs, the sprawling arrangements prove advantageous, giving the songs a loose, jazzy spontaneity. You may find the r&b of "I Had a Talk With My Woman" less convincing than the marimba jazz of "Happy Time", but in general his experiments are intriguing, keeping you guessing where he will take the song or how he'll bend his malleable voice. Then you'll get to the final four songs, culled from his last albums, which are considered by many (even those associated with Buckley) to be transparent attempts at commercial success. You'll perk up at his covers of Tom Waits' "Martha" and Fred Neil's "Dolphins", both from Sefronia (1974), but you'll most likely cringe at the graceless white funk of the final two tracks from Greetings from L.A. (1972) and Look at the Fool (1974). As "Look at the Fool" draws to a close, you may reflect more fondly on those earliest tracks and perhaps even generously excuse how awkwardly they opened the set. But something will gnaw at you, whispering that you never got a full understanding of Buckley the artist. While considering this matter, you may come to regret not spending the extra couple of bucks for the 2001 comp Morning Glory: The Tim Buckley Anthology, which boasts 33 tracks across 2 discs and better showcases Buckley's impressive range as a vocalist and songwriter. Mathematically, it's definitely the better of the two collections, but more importantly, it gives a much better impression of Buckley's career. In particular, that comp's longer tracklist includes tracks from the 1990 concert release Dream Letter: Live in London 1968, as well as his acoustic reading of "Song to the Siren", from "The Monkees" TV show, showing his full vocal range and control. But most of all it's just more revealing, casting Goodbye and Hello not as a pomp-folk snore but as a lively and diverse album that includes songs like "Pleasant Street" and "No Man Can Find the War", which could easily replace any of the songs on The Best of. Or maybe you should consider splurging on the albums themselves. Even if some of them remain neglectfully out of print, they provide the proper context to hear these songs, where the consistency and quality are to the fault or credit of the artist more than anyone else.

Artist: Tim Buckley, Album: The Best of Tim Buckley, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.1 Album review: "Maybe you picked up The Best of Tim Buckley because the fawning cult has made you curious, or perhaps you're intrigued by the many ways his life eerily mirrors that of his son, Jeff, or perhaps while perusing the B's in your local music store you came across the handsome autumn-gray slipcover packaging with a photograph of an afro'd James Franco and just had to find out what this guy sounded like. However you come to the elder Buckley, don't let The Best of be your introduction. Or, if you do, be prepared to exercise a great deal of patience. If this isn't your first exposure to Buckley, you might consider giving The Best of a pass altogether. This new single-disc compilation of the singer's decade-long career, which was marked by critical praise but little commercial success, is marred by a choppy tracklist and a scribbled portrayal of the singer and his output. You could call it merely Some of the Good of Tim Buckley. Buckley's first two albums-- Tim Buckley (1966) and Goodbye and Hello (1967)-- are represented by six tracks that showcase his powerful vocals and his and Larry Beckett's literary songwriting (they allegedly drew inspiration from ancient Greek poetry), but these songs in this order don't hold together very well. You'll admire "Aren't You the Girl" and "Song for Janie" for their almost naïve pop economy before realizing that's the first thing he jettisons on his second album, Goodbye and Hello. In fact, you'll likely grow fatigued listening to the run of songs from that release, which have aged poorly, weighted down by the excesses of the era. The cumbersome string arrangement and Buckley's solemn performance on "Morning Glory" sound silly when you realize how earnestly he's emphasizing the word "hobo." "Carnival Song" is a dated 60s folk theatre-piece, and "Goodbye and Hello" is a nine-minute, multipart epic about America written in impenetrable Dylanspeak and reaching ridiculous melodrama well before the halfway point. There have to be better songs from this period, you think. But if you persevere, you'll be rewarded. As if apologizing for the overindulgences of "Goodbye and Hello", the relatively minimalist "Sing a Song for You (Take 11)" (never released during Buckley's lifetime but compiled on Rhino Handmade's Works in Progress) proves that Buckley worked best in Spartan settings. He's accompanied only by two guitars, one strumming folk acoustic and the other darting jazz electric. You'll immediately note that his singing has become more fluid and free-flowing, less tied to traditional structures and more improvised. This is the beginning of Buckley's most creatively fertile period-- Happy Sad (1969), Blue Afternoon (1969), and Starsailor (1970)-- which forms the bedrock of his legacy. You'll hear him incorporate more styles and sounds into his music, with varying degrees of success. On these later songs, the sprawling arrangements prove advantageous, giving the songs a loose, jazzy spontaneity. You may find the r&b of "I Had a Talk With My Woman" less convincing than the marimba jazz of "Happy Time", but in general his experiments are intriguing, keeping you guessing where he will take the song or how he'll bend his malleable voice. Then you'll get to the final four songs, culled from his last albums, which are considered by many (even those associated with Buckley) to be transparent attempts at commercial success. You'll perk up at his covers of Tom Waits' "Martha" and Fred Neil's "Dolphins", both from Sefronia (1974), but you'll most likely cringe at the graceless white funk of the final two tracks from Greetings from L.A. (1972) and Look at the Fool (1974). As "Look at the Fool" draws to a close, you may reflect more fondly on those earliest tracks and perhaps even generously excuse how awkwardly they opened the set. But something will gnaw at you, whispering that you never got a full understanding of Buckley the artist. While considering this matter, you may come to regret not spending the extra couple of bucks for the 2001 comp Morning Glory: The Tim Buckley Anthology, which boasts 33 tracks across 2 discs and better showcases Buckley's impressive range as a vocalist and songwriter. Mathematically, it's definitely the better of the two collections, but more importantly, it gives a much better impression of Buckley's career. In particular, that comp's longer tracklist includes tracks from the 1990 concert release Dream Letter: Live in London 1968, as well as his acoustic reading of "Song to the Siren", from "The Monkees" TV show, showing his full vocal range and control. But most of all it's just more revealing, casting Goodbye and Hello not as a pomp-folk snore but as a lively and diverse album that includes songs like "Pleasant Street" and "No Man Can Find the War", which could easily replace any of the songs on The Best of. Or maybe you should consider splurging on the albums themselves. Even if some of them remain neglectfully out of print, they provide the proper context to hear these songs, where the consistency and quality are to the fault or credit of the artist more than anyone else."

Wavves

Wavvves

Rock

David Bevan

Wavves is the one-man noise-pop project of 22-year-old San Diegan Nathan Williams. Since his homemade cassettes and mpfree turbulence started damaging ears last year, Williams has become the focal point of what reads and feels like a maelstrom of chatter. Once something of a left-field mystery, the hype around him has built steadily throughout this young year. Now with drummer and a press photo, Williams has probably played about as many shows as he has songs to be heard. A spate of recent outings in New York a few weeks back had the scene in such a tizzy, The New York Times sent a dispatch to bear witness. And, just a few days later, to capitalize on the swell, his new label expedited the digital release of Wavvves , his second full-length in just four months. Without delving too deeply into the muck of Williams' proper (and purely self-titled) debut LP, Wavves , it's worth noting that each of his twin long-players share more than just a menu of goths, weeeeeeed, demons, breakers, and vintage skate photography. While his second is the marginally less abrasive, more realized of the two efforts, both feature the same roach-encrusted punk pop. Be it in the opening power chords of "Beach Demon" or "To the Dregs", there's a couple of fried amps' worth of trusted guitar tropes and distortion-- tricks borrowed from the Wipers and Sonic Youth-- enveloping Williams' carbonated choruses. The vocal hooks themselves come fast, usually propelled by titanic drumbeats nicked from 1960s girl group music. It's not immediate--- and hardly the "pop" record that some have characterized it as-- but deep in the froth of highlight "No Hope Kids" lurks more than just a thick dose of teenaged ennui or even volume. There's thrilling evidence of compelling, thoughtful craftsmanship as well. Wavves' no-fi bent has been compared to No Age's. But while those guys tend to reach far outside of their own feedback for spaces more expansive, Wavves' music feels more insular, self-contained, and unsettling. These aren't shouts from a house party, but from a solitary bedroom. And Wavvves ' outbursts are often tempered and sandwiched between clipped electronics (opener "Rainbow Everywhere" and "Goth Girls") or experimental noise ("Killer Punx, Scary Demons") that help congeal the album as a whole. As the hubbub surrounding his music and name game began to gather serious cybersteam over the past few months, the San Diego native wisely moved his signature from small-time imprint De Stijl, to the bigger, much more historically distinct Fat Possum. Business measures and consonant gimmicks aside, the hop down South makes perfect aesthetic sense-- this young man is most certainly singing the blues. Hopeless stoner/loner incantations are scattered throughout, though two of the album's most bulletproof moments are also it's most deliciously bleak. Next to the pains of "No Hope Kids" (no car, no friends, no family, no friends, no girl), "So Bored" leaves memorable blisters. It's the record's one slam-dunk earworm, and it's a total bummer. Over three melted chords and his own back-up oooooooh's and aaaaaah's, Williams' moans a mantra that's bled into every track: "I'm sooooo booooored, I'm sooooo boooored." Not for much longer.

Artist: Wavves, Album: Wavvves, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 8.1 Album review: "Wavves is the one-man noise-pop project of 22-year-old San Diegan Nathan Williams. Since his homemade cassettes and mpfree turbulence started damaging ears last year, Williams has become the focal point of what reads and feels like a maelstrom of chatter. Once something of a left-field mystery, the hype around him has built steadily throughout this young year. Now with drummer and a press photo, Williams has probably played about as many shows as he has songs to be heard. A spate of recent outings in New York a few weeks back had the scene in such a tizzy, The New York Times sent a dispatch to bear witness. And, just a few days later, to capitalize on the swell, his new label expedited the digital release of Wavvves , his second full-length in just four months. Without delving too deeply into the muck of Williams' proper (and purely self-titled) debut LP, Wavves , it's worth noting that each of his twin long-players share more than just a menu of goths, weeeeeeed, demons, breakers, and vintage skate photography. While his second is the marginally less abrasive, more realized of the two efforts, both feature the same roach-encrusted punk pop. Be it in the opening power chords of "Beach Demon" or "To the Dregs", there's a couple of fried amps' worth of trusted guitar tropes and distortion-- tricks borrowed from the Wipers and Sonic Youth-- enveloping Williams' carbonated choruses. The vocal hooks themselves come fast, usually propelled by titanic drumbeats nicked from 1960s girl group music. It's not immediate--- and hardly the "pop" record that some have characterized it as-- but deep in the froth of highlight "No Hope Kids" lurks more than just a thick dose of teenaged ennui or even volume. There's thrilling evidence of compelling, thoughtful craftsmanship as well. Wavves' no-fi bent has been compared to No Age's. But while those guys tend to reach far outside of their own feedback for spaces more expansive, Wavves' music feels more insular, self-contained, and unsettling. These aren't shouts from a house party, but from a solitary bedroom. And Wavvves ' outbursts are often tempered and sandwiched between clipped electronics (opener "Rainbow Everywhere" and "Goth Girls") or experimental noise ("Killer Punx, Scary Demons") that help congeal the album as a whole. As the hubbub surrounding his music and name game began to gather serious cybersteam over the past few months, the San Diego native wisely moved his signature from small-time imprint De Stijl, to the bigger, much more historically distinct Fat Possum. Business measures and consonant gimmicks aside, the hop down South makes perfect aesthetic sense-- this young man is most certainly singing the blues. Hopeless stoner/loner incantations are scattered throughout, though two of the album's most bulletproof moments are also it's most deliciously bleak. Next to the pains of "No Hope Kids" (no car, no friends, no family, no friends, no girl), "So Bored" leaves memorable blisters. It's the record's one slam-dunk earworm, and it's a total bummer. Over three melted chords and his own back-up oooooooh's and aaaaaah's, Williams' moans a mantra that's bled into every track: "I'm sooooo booooored, I'm sooooo boooored." Not for much longer."

Mull Historical Society

Loss

Rock

Joe Tangari

Do you long for the pop of a past era-- say, the early 70s? Do you like lots of instruments, whether they all belong in a song or not? Are you into artists who seem to be full bands at first, but then turn out to be just one guy with lots of musical friends? Well, if you answered yes to any of those inquiries, come with me, I'd like to take you on a tour of the Mull Historical Society. If you answered no to all of them, come along anyway-- we won't be long. As your guide to the Mull Historical Society, I'd like to note that it's not my job to stick up for the Society's output so much as it is to inform you about the Society and all it has to offer. With this in mind, let's proceed directly to an overview before delving a little more deeply: Mull Historical Society is not a full band, nor even a society, but rather the creative vehicle of songwriter Scottish Colin MacIntyre. MacIntyre nets a massive haul of guest players, choirs and orchestras to serve his compositions, in much the same way that Neil Hannon used to for the Divine Comedy, or, perhaps more aptly, in the same way that Jake Shillington does for My Life Story. The vintage of his songcraft is probably about 1971 or so, though the production and arranging techniques he implements are more modern. MacIntyre's voice is a high, nasal whine, extremely similar to Kevin Junior of the Chamber Strings, or kind of like Lindsay Buckingham with a slight cold. It serves his classicist pop melodies quite well, and you could never accuse him of writing out of his range or being off in his delivery. The real problem arises from the fact that, while his songs are fundamentally simple, MacIntyre would prefer you didn't realize how basic they are, piling on everything and the kitchen sink in a transparent attempt to cover up the lacking songwriting. The supersize approach works for some of the songs, but by and large, these tracks suffocate under overambitious arrangements. The good news is, there are some really good songs here-- even if some of them are hidden under impenetrable piles of arrangement. And there are even a few that aren't hidden at all, like "This Is Not Who We Were," one of the few songs that gets up off its ass and ramps up the tempo up a bit. It almost rocks! "Animal Cannabus" gets by mostly unscathed, too, though a preponderance of add-on synths and bells threatens it several times. The best song, though, is probably "Watching Xanadu." Why, if it had only been released 27 years ago, you'd be hearing it on those midnight ads for those AM Gold CDs that nobody actually seems to have in their collection when you come to visit. Still, it'll certainly get the guilty pleasure juice boiling in your loins, with its remarkably infectious chorus and swooning Burt Bacharach candor. But then there's the rest, and though you could hardly call any of it flat out bad, most of it suffers from one or more afflictions that keep it from being all that engaging. "Barcode Bypass" is probably the sparsest song here, and its weird, dark choral ending is pretty neat, but god only knows why they chose to drag it out to the seven-minute mark, stretching it further than it could realistically stay interesting. "Public Service Announcer" and "I Tried" collapse under their own weight before they can really get going anywhere; "Only I" is like Rufus Wainwright Jr. with a bigger orchestra and an overload of trumpet bombast. "Mull Historical Society" functions not only as MacIntyre's signature song, but also as his project's aggressive human resources department, beckoning "Come on and join us" over and over again amidst a ridiculous arrangement of horns, synthesized steel drums and electronics that's so cluttered it makes my desk look orderly. The Mull Historical Society Children's Choir struggles to inject life into the leaden beat of "Instead," but can barely be heard over the orchestra and a barrage of effects. And that concludes our little tour. At this point, you should have a fairly good idea of what to expect from Mull Historical Society. Really, if MacIntyre didn't overpopulate his songs with so many sounds, he could have a pretty decent record on his hands. But as it stands, he does, and it hurts this album a lot. Less is more, and Loss is middling.

Artist: Mull Historical Society, Album: Loss, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.1 Album review: "Do you long for the pop of a past era-- say, the early 70s? Do you like lots of instruments, whether they all belong in a song or not? Are you into artists who seem to be full bands at first, but then turn out to be just one guy with lots of musical friends? Well, if you answered yes to any of those inquiries, come with me, I'd like to take you on a tour of the Mull Historical Society. If you answered no to all of them, come along anyway-- we won't be long. As your guide to the Mull Historical Society, I'd like to note that it's not my job to stick up for the Society's output so much as it is to inform you about the Society and all it has to offer. With this in mind, let's proceed directly to an overview before delving a little more deeply: Mull Historical Society is not a full band, nor even a society, but rather the creative vehicle of songwriter Scottish Colin MacIntyre. MacIntyre nets a massive haul of guest players, choirs and orchestras to serve his compositions, in much the same way that Neil Hannon used to for the Divine Comedy, or, perhaps more aptly, in the same way that Jake Shillington does for My Life Story. The vintage of his songcraft is probably about 1971 or so, though the production and arranging techniques he implements are more modern. MacIntyre's voice is a high, nasal whine, extremely similar to Kevin Junior of the Chamber Strings, or kind of like Lindsay Buckingham with a slight cold. It serves his classicist pop melodies quite well, and you could never accuse him of writing out of his range or being off in his delivery. The real problem arises from the fact that, while his songs are fundamentally simple, MacIntyre would prefer you didn't realize how basic they are, piling on everything and the kitchen sink in a transparent attempt to cover up the lacking songwriting. The supersize approach works for some of the songs, but by and large, these tracks suffocate under overambitious arrangements. The good news is, there are some really good songs here-- even if some of them are hidden under impenetrable piles of arrangement. And there are even a few that aren't hidden at all, like "This Is Not Who We Were," one of the few songs that gets up off its ass and ramps up the tempo up a bit. It almost rocks! "Animal Cannabus" gets by mostly unscathed, too, though a preponderance of add-on synths and bells threatens it several times. The best song, though, is probably "Watching Xanadu." Why, if it had only been released 27 years ago, you'd be hearing it on those midnight ads for those AM Gold CDs that nobody actually seems to have in their collection when you come to visit. Still, it'll certainly get the guilty pleasure juice boiling in your loins, with its remarkably infectious chorus and swooning Burt Bacharach candor. But then there's the rest, and though you could hardly call any of it flat out bad, most of it suffers from one or more afflictions that keep it from being all that engaging. "Barcode Bypass" is probably the sparsest song here, and its weird, dark choral ending is pretty neat, but god only knows why they chose to drag it out to the seven-minute mark, stretching it further than it could realistically stay interesting. "Public Service Announcer" and "I Tried" collapse under their own weight before they can really get going anywhere; "Only I" is like Rufus Wainwright Jr. with a bigger orchestra and an overload of trumpet bombast. "Mull Historical Society" functions not only as MacIntyre's signature song, but also as his project's aggressive human resources department, beckoning "Come on and join us" over and over again amidst a ridiculous arrangement of horns, synthesized steel drums and electronics that's so cluttered it makes my desk look orderly. The Mull Historical Society Children's Choir struggles to inject life into the leaden beat of "Instead," but can barely be heard over the orchestra and a barrage of effects. And that concludes our little tour. At this point, you should have a fairly good idea of what to expect from Mull Historical Society. Really, if MacIntyre didn't overpopulate his songs with so many sounds, he could have a pretty decent record on his hands. But as it stands, he does, and it hurts this album a lot. Less is more, and Loss is middling."

The Eternals

Approaching the Energy Field

Electronic,Experimental,Rock

Jess Harvell

In some ways, the Eternals are a band operating in the wrong era. Their multi-genre stew-- full of funk, dub, jazz, hip-hop, and post-punk-- always takes me back to the late 1990s. That was a time when many cutting-edge bands were so obsessed with rhythms from outside rock's mainstream, their classic forms and brand-new mutations, that it was hard to even sell them in some quarters as "rock." At the time, this rhythmic-centric synthesis seemed to some of us like the genre's future, but the moment, unfortunately, passed quickly. Few current indie bands are paying tribute to Sun Ra or King Tubby, blending various strains of Afro-Caribbean rhythm culture and cutting the mix with rock's bite. Of course, the Eternals aren't some post-rock analog to the current wave of lo-fi 90s nostalgia. They come directly out of the tradition, and over the course of four albums released in the last decade, they've kept its stylistically promiscuous vibe alive. But in any era, even one crowded with likeminded bands, they would be unique. Mostly that's down to vocalist Damon Locks and his wild changeups. Many of those late-90s bands peddled instrumentals. The rest had singers who (being way charitable here) seriously lacked for charisma. That's not a charge you could ever seriously aim at Locks, whose fearless vocal acrobatics, sometimes straining against his skill set, are what set him apart from most indie singers, then or now. Punk sneer, cosmic P-Funk rapping, cracked crooning, wizened reggae mysticism: Locks rarely sings the same way twice on Approaching the Energy Field. His dub-style chatting and "mystic space voice" chanting have more hair-raising conviction than his more conventional (and technically just-okay) singing, just as the Eternals' music gets better the more it strays from homages to familiar genres and into weird combinations. But as on the previous albums, its Locks' abundance of personality and weird way with a hook that elevates the Eternals beyond an experiment in making new rhythms out of old, a band with both a deep love of post-funk history and the chops to scramble that history into new shapes. Still, musically, this is the most varied and accomplished Eternals set yet. Approaching the Energy Field covers a wider range of sounds than even their first three albums, which were already pretty diverse: The jagged beats of Anti-Pop style ultra-underground hip-hop; the jumpy syncopations of UK bass music like broken beat and dubstep; spaced-out George Clinton synthesizer epics; low-key Latin jazz. It's clear the band knows and loves these sounds; you get the feeling they could ape any of them convincingly if they wished. But they're also too restless to play things straight, to simply pay homage to their influences and obsessions. Aside from their commitment to rhythm, that desire to bend the rules and mix things up is still the Eternals' greatest asset. It's why the album's best moments are those which can be pegged to no particular genre, even when the beats drop away, like on "I Let the Telephone Ring", which evokes Spaghetti western soundtracks, Stravinsky-ish orchestral music, and the fragile dream-pop ballads of A.R. Kane. The Eternals may be out their own in their own in the once again guitar-centric world of indie rock circa 2011, but that just means we're doubly lucky they're still listening so widely, still pushing themselves to come up with such unexpected new hybrids.

Artist: The Eternals, Album: Approaching the Energy Field, Genre: Electronic,Experimental,Rock, Score (1-10): 7.6 Album review: "In some ways, the Eternals are a band operating in the wrong era. Their multi-genre stew-- full of funk, dub, jazz, hip-hop, and post-punk-- always takes me back to the late 1990s. That was a time when many cutting-edge bands were so obsessed with rhythms from outside rock's mainstream, their classic forms and brand-new mutations, that it was hard to even sell them in some quarters as "rock." At the time, this rhythmic-centric synthesis seemed to some of us like the genre's future, but the moment, unfortunately, passed quickly. Few current indie bands are paying tribute to Sun Ra or King Tubby, blending various strains of Afro-Caribbean rhythm culture and cutting the mix with rock's bite. Of course, the Eternals aren't some post-rock analog to the current wave of lo-fi 90s nostalgia. They come directly out of the tradition, and over the course of four albums released in the last decade, they've kept its stylistically promiscuous vibe alive. But in any era, even one crowded with likeminded bands, they would be unique. Mostly that's down to vocalist Damon Locks and his wild changeups. Many of those late-90s bands peddled instrumentals. The rest had singers who (being way charitable here) seriously lacked for charisma. That's not a charge you could ever seriously aim at Locks, whose fearless vocal acrobatics, sometimes straining against his skill set, are what set him apart from most indie singers, then or now. Punk sneer, cosmic P-Funk rapping, cracked crooning, wizened reggae mysticism: Locks rarely sings the same way twice on Approaching the Energy Field. His dub-style chatting and "mystic space voice" chanting have more hair-raising conviction than his more conventional (and technically just-okay) singing, just as the Eternals' music gets better the more it strays from homages to familiar genres and into weird combinations. But as on the previous albums, its Locks' abundance of personality and weird way with a hook that elevates the Eternals beyond an experiment in making new rhythms out of old, a band with both a deep love of post-funk history and the chops to scramble that history into new shapes. Still, musically, this is the most varied and accomplished Eternals set yet. Approaching the Energy Field covers a wider range of sounds than even their first three albums, which were already pretty diverse: The jagged beats of Anti-Pop style ultra-underground hip-hop; the jumpy syncopations of UK bass music like broken beat and dubstep; spaced-out George Clinton synthesizer epics; low-key Latin jazz. It's clear the band knows and loves these sounds; you get the feeling they could ape any of them convincingly if they wished. But they're also too restless to play things straight, to simply pay homage to their influences and obsessions. Aside from their commitment to rhythm, that desire to bend the rules and mix things up is still the Eternals' greatest asset. It's why the album's best moments are those which can be pegged to no particular genre, even when the beats drop away, like on "I Let the Telephone Ring", which evokes Spaghetti western soundtracks, Stravinsky-ish orchestral music, and the fragile dream-pop ballads of A.R. Kane. The Eternals may be out their own in their own in the once again guitar-centric world of indie rock circa 2011, but that just means we're doubly lucky they're still listening so widely, still pushing themselves to come up with such unexpected new hybrids."

Jeezy

1,000 Grams Vol. 1

Rap

Tom Breihan

The main takeaway from 1,000 Grams Vol. 1 is that we're seeing a potential feud brewing between Young Jeezy and Rick Ross. For connoisseurs of rap beef, that's an intriguing one. Jeezy and Ross are really the only two relevant, popular Southern rappers who haven't had to do any jail time over the past few years, and they both work in an extremely similar style. They're evenly matched. On "Death B4 Dishonor", the first song on 1,000 Grams, Jeezy hijacks the Ross track "B.M.F. (Blowin' Money Fast)", probably the summer's biggest straight-up banger, to throw a few thinly veiled barbs Ross' way. Jeezy's issue: Ross has reappropriated the initials of the drug gang Black Mafia Family and the name of Big Meech, their imprisoned leader, someone who Jeezy knows. So: "How you blowin' money fast? You don't know the crew/ Are you part of the fam? Shit, I never knew." Ross has already responded in song, obliquely accusing Jeezy of, among other things, being from Cleveland-- some inside baseball shit that I don't even understand. Suffice to say: Potentially the biggest rap battle of 2010 is a squabble over who has more right to use the name of an incarcerated drug dealer. That's some deep silliness. It also means the main takeaway of 1,000 Grams, the second Jeezy mixtape this year, is not the music contained therein. The tracks here all feel like afterthoughts. That wasn't the case on the tape's predecessor, Trap or Die II. On that one, Jeezy exhibited some seriously canny beat selection, picking some of the most chaotically sinister synth-blares of his entire career and showcasing his absolutely nuts new single "Lose My Mind". But on 1,000 Grams, Jeezy exclusively uses other people's beats, an old-school mixtape technique that not too many people mess with anymore. The tape finds Jeezy rapping over most of the bigger tracks of the last year or so. Sometimes those tracks work well with his voice, and sometimes they don't. Lex Luger's beats for "B.M.F." and Wacka Flocka Flame's "Hard in the Paint" sound like the synth-Sabbath stompers that Drumma Boy regularly makes for Jeezy, so he sounds right at home on them. But he's a mess on something like Timbaland and Drake's "Say Something", trying out an AutoTuned croon that the world really never needs to hear again. Worse, Jeezy is basically playing Weird Al on the tape, adapting those tracks' original cadences and changing just enough words that the songs are now about dealing drugs. Diddy's "Hello Good Morning", for instance, now has this chorus: "Yayo! Good morning!" Kanye West's "Power", obviously, becomes "Powder". Five or six years into his career, Jeezy is still talking the same drug-talk he always has, and there's very little charge left in it when he's not on one of those superhuman beats that he just inhabits like nobody else. On 2008's great album The Recession, he widened his scope enough to talk about the world around him with the same force and passion that he'd always brought to the drug stuff, and he came away with his best album. But how he's back to zero-perspective rants about moving kis like he's in the drive-thru and Mickey D's or lovingly describing the way cocaine and baking soda harden up together. And artlessly jamming this stuff into other people's songs is not really working for him. It's just stupid. Of course, the forthcoming Jeezy album could still be great. Jeezy thrives on a very specific kind of track, one where the grain of his voice can sink in deep and he has enough room to deliver his trademark ad-libs. And even this tape has some fun moments; I especially like how he pronounces "monster" like "Munster" so it'll rhyme with "dumpster." But as haphazardly curated as this thing is, the whole thing seems to exist to support his opening salvo against Ross. And judging by the respective quality of both this tape and Ross' great new Teflon Don, Jeezy is heading for a big L here.

Artist: Jeezy, Album: 1,000 Grams Vol. 1, Genre: Rap, Score (1-10): 4.2 Album review: "The main takeaway from 1,000 Grams Vol. 1 is that we're seeing a potential feud brewing between Young Jeezy and Rick Ross. For connoisseurs of rap beef, that's an intriguing one. Jeezy and Ross are really the only two relevant, popular Southern rappers who haven't had to do any jail time over the past few years, and they both work in an extremely similar style. They're evenly matched. On "Death B4 Dishonor", the first song on 1,000 Grams, Jeezy hijacks the Ross track "B.M.F. (Blowin' Money Fast)", probably the summer's biggest straight-up banger, to throw a few thinly veiled barbs Ross' way. Jeezy's issue: Ross has reappropriated the initials of the drug gang Black Mafia Family and the name of Big Meech, their imprisoned leader, someone who Jeezy knows. So: "How you blowin' money fast? You don't know the crew/ Are you part of the fam? Shit, I never knew." Ross has already responded in song, obliquely accusing Jeezy of, among other things, being from Cleveland-- some inside baseball shit that I don't even understand. Suffice to say: Potentially the biggest rap battle of 2010 is a squabble over who has more right to use the name of an incarcerated drug dealer. That's some deep silliness. It also means the main takeaway of 1,000 Grams, the second Jeezy mixtape this year, is not the music contained therein. The tracks here all feel like afterthoughts. That wasn't the case on the tape's predecessor, Trap or Die II. On that one, Jeezy exhibited some seriously canny beat selection, picking some of the most chaotically sinister synth-blares of his entire career and showcasing his absolutely nuts new single "Lose My Mind". But on 1,000 Grams, Jeezy exclusively uses other people's beats, an old-school mixtape technique that not too many people mess with anymore. The tape finds Jeezy rapping over most of the bigger tracks of the last year or so. Sometimes those tracks work well with his voice, and sometimes they don't. Lex Luger's beats for "B.M.F." and Wacka Flocka Flame's "Hard in the Paint" sound like the synth-Sabbath stompers that Drumma Boy regularly makes for Jeezy, so he sounds right at home on them. But he's a mess on something like Timbaland and Drake's "Say Something", trying out an AutoTuned croon that the world really never needs to hear again. Worse, Jeezy is basically playing Weird Al on the tape, adapting those tracks' original cadences and changing just enough words that the songs are now about dealing drugs. Diddy's "Hello Good Morning", for instance, now has this chorus: "Yayo! Good morning!" Kanye West's "Power", obviously, becomes "Powder". Five or six years into his career, Jeezy is still talking the same drug-talk he always has, and there's very little charge left in it when he's not on one of those superhuman beats that he just inhabits like nobody else. On 2008's great album The Recession, he widened his scope enough to talk about the world around him with the same force and passion that he'd always brought to the drug stuff, and he came away with his best album. But how he's back to zero-perspective rants about moving kis like he's in the drive-thru and Mickey D's or lovingly describing the way cocaine and baking soda harden up together. And artlessly jamming this stuff into other people's songs is not really working for him. It's just stupid. Of course, the forthcoming Jeezy album could still be great. Jeezy thrives on a very specific kind of track, one where the grain of his voice can sink in deep and he has enough room to deliver his trademark ad-libs. And even this tape has some fun moments; I especially like how he pronounces "monster" like "Munster" so it'll rhyme with "dumpster." But as haphazardly curated as this thing is, the whole thing seems to exist to support his opening salvo against Ross. And judging by the respective quality of both this tape and Ross' great new Teflon Don, Jeezy is heading for a big L here."

James Blake

CMYK EP

Pop/R&B

Mike Powell

CMYK is only the third release from London electronic producer James Blake, who is only 21-- and the reason I keep saying "only" is because I get a little dumb thinking about how much ground he's covered in so few steps. His style is already recognizable: progressions of thick soul and jazz chords (a product of years of piano lessons), pitched-down and mangled vocals (often his own), and mid-tempo beats that balance synthesized sub-bass with handclaps, snaps, and other humanizing soundlets. But each of his releases-- last year's "Air & Lack Thereof" / "Sparing the Horses" single, February's The Bells Sketch EP, and now, CMYK EP-- also sounds like its own project, filled with private rules and concepts. He's writing his theme and his variations at the same time. Blake isn't peerless, exactly. He's got collaborators and associates. (Untold and Mount Kimbie-- two artists he's done remixes for-- come to mind.) But Blake's peers are better known for the boundaries they're breaking down than the ones they're reinforcing, which is to say that Blake-- who appears to have a brain full of uncategorizable ideas-- is in a good position to do whatever tickles him. (The BBC DJ Gilles Peterson had him as a guest on his show last week, where he talked about his plans for a vocal-and-piano EP, and how he'd just had his mind pried open by seeing Joanna Newsom live. From any other contemporary electronic producer, I'd be surprised.) CMYK is built from samples primarily from 90s R&B. Sometimes, they're incredibly obvious-- obvious like "I hope James Blake doesn't end up with legal fees" obvious. Other times, he crushes them beyond recognition. (We know from a Rising interview last month that Brandy is on there somewhere, and R. Kelly, too.) The title track draws on both Kelis' "Caught Out There" and Aaliyah's "Are You That Somebody"-- songs that helped define the years they came out in by sounding two steps ahead of everything around them. This is canny for plenty of reasons, I think, but I'll be brief: Blake takes two R&B archetypes-- the Spurned Woman and the Secret Lover-- and imagines them in a back and forth. It's modern homage to old ideas. But if you know the songs already, it's also an exercise in warming up your cultural memory-- both tracks are over 10 years old but under 15, a kind of dead zone for nostalgia, not yet retro-ready but no longer current. He's not reminding us of something we've forgotten or telling us about something we never knew about, he's reanimating songs that are probably just at the edge of peoples' thoughts. (It's also a statement of allegiances: though Blake-- as Harmonimix-- has worked with Lil' Wayne's voice, he doesn't seem to be as interested in current American hip-hop and R&B as much as he is in picking up where Timbaland and the Neptunes left off at the end of the 1990s.) But what makes the track isn't its samples, its the way Blake integrates them. Everything on CMYK is remarkably balanced: throwback sounds (a soul singer) next to contemporary ones (filtered synthesizer sweeps); deeply processed sounds (a vocoder) next to clean ones; moments of dissonance and digital noise next to a consonant progression of organ chords. One minute it's naked, the next it's obscure. Blake's songs-- three- and four-minute long pieces of electronic pop-- have no real space or time. They're not dance tracks. They're deeply retro and slightly futuristic-- which is to say they're contemporary. They're made on a home computer, but sound like the work of an animatronic band. I keep thinking of the Wong Kar-wai movie 2046, ostensibly a love story with parallel narratives, one set in the 1950s, one set in 2046. The superficial surroundings of the past are different from the future, but at one point, two characters say the same exact thing: "Leave with me." The context, though, is different, and changing the context changes the meaning. And when the meaning is changed, communication breaks down. In both cases, the characters are somehow misunderstood, and the misunderstanding leads to heartbreak. James Blake plays in these gaps-- these modern gaps-- in ways that are both clever and sympathetic. "Do androids dream of electric sheep?" is an old question. Blake's trying to figure out how convincingly they sing gospel.

Artist: James Blake, Album: CMYK EP, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 8.3 Album review: "CMYK is only the third release from London electronic producer James Blake, who is only 21-- and the reason I keep saying "only" is because I get a little dumb thinking about how much ground he's covered in so few steps. His style is already recognizable: progressions of thick soul and jazz chords (a product of years of piano lessons), pitched-down and mangled vocals (often his own), and mid-tempo beats that balance synthesized sub-bass with handclaps, snaps, and other humanizing soundlets. But each of his releases-- last year's "Air & Lack Thereof" / "Sparing the Horses" single, February's The Bells Sketch EP, and now, CMYK EP-- also sounds like its own project, filled with private rules and concepts. He's writing his theme and his variations at the same time. Blake isn't peerless, exactly. He's got collaborators and associates. (Untold and Mount Kimbie-- two artists he's done remixes for-- come to mind.) But Blake's peers are better known for the boundaries they're breaking down than the ones they're reinforcing, which is to say that Blake-- who appears to have a brain full of uncategorizable ideas-- is in a good position to do whatever tickles him. (The BBC DJ Gilles Peterson had him as a guest on his show last week, where he talked about his plans for a vocal-and-piano EP, and how he'd just had his mind pried open by seeing Joanna Newsom live. From any other contemporary electronic producer, I'd be surprised.) CMYK is built from samples primarily from 90s R&B. Sometimes, they're incredibly obvious-- obvious like "I hope James Blake doesn't end up with legal fees" obvious. Other times, he crushes them beyond recognition. (We know from a Rising interview last month that Brandy is on there somewhere, and R. Kelly, too.) The title track draws on both Kelis' "Caught Out There" and Aaliyah's "Are You That Somebody"-- songs that helped define the years they came out in by sounding two steps ahead of everything around them. This is canny for plenty of reasons, I think, but I'll be brief: Blake takes two R&B archetypes-- the Spurned Woman and the Secret Lover-- and imagines them in a back and forth. It's modern homage to old ideas. But if you know the songs already, it's also an exercise in warming up your cultural memory-- both tracks are over 10 years old but under 15, a kind of dead zone for nostalgia, not yet retro-ready but no longer current. He's not reminding us of something we've forgotten or telling us about something we never knew about, he's reanimating songs that are probably just at the edge of peoples' thoughts. (It's also a statement of allegiances: though Blake-- as Harmonimix-- has worked with Lil' Wayne's voice, he doesn't seem to be as interested in current American hip-hop and R&B as much as he is in picking up where Timbaland and the Neptunes left off at the end of the 1990s.) But what makes the track isn't its samples, its the way Blake integrates them. Everything on CMYK is remarkably balanced: throwback sounds (a soul singer) next to contemporary ones (filtered synthesizer sweeps); deeply processed sounds (a vocoder) next to clean ones; moments of dissonance and digital noise next to a consonant progression of organ chords. One minute it's naked, the next it's obscure. Blake's songs-- three- and four-minute long pieces of electronic pop-- have no real space or time. They're not dance tracks. They're deeply retro and slightly futuristic-- which is to say they're contemporary. They're made on a home computer, but sound like the work of an animatronic band. I keep thinking of the Wong Kar-wai movie 2046, ostensibly a love story with parallel narratives, one set in the 1950s, one set in 2046. The superficial surroundings of the past are different from the future, but at one point, two characters say the same exact thing: "Leave with me." The context, though, is different, and changing the context changes the meaning. And when the meaning is changed, communication breaks down. In both cases, the characters are somehow misunderstood, and the misunderstanding leads to heartbreak. James Blake plays in these gaps-- these modern gaps-- in ways that are both clever and sympathetic. "Do androids dream of electric sheep?" is an old question. Blake's trying to figure out how convincingly they sing gospel."

The Tough Alliance

New Waves EP

Electronic

Marc Hogan

Henning Fürst and Eric Berglund aren't "real" pop stars; they just play them in Sweden. As electronic pop duo the Tough Alliance, Fürst and Berglund perform their live shows without instruments, committing the ultimate rock heresy of dancing and miming to pre-recorded tracks. (Just ask the Knife. Or Milli Vanilli.) The tracks themselves seem to aspire to platinum status, matching shiny digital beats to vaguely tropical synths, sugar-sweet melodies, and cryptic yet simple lyrics that often involve romance. If you weren't paying attention, you might think they had more in common with Ace of Base than with other Gothenburg-born groups such as the Knife or Love Is All. Like Malcolm McLaren or the KLF, though, the Tough Alliance spike their pop with Situationist politics, sometimes to a point where it's difficult to separate the music from the group's broader arsenal of cultural weaponry. Fürst and Berglund certainly don't; as with Tony Wilson's Factory Records, their Sincerely Yours imprint (Air France, the Honeydrips) assigns a catalog number to everything from promo videos to bottles of wine. "A way to escape or a way to wage war?" they asked in Yours000, the first post on the label's website. The New Waves EP-- released last year in Europe and now finally available in North America via Summer Lovers Unlimited-- is probably both. The disc represents a step forward from the inexperienced shoutiness of neverthelesss promising 2005 debut The New School, though at only four tracks New Waves inevitably feels slight next to new full-length A New Chance (which Summer Lovers Unlimited also hopes to bring to these shores eventually). The bright synths, dubby drum loops, and wistful lyrics of "Silly Crimes" make it a clear standout-- the kind of track it's hard to believe isn't on a proper album. With just a few words and a cheesy spring break vibe, the song manages to be fragile and emotionally rewarding without affecting the trappings of seriousness, as so many current indie spoilsports do. Even a rare precious line like "wasting love, ennobling hate" is surrounded by those purring bird-call synth noises. The EP begins on a more confrontational note: "Kill this compromise," a voice repeats through Daft Punk-like vocoder on "Kill Kill Kill", basically a song fragment. The lyric will recur on *The New School'*s "Babylon". A more substantial testament to the Tough Alliance's unique vision is "25 Years and Runnin'", which imagines a life spent looking for a home while forever unable to shake some deep-seated inner woe. Vivid melodies and globetrotting lyrics pull a yearning pop victory from the jaws of Eurodance synths, 4x4 beats, some oddly Caribbean-style percussion, and crazed sound effects: "Now I know that New York is where a boy can have some fun/ If I only could change where I came from." Cheeky finale "Mine Was Real" covers the heartbreaking 1970 soul classic by Rozetta Johnson, adding the duo's wall-of-can-sound production but seeming to lose none of the original's sincerity. Now that's what I call détournement. In keeping with the Tough Alliance's multimedia tactics, New Waves comes with a pair of videos. The clip for "Silly Crimes", called "Simple Games", shows girls jumping rope in the sun-dappled outdoors and in front of a film projection (a recurring visual motif of theirs) of splashing waves; its unbridled innocence leaves me wondering what darker subtext might or might not be lurking beneath. "25 Summers and Runnin'", the video for "25 Years and Runnin'", also encourages further scrutiny despite a somewhat more jumbled appearance, as a simple negative image of a running man is superimposed above shots of tennis players, migrating geese, and Tough Alliance gigs. If the duo's full political intentions aren't necessarily clear at the end of the EP, their musical ones are: Fürst and Berglund are a couple of punk-minded provocateurs who play pop not for camp value or hipster irony, but because it's the purest form of expression a boy has left.

Artist: The Tough Alliance, Album: New Waves EP, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 8.0 Album review: "Henning Fürst and Eric Berglund aren't "real" pop stars; they just play them in Sweden. As electronic pop duo the Tough Alliance, Fürst and Berglund perform their live shows without instruments, committing the ultimate rock heresy of dancing and miming to pre-recorded tracks. (Just ask the Knife. Or Milli Vanilli.) The tracks themselves seem to aspire to platinum status, matching shiny digital beats to vaguely tropical synths, sugar-sweet melodies, and cryptic yet simple lyrics that often involve romance. If you weren't paying attention, you might think they had more in common with Ace of Base than with other Gothenburg-born groups such as the Knife or Love Is All. Like Malcolm McLaren or the KLF, though, the Tough Alliance spike their pop with Situationist politics, sometimes to a point where it's difficult to separate the music from the group's broader arsenal of cultural weaponry. Fürst and Berglund certainly don't; as with Tony Wilson's Factory Records, their Sincerely Yours imprint (Air France, the Honeydrips) assigns a catalog number to everything from promo videos to bottles of wine. "A way to escape or a way to wage war?" they asked in Yours000, the first post on the label's website. The New Waves EP-- released last year in Europe and now finally available in North America via Summer Lovers Unlimited-- is probably both. The disc represents a step forward from the inexperienced shoutiness of neverthelesss promising 2005 debut The New School, though at only four tracks New Waves inevitably feels slight next to new full-length A New Chance (which Summer Lovers Unlimited also hopes to bring to these shores eventually). The bright synths, dubby drum loops, and wistful lyrics of "Silly Crimes" make it a clear standout-- the kind of track it's hard to believe isn't on a proper album. With just a few words and a cheesy spring break vibe, the song manages to be fragile and emotionally rewarding without affecting the trappings of seriousness, as so many current indie spoilsports do. Even a rare precious line like "wasting love, ennobling hate" is surrounded by those purring bird-call synth noises. The EP begins on a more confrontational note: "Kill this compromise," a voice repeats through Daft Punk-like vocoder on "Kill Kill Kill", basically a song fragment. The lyric will recur on *The New School'*s "Babylon". A more substantial testament to the Tough Alliance's unique vision is "25 Years and Runnin'", which imagines a life spent looking for a home while forever unable to shake some deep-seated inner woe. Vivid melodies and globetrotting lyrics pull a yearning pop victory from the jaws of Eurodance synths, 4x4 beats, some oddly Caribbean-style percussion, and crazed sound effects: "Now I know that New York is where a boy can have some fun/ If I only could change where I came from." Cheeky finale "Mine Was Real" covers the heartbreaking 1970 soul classic by Rozetta Johnson, adding the duo's wall-of-can-sound production but seeming to lose none of the original's sincerity. Now that's what I call détournement. In keeping with the Tough Alliance's multimedia tactics, New Waves comes with a pair of videos. The clip for "Silly Crimes", called "Simple Games", shows girls jumping rope in the sun-dappled outdoors and in front of a film projection (a recurring visual motif of theirs) of splashing waves; its unbridled innocence leaves me wondering what darker subtext might or might not be lurking beneath. "25 Summers and Runnin'", the video for "25 Years and Runnin'", also encourages further scrutiny despite a somewhat more jumbled appearance, as a simple negative image of a running man is superimposed above shots of tennis players, migrating geese, and Tough Alliance gigs. If the duo's full political intentions aren't necessarily clear at the end of the EP, their musical ones are: Fürst and Berglund are a couple of punk-minded provocateurs who play pop not for camp value or hipster irony, but because it's the purest form of expression a boy has left."

Volapük

Where Is Tamashii?

Dominique Leone

French drummer and composer Guigou Chenevier formed Volapük in the early 90s with cellist Guillaume Saurel and clarinetist Michel Mandel. Fringe music lovers will recognize Chenevier from his infamous rock project Etron Fou Leloublan, one of the original RIO bands (Henry Cow, Univers Zero), and from appearing on Fred Frith's 1981 Speechless LP. He also played on one of the first real post-rock records, Vidéo Aventures' Musiques Pour Garçons et Filles (1980), reissued on CD in the late 90s and of interest to anyone at all into experimental rock. Chenevier's own work tends to feature angular, top-heavy riffs over his own precise, pitter-patter drumming and with a penchant for playful improvisation. In Etron Fou, he worked with sax and guitar or organ in sort of a DIY avant-prog vein; with Volapük the emphasis is closer to European folk, albeit highly energetic and sharply dynamic. Where Is Tamashii? is Volapük's fourth record, and second to feature violinist and vocalist Takumi Fukushuma (formerly of the brilliant Japanese experimental ensemble After Dinner). The band specializes in an expert fusion of folk, circus music, gypsy dances and sounding like something that would go very well over a silent film about murderous clowns. Fukushuma's occasional vocals also bring a few of the songs into a realm similar to Czech vocalist Iva Bittova's eccentric avant-pop. All of this happens without the slightest hint of "Art," though the fact that Chenevier had to pull his musicians from classical conservatories should tell you something. There aren't many bands playing this kind of music, but I can say without hyperbole that Volapük is by some measure the best. Despite the distinctive ingredients that go into Volapük's songs, the best ones are those that aren't obviously tied to any particular style. The title track begins as a cumbersome, yet sweet string-led ballad; when Fukushuma's vocals enter it becomes a very odd (and just as alluring) form of café J-pop. And just as soon, Mandel hits a deft, repeated figure on bass clarinet suggesting modest chaos is never far from this band's minds. Likewise, "Impro Cloche" begins as a kinetic, repetitive math-rock vamp, but when the clarinet rears its head, and Chenevier drops his wind-up toy breakbeat, the whole mess transforms into a 21st Century version of Raymond Scott's powerhouse big band. Midway through, a violin wails as if being tortured, the rest of the band sneaks out and Chenevier is left to pound out his way with what sounds like a can of soup and silverware. Le awesome. Elsewhere, Volapük's folk roots shine through, as on "Boom Boom" (classical Asian) and "Pas de Panique" (tango/French chamber dance crossing). On these tunes, their abilities to pull off less intense music are obvious, though Chenevier can hardly hide his restless figures for very long. "Mission" begins as aggressive pouncing with drums and cello, and adds a fluttering violin to announce its lengthy mid-section development. Chenevier's playing occasionally reminds me of Can's Jaki Liebezeit in the way he translates minimal flash into maximum pulse; during the solo section, his playing under Mandel's low-key, slightly Klezmer-influenced solo is admirably restrained. The gradually work up an intense dialogue, even with Mandel doubling himself with another solo at the same time, yet never approaching anything close to skronk. Volapük's previous three records were released on the Cuneiform imprint, which should give yet another idea of what to expect for anyone familiar with that label's roster. As it happens, the band is much more accessible than their pedigree might lead one to believe, though that might come down to the crispness of their arrangements. I can say that music at once as joyous, strange and accomplished is few and far between, so with any luck this catches on outside their small circle of fans. Chenevier's projects can always stand more exposure, and Where Is Tamashii? is on par with the best of them.

Artist: Volapük, Album: Where Is Tamashii?, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 8.2 Album review: "French drummer and composer Guigou Chenevier formed Volapük in the early 90s with cellist Guillaume Saurel and clarinetist Michel Mandel. Fringe music lovers will recognize Chenevier from his infamous rock project Etron Fou Leloublan, one of the original RIO bands (Henry Cow, Univers Zero), and from appearing on Fred Frith's 1981 Speechless LP. He also played on one of the first real post-rock records, Vidéo Aventures' Musiques Pour Garçons et Filles (1980), reissued on CD in the late 90s and of interest to anyone at all into experimental rock. Chenevier's own work tends to feature angular, top-heavy riffs over his own precise, pitter-patter drumming and with a penchant for playful improvisation. In Etron Fou, he worked with sax and guitar or organ in sort of a DIY avant-prog vein; with Volapük the emphasis is closer to European folk, albeit highly energetic and sharply dynamic. Where Is Tamashii? is Volapük's fourth record, and second to feature violinist and vocalist Takumi Fukushuma (formerly of the brilliant Japanese experimental ensemble After Dinner). The band specializes in an expert fusion of folk, circus music, gypsy dances and sounding like something that would go very well over a silent film about murderous clowns. Fukushuma's occasional vocals also bring a few of the songs into a realm similar to Czech vocalist Iva Bittova's eccentric avant-pop. All of this happens without the slightest hint of "Art," though the fact that Chenevier had to pull his musicians from classical conservatories should tell you something. There aren't many bands playing this kind of music, but I can say without hyperbole that Volapük is by some measure the best. Despite the distinctive ingredients that go into Volapük's songs, the best ones are those that aren't obviously tied to any particular style. The title track begins as a cumbersome, yet sweet string-led ballad; when Fukushuma's vocals enter it becomes a very odd (and just as alluring) form of café J-pop. And just as soon, Mandel hits a deft, repeated figure on bass clarinet suggesting modest chaos is never far from this band's minds. Likewise, "Impro Cloche" begins as a kinetic, repetitive math-rock vamp, but when the clarinet rears its head, and Chenevier drops his wind-up toy breakbeat, the whole mess transforms into a 21st Century version of Raymond Scott's powerhouse big band. Midway through, a violin wails as if being tortured, the rest of the band sneaks out and Chenevier is left to pound out his way with what sounds like a can of soup and silverware. Le awesome. Elsewhere, Volapük's folk roots shine through, as on "Boom Boom" (classical Asian) and "Pas de Panique" (tango/French chamber dance crossing). On these tunes, their abilities to pull off less intense music are obvious, though Chenevier can hardly hide his restless figures for very long. "Mission" begins as aggressive pouncing with drums and cello, and adds a fluttering violin to announce its lengthy mid-section development. Chenevier's playing occasionally reminds me of Can's Jaki Liebezeit in the way he translates minimal flash into maximum pulse; during the solo section, his playing under Mandel's low-key, slightly Klezmer-influenced solo is admirably restrained. The gradually work up an intense dialogue, even with Mandel doubling himself with another solo at the same time, yet never approaching anything close to skronk. Volapük's previous three records were released on the Cuneiform imprint, which should give yet another idea of what to expect for anyone familiar with that label's roster. As it happens, the band is much more accessible than their pedigree might lead one to believe, though that might come down to the crispness of their arrangements. I can say that music at once as joyous, strange and accomplished is few and far between, so with any luck this catches on outside their small circle of fans. Chenevier's projects can always stand more exposure, and Where Is Tamashii? is on par with the best of them."

Björk

Voltaic

Electronic,Pop/R&B

Ryan Dombal

Up to this point, the bounty of extracurricular Björk releases-- the live DVDs, remix albums, live LPs, odds'n'sods box sets, surround sound packages-- have all orbited around an astounding centerpiece, whether it be Debut or Post or Homogenic or Vespertine. Such bonus materials were meant to augment the primary artifact and, more often than not, did just that-- even the hilariously excessive Surrounded Dolby 5.1 set came in an irresistible cotton candy-colored square. But Voltaïc's task is tougher. Björk's latest foray into the deluxe edition world not only has to bolster 2007's Volta, it has to save it. Because even the dude with the Homogenic tattoo on his leg has to admit-- Volta is Björk's worst solo album. In his review of the album, Pitchfork's Mark Pytlik keenly observed that it sounded "almost unfinished," and the heftiness of the Voltaïc package almost seems to acknowledge this fact. Of the five available versions of the set, the most maxed-out boasts a live DVD chronicling two Volta-era gigs, a DVD stuffed with Volta music videos, a CD of Volta remixes from the likes of Simian Mobile Disco and Ratatat, a Volta-heavy CD recorded at London's Olympic Studio with Björk's Volta tour ensemble, and three LPs that reiterate the tunes on the aforementioned CDs. Voltaïc isn't a victory lap as much as an attempted rescue mission. The Volta Tour live DVD is the set's centerpiece and offers the best evidence for re-evaluation. Ironically, though, the disc's two shows-- a full-stage extravaganza taped at the Olympia in Paris and a solemn, largely acoustic performance at an Icelandic church-- didn't make me want to give the original Volta another go. Even with frills including Björk's Rainbow Brite-inspired getup, a 10-piece female brass ensemble dressed up like Skittles, and plenty of green lasers, songs like "Earth Intruders", "Vertebrae by Vertebrae", and "Wanderlust" simply can't hope to compete with greatest hits like "Army of Me" and "Bachelorette". But the DVD does make a great case for what may be Björk's most mysterious and eccentric album, 2004's underappreciated Medúlla. Since the singer didn't tour behind that all-vocal curio upon its release, the Volta tour marked the live coming out of several Medúlla tracks. Re-arranged for her full band, a mini Medúlla suite from the the Paris show proves to be its most unpredictably stunning stretch. "Where Is the Line" digs even deeper into its death metal-meets-Gregorian chanting roots, churning with enough gothic evil to satisfy Sunn O))). Then, "Who Is It" fulfills the sprightly, weirdo-pop pleasures that Volta promised but didn't deliver. Finally, "Desired Constellation"-- a static-y electro-ballad that finds Björk ecstatically questioning her own place in the world-- glides like a worthy successor to Homogenic classic "All Is Full of Love". Meanwhile, of the five tracks performed at the hushed Reykjavik locale, Medúlla's three entries roundly trump the two Volta selections. Modern hymns "Vökuró" and "Sonnets / Unrealities XI" take advantage of a full choir to translate a dark knowing seemingly born of another epoch entirely. Volta's understandably forgotten mother-to-son finale, "My Juvenile", gets an appropriately warm voice-and-harpsichord treatment and goes lengths to show this 43-year-old pop irregularity looks and sounds noticeably more comfortable in a church than an arena. The rest of Voltaïc is marred by redundancies. While the remix disc collects an impressive list of producers-- XXXchange, Matthew Herbert, Modeselektor-- almost the whole collection is based on not-completely-radical reworks of the same three songs: "Earth Intruders", "Declare Independence", and "Innocence". Even considering upgrades like XXXchange's admirably funked take on "Earth Intruders", the disc becomes wearisome. Kudos to Ratatat, who take on the less obvious-- and not-exactly-danceable-- track "Wanderlust" and flip it into something more pop-friendly and fun than anything on Volta proper. Most inconsequentially repetitious, though, is the Live at Olympic Studios disc, recorded by the Volta tour band near the beginning of the trek's 18-month, on-and-off itinerary. Stuck in a purgatory between live album and studio creation, it offers risk-less takes on five Volta tunes, which once again sound staggeringly unmemorable next to stuff like "Pagan Poetry" and "Hunter". Which brings us to the music videos DVD. To say the videos from Volta were disappointing is an extreme understatement; the album's five clips are not just "bad for Björk," i.e., sub par material from possibly the most original and ambitious video artist this side of Michael Jackson and Madonna. Most of these videos are just inept, full stop. It's almost shocking. But there is a common thread, which may speak to Volta's overall lack of luster. In all of the clips here, Björk's face is obscured or completely computer generated-- from the embarrassingly amateur CGI head of the "Earth Intruders" video to her constellation-ized face in "Dull Flame of Desire" to the Michel Gondry collaboration "Declare Independence"-- their least successful vid by miles-- where her head is mostly seen behind a megaphone. This may not matter if Björk didn't have one of the most expressive visages in all of pop; previous eye crushers like "Big Time Sensuality", "Hunter", and "Hidden Place" all rely almost exclusively on the unique contours and twitches of her cheeks, mouth, nose, etc. She even made a straight-up robot appear more than human with the help of video auteur Chris Cunningham in the "All Is Full of Love" clip. This second-hand facelessness runs throughout Volta, which still reads oddly rote and cold with this addendum. Even with its hulking abundance, Voltaïc is flesh without bone.

Artist: Björk, Album: Voltaic, Genre: Electronic,Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 5.2 Album review: "Up to this point, the bounty of extracurricular Björk releases-- the live DVDs, remix albums, live LPs, odds'n'sods box sets, surround sound packages-- have all orbited around an astounding centerpiece, whether it be Debut or Post or Homogenic or Vespertine. Such bonus materials were meant to augment the primary artifact and, more often than not, did just that-- even the hilariously excessive Surrounded Dolby 5.1 set came in an irresistible cotton candy-colored square. But Voltaïc's task is tougher. Björk's latest foray into the deluxe edition world not only has to bolster 2007's Volta, it has to save it. Because even the dude with the Homogenic tattoo on his leg has to admit-- Volta is Björk's worst solo album. In his review of the album, Pitchfork's Mark Pytlik keenly observed that it sounded "almost unfinished," and the heftiness of the Voltaïc package almost seems to acknowledge this fact. Of the five available versions of the set, the most maxed-out boasts a live DVD chronicling two Volta-era gigs, a DVD stuffed with Volta music videos, a CD of Volta remixes from the likes of Simian Mobile Disco and Ratatat, a Volta-heavy CD recorded at London's Olympic Studio with Björk's Volta tour ensemble, and three LPs that reiterate the tunes on the aforementioned CDs. Voltaïc isn't a victory lap as much as an attempted rescue mission. The Volta Tour live DVD is the set's centerpiece and offers the best evidence for re-evaluation. Ironically, though, the disc's two shows-- a full-stage extravaganza taped at the Olympia in Paris and a solemn, largely acoustic performance at an Icelandic church-- didn't make me want to give the original Volta another go. Even with frills including Björk's Rainbow Brite-inspired getup, a 10-piece female brass ensemble dressed up like Skittles, and plenty of green lasers, songs like "Earth Intruders", "Vertebrae by Vertebrae", and "Wanderlust" simply can't hope to compete with greatest hits like "Army of Me" and "Bachelorette". But the DVD does make a great case for what may be Björk's most mysterious and eccentric album, 2004's underappreciated Medúlla. Since the singer didn't tour behind that all-vocal curio upon its release, the Volta tour marked the live coming out of several Medúlla tracks. Re-arranged for her full band, a mini Medúlla suite from the the Paris show proves to be its most unpredictably stunning stretch. "Where Is the Line" digs even deeper into its death metal-meets-Gregorian chanting roots, churning with enough gothic evil to satisfy Sunn O))). Then, "Who Is It" fulfills the sprightly, weirdo-pop pleasures that Volta promised but didn't deliver. Finally, "Desired Constellation"-- a static-y electro-ballad that finds Björk ecstatically questioning her own place in the world-- glides like a worthy successor to Homogenic classic "All Is Full of Love". Meanwhile, of the five tracks performed at the hushed Reykjavik locale, Medúlla's three entries roundly trump the two Volta selections. Modern hymns "Vökuró" and "Sonnets / Unrealities XI" take advantage of a full choir to translate a dark knowing seemingly born of another epoch entirely. Volta's understandably forgotten mother-to-son finale, "My Juvenile", gets an appropriately warm voice-and-harpsichord treatment and goes lengths to show this 43-year-old pop irregularity looks and sounds noticeably more comfortable in a church than an arena. The rest of Voltaïc is marred by redundancies. While the remix disc collects an impressive list of producers-- XXXchange, Matthew Herbert, Modeselektor-- almost the whole collection is based on not-completely-radical reworks of the same three songs: "Earth Intruders", "Declare Independence", and "Innocence". Even considering upgrades like XXXchange's admirably funked take on "Earth Intruders", the disc becomes wearisome. Kudos to Ratatat, who take on the less obvious-- and not-exactly-danceable-- track "Wanderlust" and flip it into something more pop-friendly and fun than anything on Volta proper. Most inconsequentially repetitious, though, is the Live at Olympic Studios disc, recorded by the Volta tour band near the beginning of the trek's 18-month, on-and-off itinerary. Stuck in a purgatory between live album and studio creation, it offers risk-less takes on five Volta tunes, which once again sound staggeringly unmemorable next to stuff like "Pagan Poetry" and "Hunter". Which brings us to the music videos DVD. To say the videos from Volta were disappointing is an extreme understatement; the album's five clips are not just "bad for Björk," i.e., sub par material from possibly the most original and ambitious video artist this side of Michael Jackson and Madonna. Most of these videos are just inept, full stop. It's almost shocking. But there is a common thread, which may speak to Volta's overall lack of luster. In all of the clips here, Björk's face is obscured or completely computer generated-- from the embarrassingly amateur CGI head of the "Earth Intruders" video to her constellation-ized face in "Dull Flame of Desire" to the Michel Gondry collaboration "Declare Independence"-- their least successful vid by miles-- where her head is mostly seen behind a megaphone. This may not matter if Björk didn't have one of the most expressive visages in all of pop; previous eye crushers like "Big Time Sensuality", "Hunter", and "Hidden Place" all rely almost exclusively on the unique contours and twitches of her cheeks, mouth, nose, etc. She even made a straight-up robot appear more than human with the help of video auteur Chris Cunningham in the "All Is Full of Love" clip. This second-hand facelessness runs throughout Volta, which still reads oddly rote and cold with this addendum. Even with its hulking abundance, Voltaïc is flesh without bone."

EZ T

Goodbye Little Doll

Folk/Country

William Bowers

Too much "Americana" or "alt-country" product seems eager to bore. Too many of the acts are either redundant tributes to better bands or materially nostalgic in the Cracker Barrel way, churning out prefab faux-rural simulacra. Fortunately, EZ T trots alongside those few scuffed-rhinestone acts able to use Americana's cadences to examine darker waves of grain. While you'd be right in assuming that Goodbye Little Doll's sound barely dodges cow-patties in that field of dreams between Wilco and Junior Kimbrough, the album's urbane nihilism and undertones of absurdity protect it from being confused with the O Brotherhoodlums whose "agrarian" poses are as transparently escapist as Disney's Main Street USA. Fans of Drag City's key post-folk dramatists might consider this album an all-star jam, since it boasts so many recognizable session-people (and even makes an argument that these musicians comprise much of the twisted Bonnie backbone that other bands are often accused of echoing). EZ T is lead by Will Oldham studio and concert collaborator Colin Gagon, features two members of Ned Oldham's Anomoanon, boasts Paul Oldham on bass, showcases the production skills of Bill (Smog) Callahan, and is seasoned with Smog backup singer Sarabeth Tucek's unadorned pipes. Gagon's voice suggests that he's a temporary medium for the looser ghost of Papa M's Dave Pajo, and the wishlist "Central Control" is practically an homage to the Silver Jews' David Berman (what with its great line about Nixon withering, and the mini-refrain, "I want to drink my weight in blood"). So if you're keeping score, Liam Hayes' Plush project remains the only "spinoff" from this circle whose releases don't give their peers away. Let me not treat EZ T like Drag City apocrypha, though, even if Gagon's lyrical tone mirrors the observations of Arise Therefore's whoreson stranger, and even if he furthers that label's family-affair ethos by enlisting two more Gagons to accompany him. Goodbye Little Doll is somehow a singular beast, perhaps due to Gagon's tough mumble (the listener pictures an anemic Joe Don Baker) and his players' scrappier, less deliberate executions. Plus he rocks out! If you ever hoped to hear Bleeding Rearwater Revival cover the climax of "How Soon Is Now" (yes, the "I go about things the wrong way" part), then just wait for the final minute of the fence-torching "New River". Hell, the first line is startling enough: "Mama, don't hang yourself." And then there's the point at which the speaker reckons he "could kill the president with my bare hands"-- The album is packed with raucous portraits of misfortunate mothers, sisters and children (imagine if the Donner Party was actually a shindig in someone's loft). "Fingerless Children" is a rewrite of the traditional "Motherless Children" popularized by The Carter Family and Blind Willie Johnson (okay, EZ T's arrangement wouldn't sound out of place on their producer's Rain on Lens). The parent and sibling on "Cruxes, Cruxes" even poisoned the song's speaker. Unlike exile-hungry hipsters, Gagon doesn't take domestic/matriarchal imagery for granted, and never insists that sisters lack mystery. (While I'm outing my womb-envy, I'll add that this album's worst repeat-play trait is its Chan Marshall-esque minor-chord minimalism.) If we're lucky, future Americana-ists will consult EZ T to learn how the credneck sound can be a vivid palette with which to investigate and convey complicated moods and ironies, just as some paper mills wait until night to release their pollutant clouds.

Artist: EZ T, Album: Goodbye Little Doll, Genre: Folk/Country, Score (1-10): 7.9 Album review: "Too much "Americana" or "alt-country" product seems eager to bore. Too many of the acts are either redundant tributes to better bands or materially nostalgic in the Cracker Barrel way, churning out prefab faux-rural simulacra. Fortunately, EZ T trots alongside those few scuffed-rhinestone acts able to use Americana's cadences to examine darker waves of grain. While you'd be right in assuming that Goodbye Little Doll's sound barely dodges cow-patties in that field of dreams between Wilco and Junior Kimbrough, the album's urbane nihilism and undertones of absurdity protect it from being confused with the O Brotherhoodlums whose "agrarian" poses are as transparently escapist as Disney's Main Street USA. Fans of Drag City's key post-folk dramatists might consider this album an all-star jam, since it boasts so many recognizable session-people (and even makes an argument that these musicians comprise much of the twisted Bonnie backbone that other bands are often accused of echoing). EZ T is lead by Will Oldham studio and concert collaborator Colin Gagon, features two members of Ned Oldham's Anomoanon, boasts Paul Oldham on bass, showcases the production skills of Bill (Smog) Callahan, and is seasoned with Smog backup singer Sarabeth Tucek's unadorned pipes. Gagon's voice suggests that he's a temporary medium for the looser ghost of Papa M's Dave Pajo, and the wishlist "Central Control" is practically an homage to the Silver Jews' David Berman (what with its great line about Nixon withering, and the mini-refrain, "I want to drink my weight in blood"). So if you're keeping score, Liam Hayes' Plush project remains the only "spinoff" from this circle whose releases don't give their peers away. Let me not treat EZ T like Drag City apocrypha, though, even if Gagon's lyrical tone mirrors the observations of Arise Therefore's whoreson stranger, and even if he furthers that label's family-affair ethos by enlisting two more Gagons to accompany him. Goodbye Little Doll is somehow a singular beast, perhaps due to Gagon's tough mumble (the listener pictures an anemic Joe Don Baker) and his players' scrappier, less deliberate executions. Plus he rocks out! If you ever hoped to hear Bleeding Rearwater Revival cover the climax of "How Soon Is Now" (yes, the "I go about things the wrong way" part), then just wait for the final minute of the fence-torching "New River". Hell, the first line is startling enough: "Mama, don't hang yourself." And then there's the point at which the speaker reckons he "could kill the president with my bare hands"-- The album is packed with raucous portraits of misfortunate mothers, sisters and children (imagine if the Donner Party was actually a shindig in someone's loft). "Fingerless Children" is a rewrite of the traditional "Motherless Children" popularized by The Carter Family and Blind Willie Johnson (okay, EZ T's arrangement wouldn't sound out of place on their producer's Rain on Lens). The parent and sibling on "Cruxes, Cruxes" even poisoned the song's speaker. Unlike exile-hungry hipsters, Gagon doesn't take domestic/matriarchal imagery for granted, and never insists that sisters lack mystery. (While I'm outing my womb-envy, I'll add that this album's worst repeat-play trait is its Chan Marshall-esque minor-chord minimalism.) If we're lucky, future Americana-ists will consult EZ T to learn how the credneck sound can be a vivid palette with which to investigate and convey complicated moods and ironies, just as some paper mills wait until night to release their pollutant clouds."

Melkbelly

Nothing Valley

Rock

Steven Arroyo

When it comes to song building, Melkbelly are, more precisely, song demolishers. They tear the wallpaper off of traditional structures, take sledgehammers to the joists and excavators to the foundations, then giddily sift through the rubble and reassemble the debris into something that in no way resembles a normal structure. Just don’t try telling them that. When Miranda Winters sings about “traditional circles in the woods” on the final track of the adventurous four-piece’s formal debut LP, Nothing Valley, she’s out for blood. Exactly what she has in mind is anyone’s guess, but this moment from “Helloween” offers a telling taste of the fuel in the noisy rockers’ frenetic, overheated motor. Like steel wool on brushed metal, Nothing Valley reconciles the affability of Winters’ scattershot words with a thunderously heavy, sometimes doom-suggestive atmosphere. “Concrete is raw, concrete is cold/This slouch is weighted, too,” she sings softly on “R.O.R.O.B.,” her voice a feather adrift over the city. Later, the song slams the brakes into a two-minute coda of deep, labored instrumental wheezing—inhaling with a faint but silence-piercing guitar screech, exhaling with concrete-cracking release. It’s not the first sudden shift on Nothing Valley—not even the first on that particular song. Where many indie-rock bands approach jump cuts in tempo or key like a watercolorist might a flamethrower, Melkbelly chuck wrench after wrench into the album’s traction and still end up with engaging arcs. “Petrified” starts as a solo cover of an imagined Black Sabbath song and finishes with the whole band mimicking a hyperventilating security alarm squealing pulselessly by the end. Despite the crashing pace, dynamics, or melodic trajectory of most tracks, Melkbelly flex an innate sense of balance. Nothing Valley enters suddenly and in panic. Opener “Off the Lot” jumps in at full-throttle physicality rather than easing in and ramping up: If Winters, guitarist Bart Winters, and bassist Liam Winters conjure an electrical storm, James Wetzel’s breakneck drumming tosses about like wayward hailstones. After, they about-face into “Kid Kreative,” a savory single that literally shouts out breakfast food while sonically spoon-crushing granola into a bowl of honey. As they did on their 2014 EP Pennsylvania, Melkbelly hint at an obsession with food and human digestive functions. Nothing Valley’s gastric and gastronomic imagery gets outright, proudly silly; there’s even a line about drinking ketchup water. It’s not hard to picture the band writing while stomping grapes together, barefoot and plugged in, sparked by squishy sounds and sticky sensations. Melkbelly’s kinship to peak-grating Sonic Youth goes beyond Nothing Valley’s captioned-frame cover art; experimentation runs through the creative backgrounds of each member. Miranda and Bart’s prior project Coffin Ships featured the duo writing sweeter-flavored pop while gamely indulging risks like Miranda performing on drums and keys simultaneously with one hand each. Meanwhile, the drumming of the jazz-versed Wetzel, whose snare whacks are perfectly maxed out with help from producer Dave Vettraino, applies advanced mathematics to their finger-paint sensibilities. On Nothing Valley—the first release from Wax Nine, a Carpark Records subsidiary launched by Speedy Ortiz bandleader Sadie Dupuis—Melkbelly reach their hands into pink slime and somehow pull out real nourishment, along the way finding square footing for a mutual next step.

Artist: Melkbelly, Album: Nothing Valley, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "When it comes to song building, Melkbelly are, more precisely, song demolishers. They tear the wallpaper off of traditional structures, take sledgehammers to the joists and excavators to the foundations, then giddily sift through the rubble and reassemble the debris into something that in no way resembles a normal structure. Just don’t try telling them that. When Miranda Winters sings about “traditional circles in the woods” on the final track of the adventurous four-piece’s formal debut LP, Nothing Valley, she’s out for blood. Exactly what she has in mind is anyone’s guess, but this moment from “Helloween” offers a telling taste of the fuel in the noisy rockers’ frenetic, overheated motor. Like steel wool on brushed metal, Nothing Valley reconciles the affability of Winters’ scattershot words with a thunderously heavy, sometimes doom-suggestive atmosphere. “Concrete is raw, concrete is cold/This slouch is weighted, too,” she sings softly on “R.O.R.O.B.,” her voice a feather adrift over the city. Later, the song slams the brakes into a two-minute coda of deep, labored instrumental wheezing—inhaling with a faint but silence-piercing guitar screech, exhaling with concrete-cracking release. It’s not the first sudden shift on Nothing Valley—not even the first on that particular song. Where many indie-rock bands approach jump cuts in tempo or key like a watercolorist might a flamethrower, Melkbelly chuck wrench after wrench into the album’s traction and still end up with engaging arcs. “Petrified” starts as a solo cover of an imagined Black Sabbath song and finishes with the whole band mimicking a hyperventilating security alarm squealing pulselessly by the end. Despite the crashing pace, dynamics, or melodic trajectory of most tracks, Melkbelly flex an innate sense of balance. Nothing Valley enters suddenly and in panic. Opener “Off the Lot” jumps in at full-throttle physicality rather than easing in and ramping up: If Winters, guitarist Bart Winters, and bassist Liam Winters conjure an electrical storm, James Wetzel’s breakneck drumming tosses about like wayward hailstones. After, they about-face into “Kid Kreative,” a savory single that literally shouts out breakfast food while sonically spoon-crushing granola into a bowl of honey. As they did on their 2014 EP Pennsylvania, Melkbelly hint at an obsession with food and human digestive functions. Nothing Valley’s gastric and gastronomic imagery gets outright, proudly silly; there’s even a line about drinking ketchup water. It’s not hard to picture the band writing while stomping grapes together, barefoot and plugged in, sparked by squishy sounds and sticky sensations. Melkbelly’s kinship to peak-grating Sonic Youth goes beyond Nothing Valley’s captioned-frame cover art; experimentation runs through the creative backgrounds of each member. Miranda and Bart’s prior project Coffin Ships featured the duo writing sweeter-flavored pop while gamely indulging risks like Miranda performing on drums and keys simultaneously with one hand each. Meanwhile, the drumming of the jazz-versed Wetzel, whose snare whacks are perfectly maxed out with help from producer Dave Vettraino, applies advanced mathematics to their finger-paint sensibilities. On Nothing Valley—the first release from Wax Nine, a Carpark Records subsidiary launched by Speedy Ortiz bandleader Sadie Dupuis—Melkbelly reach their hands into pink slime and somehow pull out real nourishment, along the way finding square footing for a mutual next step."

Ebo Taylor

Love and Death

Global

Joe Tangari

During the 1970s, Ebo Taylor was one of the leading lights of Ghana's guitar highlife and Afrobeat scenes. He had a productive solo career and was one of the stars of the Apagya Show Band supergroup-- his contributions as guitarist and bandleader helped define the sound that we associate with 70s Ghana today. But it wasn't until this past decade that Taylor gained any kind of notoriety outside of West Africa. Soundway Records included his songs, both on his own and with Apagya, on its groundbreaking Ghana Soundz compilations, and he stood out as a guy with his own sound. "Atwer Abroba" and "Heaven", the two solo songs the label compiled, had a distinctive rhythm, a cousin of the Fela Kuti/Tony Allen backbeat that gave the songs a feeling of unstoppable momentum but felt much heavier than its Nigerian counterpart. One of the best side effects of the surge of interest in West African popular music has been the revival of many careers and groups that had long been idle or working in the margins-- Mulatu Astatke, Bembeya Jazz, Orchestra Baobab, and Poly-Rythmo have all come back, and now Taylor joins them with his first-ever international release. He's joined by musicians from Berlin's Afrobeat Academy, which is comprised of members of Poets of Rhythm, Kabu Kabu, and Marijata, the last of which was active in Ghana around the same time as Taylor in the 70s. The band is important, because it's key to achieving a sound that makes it feel like Taylor never went away-- the material is fresh, but it has a thick, vintage sound that ties back to Taylor's old work nicely. It must be said that it also generalizes his sound a little bit; many Afrobeat Academy members cut their teeth on Fela, after all, and that's clear especially in the rhythm guitar and bass playing of J. Whitefield and Patrick Frankowski, respectively. That should, however, be taken as an observation of style and not quality, as there's not really anything you could call a wrong note on the whole album. Taylor's songs are mostly newly written for the project, though the phenomenal title track is a new version of a song he originally recorded in 1980 after his first wife left him-- in the song, he compares her kiss at their wedding to a kiss of death as his guitar rolls calmly along beside his vocal. Taylor has made what appears to be a strategic decision to open the album with "Nga Nga", an adaptation of a Ghanaian children's rhyme that many people interested in highlife and Afrobeat will already recognize from a version by the Sweet Talks. Taylor's take is less frantic and takes a sort of slow-burn approach, his guitar slashing ominously against the heavy horns and spacey, snaking sax lead. That flash of the familiar isn't necessarily a fleeting one-- if you're a fan of Ghana Soundz or, really, funky old West African music in general, you will feel right at home on this album. Taylor hasn't lost a bit of the spark that made his old records good (and we'll get a chance to compare more directly later this year when Strut releases a compilation of his old songs), and the new songs honor the spirit of that music without rehashing it. There's no need for an artist like Taylor to reinvent himself at this stage-- Love and Death gives us exactly what we want and does it exceedingly well.

Artist: Ebo Taylor, Album: Love and Death, Genre: Global, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "During the 1970s, Ebo Taylor was one of the leading lights of Ghana's guitar highlife and Afrobeat scenes. He had a productive solo career and was one of the stars of the Apagya Show Band supergroup-- his contributions as guitarist and bandleader helped define the sound that we associate with 70s Ghana today. But it wasn't until this past decade that Taylor gained any kind of notoriety outside of West Africa. Soundway Records included his songs, both on his own and with Apagya, on its groundbreaking Ghana Soundz compilations, and he stood out as a guy with his own sound. "Atwer Abroba" and "Heaven", the two solo songs the label compiled, had a distinctive rhythm, a cousin of the Fela Kuti/Tony Allen backbeat that gave the songs a feeling of unstoppable momentum but felt much heavier than its Nigerian counterpart. One of the best side effects of the surge of interest in West African popular music has been the revival of many careers and groups that had long been idle or working in the margins-- Mulatu Astatke, Bembeya Jazz, Orchestra Baobab, and Poly-Rythmo have all come back, and now Taylor joins them with his first-ever international release. He's joined by musicians from Berlin's Afrobeat Academy, which is comprised of members of Poets of Rhythm, Kabu Kabu, and Marijata, the last of which was active in Ghana around the same time as Taylor in the 70s. The band is important, because it's key to achieving a sound that makes it feel like Taylor never went away-- the material is fresh, but it has a thick, vintage sound that ties back to Taylor's old work nicely. It must be said that it also generalizes his sound a little bit; many Afrobeat Academy members cut their teeth on Fela, after all, and that's clear especially in the rhythm guitar and bass playing of J. Whitefield and Patrick Frankowski, respectively. That should, however, be taken as an observation of style and not quality, as there's not really anything you could call a wrong note on the whole album. Taylor's songs are mostly newly written for the project, though the phenomenal title track is a new version of a song he originally recorded in 1980 after his first wife left him-- in the song, he compares her kiss at their wedding to a kiss of death as his guitar rolls calmly along beside his vocal. Taylor has made what appears to be a strategic decision to open the album with "Nga Nga", an adaptation of a Ghanaian children's rhyme that many people interested in highlife and Afrobeat will already recognize from a version by the Sweet Talks. Taylor's take is less frantic and takes a sort of slow-burn approach, his guitar slashing ominously against the heavy horns and spacey, snaking sax lead. That flash of the familiar isn't necessarily a fleeting one-- if you're a fan of Ghana Soundz or, really, funky old West African music in general, you will feel right at home on this album. Taylor hasn't lost a bit of the spark that made his old records good (and we'll get a chance to compare more directly later this year when Strut releases a compilation of his old songs), and the new songs honor the spirit of that music without rehashing it. There's no need for an artist like Taylor to reinvent himself at this stage-- Love and Death gives us exactly what we want and does it exceedingly well."

Tickley Feather

Tickley Feather

Rock

Joshua Love

Tickley Feather's debut long-player opens with a small child's voice drawling, somewhat disconcertingly, "I've got magic inside my bones somewhere." Similar spoken snippets are scattered throughout the record, each centering around the words "bones" or "magic," or both. Clearly the repetition is intentional and well-considered, as you'd be hard-pressed to come up with two terms that better convey the essence of a skeletally lo-fi album that pulls its bliss from such improbable places. The brainchild of Philadelphia resident Annie Sachs, Tickley Feather's scratchy bedroom probings slot nicely next to fellow Paw Tracks alum Ariel Pink, yet (as is the case with Pink), she's not nearly as musically dynamic or engaging as the kingpins of her loose coterie, Animal Collective. The song title "Keyboards Is Drunk" is a succinct summation of Sachs' approach (she's clearly quite fond of straightforward nomenclature-- see also titles like "Rain Bucket" and "Leaking Roof"), as she utilizes wobbly, simplistic key patterns and layers them with largely indecipherable singsong melodies or chirpy yells, occasionally a low-rent drum track, and other sonic detritus. This is the kind of record where hiss, feedback, and even the abstract concepts of cheapness and obfuscation are more or less instruments as well, coloring and shaping what we hear, burying certain motifs while embellishing others. Given her deliberately limited palette, it makes sense that Sachs' tracks would start to sound a bit same-y, with their abbreviated running times admittedly a saving grace, as even three and a half minutes of "Night Train" interminably attests. Still, there are plenty of standouts here, haunting or earworm-ish moments like the "tra la la"s of "Le Daylight" or the relatively long, smudgy vocal lines that sprout into melodies on "The Python" and "Night Chant". As you'd expect, even minor departures from the blueprint stand out, with magnified thrills arising from the booming "Psycho Killer" bass of "Sorry Party" and the harsher electro edge of "Tonight Is the Nite" (both of which also find Sachs yelling more than usual). As a standalone artifact Tickley Feather has plenty of charm, yielding something furtive but friendly for those who penetrate its mountains of artlessness and hiss. However, the jury's still out on whether there's enough here to build a sustainable and rewarding aesthetic.

Artist: Tickley Feather, Album: Tickley Feather, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.7 Album review: "Tickley Feather's debut long-player opens with a small child's voice drawling, somewhat disconcertingly, "I've got magic inside my bones somewhere." Similar spoken snippets are scattered throughout the record, each centering around the words "bones" or "magic," or both. Clearly the repetition is intentional and well-considered, as you'd be hard-pressed to come up with two terms that better convey the essence of a skeletally lo-fi album that pulls its bliss from such improbable places. The brainchild of Philadelphia resident Annie Sachs, Tickley Feather's scratchy bedroom probings slot nicely next to fellow Paw Tracks alum Ariel Pink, yet (as is the case with Pink), she's not nearly as musically dynamic or engaging as the kingpins of her loose coterie, Animal Collective. The song title "Keyboards Is Drunk" is a succinct summation of Sachs' approach (she's clearly quite fond of straightforward nomenclature-- see also titles like "Rain Bucket" and "Leaking Roof"), as she utilizes wobbly, simplistic key patterns and layers them with largely indecipherable singsong melodies or chirpy yells, occasionally a low-rent drum track, and other sonic detritus. This is the kind of record where hiss, feedback, and even the abstract concepts of cheapness and obfuscation are more or less instruments as well, coloring and shaping what we hear, burying certain motifs while embellishing others. Given her deliberately limited palette, it makes sense that Sachs' tracks would start to sound a bit same-y, with their abbreviated running times admittedly a saving grace, as even three and a half minutes of "Night Train" interminably attests. Still, there are plenty of standouts here, haunting or earworm-ish moments like the "tra la la"s of "Le Daylight" or the relatively long, smudgy vocal lines that sprout into melodies on "The Python" and "Night Chant". As you'd expect, even minor departures from the blueprint stand out, with magnified thrills arising from the booming "Psycho Killer" bass of "Sorry Party" and the harsher electro edge of "Tonight Is the Nite" (both of which also find Sachs yelling more than usual). As a standalone artifact Tickley Feather has plenty of charm, yielding something furtive but friendly for those who penetrate its mountains of artlessness and hiss. However, the jury's still out on whether there's enough here to build a sustainable and rewarding aesthetic."

Midnight Movies

Midnight Movies

Rock

Peter Macia

Judging from the press for Midnight Movies, you'd think Nico's stinky corpse had been exhumed from the Grunewald Forest and propped up on the east side of Los Angeles. While there may be no shortage of high cheek-boned talent leeches in town, I've yet to hear any firsthand accounts of a 66-year-old Bavarian cadaver wandering about. This, I'm sure, will be good news to Gena Olivier's parents as I'm sure she's been telling them for years that she, in fact, is the lead singer of Midnight Movies. While Olivier's ghostly baritone does occasionally hint at the Chelsea Girl's narco-drone-- especially when she drops tone at the end of a line-- she pairs the gloom with a winsome lilt that indicates actual emotion, all while pounding away on her drum kit. The easy comparisons are the nagging wench for Midnight Movies, though, and they don't stop with the singer. Guitarist Larry Schemel and keyboardist Jason Hammons blend the sprawl of Trail of Dead and Clinic's thundering hum with Stereolab's electronic flourishes, blanketing the album in a foreboding amber-tinted haze. At times though, having such contemporary influences arrests the record's momentum, particularly when they are not hidden all that well-- "Just To Play" damn near samples the intro to Walking With Thee's "Harmony". The band's saving grace is its commitment to and execution of its textural aesthetic, owing as much to David Lynch's oneiric odes to Los Angeles as any musical counterpart. Midnight Movies shoots for a fevered dream in which the broad day's shadows and the night beyond the headlights are equally ominous, and more often than not, it succeeds. Schemel and Hammons' melodies lurk and lunge where necessary, and Olivier taps out the telltale heartbeat. Olivier's lyrics frequently resemble the diary of an apparition doomed to haunt the bearded and black-rimmed corners of neighborhood dives. On "Human Mind Trap" she mourns, "Pondering inside her grave/hopeless knowing there's no end/she cries and cries". Elsewhere, she sounds like the crazy girl who slipped pages of Gorey into your locker scribbled with poetry, most preciously on "Words For A Love Song", literally a laundry list of apt vocab. And here's where the Nico comparison is relevant because it is Olivier's voice as instrument that is most compelling, much in the same way that Reed, Dylan, and Cale manipulated the German ice queen's voice to reflect the intention of their compositions. If Midnight Movies sucked you'd have read a list of influences like Lauper, Yankovic and Har Mar instead of what's above. Some bands are lucky enough to get paid to find their sound. Some never find it. If Midnight Movies don't allow hype to flop their buttocks over their ears, they should be just fine.

Artist: Midnight Movies, Album: Midnight Movies, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: "Judging from the press for Midnight Movies, you'd think Nico's stinky corpse had been exhumed from the Grunewald Forest and propped up on the east side of Los Angeles. While there may be no shortage of high cheek-boned talent leeches in town, I've yet to hear any firsthand accounts of a 66-year-old Bavarian cadaver wandering about. This, I'm sure, will be good news to Gena Olivier's parents as I'm sure she's been telling them for years that she, in fact, is the lead singer of Midnight Movies. While Olivier's ghostly baritone does occasionally hint at the Chelsea Girl's narco-drone-- especially when she drops tone at the end of a line-- she pairs the gloom with a winsome lilt that indicates actual emotion, all while pounding away on her drum kit. The easy comparisons are the nagging wench for Midnight Movies, though, and they don't stop with the singer. Guitarist Larry Schemel and keyboardist Jason Hammons blend the sprawl of Trail of Dead and Clinic's thundering hum with Stereolab's electronic flourishes, blanketing the album in a foreboding amber-tinted haze. At times though, having such contemporary influences arrests the record's momentum, particularly when they are not hidden all that well-- "Just To Play" damn near samples the intro to Walking With Thee's "Harmony". The band's saving grace is its commitment to and execution of its textural aesthetic, owing as much to David Lynch's oneiric odes to Los Angeles as any musical counterpart. Midnight Movies shoots for a fevered dream in which the broad day's shadows and the night beyond the headlights are equally ominous, and more often than not, it succeeds. Schemel and Hammons' melodies lurk and lunge where necessary, and Olivier taps out the telltale heartbeat. Olivier's lyrics frequently resemble the diary of an apparition doomed to haunt the bearded and black-rimmed corners of neighborhood dives. On "Human Mind Trap" she mourns, "Pondering inside her grave/hopeless knowing there's no end/she cries and cries". Elsewhere, she sounds like the crazy girl who slipped pages of Gorey into your locker scribbled with poetry, most preciously on "Words For A Love Song", literally a laundry list of apt vocab. And here's where the Nico comparison is relevant because it is Olivier's voice as instrument that is most compelling, much in the same way that Reed, Dylan, and Cale manipulated the German ice queen's voice to reflect the intention of their compositions. If Midnight Movies sucked you'd have read a list of influences like Lauper, Yankovic and Har Mar instead of what's above. Some bands are lucky enough to get paid to find their sound. Some never find it. If Midnight Movies don't allow hype to flop their buttocks over their ears, they should be just fine."

Julia Michaels

Nervous System EP

Pop/R&B

Katherine St. Asaph

Last April marked the first time since 1984 that no women landed a solo single in Billboard’s Top 10. Most of the divas of just a few years ago have faded or cultivated distribution channels outside radio airplay. When women crack the upper reaches of the charts nowadays, it’s almost always via second (or no) billing on a star producer’s track: Zedd and Alessia Cara’s “Stay,” Kygo and Selena Gomez’s “It Ain’t Me,” DJ Khaled, Bryson Tiller, and Rihanna’s “Wild Thoughts.” The improbable exception? Songwriter-turned-singer Julia Michaels, whose “Issues” bubbled almost all the way up to the Top 10 in a sea of dudes. Michaels wasn’t exactly a newcomer, having written several pop tracks like Hailee Steinfeld’s self-love-via-”self-love” anthem “Love Myself” and most of Selena Gomez’s recent work, like the teasing “Hands to Myself” and crushed-out Talking Heads flip “Bad Liar.” What’s remarkable about this isn’t that Julia Michaels has successfully crossed over from behind-the-scenes songwriting; artists have managed this since Motown and probably before, and Michaels had all the support majors can buy. What’s remarkable in 2017 is that she did it without a decades-long label tenure like Sia, a high-profile vocal feature like Halsey (unless you count an uncredited Cash Cash spot, which you shouldn’t), or a pile of gimmicks like Meghan Trainor, whose early singles were practically storyboards for future thinkpieces. And what’s especially remarkable is that the singles Michaels released have bucked all the radio trends except the ones she started. They’re sparse in sound, confessional in story, and barely removed from their acoustic beginnings. They are, for lack of a better term, singer-songwritery. This isn’t uncommon. Almost every pop writer, from Bonnie McKee to Stefani Germanotta, begins as a traditional acoustic artist, the kind who 20 years ago might have played Lilith Fair. Michaels is no exception; her influences include the unquestionably legit likes of Laura Marling and Fiona Apple, and pop-rock tracks like “Next to You” could easily have fit in on the soundtracks to “Dawson’s Creek” or even “Buffy.” But today, while male singer-songwriters have no problem charting (or, in Ed Sheeran’s case, being four-fifths of the charts in the UK) female singer-songwriters struggle, and adapt. What might have been released as an acoustic ballad 20 years ago is more likely today to be absorbed into an EDM topline—think David Guetta ft. Michelle Branch. Michaels’ early career whiplashed between both poles. On the one hand, an album of sedate piano ballads she likened to a bunch of Australian singer-songwriters (”Issues” was particularly well-received Down Under, where she’s now touring). On the other, the “Austin & Ally” theme and a breathtakingly cynical cut-rate ”Tik Tok” for “The Hills.” But when launching a solo career, like launching a brand, lack of cohesiveness is death. So on Nervous System, Michaels’ first EP with Republic, she blends the two with promising results. Besides “Issues,” produced by former Dr. Luke protege Benny Blanco, Nervous System is largely the work of Michaels’ core collaborators: co-writer Justin Tranter and producers Mattman & Robin (Carly Rae Jepsen, Tove Lo). Michaels’ influences are in there if you listen—in particular, the pizzicato strings of “Issues” and jaunty dysfunction of “Just Do It” suggest someone who’s spent a good year or two with Regina Spektor’s Begin to Hope. Likewise, “Don’t Wanna Think”—her take on Rihanna’s “Higher” with furiously played piano and self-referential lyrics—is songwriter’s songwriting: an acoustic portfolio piece. But most of Nervous System is far less polished, both as songwriting and as pop songs: production restrained where it might have been blown out, hooks delivered in low-key sotto voce, and lyrics first-thought-best-thought with words spilling out of the confines of their choruses and snapping at the ends of their verses. At best, the effect is disarmingly plainspoken when her asides and quirks are left in rather than sanded off. At worst, it leans a bit too much into the accept-me-at-my-worst confessional that’s become (fairly or not) singer-songwriter cliche: tell rather than show. Parts of “Issues” and “Worst in Me” might as well be SongMeanings explanations of “Fast As You Can.” A current of bleakness has run through pop radio for some time now, and Michaels shares her part; singles like her “Surrender,” Gomez’s “Good For You” and Norwegian newcomer Astrid S.’s “Hurt So Good” are shot through with despair, sometimes intentional, sometimes not. But while those singles certainly achieve the desired effect, Tranter and Michaels are best when goofing around—like on the deeply dumb, kinda fun “Pink.” “There’s no innuendos, it’s exactly what you think,” Michaels whispers after a series of innuendos, with the deadpan mock-seriousness of someone who’s explained “Love Myself” to the press one too many times. The punchline? A chorus of scuzzy, breathy electro, but played more as goofy than seductive. ”Uh Huh” takes a standard campfire-strum of a pop ballad and dents up all the edges: verses strewn with dissonant plinks at the too-high end of the piano, voice contorted into a vocoder glissando, a chorus full of gleeful yelps, and about four lines’ worth of lyrics packed into where the hook would go. It’s perhaps the most shambolic song released to pop radio in 2017, and sounds nothing like its company—but its form perfectly matches its crushed-out, breathless subject matter. It doesn’t play like a hit at all, but neither did “Issues.” The songwriters who have succeeded tend not to be those who’ve tried to replicate the hyper-polished, machine-slick pop material of their clients but those who revel in unapologetic, relatable messiness, whether it be Sia’s cultivated camera-shyness and deeply uncool yet lucrative Clarissa Pinkola Estes flavor of self-help or Kesha’s scrappy party-runoff aesthetic—glitter, trash-bags, and human teeth—that kept devotees around well after the last drops left her bottle of Jack. Michaels, with her modest persona and writing style she likens to therapy, best fits this company, a promising sign for the future.

Artist: Julia Michaels, Album: Nervous System EP, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 6.6 Album review: "Last April marked the first time since 1984 that no women landed a solo single in Billboard’s Top 10. Most of the divas of just a few years ago have faded or cultivated distribution channels outside radio airplay. When women crack the upper reaches of the charts nowadays, it’s almost always via second (or no) billing on a star producer’s track: Zedd and Alessia Cara’s “Stay,” Kygo and Selena Gomez’s “It Ain’t Me,” DJ Khaled, Bryson Tiller, and Rihanna’s “Wild Thoughts.” The improbable exception? Songwriter-turned-singer Julia Michaels, whose “Issues” bubbled almost all the way up to the Top 10 in a sea of dudes. Michaels wasn’t exactly a newcomer, having written several pop tracks like Hailee Steinfeld’s self-love-via-”self-love” anthem “Love Myself” and most of Selena Gomez’s recent work, like the teasing “Hands to Myself” and crushed-out Talking Heads flip “Bad Liar.” What’s remarkable about this isn’t that Julia Michaels has successfully crossed over from behind-the-scenes songwriting; artists have managed this since Motown and probably before, and Michaels had all the support majors can buy. What’s remarkable in 2017 is that she did it without a decades-long label tenure like Sia, a high-profile vocal feature like Halsey (unless you count an uncredited Cash Cash spot, which you shouldn’t), or a pile of gimmicks like Meghan Trainor, whose early singles were practically storyboards for future thinkpieces. And what’s especially remarkable is that the singles Michaels released have bucked all the radio trends except the ones she started. They’re sparse in sound, confessional in story, and barely removed from their acoustic beginnings. They are, for lack of a better term, singer-songwritery. This isn’t uncommon. Almost every pop writer, from Bonnie McKee to Stefani Germanotta, begins as a traditional acoustic artist, the kind who 20 years ago might have played Lilith Fair. Michaels is no exception; her influences include the unquestionably legit likes of Laura Marling and Fiona Apple, and pop-rock tracks like “Next to You” could easily have fit in on the soundtracks to “Dawson’s Creek” or even “Buffy.” But today, while male singer-songwriters have no problem charting (or, in Ed Sheeran’s case, being four-fifths of the charts in the UK) female singer-songwriters struggle, and adapt. What might have been released as an acoustic ballad 20 years ago is more likely today to be absorbed into an EDM topline—think David Guetta ft. Michelle Branch. Michaels’ early career whiplashed between both poles. On the one hand, an album of sedate piano ballads she likened to a bunch of Australian singer-songwriters (”Issues” was particularly well-received Down Under, where she’s now touring). On the other, the “Austin & Ally” theme and a breathtakingly cynical cut-rate ”Tik Tok” for “The Hills.” But when launching a solo career, like launching a brand, lack of cohesiveness is death. So on Nervous System, Michaels’ first EP with Republic, she blends the two with promising results. Besides “Issues,” produced by former Dr. Luke protege Benny Blanco, Nervous System is largely the work of Michaels’ core collaborators: co-writer Justin Tranter and producers Mattman & Robin (Carly Rae Jepsen, Tove Lo). Michaels’ influences are in there if you listen—in particular, the pizzicato strings of “Issues” and jaunty dysfunction of “Just Do It” suggest someone who’s spent a good year or two with Regina Spektor’s Begin to Hope. Likewise, “Don’t Wanna Think”—her take on Rihanna’s “Higher” with furiously played piano and self-referential lyrics—is songwriter’s songwriting: an acoustic portfolio piece. But most of Nervous System is far less polished, both as songwriting and as pop songs: production restrained where it might have been blown out, hooks delivered in low-key sotto voce, and lyrics first-thought-best-thought with words spilling out of the confines of their choruses and snapping at the ends of their verses. At best, the effect is disarmingly plainspoken when her asides and quirks are left in rather than sanded off. At worst, it leans a bit too much into the accept-me-at-my-worst confessional that’s become (fairly or not) singer-songwriter cliche: tell rather than show. Parts of “Issues” and “Worst in Me” might as well be SongMeanings explanations of “Fast As You Can.” A current of bleakness has run through pop radio for some time now, and Michaels shares her part; singles like her “Surrender,” Gomez’s “Good For You” and Norwegian newcomer Astrid S.’s “Hurt So Good” are shot through with despair, sometimes intentional, sometimes not. But while those singles certainly achieve the desired effect, Tranter and Michaels are best when goofing around—like on the deeply dumb, kinda fun “Pink.” “There’s no innuendos, it’s exactly what you think,” Michaels whispers after a series of innuendos, with the deadpan mock-seriousness of someone who’s explained “Love Myself” to the press one too many times. The punchline? A chorus of scuzzy, breathy electro, but played more as goofy than seductive. ”Uh Huh” takes a standard campfire-strum of a pop ballad and dents up all the edges: verses strewn with dissonant plinks at the too-high end of the piano, voice contorted into a vocoder glissando, a chorus full of gleeful yelps, and about four lines’ worth of lyrics packed into where the hook would go. It’s perhaps the most shambolic song released to pop radio in 2017, and sounds nothing like its company—but its form perfectly matches its crushed-out, breathless subject matter. It doesn’t play like a hit at all, but neither did “Issues.” The songwriters who have succeeded tend not to be those who’ve tried to replicate the hyper-polished, machine-slick pop material of their clients but those who revel in unapologetic, relatable messiness, whether it be Sia’s cultivated camera-shyness and deeply uncool yet lucrative Clarissa Pinkola Estes flavor of self-help or Kesha’s scrappy party-runoff aesthetic—glitter, trash-bags, and human teeth—that kept devotees around well after the last drops left her bottle of Jack. Michaels, with her modest persona and writing style she likens to therapy, best fits this company, a promising sign for the future."

Martha Wainwright

I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too

Rock

Joshua Love

At the structural level, Martha Wainwright's compositions are not necessarily remarkable. She favors melodic, arty, periodically driving mid-tempo piano rock that shares obvious stylistic kinship with the likes of Tori Amos and Kate Bush. As the daughter of famed folk songwriters Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle, her lyrics perhaps predictably reflect a lifestyle of tweedy-bohemian cultural privilege, laden with references to farmhouses, Captain Beefheart, and the BBC, and frequently seeming to chronicle relationships with-- surprise-- other artists and songwriters. Almost the entire thrill of Wainwright's music is tied up in her vocal performance, which of course is something that's been said at times about Amos and Bush as well. The second best thing about I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too may be its title, but the absolute best is the way Wainwright attacks so many of these songs, transforming lyrics that might otherwise be faintly ridiculous into vital testaments, taking music that's mostly MOR and wringing from it a startling wealth of shiver-inducing moments. Wainwright has no boundaries and no shame when it comes to her delivery, and hence it's inevitable some listeners will find her squeals and moans and unusual phrasing unbearably florid and perhaps even comical. Yet the popularity of a guy like Antony Hegarty suggests many of you don't always demand plainspoken grit from your singers, so hopefully you too can be mesmerized by how Wainwright adds druggy, Lethe-like connotations to her pronunciation of the word "river" on the operatic, austere "Niger River", or the teasing way she stretches words on "Jesus and Mary", giving us something that sounds like "I'll keep you a-round-ha-hownd/ This dirty old town-ha-hown." Even bigger chills come when the music's intensity actually matches Wainwright's. "You Cheated Me" carries a tightly spring-loaded chorus that belies her musical debt to Fleetwood Mac, and Wainwright is every bit its match, cramming her lines with all the filigrees and exhortations they can hold. "Comin' Tonight" is messier and even better, Wainwright bleating, "I could steal a melody" with open-throated abandon before descending into such incomprehensible emoting that it's clear melody is actually the furthest thing from her mind. In fact, understanding or even making out the words on Wainwright's best songs is largely ancillary-- this kind of concentrated, spine-tingling fervor doesn't really require context. Wainwright does lean pretty heavily on this formula of mild, occasionally rocky folk-pop doused with generous measures of vocal swooping and diving. And admittedly it can be somewhat wearying to try and consume the record in one sitting, especially by the time you get to the wailing "So Many Friends" or the arch, gothic "In the Middle of the Night". The album's arrangements do go a long way towards mitigating this exhaustion-- in the case of an artist like Wainwright, "tasteful" need not be a pejorative, not when the dusty drum rolls and taut guitar thrum of "Hearts Club Band" offer their own kind of drama, bereft of histrionics for a change. Of course, histrionics remain Wainwright's bread and butter, and they don't come much more cathartic and hair-raising than the unexpected dam bursts of "Jimi". The verses tease our ghoulish interest with their passing reference to Wainwright's famous dad, but it's the straightforward simplicity of the chorus that really compels, as Wainwright bears down and rides the music's rising squall to declaim, "It takes up so much time/ And it makes up for nothing" with a passion and purpose that seem for a moment to overwhelm even her love of precious language and vocal virtuosity.

Artist: Martha Wainwright, Album: I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "At the structural level, Martha Wainwright's compositions are not necessarily remarkable. She favors melodic, arty, periodically driving mid-tempo piano rock that shares obvious stylistic kinship with the likes of Tori Amos and Kate Bush. As the daughter of famed folk songwriters Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle, her lyrics perhaps predictably reflect a lifestyle of tweedy-bohemian cultural privilege, laden with references to farmhouses, Captain Beefheart, and the BBC, and frequently seeming to chronicle relationships with-- surprise-- other artists and songwriters. Almost the entire thrill of Wainwright's music is tied up in her vocal performance, which of course is something that's been said at times about Amos and Bush as well. The second best thing about I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too may be its title, but the absolute best is the way Wainwright attacks so many of these songs, transforming lyrics that might otherwise be faintly ridiculous into vital testaments, taking music that's mostly MOR and wringing from it a startling wealth of shiver-inducing moments. Wainwright has no boundaries and no shame when it comes to her delivery, and hence it's inevitable some listeners will find her squeals and moans and unusual phrasing unbearably florid and perhaps even comical. Yet the popularity of a guy like Antony Hegarty suggests many of you don't always demand plainspoken grit from your singers, so hopefully you too can be mesmerized by how Wainwright adds druggy, Lethe-like connotations to her pronunciation of the word "river" on the operatic, austere "Niger River", or the teasing way she stretches words on "Jesus and Mary", giving us something that sounds like "I'll keep you a-round-ha-hownd/ This dirty old town-ha-hown." Even bigger chills come when the music's intensity actually matches Wainwright's. "You Cheated Me" carries a tightly spring-loaded chorus that belies her musical debt to Fleetwood Mac, and Wainwright is every bit its match, cramming her lines with all the filigrees and exhortations they can hold. "Comin' Tonight" is messier and even better, Wainwright bleating, "I could steal a melody" with open-throated abandon before descending into such incomprehensible emoting that it's clear melody is actually the furthest thing from her mind. In fact, understanding or even making out the words on Wainwright's best songs is largely ancillary-- this kind of concentrated, spine-tingling fervor doesn't really require context. Wainwright does lean pretty heavily on this formula of mild, occasionally rocky folk-pop doused with generous measures of vocal swooping and diving. And admittedly it can be somewhat wearying to try and consume the record in one sitting, especially by the time you get to the wailing "So Many Friends" or the arch, gothic "In the Middle of the Night". The album's arrangements do go a long way towards mitigating this exhaustion-- in the case of an artist like Wainwright, "tasteful" need not be a pejorative, not when the dusty drum rolls and taut guitar thrum of "Hearts Club Band" offer their own kind of drama, bereft of histrionics for a change. Of course, histrionics remain Wainwright's bread and butter, and they don't come much more cathartic and hair-raising than the unexpected dam bursts of "Jimi". The verses tease our ghoulish interest with their passing reference to Wainwright's famous dad, but it's the straightforward simplicity of the chorus that really compels, as Wainwright bears down and rides the music's rising squall to declaim, "It takes up so much time/ And it makes up for nothing" with a passion and purpose that seem for a moment to overwhelm even her love of precious language and vocal virtuosity."

Matthew Shipp

Harmony and Abyss

Experimental,Jazz

Matthew Murphy

With Harmony and Abyss, Matthew Shipp continues to improve upon the synthesis of jazz, electronics, and neo-classical composition first shown on his contributions to Thirsty Ear's ongoing Blue Series. Adhering to the methods established on 2002's Nu Bop and last year's Equilibrium, Shipp combines his acoustic piano with William Parker's bass, Gerald Cleaver's live drums, and the varied electronic hi-jinx of Chris Flam. The resulting mix avoids the wilder extremes of both free jazz and abstract electronica, and instead takes a more moderate scoop from the middle of each. This neither-fish-nor-fowl approach has been decried as populist pandering in some quarters-- particularly by those with fond memories of Shipp's more radical, molten work on records like David S. Ware's Cryptology-- but to his credit, Shipp clearly doesn't give a good goddamn what his listeners might expect of him. He resolutely plows forward on Harmony and Abyss, leaving jazz orthodoxy further in his rearview. In fact, only one track here-- the burbling, pointillist "Invisible Light"-- contains what can easily be identified as improvisation. Otherwise, the album sounds carefully and almost rigidly composed, with Shipp's repetitive, chunky chords meticulously mapping out the shades and melodies of each song in order to ensure that no one gets lost peeking down any side streets. The album contains Shipp's most seamless integration of acoustic instruments and electronics yet, and its peak moments fall well outside simple categorization. "Virgin Complex", with its swirl of bowed strings, electronic vapor, and lyrical piano recalls the avant chamber-pop of Rachel's Systems/Layers as much as it does any jazz. Parker's nimble bass drives the quietly propulsive and majestic "Blood 2 the Brain", a multi-faceted track that wouldn't sound out of place on a DJ Shadow release. Elsewhere, Flam takes to the foreground, as on "String Theory" where Shipp's piano drifts unmoored through a wilderness of mysterious, foreboding whirrs and thuds. Best of all might be "Amino Acid" where Flam's electronically generated hoofbeats and thunderclaps effortlessly link onto Cleaver's dexterous percussion to form a woozy, lurching conga line beneath Shipp's inverted Monk-esque pounding. Strange as it may sound, though, the album's fussy, studied flawlessness is its chief flaw. The opening "Ion", for example, sounds as though all distinguishing fingerprints have been deliberately wiped away, leaving Shipp at the piano running restrained, depersonalized scale exercises over a stiff, boxy breakbeat. It's the sort of generic, unobtrusive piece that seems intended to not startle the customers down at Starbucks. Such antiseptic moments are rare on Harmony and Abyss, but even so, it's a bit disappointing to see such adventurous players operating within a format where so little seems to have been left to chance. Shipp should now feel completely secure in his ability to unify all these disparate musical elements; maybe next time he'll feel freer to air things out and really tear the roof off.

Artist: Matthew Shipp, Album: Harmony and Abyss, Genre: Experimental,Jazz, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: "With Harmony and Abyss, Matthew Shipp continues to improve upon the synthesis of jazz, electronics, and neo-classical composition first shown on his contributions to Thirsty Ear's ongoing Blue Series. Adhering to the methods established on 2002's Nu Bop and last year's Equilibrium, Shipp combines his acoustic piano with William Parker's bass, Gerald Cleaver's live drums, and the varied electronic hi-jinx of Chris Flam. The resulting mix avoids the wilder extremes of both free jazz and abstract electronica, and instead takes a more moderate scoop from the middle of each. This neither-fish-nor-fowl approach has been decried as populist pandering in some quarters-- particularly by those with fond memories of Shipp's more radical, molten work on records like David S. Ware's Cryptology-- but to his credit, Shipp clearly doesn't give a good goddamn what his listeners might expect of him. He resolutely plows forward on Harmony and Abyss, leaving jazz orthodoxy further in his rearview. In fact, only one track here-- the burbling, pointillist "Invisible Light"-- contains what can easily be identified as improvisation. Otherwise, the album sounds carefully and almost rigidly composed, with Shipp's repetitive, chunky chords meticulously mapping out the shades and melodies of each song in order to ensure that no one gets lost peeking down any side streets. The album contains Shipp's most seamless integration of acoustic instruments and electronics yet, and its peak moments fall well outside simple categorization. "Virgin Complex", with its swirl of bowed strings, electronic vapor, and lyrical piano recalls the avant chamber-pop of Rachel's Systems/Layers as much as it does any jazz. Parker's nimble bass drives the quietly propulsive and majestic "Blood 2 the Brain", a multi-faceted track that wouldn't sound out of place on a DJ Shadow release. Elsewhere, Flam takes to the foreground, as on "String Theory" where Shipp's piano drifts unmoored through a wilderness of mysterious, foreboding whirrs and thuds. Best of all might be "Amino Acid" where Flam's electronically generated hoofbeats and thunderclaps effortlessly link onto Cleaver's dexterous percussion to form a woozy, lurching conga line beneath Shipp's inverted Monk-esque pounding. Strange as it may sound, though, the album's fussy, studied flawlessness is its chief flaw. The opening "Ion", for example, sounds as though all distinguishing fingerprints have been deliberately wiped away, leaving Shipp at the piano running restrained, depersonalized scale exercises over a stiff, boxy breakbeat. It's the sort of generic, unobtrusive piece that seems intended to not startle the customers down at Starbucks. Such antiseptic moments are rare on Harmony and Abyss, but even so, it's a bit disappointing to see such adventurous players operating within a format where so little seems to have been left to chance. Shipp should now feel completely secure in his ability to unify all these disparate musical elements; maybe next time he'll feel freer to air things out and really tear the roof off."

Various Artists

Welcome Home/Diggin' the Universe

Paul Thompson

The ramshackle, the bleary, the vagabond-- they've all got a home at Woodsist. The tiny label, managed by Jeremy Earl of its flagship band, Woods, has carved out an undeniable aesthetic over the years, one its new cassette-and-LP-only compilation seems determined to shake out a bit. Welcome Home/Diggin' the Universe earns its slashmark. Its first half collects seven songs that hold close to the mid-morning Creedence Clearwater comedown mode the label's become known for; the second runs the gamut from run'n'gun pop-punk to prim Sarah Records-style twee. It is, somewhat by design, a fairly uneven collection, but it nevertheless showcases the two sides of Woodsist's vision. Woods set the tone of the comp's first half with their sunbleached ambler "I'm Not Gone", the set's highlight. It's got a wonderfully casual feel to it, each seam of its recording showing, and while it lacks some of that undercurrent of dread marking their best stuff, it's yet another win for the band. From there all the way Home, it's variations on a theme; Baltimore's Run DMT mostly leave the hypnagogy behind for a crackly, decaying, somewhat unsteady folk-rocker. White Fence slide a bumpy organ under the slack "The Love Between". San Fran's the Fresh & Onlys offer another tour of their garage with the blues-soaked lament "Heel. Toe.". From the Mantles' basher "Bad Movies" to Skygreen Leopards' Byrdsian cover of the Cure's "Catch", there's certainly some spread between the tunes, but they're tied together by their shambolic production and devil-may-care pacing. The set's got an easy feel to it, and when Real Estate's Alex Bleeker brings it to a close with his impressive country-tinged strummer "Gettin By", the label's low-impact, high-yield mission becomes quite self-apparent. Diggin' the Universe proves a far wilder and woollier affair than what precedes it. Moon Duo's "A Little Way Different" most certainly is; not only a departure for the comp, it's something of a switch for the band itself, a comparatively clear-eyed mod-spy groover reminiscent of Yo La Tengo at their most playful. It kicks off a second half that feels like a mixtape rather than a label comp, and it's a welcome change of pace. City Center tackle the Grateful Dead's eternal "Box of Rain", smothering it in reverb but maintaining the song's easy beauty, turning in one of the more exquisite-- and certainly least jam-bandy-- Dead covers you're likely to hear. CaUSE co-MOTION! knock out fun little piffle "Over U" in just short of two minutes, and Skygreen affiliates the Art Museums turn in the graceful but slight "Darling Are You Out of Your League Again". NODZZZ pull another catchy pile of whoa-ohs out of nowhere, although they drown "Old Clothes" in enough scuzz that the results are a tad drab. Ducktails' beauteous "Sun Out My Window" certainly sounds like its title, a rangy little meanderer that feels like sleeping through your alarm and realizing you didn't have much to do anyway. That lack of urgency, time unspooling rather than continuing apace, is certainly a mark against many of these tracks; the willful amateurishness of much of this stuff, both compositionally and sonically, can feel at times a bit unfinished and, at its worst, unconcerned. The best stuff tends to stick fairly close to verse-chorus-verse, it just plays with said structure with dirt-embedded fingernails; often the other songs feel a bit too formless, too casual. But most of Welcome Home/Diggin' the Universe puts the song out in front of the vibe, in much the same way Woods' recent At Echo Lake shed some of the wayfaring feel of Songs of Shame and just got down to it. Wobbly as the sonics may sometimes get, so long as Woodsist continues to keep the songs surefooted, the label's path seems clear.

Artist: Various Artists, Album: Welcome Home/Diggin' the Universe, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 7.0 Album review: "The ramshackle, the bleary, the vagabond-- they've all got a home at Woodsist. The tiny label, managed by Jeremy Earl of its flagship band, Woods, has carved out an undeniable aesthetic over the years, one its new cassette-and-LP-only compilation seems determined to shake out a bit. Welcome Home/Diggin' the Universe earns its slashmark. Its first half collects seven songs that hold close to the mid-morning Creedence Clearwater comedown mode the label's become known for; the second runs the gamut from run'n'gun pop-punk to prim Sarah Records-style twee. It is, somewhat by design, a fairly uneven collection, but it nevertheless showcases the two sides of Woodsist's vision. Woods set the tone of the comp's first half with their sunbleached ambler "I'm Not Gone", the set's highlight. It's got a wonderfully casual feel to it, each seam of its recording showing, and while it lacks some of that undercurrent of dread marking their best stuff, it's yet another win for the band. From there all the way Home, it's variations on a theme; Baltimore's Run DMT mostly leave the hypnagogy behind for a crackly, decaying, somewhat unsteady folk-rocker. White Fence slide a bumpy organ under the slack "The Love Between". San Fran's the Fresh & Onlys offer another tour of their garage with the blues-soaked lament "Heel. Toe.". From the Mantles' basher "Bad Movies" to Skygreen Leopards' Byrdsian cover of the Cure's "Catch", there's certainly some spread between the tunes, but they're tied together by their shambolic production and devil-may-care pacing. The set's got an easy feel to it, and when Real Estate's Alex Bleeker brings it to a close with his impressive country-tinged strummer "Gettin By", the label's low-impact, high-yield mission becomes quite self-apparent. Diggin' the Universe proves a far wilder and woollier affair than what precedes it. Moon Duo's "A Little Way Different" most certainly is; not only a departure for the comp, it's something of a switch for the band itself, a comparatively clear-eyed mod-spy groover reminiscent of Yo La Tengo at their most playful. It kicks off a second half that feels like a mixtape rather than a label comp, and it's a welcome change of pace. City Center tackle the Grateful Dead's eternal "Box of Rain", smothering it in reverb but maintaining the song's easy beauty, turning in one of the more exquisite-- and certainly least jam-bandy-- Dead covers you're likely to hear. CaUSE co-MOTION! knock out fun little piffle "Over U" in just short of two minutes, and Skygreen affiliates the Art Museums turn in the graceful but slight "Darling Are You Out of Your League Again". NODZZZ pull another catchy pile of whoa-ohs out of nowhere, although they drown "Old Clothes" in enough scuzz that the results are a tad drab. Ducktails' beauteous "Sun Out My Window" certainly sounds like its title, a rangy little meanderer that feels like sleeping through your alarm and realizing you didn't have much to do anyway. That lack of urgency, time unspooling rather than continuing apace, is certainly a mark against many of these tracks; the willful amateurishness of much of this stuff, both compositionally and sonically, can feel at times a bit unfinished and, at its worst, unconcerned. The best stuff tends to stick fairly close to verse-chorus-verse, it just plays with said structure with dirt-embedded fingernails; often the other songs feel a bit too formless, too casual. But most of Welcome Home/Diggin' the Universe puts the song out in front of the vibe, in much the same way Woods' recent At Echo Lake shed some of the wayfaring feel of Songs of Shame and just got down to it. Wobbly as the sonics may sometimes get, so long as Woodsist continues to keep the songs surefooted, the label's path seems clear."

Spiritualized

Amazing Grace

Experimental,Rock

Andy Beta

In the 1980s, Jason Pierce distilled Dylan's methadone strumming, Roky Erickson's psychedelic circular breathing and LaMonte Young's numbing minimalism, and sold the delirious result to us as Spacemen 3. In the 1990s, he continued his tasteful pilfering as the figurehead of Spiritualized-- on Pure Phase, he defined blissed-out noise-pop; on Ladies and Gentlemen, We Are Floating in Space, he lifted murky hedonism from Jim Dickinson and voodoo rites from Dr. John (who even guested on the record), building towers of song on a 50-piece orchestral foundation. At its peak stood a full gospel choir, bellowing heartache and redemption. This decade hasn't been quite as kind. 2001's Let It Come Down, the ridiculously anticipated follow-up to Ladies and Gentlemen which Pierce spent four years crafting, was at times musically and lyrically powerful, but rarely both at once. And Pierce's decision to double the size of the Spiritualized Philharmonic failed to up the impact of his by-then-familiar post-breakup moaning, religious conviction, and continuing struggles with drug addiction. Now, in 2003, it seems clear-- even to Pierce-- that a change is necessary, and with Amazing Grace, he heads back to that motherly womb of rock 'n' roll: the garage. Unfortunately, there are problems from the beginning: As Pierce's voice bleats through blaring feedback on the opening track, "This Little Life of Mine", there's an unfillable void in his recklessly delivered lyrics where the song's emotional core should lie. His reconstituted band blazes, led by the bonfire-leads of guitarist Doggen (on loan from Brain Donor), but they also lurch in an almost sluggish manner that, push and pull as they might, never actually gets the lead out. There are highlights: "She Kissed Me (It Felt Like a Hit)" (it owes to the similarly titled Spector-produced Crystals song in name only) is cut from the same patch of denim and black leather as "This Little Life of Mine", but more convincingly evokes the sneering garage aesthetic of The Troggs and early Kinks; "Cheapster", burning through a variation on "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream", brandishes switchblade-sharp chops; and "Never Goin' Back" proves Spiritualized can nail The Stooges shtick as well as any of the usurping mainstream garage rockers-- but no better. Here, he replicates the bottled, melting scowl of Iggy circa the primordial Funhouse, but his imitation, like the kids he schools, is stripped of the necessary blood/cum combo needed to carry the shot through to the heart. Of course, rock was never what Pierce did best: it's the strung-out ballads and slow, unfurling of studio sounds that's always carried his wasted messages to beatific, almost narcotic effect-- as such, "Hold On" and "Lord Let It Rain on Me" serve as the linchpins of this record. For its entire opening flourish, the former tames itself into a soft strum as Pierce implores you to "hold on to those you hold dear." It's yet another demonstration of his ability to transcend limp Hallmark maxims through sheer will and conviction: he emotes no irony or bitterness, transforming simple truisms and cliches into heartbreaking revelations, much like Wayne Coyne observing that "the sun don't go down" in "Do You Realize??" And despite that the new has worn off this technique somewhat in the 20+ years Pierce has relied on it, in this moment it proves as effective as ever. Amazing Grace also manages some mildly interesting jazz flourishes. "Rated X" does about a minute's worth of Miles Davis' "He Loved Him Madly" before Pierce's weightless astronaut murmuring sends the song into the beckoning orchestral stratosphere, and "The Power and the Glory" features the record's most forward-looking moment, as it builds to a massive, cacophonous swell, aided by a horn section that puts British improv legends Kenny Wheeler and Evan Parker in front of their largest audience yet. After that intriguing instrumental fury, however, Pierce marches his poor, abused gospel choir back into place with the solemn tom thuds and plaintive guitar strum of "Lord Let It Rain on Me." Pieced together from at least four other Spiritualized songs, Pierce doles out more of his redemptive raindrops while "looking down the barrel of a gun," before finally unleashing another predictably bombastic endorphin downpour. Here, as with tracks like the banal "The Ballad of Richie Lee" and the repetitive, melodramatic closing lullaby "Lay It Down Easy", Pierce finally wears out his welcome, having utterly exhausted the possibilities of what can be accomplished within the limited constraints he's set for himself. Pierce's ability to convey pain-- much like the recovering addict's ability to feel pleasure-- is all but lost among clusters of burnt-out receptors. Even in its most inspired moments, Amazing Grace lacks the fiery intensity of any of Pierce's previous outings (including Let It Come Down). Now, fervently praying to channel the uplift of true gospel and the Gnostic moments of the Nuggets era, J Spacemen is left, for the first time, sobbing at the pearly gates.

Artist: Spiritualized, Album: Amazing Grace, Genre: Experimental,Rock, Score (1-10): 6.2 Album review: "In the 1980s, Jason Pierce distilled Dylan's methadone strumming, Roky Erickson's psychedelic circular breathing and LaMonte Young's numbing minimalism, and sold the delirious result to us as Spacemen 3. In the 1990s, he continued his tasteful pilfering as the figurehead of Spiritualized-- on Pure Phase, he defined blissed-out noise-pop; on Ladies and Gentlemen, We Are Floating in Space, he lifted murky hedonism from Jim Dickinson and voodoo rites from Dr. John (who even guested on the record), building towers of song on a 50-piece orchestral foundation. At its peak stood a full gospel choir, bellowing heartache and redemption. This decade hasn't been quite as kind. 2001's Let It Come Down, the ridiculously anticipated follow-up to Ladies and Gentlemen which Pierce spent four years crafting, was at times musically and lyrically powerful, but rarely both at once. And Pierce's decision to double the size of the Spiritualized Philharmonic failed to up the impact of his by-then-familiar post-breakup moaning, religious conviction, and continuing struggles with drug addiction. Now, in 2003, it seems clear-- even to Pierce-- that a change is necessary, and with Amazing Grace, he heads back to that motherly womb of rock 'n' roll: the garage. Unfortunately, there are problems from the beginning: As Pierce's voice bleats through blaring feedback on the opening track, "This Little Life of Mine", there's an unfillable void in his recklessly delivered lyrics where the song's emotional core should lie. His reconstituted band blazes, led by the bonfire-leads of guitarist Doggen (on loan from Brain Donor), but they also lurch in an almost sluggish manner that, push and pull as they might, never actually gets the lead out. There are highlights: "She Kissed Me (It Felt Like a Hit)" (it owes to the similarly titled Spector-produced Crystals song in name only) is cut from the same patch of denim and black leather as "This Little Life of Mine", but more convincingly evokes the sneering garage aesthetic of The Troggs and early Kinks; "Cheapster", burning through a variation on "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream", brandishes switchblade-sharp chops; and "Never Goin' Back" proves Spiritualized can nail The Stooges shtick as well as any of the usurping mainstream garage rockers-- but no better. Here, he replicates the bottled, melting scowl of Iggy circa the primordial Funhouse, but his imitation, like the kids he schools, is stripped of the necessary blood/cum combo needed to carry the shot through to the heart. Of course, rock was never what Pierce did best: it's the strung-out ballads and slow, unfurling of studio sounds that's always carried his wasted messages to beatific, almost narcotic effect-- as such, "Hold On" and "Lord Let It Rain on Me" serve as the linchpins of this record. For its entire opening flourish, the former tames itself into a soft strum as Pierce implores you to "hold on to those you hold dear." It's yet another demonstration of his ability to transcend limp Hallmark maxims through sheer will and conviction: he emotes no irony or bitterness, transforming simple truisms and cliches into heartbreaking revelations, much like Wayne Coyne observing that "the sun don't go down" in "Do You Realize??" And despite that the new has worn off this technique somewhat in the 20+ years Pierce has relied on it, in this moment it proves as effective as ever. Amazing Grace also manages some mildly interesting jazz flourishes. "Rated X" does about a minute's worth of Miles Davis' "He Loved Him Madly" before Pierce's weightless astronaut murmuring sends the song into the beckoning orchestral stratosphere, and "The Power and the Glory" features the record's most forward-looking moment, as it builds to a massive, cacophonous swell, aided by a horn section that puts British improv legends Kenny Wheeler and Evan Parker in front of their largest audience yet. After that intriguing instrumental fury, however, Pierce marches his poor, abused gospel choir back into place with the solemn tom thuds and plaintive guitar strum of "Lord Let It Rain on Me." Pieced together from at least four other Spiritualized songs, Pierce doles out more of his redemptive raindrops while "looking down the barrel of a gun," before finally unleashing another predictably bombastic endorphin downpour. Here, as with tracks like the banal "The Ballad of Richie Lee" and the repetitive, melodramatic closing lullaby "Lay It Down Easy", Pierce finally wears out his welcome, having utterly exhausted the possibilities of what can be accomplished within the limited constraints he's set for himself. Pierce's ability to convey pain-- much like the recovering addict's ability to feel pleasure-- is all but lost among clusters of burnt-out receptors. Even in its most inspired moments, Amazing Grace lacks the fiery intensity of any of Pierce's previous outings (including Let It Come Down). Now, fervently praying to channel the uplift of true gospel and the Gnostic moments of the Nuggets era, J Spacemen is left, for the first time, sobbing at the pearly gates."

Jeff Buckley

Live a L'Olympia

Rock

Christopher F. Schiel

Many religions prescribe time for meditation. It's a concept I'm sort of attracted to. I've even attempted some of the traditional methods, but I always get distracted: my foot falls asleep, my ass starts hurting from being sat on all weird, or I have intense, apocalyptic visions like the ones in Ken Russell's Altered States. (Incidentally, being transformed into a cro-magnon and busting into a zoo in the dead of night to consume live bovine is highly overrated.) I'm not really sure why I attempt to put myself through such torture, though, when I know that music can provide the obliteration of surroundings I seek. Jeff Buckley is always there for me. The first ten tracks from Buckley's second officially released live album, Live a L'Olympia, are culled from two shows that took place on July 6th and 7th in 1995, almost a year after the release of Grace. The recordings are sourced from an analog audio cassette that was found among Buckley's possessions after his death. For a major label concert release, there's a high amount of noise present, but this is significantly outweighed by the quality of the performances documented. The liner notes call these shows "high points of [Buckley's] performing career," a fact that's quite apparent in the material, which is by and large pretty stunning stuff. Such is the case with the two songs that open the album, "Lover You Should've Come Over" and "Dream Brother." Buckley's band are a focused and tight bunch who can only complement Buckley's ecstatic falsettos. Both tracks exceed seven minutes in length, yet there's not a second lacking in energy. Buckley begins the verse of "Dream Brother" with a barely audible, steadily repeating guitar note that builds to a reverbed crash as he hammers the pickup. The arrangement isn't very distant from the performance on last year's Mystery White Boy, but this recording seems somehow more poignant. Then there's "Eternal Life," and the cover of the MC5 classic, "Kick Out the Jams," while expose Buckley's subtle death metal leanings, allowing them to gawkily escape into the open. I doubt the fans are looking for more of that after the version of the former song on Mystery White Boy. Then again, I've always preferred the more minimal Live at Sin-E version of the song to Grace's studio version. Which leads me to the only problematic flaw of L'Olympia: at times, the live energy defies capture on tape, and at others, it actually interrupts the performances. Buckley stops in the middle of both "Je N'en Connais pas la Fin" and "Hallelujah." On the latter, he even asks the audience if they want him to finish the song. When heard, the question seems to be an angry retort to an impolite audience, but according to a statement made by Buckley's mom in the liner notes, Jeff was reveling in the support of his audience-- something that was relatively new to him at the time of this recording. The audience joins in to sing "Hallelujah." Buckley proclaims, "This is so rock and roll," and proceeds to sing harmony with his active audience. But while this would have been an astounding experience in person, the recording doesn't capture much of the audience, and some of Buckley's complementary vocal lines seem awkward. Later, the disc concludes with a soundboard recording of "What Will You Sa," recorded at 1995's Festival of Sacred Music, which was held in a small village in western France. Here, Azerbaijani singer Alim Qazimov adds vocals and plays tabla, with Buckley occasionally mimicking Qazimov's middle-eastern vocal turns, making it a uniquely engaging track in Buckley's live oeuvre. Live a L'Olympia hasn't yet been issued domestically, and it isn't listed on Columbia's American release schedule. For Buckley fans, I personally consider "What Will You Say" to be worth the hassle of an international order. And if you care to sing along, Jeff will harmonize. You might just forget where you are.

Artist: Jeff Buckley, Album: Live a L'Olympia, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 8.3 Album review: "Many religions prescribe time for meditation. It's a concept I'm sort of attracted to. I've even attempted some of the traditional methods, but I always get distracted: my foot falls asleep, my ass starts hurting from being sat on all weird, or I have intense, apocalyptic visions like the ones in Ken Russell's Altered States. (Incidentally, being transformed into a cro-magnon and busting into a zoo in the dead of night to consume live bovine is highly overrated.) I'm not really sure why I attempt to put myself through such torture, though, when I know that music can provide the obliteration of surroundings I seek. Jeff Buckley is always there for me. The first ten tracks from Buckley's second officially released live album, Live a L'Olympia, are culled from two shows that took place on July 6th and 7th in 1995, almost a year after the release of Grace. The recordings are sourced from an analog audio cassette that was found among Buckley's possessions after his death. For a major label concert release, there's a high amount of noise present, but this is significantly outweighed by the quality of the performances documented. The liner notes call these shows "high points of [Buckley's] performing career," a fact that's quite apparent in the material, which is by and large pretty stunning stuff. Such is the case with the two songs that open the album, "Lover You Should've Come Over" and "Dream Brother." Buckley's band are a focused and tight bunch who can only complement Buckley's ecstatic falsettos. Both tracks exceed seven minutes in length, yet there's not a second lacking in energy. Buckley begins the verse of "Dream Brother" with a barely audible, steadily repeating guitar note that builds to a reverbed crash as he hammers the pickup. The arrangement isn't very distant from the performance on last year's Mystery White Boy, but this recording seems somehow more poignant. Then there's "Eternal Life," and the cover of the MC5 classic, "Kick Out the Jams," while expose Buckley's subtle death metal leanings, allowing them to gawkily escape into the open. I doubt the fans are looking for more of that after the version of the former song on Mystery White Boy. Then again, I've always preferred the more minimal Live at Sin-E version of the song to Grace's studio version. Which leads me to the only problematic flaw of L'Olympia: at times, the live energy defies capture on tape, and at others, it actually interrupts the performances. Buckley stops in the middle of both "Je N'en Connais pas la Fin" and "Hallelujah." On the latter, he even asks the audience if they want him to finish the song. When heard, the question seems to be an angry retort to an impolite audience, but according to a statement made by Buckley's mom in the liner notes, Jeff was reveling in the support of his audience-- something that was relatively new to him at the time of this recording. The audience joins in to sing "Hallelujah." Buckley proclaims, "This is so rock and roll," and proceeds to sing harmony with his active audience. But while this would have been an astounding experience in person, the recording doesn't capture much of the audience, and some of Buckley's complementary vocal lines seem awkward. Later, the disc concludes with a soundboard recording of "What Will You Sa," recorded at 1995's Festival of Sacred Music, which was held in a small village in western France. Here, Azerbaijani singer Alim Qazimov adds vocals and plays tabla, with Buckley occasionally mimicking Qazimov's middle-eastern vocal turns, making it a uniquely engaging track in Buckley's live oeuvre. Live a L'Olympia hasn't yet been issued domestically, and it isn't listed on Columbia's American release schedule. For Buckley fans, I personally consider "What Will You Say" to be worth the hassle of an international order. And if you care to sing along, Jeff will harmonize. You might just forget where you are."

Mark Barrott

Sketches From An Island 3

Electronic

Andy Beta

In 2009, a new dance imprint located in Uruguay and called International Feel began issuing a string of mysterious, uncredited singles. Soon followed a parade of artists with names like Rocha, Efeel, the Sonic Aesthetic, Bepu N’Gali, Parada 88, Boys From Patagonia, and Young Gentlemen’s Adventure Society, each treading the squishy ground between downtempo and nu-disco, favoring the sorts of sounds that Europeans on holiday would recognize as "Balearic." A few years on, the imprint up and relocated to the island of Ibiza and soon after, most of these works were revealed to be the work of labelhead Mark Barrott, who went with his own name for last year’s breezy Sketches From An Island, which compiled two earlier EPs. Recently, Barrott announced the release of the third installment of his Sketches From An Island series via the Drip subscription service, explaining the digital fan club thus: "For me, my ‘moments of joy’ come from making music in a studio and then attempting to reach out with that music and communicate with like minded souls to form a connection." The four-song EP, which is now getting a physical release via International Feel, continues along the same trajectory as the previous album, to the point where the library funk of opener "Right 4 Me" brings to mind SFAI’s opener "Baby Come Home", right down to the melody being conveyed via a flute plug-in. Charming as the ditty is, it feels like a retread. Titlewise, "The Mysterious Island of Dr. Nimm" scans as a sequel to the prior album track "Dr Nimm's Garden of Intrigue & Delight". But while the latter is taken at a leisurely pace, this EP track features darker bass and layers of clattering percussion, bamboo flutes, chimes, and bird calls, reminiscent of jungle foliage. The other two tracks favor the kind of polyrhythmic pulses that bring to mind Music for 18 Musicians as rendered at a luau, gentle as a sea breeze, or on closer "Der Stern, Der Nie Vergeht", Cluster had they lived in Ibiza rather than in rural Germany. While the EP is pleasant enough, it doesn’t stake out much in the way of new terrain. If anything, it’s a slight step back after Barrott released a two-track "Bush Society" single earlier this spring. Although most of its components are light and buoyant, "Saviours or Savages?" carefully builds tension, its percolating rhythms never quite releasing. The 10-minute "Bush Society" is the most ambitious and successful of Barrott’s tracks to date. Like many of his songs, it begins with ambient bird calls and a distant thunderstorm, then adds rattles and hand percussion. It suggests the brightness of a Brazilian track (think Airto) but the bass synth growls that lurk beneath the percussion give it a sinister edge. Between a vocal sample evocative of the Mbuti Pygmy chants from the Ituri Rainforest and the menacing acid underpinnings, "Bush Society" sounds light and dark at once. Its 10 minutes bring to mind island life itself, in that time feels both suspended and passing far too fast.

Artist: Mark Barrott, Album: Sketches From An Island 3, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 6.9 Album review: "In 2009, a new dance imprint located in Uruguay and called International Feel began issuing a string of mysterious, uncredited singles. Soon followed a parade of artists with names like Rocha, Efeel, the Sonic Aesthetic, Bepu N’Gali, Parada 88, Boys From Patagonia, and Young Gentlemen’s Adventure Society, each treading the squishy ground between downtempo and nu-disco, favoring the sorts of sounds that Europeans on holiday would recognize as "Balearic." A few years on, the imprint up and relocated to the island of Ibiza and soon after, most of these works were revealed to be the work of labelhead Mark Barrott, who went with his own name for last year’s breezy Sketches From An Island, which compiled two earlier EPs. Recently, Barrott announced the release of the third installment of his Sketches From An Island series via the Drip subscription service, explaining the digital fan club thus: "For me, my ‘moments of joy’ come from making music in a studio and then attempting to reach out with that music and communicate with like minded souls to form a connection." The four-song EP, which is now getting a physical release via International Feel, continues along the same trajectory as the previous album, to the point where the library funk of opener "Right 4 Me" brings to mind SFAI’s opener "Baby Come Home", right down to the melody being conveyed via a flute plug-in. Charming as the ditty is, it feels like a retread. Titlewise, "The Mysterious Island of Dr. Nimm" scans as a sequel to the prior album track "Dr Nimm's Garden of Intrigue & Delight". But while the latter is taken at a leisurely pace, this EP track features darker bass and layers of clattering percussion, bamboo flutes, chimes, and bird calls, reminiscent of jungle foliage. The other two tracks favor the kind of polyrhythmic pulses that bring to mind Music for 18 Musicians as rendered at a luau, gentle as a sea breeze, or on closer "Der Stern, Der Nie Vergeht", Cluster had they lived in Ibiza rather than in rural Germany. While the EP is pleasant enough, it doesn’t stake out much in the way of new terrain. If anything, it’s a slight step back after Barrott released a two-track "Bush Society" single earlier this spring. Although most of its components are light and buoyant, "Saviours or Savages?" carefully builds tension, its percolating rhythms never quite releasing. The 10-minute "Bush Society" is the most ambitious and successful of Barrott’s tracks to date. Like many of his songs, it begins with ambient bird calls and a distant thunderstorm, then adds rattles and hand percussion. It suggests the brightness of a Brazilian track (think Airto) but the bass synth growls that lurk beneath the percussion give it a sinister edge. Between a vocal sample evocative of the Mbuti Pygmy chants from the Ituri Rainforest and the menacing acid underpinnings, "Bush Society" sounds light and dark at once. Its 10 minutes bring to mind island life itself, in that time feels both suspended and passing far too fast."

S. Carey

Range of Light

Rock

Jeremy D. Larson

S. Carey recently posted a series of pictures to his Instagram that correspond to each of the songs on his new album, Range of Light, but even without the visual aid you can practically see these images while listening*.* Each song possesses a filtered approximation of natural beauty, and the outdoor environment is a renewable resource for Carey’s songwriting: summer lakes in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, nights in Marfa, Tex., and the deserts of Arizona and California. Range of Light is the first album Carey's recorded in Bon Iver bandmate Justin Vernon's April Base studio in Fall Creek, Wis.; he cobbled together his 2010 debut All We Grow while on tour with Bon Iver and built 2012's electro-folk Hoyas EP on mostly just a laptop. The warmth, reverb, and dusty textures here form something much larger than S. Carey has ever done before, but his real talent lies in making these songs seem tiny set against the world around him. Even though Carey’s canvas is large, Range of Light is all detail—including his voice, which remains whisper-quiet and occasionally climbs to a hushed tenor akin to Sufjan Stevens. His voice is more up front than before, which gives these songs more shape as he interacts with the ceaselessly beautiful soundscapes, breaking up the serenity with songcraft. The syncopated “Crown the Pines” uses Justin Vernon’s falsetto as another background texture, but the busyness of the whole thing serves as a perfect jolt for the record. A trained percussionist in both jazz and classical music, Carey’s arrangements add a sense of rustic whimsy to Range of Light—there's tapping on glass bottles, spoons on thighs, and what sounds like someone walking over gravel. Carey achieves his greatest successes when working in a more transportative mode, though: the stately “Alpenglow” builds to the end like a thawing post-rock opus, and closing track “Neverending Fountain” provides a cathartic ending. It's easy for these songs to stir the listener, and even easier for them to to whisk the listener away to a secluded piece of earth. Paradoxically, Range of Light can sound a little too on-the-nose about embodying the majesty of nature and its meditative properties; there are greyscale cuts that possess cautious wonder and tumble-dry jazz tones, like Talk Talk left out in the cold for too long. Carey's destinations and recollections can retreat to a sleepy, melancholy safe zone. Regardless, Range Of Light is the first album that defines Carey apart from his bandmates and contemporaries, as his developed, earnest, Midwestern glow bursts through the album's cracks.

Artist: S. Carey, Album: Range of Light, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.3 Album review: "S. Carey recently posted a series of pictures to his Instagram that correspond to each of the songs on his new album, Range of Light, but even without the visual aid you can practically see these images while listening*.* Each song possesses a filtered approximation of natural beauty, and the outdoor environment is a renewable resource for Carey’s songwriting: summer lakes in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, nights in Marfa, Tex., and the deserts of Arizona and California. Range of Light is the first album Carey's recorded in Bon Iver bandmate Justin Vernon's April Base studio in Fall Creek, Wis.; he cobbled together his 2010 debut All We Grow while on tour with Bon Iver and built 2012's electro-folk Hoyas EP on mostly just a laptop. The warmth, reverb, and dusty textures here form something much larger than S. Carey has ever done before, but his real talent lies in making these songs seem tiny set against the world around him. Even though Carey’s canvas is large, Range of Light is all detail—including his voice, which remains whisper-quiet and occasionally climbs to a hushed tenor akin to Sufjan Stevens. His voice is more up front than before, which gives these songs more shape as he interacts with the ceaselessly beautiful soundscapes, breaking up the serenity with songcraft. The syncopated “Crown the Pines” uses Justin Vernon’s falsetto as another background texture, but the busyness of the whole thing serves as a perfect jolt for the record. A trained percussionist in both jazz and classical music, Carey’s arrangements add a sense of rustic whimsy to Range of Light—there's tapping on glass bottles, spoons on thighs, and what sounds like someone walking over gravel. Carey achieves his greatest successes when working in a more transportative mode, though: the stately “Alpenglow” builds to the end like a thawing post-rock opus, and closing track “Neverending Fountain” provides a cathartic ending. It's easy for these songs to stir the listener, and even easier for them to to whisk the listener away to a secluded piece of earth. Paradoxically, Range of Light can sound a little too on-the-nose about embodying the majesty of nature and its meditative properties; there are greyscale cuts that possess cautious wonder and tumble-dry jazz tones, like Talk Talk left out in the cold for too long. Carey's destinations and recollections can retreat to a sleepy, melancholy safe zone. Regardless, Range Of Light is the first album that defines Carey apart from his bandmates and contemporaries, as his developed, earnest, Midwestern glow bursts through the album's cracks."

The Drones

Havilah

Rock

Joe Colly

For one reason or another, Australia's the Drones have yet to make much of a splash outside of their home continent. The band has released consistently strong albums since its 2000 inception and garnered high praise from their countrymen-- up against Aussie faves Wolfmother and the Go-Betweens, they won the inaugural Australian Music Prize for their 2005 record Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By-- but still are mostly unknown to European and American listeners. It's hard to say precisely what accounts for this disconnect, but I propose a name change might be in order: there's nothing drone-y about what these guys do. Despite what their moniker suggests, the Drones are a high-velocity garage-blues act-- something like Gun Club with punk swapped out for capital-H hard rock. They're traditional in the way Black Lips are-- straightforward instrumentation, a healthy nod to the past-- but manage to dodge the pitfalls of revisionism with an unusual mixture of brute force, bleak lyrical content, and singer Gareth Liddiard's distinctive caterwaul. (Dude can impressively shift from a bark to a shriek to a roar in one solitary breath.) It's an intense concoction that casual indie fans will probably find abrasive, but a degree of unfriendliness seems to be part of the group's M.O. Previous records emphasized the Drones' fierceness with mostly aggressive tracks, and while Havilah (their fifth) trades some of that for slower, dirge-like pieces, they start the album with a bang... literally. Opener "Nail It Down" rumbles for a few minutes before launching a violent guitar-and-drum assault. That energy carries over to "The Minotaur", a song that's equally wicked sounding but contains moments of well-placed melody to keep it from becoming overbearing. Oddly catchy, these songs aren't totally dissimilar from the harder-edged moments of bands such as Queens of the Stone Age, but with the Drones' oft-stated distaste for the human race and lyrics like "People are a waste of food/ They're only ever happy when they're burying their friends" (from "Oh My"), it's hard to imagine them getting played on KROQ anytime soon. Havilah broadens the Drones' sonic palette and continues to carve out a sound that is uniquely theirs, and in that sense it's an accomplishment, but wrestling with the record's dark subject matter makes it a difficult listen. This is especially the case on unhurried, acoustic tracks like "I Am the Supercargo" where the vocals sit upfront in the mix and there's no captivating rock melody to latch onto. There's nothing to feel chipper about "The Drifting Housewife", for instance, where Liddiard contemplates a failed marriage over a twang-y Neil Young-inspired ballad. "I was more worried about taxes when my lovely red-eyed bride became a hairsplitting believer that I should be vilified," he sings. Nope, that doesn't sound like a healthy relationship. The record's back-end is where most of its slower material resides-- the very dark stretch that begins with "Cold and Sober" and closes with "Penumbra" will be the most trying for listeners. These tracks (and the lingering, amber-hued "Luck in the Odd Numbers" between them) show the group at their most frustrated and fatigued. Lyrically, at least, it's pretty brutal stuff. Closer "Your Acting's Like the End of the World" finally provides some light at the end of the tunnel, where Liddiard sings, "All this doom and gloom has got to me/ I can't take another punch", and we're with him there, but surely some won't make it to that point. I'd suggest trying to stick it out, though. Enduring this album is a bit like making it through a powerful-but-disturbing film. It might make you uncomfortable and you'll probably never watch it again, but you're at least glad you saw it.

Artist: The Drones, Album: Havilah, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "For one reason or another, Australia's the Drones have yet to make much of a splash outside of their home continent. The band has released consistently strong albums since its 2000 inception and garnered high praise from their countrymen-- up against Aussie faves Wolfmother and the Go-Betweens, they won the inaugural Australian Music Prize for their 2005 record Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By-- but still are mostly unknown to European and American listeners. It's hard to say precisely what accounts for this disconnect, but I propose a name change might be in order: there's nothing drone-y about what these guys do. Despite what their moniker suggests, the Drones are a high-velocity garage-blues act-- something like Gun Club with punk swapped out for capital-H hard rock. They're traditional in the way Black Lips are-- straightforward instrumentation, a healthy nod to the past-- but manage to dodge the pitfalls of revisionism with an unusual mixture of brute force, bleak lyrical content, and singer Gareth Liddiard's distinctive caterwaul. (Dude can impressively shift from a bark to a shriek to a roar in one solitary breath.) It's an intense concoction that casual indie fans will probably find abrasive, but a degree of unfriendliness seems to be part of the group's M.O. Previous records emphasized the Drones' fierceness with mostly aggressive tracks, and while Havilah (their fifth) trades some of that for slower, dirge-like pieces, they start the album with a bang... literally. Opener "Nail It Down" rumbles for a few minutes before launching a violent guitar-and-drum assault. That energy carries over to "The Minotaur", a song that's equally wicked sounding but contains moments of well-placed melody to keep it from becoming overbearing. Oddly catchy, these songs aren't totally dissimilar from the harder-edged moments of bands such as Queens of the Stone Age, but with the Drones' oft-stated distaste for the human race and lyrics like "People are a waste of food/ They're only ever happy when they're burying their friends" (from "Oh My"), it's hard to imagine them getting played on KROQ anytime soon. Havilah broadens the Drones' sonic palette and continues to carve out a sound that is uniquely theirs, and in that sense it's an accomplishment, but wrestling with the record's dark subject matter makes it a difficult listen. This is especially the case on unhurried, acoustic tracks like "I Am the Supercargo" where the vocals sit upfront in the mix and there's no captivating rock melody to latch onto. There's nothing to feel chipper about "The Drifting Housewife", for instance, where Liddiard contemplates a failed marriage over a twang-y Neil Young-inspired ballad. "I was more worried about taxes when my lovely red-eyed bride became a hairsplitting believer that I should be vilified," he sings. Nope, that doesn't sound like a healthy relationship. The record's back-end is where most of its slower material resides-- the very dark stretch that begins with "Cold and Sober" and closes with "Penumbra" will be the most trying for listeners. These tracks (and the lingering, amber-hued "Luck in the Odd Numbers" between them) show the group at their most frustrated and fatigued. Lyrically, at least, it's pretty brutal stuff. Closer "Your Acting's Like the End of the World" finally provides some light at the end of the tunnel, where Liddiard sings, "All this doom and gloom has got to me/ I can't take another punch", and we're with him there, but surely some won't make it to that point. I'd suggest trying to stick it out, though. Enduring this album is a bit like making it through a powerful-but-disturbing film. It might make you uncomfortable and you'll probably never watch it again, but you're at least glad you saw it."

Diamond Rugs

Diamond Rugs

Ian Cohen

If you're a fan of Deer Tick, you certainly don't need a lot of convincing to check out Diamond Rugs, but if you're amongst those of us who view the unapologetically likkered-up Providence band to be intolerable but redeemable, this might spark your curiosity as well. After all, collaboration is the closest we'll probably get to intervention for a group who has no incentive to alter its behavior: Deer Tick's star has risen in a manner directly proportional to their willingness to get as ornery about abusing alcohol and women as possible, and their most mean-spirited record to date (2011's Divine Providence) ended up getting them more "spirit of rock'n'roll" praise than ever. So while prime Deer Tick songwriters John McCauley and Robbie Crowell ultimately play a heavy role here, there are guest spots from better bands which make a ton of sense (Ian St. Pé of Black Lips), a good deal of sense (Hardy Morris of Dead Confederate), and almost none at all (Steve Berlin of Los Lobos, Bryan Dufresne of Six Finger Satellite). But in the end, Diamond Rugs mostly answers the question of "when is a Deer Tick album not a Deer Tick album?" tracing back to why those of us can find McCauley to be intolerable but redeemable: Some of the best songs on Diamond Rugs are his, most of the worst songs too, and between them, pretty much all of the memorable ones. If it seems like the conversation is skewed toward one band's influence, let me just point out that two of the first four songs go by "Gimme a Beer" and "Call Girl Blues". So yes, Deer Tick's input is the greatest not just in terms of personnel, but in attitude as well. In name alone, that should give you an indication of what to expect, but digging into the substance sets the rules of engagement. "Gimme a Beer" is evidence enough of things McCauley has a knack for-- shredded vocals, a ragged Westerberg melody, and a lack of decorum that can be charming.  And hey, the lyrics about all manner of wish fulfillment are funny enough to excuse the Geto Boys reference that serves as the money shot. It's actually a Geto Boys song that most people first heard in Office Space, which leads me to what's problematic about the song. As with people whose conversations consist almost entirely of quotes from movies or TV, McCauley is so reliant on blue-collar rock tropes that he's almost incapable of expressing anything real here. So maybe the chorus of "Who cares?/ Gimme a beer" is supposed to be some sort of fatalistic "fuck it," yet it feels less like an extension of the narrator's emptiness and more like a tic of McCauley's songwriting, taking the path of least resistance. Likewise, the title of "Call Girl Blues" suggests some kind of empathy or at least insight to its subject, but judging from lines like "Now where did she come from?/ Why should you care?/ Man, you oughta see her when she lets down her hair," you figure McCauley just relished the opportunity to write a song about a prostitute. At the very least, "Call Girl Blues" is willing to acknowledge a woman as a corporeal being and in a weird way, it's actually the most flattering McCauley gets about females, if only because they're seen as more admirable than the chumps who fall in love with them ("She ain't yours/ You can't hold her," McCauley hectors on the chorus). Women don't break up with the guys in these songs, they hightail it out of town, they find comfort in the arms of another man, like, immediately. But above all else, they always leave and you always end up taking their side; how could you not when McCauley exacts revenge on "Tell Me Why" by snarling "I got sweeter things in my mouth/ I swallow them and then I shit them out"? In theory, Diamond Rugs should prove extremely comforting, a celebration of rawk and male friendship in the face of vaguely rendered but all-consuming sexual denial. And yet, there's no catharsis or viscera; writing about down-low women serves as some sort of Mad Lib-ish Oblique Strategy for Diamond Rugs or lyrical gambit similar to Thom Yorke throwing pieces of paper in a hat. It's not so much phony as it is perfunctory, but in this vein of songwriting, both of those terms essentially mean the same thing. Still Diamond Rugs is occasionally enjoyable if you have no investment in what it "means" either for rock as a whole or any of its participants. If you somehow used alt-country as an entryway to indie rock, Diamond Rugs might be up your alley: "Hightail" likeably kicks up dust bounding down the same roads traveled by Los Lobos, "Country Mile" actually turns out to be dense swamp rock, and, altogether, it finds a nice textural common ground between the more far-flung acts involved here. In terms of the Hank Williams lineage, Diamond Rugs mostly sticks to Bocephus' party-preparedness and the III's lowest-common-denominator appeals to "authenticity," so its nice they honor the patriarch by dropping in "Totally Lonely", which contrasts producer Justin Collins' baritone warble with an electronic drone that almost passes for musique concrète. But the keg's kicked long before Diamond Rugs comes to a close, a point made abundantly clear by the final one-two of "Hungover and Horny" and "Christmas in a Chinese Restaurant". Credit where it's due-- that's some serious truth in advertising right there. That Diamond Rugs are far longer on camaraderie than inspiration is hardly unique to them; collaborations ranging from Traveling Wilburys to Watch the Throne invariably deal with the difficulty of juggling how much they want to express personally outside of "wow, this was sure fun for us." I don't doubt for a second that Diamond Rugs was a blast-- there are too many goofy horn charts and "guitar" exhortations to think otherwise-- and surely some of these songs got knocked out in the time it for the assistant engineer to make a beer run. But most of Diamond Rugs is like that woman in "Call Girl Blues"-- it's not yours, so you can't hold it.

Artist: Diamond Rugs, Album: Diamond Rugs, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 5.1 Album review: "If you're a fan of Deer Tick, you certainly don't need a lot of convincing to check out Diamond Rugs, but if you're amongst those of us who view the unapologetically likkered-up Providence band to be intolerable but redeemable, this might spark your curiosity as well. After all, collaboration is the closest we'll probably get to intervention for a group who has no incentive to alter its behavior: Deer Tick's star has risen in a manner directly proportional to their willingness to get as ornery about abusing alcohol and women as possible, and their most mean-spirited record to date (2011's Divine Providence) ended up getting them more "spirit of rock'n'roll" praise than ever. So while prime Deer Tick songwriters John McCauley and Robbie Crowell ultimately play a heavy role here, there are guest spots from better bands which make a ton of sense (Ian St. Pé of Black Lips), a good deal of sense (Hardy Morris of Dead Confederate), and almost none at all (Steve Berlin of Los Lobos, Bryan Dufresne of Six Finger Satellite). But in the end, Diamond Rugs mostly answers the question of "when is a Deer Tick album not a Deer Tick album?" tracing back to why those of us can find McCauley to be intolerable but redeemable: Some of the best songs on Diamond Rugs are his, most of the worst songs too, and between them, pretty much all of the memorable ones. If it seems like the conversation is skewed toward one band's influence, let me just point out that two of the first four songs go by "Gimme a Beer" and "Call Girl Blues". So yes, Deer Tick's input is the greatest not just in terms of personnel, but in attitude as well. In name alone, that should give you an indication of what to expect, but digging into the substance sets the rules of engagement. "Gimme a Beer" is evidence enough of things McCauley has a knack for-- shredded vocals, a ragged Westerberg melody, and a lack of decorum that can be charming.  And hey, the lyrics about all manner of wish fulfillment are funny enough to excuse the Geto Boys reference that serves as the money shot. It's actually a Geto Boys song that most people first heard in Office Space, which leads me to what's problematic about the song. As with people whose conversations consist almost entirely of quotes from movies or TV, McCauley is so reliant on blue-collar rock tropes that he's almost incapable of expressing anything real here. So maybe the chorus of "Who cares?/ Gimme a beer" is supposed to be some sort of fatalistic "fuck it," yet it feels less like an extension of the narrator's emptiness and more like a tic of McCauley's songwriting, taking the path of least resistance. Likewise, the title of "Call Girl Blues" suggests some kind of empathy or at least insight to its subject, but judging from lines like "Now where did she come from?/ Why should you care?/ Man, you oughta see her when she lets down her hair," you figure McCauley just relished the opportunity to write a song about a prostitute. At the very least, "Call Girl Blues" is willing to acknowledge a woman as a corporeal being and in a weird way, it's actually the most flattering McCauley gets about females, if only because they're seen as more admirable than the chumps who fall in love with them ("She ain't yours/ You can't hold her," McCauley hectors on the chorus). Women don't break up with the guys in these songs, they hightail it out of town, they find comfort in the arms of another man, like, immediately. But above all else, they always leave and you always end up taking their side; how could you not when McCauley exacts revenge on "Tell Me Why" by snarling "I got sweeter things in my mouth/ I swallow them and then I shit them out"? In theory, Diamond Rugs should prove extremely comforting, a celebration of rawk and male friendship in the face of vaguely rendered but all-consuming sexual denial. And yet, there's no catharsis or viscera; writing about down-low women serves as some sort of Mad Lib-ish Oblique Strategy for Diamond Rugs or lyrical gambit similar to Thom Yorke throwing pieces of paper in a hat. It's not so much phony as it is perfunctory, but in this vein of songwriting, both of those terms essentially mean the same thing. Still Diamond Rugs is occasionally enjoyable if you have no investment in what it "means" either for rock as a whole or any of its participants. If you somehow used alt-country as an entryway to indie rock, Diamond Rugs might be up your alley: "Hightail" likeably kicks up dust bounding down the same roads traveled by Los Lobos, "Country Mile" actually turns out to be dense swamp rock, and, altogether, it finds a nice textural common ground between the more far-flung acts involved here. In terms of the Hank Williams lineage, Diamond Rugs mostly sticks to Bocephus' party-preparedness and the III's lowest-common-denominator appeals to "authenticity," so its nice they honor the patriarch by dropping in "Totally Lonely", which contrasts producer Justin Collins' baritone warble with an electronic drone that almost passes for musique concrète. But the keg's kicked long before Diamond Rugs comes to a close, a point made abundantly clear by the final one-two of "Hungover and Horny" and "Christmas in a Chinese Restaurant". Credit where it's due-- that's some serious truth in advertising right there. That Diamond Rugs are far longer on camaraderie than inspiration is hardly unique to them; collaborations ranging from Traveling Wilburys to Watch the Throne invariably deal with the difficulty of juggling how much they want to express personally outside of "wow, this was sure fun for us." I don't doubt for a second that Diamond Rugs was a blast-- there are too many goofy horn charts and "guitar" exhortations to think otherwise-- and surely some of these songs got knocked out in the time it for the assistant engineer to make a beer run. But most of Diamond Rugs is like that woman in "Call Girl Blues"-- it's not yours, so you can't hold it."

Lisa Gerrard

The Best of Lisa Gerrard

Experimental,Pop/R&B

Joshua Klein

Like labelmates the Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance blurred genres like few acts before them. Goth, rock, medieval, world, ambient, new age, classical-- any and all of these descriptors were fair game, their various hyphenate combinations more often than not reflecting the tastes and preferences of the listener rather than accurately capturing the group's slippery, essentially unclassifiable collision of exotic sounds. Yet just as with the Cocteau's enigmatic chanteuse Elizabeth Fraser, Dead Can Dance singer Lisa Gerrard was something of a genre unto herself. No disrespect intended her longtime Dead Can Dance collaborator and fellow singer Brendan Perry, but it's Gerrard's voice that remains the band's most identifiable component, which also explains Gerrard's relatively high profile outside of Dead Can Dance. She's continually tapped to lend a certain atmospheric imprimatur to movies from such mood masters as Michael Mann and Ridley Scott, and over the course of the last ten years she's recorded a handful of solo albums and collaborative projects that have kept the Dead Can Dance thread going (especially given former partner Perry's less-than-prolific nature). The totally unnecessary The Best of Lisa Gerrard, however, is as one might presume not really part of that ongoing thread. Instead, the disc attempts to encapsulate Gerrard's career-- both with Dead Can Dance and beyond-- over the course of a scant 13 tracks. In its defense, the impeccably designed (but of course) disc was compiled and sequenced by Gerrard herself, but squeezing a voice so expansive down to a space this small remains a Pyrrhic victory, really, no matter who's doing the heavy lifting. The results mostly serve as a reminder that's there's so much more out there beyond this modest collection. The disc starts out with "Sacrifice", a collaboration with Pieter Bourke that trainspotters may recognize from Mann's The Insider (among other places it's been used), then segues back a few years into the Dead Can Dance catalog for "Ariadne" before offering a live version of that band's "Sanvean". From there on out it smoothly glides back and forth through these two major settings-- solo and Dead Can Dance-- hitting such predictable, ethereal highlights as DCD's "The Host of Seraphim" and scattered tracks from her solo career. And therein lies the rub. It's probably safe to assume that fans of Gerrard's solo work are already fans of her Dead Can Dance work, or vice versa, and have already heard or bought everything included on this best-of. It's probably also safe to assume that this disc was instead intended for those who may have only encountered Gerrard's voice in passing, were intrigued by what they heard and wanted a simple one-stop-shopping place to start. That's fair enough, except that Gerrard's not much of an iPod-age track-by-track sort of artist, and best-of or no best-of, searching for a simple place to start simply isn't as easy as it seems. She's more an all or nothing proposition, and if you like something from her you'll likely like almost everything, which would of course then render something like this set moot. Which boils down to this caveat: if you're at all curious, just grab a Dead Can Dance album, pretty much any of them. And if you like what you hear, buy more. Time will determine a best-of for you.

Artist: Lisa Gerrard, Album: The Best of Lisa Gerrard, Genre: Experimental,Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 4.8 Album review: "Like labelmates the Cocteau Twins, Dead Can Dance blurred genres like few acts before them. Goth, rock, medieval, world, ambient, new age, classical-- any and all of these descriptors were fair game, their various hyphenate combinations more often than not reflecting the tastes and preferences of the listener rather than accurately capturing the group's slippery, essentially unclassifiable collision of exotic sounds. Yet just as with the Cocteau's enigmatic chanteuse Elizabeth Fraser, Dead Can Dance singer Lisa Gerrard was something of a genre unto herself. No disrespect intended her longtime Dead Can Dance collaborator and fellow singer Brendan Perry, but it's Gerrard's voice that remains the band's most identifiable component, which also explains Gerrard's relatively high profile outside of Dead Can Dance. She's continually tapped to lend a certain atmospheric imprimatur to movies from such mood masters as Michael Mann and Ridley Scott, and over the course of the last ten years she's recorded a handful of solo albums and collaborative projects that have kept the Dead Can Dance thread going (especially given former partner Perry's less-than-prolific nature). The totally unnecessary The Best of Lisa Gerrard, however, is as one might presume not really part of that ongoing thread. Instead, the disc attempts to encapsulate Gerrard's career-- both with Dead Can Dance and beyond-- over the course of a scant 13 tracks. In its defense, the impeccably designed (but of course) disc was compiled and sequenced by Gerrard herself, but squeezing a voice so expansive down to a space this small remains a Pyrrhic victory, really, no matter who's doing the heavy lifting. The results mostly serve as a reminder that's there's so much more out there beyond this modest collection. The disc starts out with "Sacrifice", a collaboration with Pieter Bourke that trainspotters may recognize from Mann's The Insider (among other places it's been used), then segues back a few years into the Dead Can Dance catalog for "Ariadne" before offering a live version of that band's "Sanvean". From there on out it smoothly glides back and forth through these two major settings-- solo and Dead Can Dance-- hitting such predictable, ethereal highlights as DCD's "The Host of Seraphim" and scattered tracks from her solo career. And therein lies the rub. It's probably safe to assume that fans of Gerrard's solo work are already fans of her Dead Can Dance work, or vice versa, and have already heard or bought everything included on this best-of. It's probably also safe to assume that this disc was instead intended for those who may have only encountered Gerrard's voice in passing, were intrigued by what they heard and wanted a simple one-stop-shopping place to start. That's fair enough, except that Gerrard's not much of an iPod-age track-by-track sort of artist, and best-of or no best-of, searching for a simple place to start simply isn't as easy as it seems. She's more an all or nothing proposition, and if you like something from her you'll likely like almost everything, which would of course then render something like this set moot. Which boils down to this caveat: if you're at all curious, just grab a Dead Can Dance album, pretty much any of them. And if you like what you hear, buy more. Time will determine a best-of for you."

Kiln

Dusker

Electronic

Brian Howe

The Album Leaf is functional elevator-music to Brian Eno's conceptual elevator-music. It's pretty and beatific, but also unadventurous and a bit dull-- a rote version of what it emulates. In Kiln, Boards of Canada have found an Album Leaf of their own. The Michigan trio processes guitars, drums, and electronics into warm headphone tapestries of lambent melody and skittering rhythm, and while Dusker is dense with seductive ambiance, it seems like a rather disinterested seduction: plenty of stuff to flirt with the ear, little to close the deal. On paper, it's a little bit tough to pin down what makes Dusker less than satisfying: Everything appears to be in its right place. This album is obviously the result of meticulous editing: The melodic figures are deceptively stagnant, rolling through seamlessly blended iterations of various color and tone, and the even-keeled beats are syncopated with precise yet splintering percussive embellishments. The album flirts with ambient music and dub (the sort of nebulous electronic composition we file away under the catch-all "IDM"), often simultaneously, as on "Fyrepond", with its echoing, clip-cloppy cadence, sputtering loop-ends, and glassy duotone melody, and "Rustdusk", a molten pool of swelling deep-tones and fizzy live-wire drums. Both of these compositions are skillfully turned, so why do they sound so affectless? While sonic fussiness is a prerequisite to making this sort of music, Dusker sounds like it fell prey to overzealous micro-management. Since one spitting drum program much resembles another, we count on artists to imprint some aspect of their personality into the medium, and Kiln appear to have scrubbed their music so clean that not a fingerprint remains. Nothing on Dusker offends, but much of it is forgettable. The exceptions are the tracks where Kiln doesn't rely on boggy rhythms alone to hold our interest, but enlivens them with emphatic melodic content, which makes for more balanced compositions. "The Colorfreak" is enhanced by a lively down-sweeping tune, adroitly capering across stereo channels. The hushing "Airplaneshadows" glows with a sprightly yet recessed piano theme, and the staticky ringtones of "Arq" are closer to Dntel's indie-rock-in-electro-clothing than anything IDM. For what it's worth, I think the Album Leaf gets a bad rap-- sometimes, all you need is some pleasant wallpaper, and they're great at plastering up the stuff. Ditto Kiln, whose staunch formalism works against their music's conceptual strength, but bolsters its modest functionality.

Artist: Kiln, Album: Dusker, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 5.9 Album review: "The Album Leaf is functional elevator-music to Brian Eno's conceptual elevator-music. It's pretty and beatific, but also unadventurous and a bit dull-- a rote version of what it emulates. In Kiln, Boards of Canada have found an Album Leaf of their own. The Michigan trio processes guitars, drums, and electronics into warm headphone tapestries of lambent melody and skittering rhythm, and while Dusker is dense with seductive ambiance, it seems like a rather disinterested seduction: plenty of stuff to flirt with the ear, little to close the deal. On paper, it's a little bit tough to pin down what makes Dusker less than satisfying: Everything appears to be in its right place. This album is obviously the result of meticulous editing: The melodic figures are deceptively stagnant, rolling through seamlessly blended iterations of various color and tone, and the even-keeled beats are syncopated with precise yet splintering percussive embellishments. The album flirts with ambient music and dub (the sort of nebulous electronic composition we file away under the catch-all "IDM"), often simultaneously, as on "Fyrepond", with its echoing, clip-cloppy cadence, sputtering loop-ends, and glassy duotone melody, and "Rustdusk", a molten pool of swelling deep-tones and fizzy live-wire drums. Both of these compositions are skillfully turned, so why do they sound so affectless? While sonic fussiness is a prerequisite to making this sort of music, Dusker sounds like it fell prey to overzealous micro-management. Since one spitting drum program much resembles another, we count on artists to imprint some aspect of their personality into the medium, and Kiln appear to have scrubbed their music so clean that not a fingerprint remains. Nothing on Dusker offends, but much of it is forgettable. The exceptions are the tracks where Kiln doesn't rely on boggy rhythms alone to hold our interest, but enlivens them with emphatic melodic content, which makes for more balanced compositions. "The Colorfreak" is enhanced by a lively down-sweeping tune, adroitly capering across stereo channels. The hushing "Airplaneshadows" glows with a sprightly yet recessed piano theme, and the staticky ringtones of "Arq" are closer to Dntel's indie-rock-in-electro-clothing than anything IDM. For what it's worth, I think the Album Leaf gets a bad rap-- sometimes, all you need is some pleasant wallpaper, and they're great at plastering up the stuff. Ditto Kiln, whose staunch formalism works against their music's conceptual strength, but bolsters its modest functionality."

Nicole Willis & the Soul Investigators

Keep Reachin' Up

Pop/R&B

Joe Tangari

My knee-jerk reaction to the music on Keep Reachin' Up is to call it retro soul, and to a degree, that's quite accurate. It's soul music with classic-sounding arrangements and production, but the maturity of the compositions and the ingenuity of the string orchestrations that adorn several of the songs make the retro tag feel unnecessary. Really, this is just plain good soul music that touches signposts from New Orleans to Memphis to Philly to Detroit. This is solo joint #3 for Willis, who spent much of the 90s dropping guest vocals for The The, Deee-lite, Leftfield and other acts. She has a classic soul voice, sweet and cool but capable of rising up for a good wail when the song needs it. Where, for me, her first two records suffered a bit from their sound, this move to raw, funky immediacy and old-school economy works beautifully and lets her voice fulfill its potential. The Soul Investigators, who are largely responsible for the shift, hail from the soul Mecca of Finland, as does the Pekka Kuusisto String Orchestra, which injects a flash of silver into some of the records' darkest corners. The Soul Investigators must live and breathe old soul and funk 45s, because they've internalized all of the tropes and elements of the music to the point where they're able to invent new things with them. Drummer Jukka Sarapää holds a steady groove the whole way through, and the guitar, bass, and organ leave lots of room for Willis and the horn section, which includes Willis' husband, Jimi Tenor, on several songs. The record's opening salvo, the exuberant "Feeling Free", is sublime, building a driving beat around a repeated pizzicato string figure. "I'm lovin' this music/ I'm feelin' free," sings Willis on the swirling chorus-it's a well-traveled "weekend is for parties" theme, but Willis, who writes all her own lyrics, puts a nice spin on it. The opener's ebullience is miles away from the epic waltz that lies near the album's other end. "No One's Gonna Love You" kicks off with a tipsy, palm-muted guitar part that drags you down into a sweaty, organ-soaked underworld, where Willis is menaced by the orchestra, which stalks the arrangement like her estranged lover haunts her thoughts. The chorus splits the song wide open with thunderclap drums, dramatic backing vocals and swelling horns. The song sounds like romantic turmoil feels. Most of the rest of the record is more in tune with its free-spirited beginning. "If This Ain't Love (Don't Know What Is)" strips the Motown sound to its essential elements, with the snare drum hitting every beat, but the heavily echoplexed flute solo, played by Tenor, injects a dose of psychedelia when you least expect it. Willis forms her own vocal jazz ensemble through overdubs on "Blues Downtown", while the horns get down with the slinky groove and slashing, noir guitar. Engineer/producer Didier Selin deserved a lot of credit for getting such a rich, three-dimensional sound out of the band. There are a few low ebbs: The instrumental "Soul Investigators Theme" plays like a backing track without the vocal, and the title track sacrifices the tune in favor of a funky groove, and hits one passage where it sounds like a skipping record-dig the drum break and horn arrangement, though. These minor transgressions are hardly worth talking about in light of how strong the record is on the whole, however, and Willis has snatched a solid position in the soul revival world. If I were to make a direct comparison, I might position her as the Martha Reeves to Sharon Jones' Irma Thomas, though that comparison is a bit too facile. In the end, it goes back to what I said at the top: This is just good soul music.

Artist: Nicole Willis & the Soul Investigators, Album: Keep Reachin' Up, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 7.6 Album review: "My knee-jerk reaction to the music on Keep Reachin' Up is to call it retro soul, and to a degree, that's quite accurate. It's soul music with classic-sounding arrangements and production, but the maturity of the compositions and the ingenuity of the string orchestrations that adorn several of the songs make the retro tag feel unnecessary. Really, this is just plain good soul music that touches signposts from New Orleans to Memphis to Philly to Detroit. This is solo joint #3 for Willis, who spent much of the 90s dropping guest vocals for The The, Deee-lite, Leftfield and other acts. She has a classic soul voice, sweet and cool but capable of rising up for a good wail when the song needs it. Where, for me, her first two records suffered a bit from their sound, this move to raw, funky immediacy and old-school economy works beautifully and lets her voice fulfill its potential. The Soul Investigators, who are largely responsible for the shift, hail from the soul Mecca of Finland, as does the Pekka Kuusisto String Orchestra, which injects a flash of silver into some of the records' darkest corners. The Soul Investigators must live and breathe old soul and funk 45s, because they've internalized all of the tropes and elements of the music to the point where they're able to invent new things with them. Drummer Jukka Sarapää holds a steady groove the whole way through, and the guitar, bass, and organ leave lots of room for Willis and the horn section, which includes Willis' husband, Jimi Tenor, on several songs. The record's opening salvo, the exuberant "Feeling Free", is sublime, building a driving beat around a repeated pizzicato string figure. "I'm lovin' this music/ I'm feelin' free," sings Willis on the swirling chorus-it's a well-traveled "weekend is for parties" theme, but Willis, who writes all her own lyrics, puts a nice spin on it. The opener's ebullience is miles away from the epic waltz that lies near the album's other end. "No One's Gonna Love You" kicks off with a tipsy, palm-muted guitar part that drags you down into a sweaty, organ-soaked underworld, where Willis is menaced by the orchestra, which stalks the arrangement like her estranged lover haunts her thoughts. The chorus splits the song wide open with thunderclap drums, dramatic backing vocals and swelling horns. The song sounds like romantic turmoil feels. Most of the rest of the record is more in tune with its free-spirited beginning. "If This Ain't Love (Don't Know What Is)" strips the Motown sound to its essential elements, with the snare drum hitting every beat, but the heavily echoplexed flute solo, played by Tenor, injects a dose of psychedelia when you least expect it. Willis forms her own vocal jazz ensemble through overdubs on "Blues Downtown", while the horns get down with the slinky groove and slashing, noir guitar. Engineer/producer Didier Selin deserved a lot of credit for getting such a rich, three-dimensional sound out of the band. There are a few low ebbs: The instrumental "Soul Investigators Theme" plays like a backing track without the vocal, and the title track sacrifices the tune in favor of a funky groove, and hits one passage where it sounds like a skipping record-dig the drum break and horn arrangement, though. These minor transgressions are hardly worth talking about in light of how strong the record is on the whole, however, and Willis has snatched a solid position in the soul revival world. If I were to make a direct comparison, I might position her as the Martha Reeves to Sharon Jones' Irma Thomas, though that comparison is a bit too facile. In the end, it goes back to what I said at the top: This is just good soul music."

Makaya McCraven

Highly Rare

Jazz

Steven Arroyo

Two winters ago, Danny’s Tavern cheated death. The bar on Chicago’s North Side seemed doomed for demolition; headlines called it official, and event organizers spread word of formal farewells. It was saved at the 11th hour by an outpouring of public testimonial and an owner’s promise to fix its deteriorating roof. Playing out in the year before the iconic nearby venue Double Door was shuttered, it was a major victory for Chicago music. A winter night at Danny’s can feel like stepping into a long-exposure photograph: The place glows, both by spare candlelight and from the memory of all the music its walls and dancefloors have soaked up in the past three decades. Tucked into the middle of a quiet residential block, it rarely hosts live-band performances, yet it’s a premier place to listen. All of this is essential context for the new mixtape by the Chicago drummer and producer Makaya McCraven. Recorded at the bar on a below-freezing night last November, 12 days after a nightmarish presidential election, Highly Rare finds McCraven and his band leaning into the winter night to deftly explore sanctuary, silence, and a looming sense that the roof might be caving in on all of us. McCraven is a beat architect whose craft is threefold. He’s a drummer and bandleader first, but his voice doesn’t really materialize until after sounds are laid to tape—in this case, a Tascam four-track. As a producer, McCraven sifts through, chops up, and reassembles the improvisations of his own band, which here comprises three fellow top-talent players from the local recording company International Anthem. Manipulating their spontaneous takes, he transforms the improvised raw material into a carefully edited statement made out of free-form parts. The finished product is somehow both more rhythmic and elusive than its origins. Highly Rare finds a dark aisle between free jazz and hip-hop and traverses it restlessly, breaking down the division between the two forms. On “Above & Beyond,” the record’s foremost feet-mover, Nick Mazzarella’s alto sax jumps between precisely inflected phrases and throaty wails into the void. The next track, “Venus Rising,” begins with McCraven’s skittering drumbeat quietly underscoring bleary-eyed groans from Mazzarella’s sax and Ben LaMar Gay’s cornet—then slowly wakes up, hoists itself up via Junius Paul’s bass, and snowballs into anxious chaos until the room spins. McCraven’s touch isn’t limited to his arrangements, as he loops and shifts pieces around; it’s also audible in the finishing touches he puts on these sounds. His window-rattling beats sound magnetically attracted to the lo-fi nakedness layered on top of them. “Left Fields” grows from a thin-sounding seed of Gay chanting in circles over his own diddley bow, stretching out over 11 and a half minutes and eventually latching onto a booming four-on-the-floor infrastructure. Though the components were his to begin with, it’s as if McCraven is building music out of found objects—objects not planned in their particulars, but borne of the perfect environment, process, and night. Night, above all, lights the way for Highly Rare. A track entitled “Icy Lightning” features Gay repeatedly calling out the titular phrase, which in its taunting cadence can easily be heard as a more ominous “I see lightning.” It’s a curiously fitting moment. McCraven moves confidently through a bleak landscape on Highly Rare, confronting nightmares by having fun in their face, toying with rhythmic conventions and taunting them with his gifts.

Artist: Makaya McCraven, Album: Highly Rare, Genre: Jazz, Score (1-10): 7.6 Album review: "Two winters ago, Danny’s Tavern cheated death. The bar on Chicago’s North Side seemed doomed for demolition; headlines called it official, and event organizers spread word of formal farewells. It was saved at the 11th hour by an outpouring of public testimonial and an owner’s promise to fix its deteriorating roof. Playing out in the year before the iconic nearby venue Double Door was shuttered, it was a major victory for Chicago music. A winter night at Danny’s can feel like stepping into a long-exposure photograph: The place glows, both by spare candlelight and from the memory of all the music its walls and dancefloors have soaked up in the past three decades. Tucked into the middle of a quiet residential block, it rarely hosts live-band performances, yet it’s a premier place to listen. All of this is essential context for the new mixtape by the Chicago drummer and producer Makaya McCraven. Recorded at the bar on a below-freezing night last November, 12 days after a nightmarish presidential election, Highly Rare finds McCraven and his band leaning into the winter night to deftly explore sanctuary, silence, and a looming sense that the roof might be caving in on all of us. McCraven is a beat architect whose craft is threefold. He’s a drummer and bandleader first, but his voice doesn’t really materialize until after sounds are laid to tape—in this case, a Tascam four-track. As a producer, McCraven sifts through, chops up, and reassembles the improvisations of his own band, which here comprises three fellow top-talent players from the local recording company International Anthem. Manipulating their spontaneous takes, he transforms the improvised raw material into a carefully edited statement made out of free-form parts. The finished product is somehow both more rhythmic and elusive than its origins. Highly Rare finds a dark aisle between free jazz and hip-hop and traverses it restlessly, breaking down the division between the two forms. On “Above & Beyond,” the record’s foremost feet-mover, Nick Mazzarella’s alto sax jumps between precisely inflected phrases and throaty wails into the void. The next track, “Venus Rising,” begins with McCraven’s skittering drumbeat quietly underscoring bleary-eyed groans from Mazzarella’s sax and Ben LaMar Gay’s cornet—then slowly wakes up, hoists itself up via Junius Paul’s bass, and snowballs into anxious chaos until the room spins. McCraven’s touch isn’t limited to his arrangements, as he loops and shifts pieces around; it’s also audible in the finishing touches he puts on these sounds. His window-rattling beats sound magnetically attracted to the lo-fi nakedness layered on top of them. “Left Fields” grows from a thin-sounding seed of Gay chanting in circles over his own diddley bow, stretching out over 11 and a half minutes and eventually latching onto a booming four-on-the-floor infrastructure. Though the components were his to begin with, it’s as if McCraven is building music out of found objects—objects not planned in their particulars, but borne of the perfect environment, process, and night. Night, above all, lights the way for Highly Rare. A track entitled “Icy Lightning” features Gay repeatedly calling out the titular phrase, which in its taunting cadence can easily be heard as a more ominous “I see lightning.” It’s a curiously fitting moment. McCraven moves confidently through a bleak landscape on Highly Rare, confronting nightmares by having fun in their face, toying with rhythmic conventions and taunting them with his gifts."

Red Pill

Instinctive Drowning

Rap

Jay Balfour

Red Pill has studied his depression. He knows how it works and where it comes from, but the 28-year old Michigan rapper rarely seems to crawl towards relief. Pill, whose real name is Chris Orrick, has frequently come off as an endearing and relatable deadbeat in his raps, but his second solo album inches away from light-hearted self-deprecation in favor of darker introspection. On Instinctive Drowning,* *the Detroit MC raps about his hand-me-down alcoholism and depression, contextualizing his illnesses as both personal and genetic. Caught in his own mind, the Mello Music Group artist—who is also one-third of the proudly blue-collar underground hip-hop group Ugly Heroes—is a fervent over-analyzer. This tendency sometimes spins his raps into histrionic narration. “I’ve been heartsick/So consider this catharsis,” he sputters triumphantly on the album’s first track, a clumsily obvious recap for such a patently emotional song. This awkward self-referencing falls flat at times, but Red Pill is sincere and his pain never feels like a put-on. Noticeably, *Instinctive Drowning *carries some of the best and most tailored production that Orrick has enjoyed yet as a solo rapper, driven by a single-producer approach. In this case, San Diego producer/rapper Ill Poetic has upgraded Pill’s previous stable of jazzy boom-bap for a more eclectic and ambitiously moody palette. While some tracks stick to Red Pill’s initial wheelhouse of snappy drums, Ill Poetic is also as apt to construct a new groove as he is to rotely loop up an old one. “Jeffrey Star” freewheels loosely with a Sun Ra-inspired gait to start; “When the Devil Knocks” sounds like boom-bap-inspired crime funk. Many of the songs meander into musical bridges and soulful change-ups, but sometimes the effect is squandered. On “Four Part Cure,” the distorted guitar-driven switch-up sounds forced into place instead of urgently called for. This new album also contains Red Pill’s strongest rapping to date. The painfully clever album name is crystallized when Orrick recounts his mother’s early death in gripping detail on the title track. “Just shy of the age when her liver failed/Most of my money been spent on liquor sales,” he raps, reluctantly lining himself up for the same fate. Red Pill is almost never upbeat, but there’s a charm to his soul-searching. As a lyricist Red Pill isn’t flashy as much as casually confident. But sometimes Orrick’s delivery hobbles awkwardly. His hooks are often chanted monotonously in a rarely intoned but variously syncopated flow, an artifact of his general reluctance toward singing. Here and there it works, but an album full of these choruses gums up the momentum. Elsewhere, Pill collapses into a weirdly contrived voice on “Club Privilege,” his almost tongue-in-cheek stab at a self-assured party track that doesn’t quite hit the mark as a lucid P.S.A. about white privilege. (And yet the self-awareness is productive if not clunky.) Along with the title track, the best songs on *Instinctive Drowning *are sandwiched in the middle. “Fuck Your Ambition” carries the record’s lone listed feature in the form of a charged-up P.O.S. verse. Both Orrick and Ill Poetic make the Minneapolis punk MC sound at home: the producer provides an ambient beat with tweaking, mechanical drum programming, while Red Pill borrows some of P.O.S.’ shouty, disjointed cadence. On “Gin & Tonic,” one of album’s lead singles and one of the artist’s best songs to date, Orrick shares a wistfully cautious optimism about his relationship, drinking, and pervasive sadness. It’s a telling highlight. The rapper both wallows in and stirs from his depression throughout Instinctive Drowning, which is an album largely devoted to the inevitability and persistence of a tormented mind. Red Pill never seems to find solace as much as endurance.

Artist: Red Pill, Album: Instinctive Drowning, Genre: Rap, Score (1-10): 6.5 Album review: "Red Pill has studied his depression. He knows how it works and where it comes from, but the 28-year old Michigan rapper rarely seems to crawl towards relief. Pill, whose real name is Chris Orrick, has frequently come off as an endearing and relatable deadbeat in his raps, but his second solo album inches away from light-hearted self-deprecation in favor of darker introspection. On Instinctive Drowning,* *the Detroit MC raps about his hand-me-down alcoholism and depression, contextualizing his illnesses as both personal and genetic. Caught in his own mind, the Mello Music Group artist—who is also one-third of the proudly blue-collar underground hip-hop group Ugly Heroes—is a fervent over-analyzer. This tendency sometimes spins his raps into histrionic narration. “I’ve been heartsick/So consider this catharsis,” he sputters triumphantly on the album’s first track, a clumsily obvious recap for such a patently emotional song. This awkward self-referencing falls flat at times, but Red Pill is sincere and his pain never feels like a put-on. Noticeably, *Instinctive Drowning *carries some of the best and most tailored production that Orrick has enjoyed yet as a solo rapper, driven by a single-producer approach. In this case, San Diego producer/rapper Ill Poetic has upgraded Pill’s previous stable of jazzy boom-bap for a more eclectic and ambitiously moody palette. While some tracks stick to Red Pill’s initial wheelhouse of snappy drums, Ill Poetic is also as apt to construct a new groove as he is to rotely loop up an old one. “Jeffrey Star” freewheels loosely with a Sun Ra-inspired gait to start; “When the Devil Knocks” sounds like boom-bap-inspired crime funk. Many of the songs meander into musical bridges and soulful change-ups, but sometimes the effect is squandered. On “Four Part Cure,” the distorted guitar-driven switch-up sounds forced into place instead of urgently called for. This new album also contains Red Pill’s strongest rapping to date. The painfully clever album name is crystallized when Orrick recounts his mother’s early death in gripping detail on the title track. “Just shy of the age when her liver failed/Most of my money been spent on liquor sales,” he raps, reluctantly lining himself up for the same fate. Red Pill is almost never upbeat, but there’s a charm to his soul-searching. As a lyricist Red Pill isn’t flashy as much as casually confident. But sometimes Orrick’s delivery hobbles awkwardly. His hooks are often chanted monotonously in a rarely intoned but variously syncopated flow, an artifact of his general reluctance toward singing. Here and there it works, but an album full of these choruses gums up the momentum. Elsewhere, Pill collapses into a weirdly contrived voice on “Club Privilege,” his almost tongue-in-cheek stab at a self-assured party track that doesn’t quite hit the mark as a lucid P.S.A. about white privilege. (And yet the self-awareness is productive if not clunky.) Along with the title track, the best songs on *Instinctive Drowning *are sandwiched in the middle. “Fuck Your Ambition” carries the record’s lone listed feature in the form of a charged-up P.O.S. verse. Both Orrick and Ill Poetic make the Minneapolis punk MC sound at home: the producer provides an ambient beat with tweaking, mechanical drum programming, while Red Pill borrows some of P.O.S.’ shouty, disjointed cadence. On “Gin & Tonic,” one of album’s lead singles and one of the artist’s best songs to date, Orrick shares a wistfully cautious optimism about his relationship, drinking, and pervasive sadness. It’s a telling highlight. The rapper both wallows in and stirs from his depression throughout Instinctive Drowning, which is an album largely devoted to the inevitability and persistence of a tormented mind. Red Pill never seems to find solace as much as endurance."

Florence and the Machine

MTV Unplugged

Pop/R&B

Lindsay Zoladz

To answer your first question: Yes, they still do these. "MTV Unplugged" was once a showcase for pop culture writ impossibly large-- a place where the entire world could gasp at Gene Simmons' bare face or where Kurt Cobain could introduce over five million record buyers to the Vaselines. But in recent years, the show's institutional power has fizzled, and its most recent installments have featured tepid, obligatorily low-lit performances from are-they-really-that-famous? acts like 30 Seconds to Mars and Young the Giant. Which is why Florence and the Machine's Unplugged instalment feels so promising. One of the more compelling pop acts to spring up in recent years, it's hard to imagine a voice more equipped to puff new life into the series than that of celestially soulful frontwoman Florence Welch. As on mega-hits like "Dog Days Are Over" and "Shake It Out", Welch has displayed a talent for sprawling her demons and heartbreak across canvases bigger than the sky: Every song she's ever sung has been writ large. And occasionally, that's the problem. While her promising 2009 debut, Lungs, had the skittish, genre-hopping restlessness of an artist still settling into her sound, the 12 tracks on its followup, Ceremonials, came in only one size: gigantic. Even the ballads beat with earth-shaking percussion were gilded with epic, Greek choral background vocals and all other varieties of sonic baubles. Though Welch's voice is undeniably powerful, the songs beneath it all seemed well-composed and deeply felt, but their emotional impact was often blunted by producer Paul Epworth's unrelenting maximalism, ramped up from his work on Welch's debut. Which makes them perfect candidates for the classic scaled-back, stripped-down approach, right? You'd think so. In quite a few cases, the Unplugged treatment does work wonders. The opening number, "Only if for a Night", is more arresting here than it is kicking off Ceremonials, where its haunting power (the song is about being visited in a dream by the ghost of a loved one: typical Florence stuff) was interrupted by a superfluous, glitchy beat. The Unplugged version gives the song much-needed room to breathe, and with fewer distractions the searing imagery of Welch's lyrics have a chance to float to the surface. "And the grass was so green against my new clothes," she trills, losing herself in the song's second verse, "And I did cartwheels in your honor dancing on tip-toes/ My own secret ceremonials before the service began/ In the graveyard, doing handstands." It's an oddly joyous funeral rite, but it's Welch articulating the feeling she plumbs best-- deriving light from the deepest darkness and feeling more at home in the world of spirits than the corporeal one. Same goes for "Breaking Down". On Ceremonials, that song's edges are padded with stately chamber-pop echoes, as though to protect Welch from bruises as she wrestles her demons to the ground. The sparse arrangement of the Unplugged version allows Welch to find deeper and even more unsettling emotion in the song, transforming the chorus from a pop hook to something like a moaning, seasick dirge. Some of the greatest "MTV Unplugged" moments have been somewhat unlikely covers (Maxwell doing Kate Bush! Nirvana doing Lead Belly!), and here we get Welch adding to this enduring trope with her take on "Try a Little Tenderness". It's a lovely vocal performance (she hits a note early on that will probably prompt someone to book her for an upcoming Whitney tribute), but it also brings into focus the problem with her Unplugged as a whole: Its emotional range is decidedly limited. Welch's "Try a Little Tenderness" is mournful and utterly devoid of playfulness, and-- though no one's going to fault her for her putting her own signature spin on a classic-- so is every other moment of this performance. Which means that "Tenderness" bleeds right into the song after it, an acoustic arrangement of the power-ballad "No Light, No Light". Her twangy duet with Josh Homme, a cover of the Johnny Cash and June Carter song "Jackson", provides a little deviation, but not much. Many of these songs might sound good on their own, but listening to them one after the other exposes their repetitions. There's only a certain number of times you can listen to Welch feeling lost in the verse and then found, transcendently, in the bombast of the chorus before it all starts to feel like a package of "Amazing Grace"-themed magnetic poetry, with each new track shuffling the elements around just so. Unlike one of Welch's songs, though, Unplugged is a decrescendo, and the performance runs out of steam by the time she gets to two of her best songs, "Dog Days are Over" and "Shake it Out". The latter, a torch song that has enough oomph not just to move mountains but to pick them up and punt them, peters out into a disappointingly tepid finale. No one who listens to Unplugged will accuse Welch of being an untalented singer, but they might be left wanting more from the material she lends her voice to. Fans will enjoy hearing Welch's songs opened up in this format, but her Unplugged definitely doesn't rank among the classics of the series. The artists who have been responsible for the best and most enduring Unplugged albums-- Nirvana, Lauryn Hill, and Jay-Z's collaboration with the Roots-- all used the candle-lit stage to explore new directions in their respective sounds. For Welch, it serves the opposite end: It displays the boundlessness of her vocal talent but finds her tethered to a frustratingly limited aesthetic.

Artist: Florence and the Machine, Album: MTV Unplugged, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 5.9 Album review: "To answer your first question: Yes, they still do these. "MTV Unplugged" was once a showcase for pop culture writ impossibly large-- a place where the entire world could gasp at Gene Simmons' bare face or where Kurt Cobain could introduce over five million record buyers to the Vaselines. But in recent years, the show's institutional power has fizzled, and its most recent installments have featured tepid, obligatorily low-lit performances from are-they-really-that-famous? acts like 30 Seconds to Mars and Young the Giant. Which is why Florence and the Machine's Unplugged instalment feels so promising. One of the more compelling pop acts to spring up in recent years, it's hard to imagine a voice more equipped to puff new life into the series than that of celestially soulful frontwoman Florence Welch. As on mega-hits like "Dog Days Are Over" and "Shake It Out", Welch has displayed a talent for sprawling her demons and heartbreak across canvases bigger than the sky: Every song she's ever sung has been writ large. And occasionally, that's the problem. While her promising 2009 debut, Lungs, had the skittish, genre-hopping restlessness of an artist still settling into her sound, the 12 tracks on its followup, Ceremonials, came in only one size: gigantic. Even the ballads beat with earth-shaking percussion were gilded with epic, Greek choral background vocals and all other varieties of sonic baubles. Though Welch's voice is undeniably powerful, the songs beneath it all seemed well-composed and deeply felt, but their emotional impact was often blunted by producer Paul Epworth's unrelenting maximalism, ramped up from his work on Welch's debut. Which makes them perfect candidates for the classic scaled-back, stripped-down approach, right? You'd think so. In quite a few cases, the Unplugged treatment does work wonders. The opening number, "Only if for a Night", is more arresting here than it is kicking off Ceremonials, where its haunting power (the song is about being visited in a dream by the ghost of a loved one: typical Florence stuff) was interrupted by a superfluous, glitchy beat. The Unplugged version gives the song much-needed room to breathe, and with fewer distractions the searing imagery of Welch's lyrics have a chance to float to the surface. "And the grass was so green against my new clothes," she trills, losing herself in the song's second verse, "And I did cartwheels in your honor dancing on tip-toes/ My own secret ceremonials before the service began/ In the graveyard, doing handstands." It's an oddly joyous funeral rite, but it's Welch articulating the feeling she plumbs best-- deriving light from the deepest darkness and feeling more at home in the world of spirits than the corporeal one. Same goes for "Breaking Down". On Ceremonials, that song's edges are padded with stately chamber-pop echoes, as though to protect Welch from bruises as she wrestles her demons to the ground. The sparse arrangement of the Unplugged version allows Welch to find deeper and even more unsettling emotion in the song, transforming the chorus from a pop hook to something like a moaning, seasick dirge. Some of the greatest "MTV Unplugged" moments have been somewhat unlikely covers (Maxwell doing Kate Bush! Nirvana doing Lead Belly!), and here we get Welch adding to this enduring trope with her take on "Try a Little Tenderness". It's a lovely vocal performance (she hits a note early on that will probably prompt someone to book her for an upcoming Whitney tribute), but it also brings into focus the problem with her Unplugged as a whole: Its emotional range is decidedly limited. Welch's "Try a Little Tenderness" is mournful and utterly devoid of playfulness, and-- though no one's going to fault her for her putting her own signature spin on a classic-- so is every other moment of this performance. Which means that "Tenderness" bleeds right into the song after it, an acoustic arrangement of the power-ballad "No Light, No Light". Her twangy duet with Josh Homme, a cover of the Johnny Cash and June Carter song "Jackson", provides a little deviation, but not much. Many of these songs might sound good on their own, but listening to them one after the other exposes their repetitions. There's only a certain number of times you can listen to Welch feeling lost in the verse and then found, transcendently, in the bombast of the chorus before it all starts to feel like a package of "Amazing Grace"-themed magnetic poetry, with each new track shuffling the elements around just so. Unlike one of Welch's songs, though, Unplugged is a decrescendo, and the performance runs out of steam by the time she gets to two of her best songs, "Dog Days are Over" and "Shake it Out". The latter, a torch song that has enough oomph not just to move mountains but to pick them up and punt them, peters out into a disappointingly tepid finale. No one who listens to Unplugged will accuse Welch of being an untalented singer, but they might be left wanting more from the material she lends her voice to. Fans will enjoy hearing Welch's songs opened up in this format, but her Unplugged definitely doesn't rank among the classics of the series. The artists who have been responsible for the best and most enduring Unplugged albums-- Nirvana, Lauryn Hill, and Jay-Z's collaboration with the Roots-- all used the candle-lit stage to explore new directions in their respective sounds. For Welch, it serves the opposite end: It displays the boundlessness of her vocal talent but finds her tethered to a frustratingly limited aesthetic."

Black Bananas

Electric Brick Wall

Rock

Miles Raymer

The 1990s alt-rock boom produced a lot of rock stars who weren’t very good at being rock stars: too glum, too suspicious of the mainstream audience they found themselves playing to, or both at the same time. Few of them really seemed to really relish the role, and the ones who stand out most, looking back from two decades later, were women: Kim Gordon, Courtney Love, and Royal Trux frontwoman Jennifer Herrema. While their contemporaries were imploding the classic rock golden-god mythos through a truculent refusal to follow the rulebook, Herrema and Royal Trux's Neil Hagerty, were accomplishing something similar by emulating its sickest qualities. Falling half-accidentally into a pile of the major label cash that was flying around, Herrema and Hagerty put that money into drugs and druggy records that achieved the same kind of squalid junkie transcendence as Exile on Main Street, with far less romanticism. Their carton-a-day croaks and fucked-up frames represented "heroin chic" taken to its scabrous logical conclusion, and they reveled in its repulsiveness to an extent that terminally disconcerted much of the audience that their often achingly beautiful records deserved. The whole project sounded filthy and, somehow, glorious. Unlike a good deal of her contemporaries, Herrema’s continued evolving as an artist since the '90s. After her partnership with Hagerty dissolved following 2000's Pound for Pound, which explored Southern rock and the coke-addled disco side of the late-'70s Stones, she formed and fronted RTX, which added a scuzzy streak of hair metal into the mix. With her latest group, Black Bananas, she’s dragged that whole pile of classic rock influences into the present day. The group’s first album, 2012’s Rad Times Xpress IV, was a weird mishmash of stoner grooves, flamboyant hair metal, and the seedier side of the contemporary club scene, the results sounding like someone dragged 1984-era David Lee Roth into at a basement DJ night and filled him full of cough syrup. It was a mess, but like most messes Herrema’s involved in, it was compelling. Electric Brick Wall is a far more coherent synthesis of those disparate influences, and possibly her strongest record since the Trux’s peak. The album's female-fronted pileup of overblown drum machines and retro guitar riffage shares surface similarities with Sleigh Bells, but instead of that band's shimmering, pixellated gleam, Black Bananas give off a debauched, grimy aura. When they evoke the Sunset Strip in the '80s it’s not the fictionalized version served up by the Motley Crüe wannabes of the time but the seedy real-life version, with rumbling rap beats mixed in for kicks. At other points, the group ditches its retro references and shoots for an almost purely contemporary sound, which Herrema’s seldom attempted previously. “Give It to Me” is a slick (by her standards) take on dance floor electro-pop, while “Physical Emotions” is their take on straight-up radio R&B, complete with Auto-Tune; even with the requisite amount of distortion that they slather on it, it still has a modern sheen that even listeners attuned to Herrema’s wild stylistic impulses won’t see coming. After years spent ransacking the past, she’s turned her sights on the here and now, and it’s as fucked-up and fascinating as anything she’s ever done.

Artist: Black Bananas, Album: Electric Brick Wall, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "The 1990s alt-rock boom produced a lot of rock stars who weren’t very good at being rock stars: too glum, too suspicious of the mainstream audience they found themselves playing to, or both at the same time. Few of them really seemed to really relish the role, and the ones who stand out most, looking back from two decades later, were women: Kim Gordon, Courtney Love, and Royal Trux frontwoman Jennifer Herrema. While their contemporaries were imploding the classic rock golden-god mythos through a truculent refusal to follow the rulebook, Herrema and Royal Trux's Neil Hagerty, were accomplishing something similar by emulating its sickest qualities. Falling half-accidentally into a pile of the major label cash that was flying around, Herrema and Hagerty put that money into drugs and druggy records that achieved the same kind of squalid junkie transcendence as Exile on Main Street, with far less romanticism. Their carton-a-day croaks and fucked-up frames represented "heroin chic" taken to its scabrous logical conclusion, and they reveled in its repulsiveness to an extent that terminally disconcerted much of the audience that their often achingly beautiful records deserved. The whole project sounded filthy and, somehow, glorious. Unlike a good deal of her contemporaries, Herrema’s continued evolving as an artist since the '90s. After her partnership with Hagerty dissolved following 2000's Pound for Pound, which explored Southern rock and the coke-addled disco side of the late-'70s Stones, she formed and fronted RTX, which added a scuzzy streak of hair metal into the mix. With her latest group, Black Bananas, she’s dragged that whole pile of classic rock influences into the present day. The group’s first album, 2012’s Rad Times Xpress IV, was a weird mishmash of stoner grooves, flamboyant hair metal, and the seedier side of the contemporary club scene, the results sounding like someone dragged 1984-era David Lee Roth into at a basement DJ night and filled him full of cough syrup. It was a mess, but like most messes Herrema’s involved in, it was compelling. Electric Brick Wall is a far more coherent synthesis of those disparate influences, and possibly her strongest record since the Trux’s peak. The album's female-fronted pileup of overblown drum machines and retro guitar riffage shares surface similarities with Sleigh Bells, but instead of that band's shimmering, pixellated gleam, Black Bananas give off a debauched, grimy aura. When they evoke the Sunset Strip in the '80s it’s not the fictionalized version served up by the Motley Crüe wannabes of the time but the seedy real-life version, with rumbling rap beats mixed in for kicks. At other points, the group ditches its retro references and shoots for an almost purely contemporary sound, which Herrema’s seldom attempted previously. “Give It to Me” is a slick (by her standards) take on dance floor electro-pop, while “Physical Emotions” is their take on straight-up radio R&B, complete with Auto-Tune; even with the requisite amount of distortion that they slather on it, it still has a modern sheen that even listeners attuned to Herrema’s wild stylistic impulses won’t see coming. After years spent ransacking the past, she’s turned her sights on the here and now, and it’s as fucked-up and fascinating as anything she’s ever done."

Meat Puppets

Golden Lies

Rock

Al Shipley

Don't let the cover art fool you. Golden Lies may continue the tradition of nearly every previous Meat Puppets album with its surreal cover illustration, but the consistencies end there. In fact, it's questionable whether the words "Meat Puppets" should even appear on this album's artwork, since the artist behind it is the only remaining member of the band's original lineup, guitarist Curt Kirkwood. To be fair, the outcry over the exclusion of founding members Derrick Bostrom and Cris Kirkwood is for mostly sentimental reasons. Cris' continuing downward spiral of drug addiction is an understandable if unfortunate circumstance of his absence, and Bostrom has retired to the Puppets' birthplace of Arizona, presiding over the band's legacy with an official website and last year's comprehensive series of Rykodisc reissues. In the meantime, Curt Kirkwood has relocated to Austin and enlisted a new backing band, including second guitarist Kyle Ellison, who served as an addition to the original trio's last few tours together. As such, one might hope that this Texan incarnation would recall the ZZ Top-inspired southern fried boogie of 1987's underrated Huevos. No such luck. Before we go any further, though, let's get a few things straight: a lot of the criticisms I'm levelling at this band would be rendered moot if the guys had stuck with their original name, the Royal Neanderthal Orchestra. But without the name recognition and expectations that go with the first new Meat Puppets album in five years, Golden Lies likely wouldn't even see release. And I can't say that I'd consider that such a bad thing, having heard it. Kirkwood barely even got Golden Lies issued under the Puppets' name, having been screwed on their contract to London/Polygram thanks to the Unigram merger that rendered so many of the labels' bands and workers unemployed. So, Kirkwood ended up on Breaking Records, an imprint run by none other than Hootie and the Blowfish. That's right, Hootie and the Blowfish. Yes, of Hootie and the Blowfish fame. If that isn't a severe indicator of the music industry's inability to deal with any kind of music that could be even vaguely categorized as "rootsy," I don't know what is. Contrary to the conventional wisdom about commercial breakthroughs by cult favorites, 1994's Too High to Die was actually one of the best Meat Puppets albums in years at the time of its release. Its hard-spined rock approach and Curt's top-notch soloing would have made it a great guilty pleasure if they hadn't suddenly found themselves in vogue for that fleeting moment. Unfortunately, the album's follow-up, No Joke!, was just that, placing them in another rut with a droning alt-metal sensibility. Now, with half a decade and the entire rest of the band laid to waste, the band's future seems far from gleaming. And indeed, it is. Initially, Golden Lies confuses too much to allow for disappointment. After all, confounding expectations with a tweaked, fuck-all attitude was always an active ingredient in these guys' appeal. But the album's "Intro" itself is none too promising, a bizarre sample of the forest people of Cameroon set to a mechanized dance beat. From there, the album settles into a series of unremarkable mid-tempo hard rock tunes, with an increasingly marked sense of melancholy and resignation. With Butthole Surfer Paul Leary largely absent from the proceedings, Kirkwood's self-production comes off as a pale imitation of the inspired touches Leary offered their last couple of records. Flangers and other flashy effects twirl around at random intervals as if to distract from the inescapable blandness of the songs. Atmospheric whooshes begin nearly every track. Processed drums clank and synths bubble over. It might actually be considered slick over-production if it weren't so sloppy. "Hercules," however, marks the first clear sign that something is terribly wrong. An awkward a cappella intro gives way to an even more awkward attempt at a catchy rock tune with simply awful lyrics. Later, "Pieces of Me"-- not the Jewel song-- makes the exact same mistake. But this a cappella intro suddenly and conspicuously fades out as if Kirkwood realized they'd already done it. The goonish riff rock of "Take Off Your Clothes" and the downright corny "Batwing" are also prime contenders for sending you straight to the stop button. The evolution of Curt Kirkwood's vocal delivery has been one of the least predictable in recent history. On early Meat Puppets records, he alternated between an unsteady croon and a throaty mumble. Over the years, he's cultivated a flat, almost deadpan, approach that manages not to skirt the melody, while harmonizing with Cris in a way that only brothers can. On Golden Lies, Curt's multi-tracked vocals eerily recall Cris' harmonies, though lack the chemistry that made the combination work. And often, Curt resorts to shouting in halting syllables that vaguely resemble rapping. It's representative of the sad state of affairs that the best moments on Golden Lies transparently recall highlights from later albums already past the Meat Puppets' prime. "Turantula" would be a solid contender for the best song here if not for the fact that it's a lazy fusion of the jumpy rhythm from Too High to Die's "Never to Be Found" and a melody similar to that of half the songs on No Joke. The single, "Armed and Stupid," a holdover from last year's You Love Me EP, rocks harder and more hummably than the rest of the album, but can't shake the feel of being just another No Joke outtake. Some bands display a consistency of craft that keeps them listenable even during their fallow or experimental periods. Others stumble so often and so badly that even the fans are forced to question the validity of the rewarding moments. Curt Kirkwood and the Meat Puppets have built a long career out of both disappointing and surprising, and have still managed to turn out a fair share of enduring works. But with even the identity of the band behind the name now in question, I wouldn't expect any more pleasant surprises from the Meat Puppets.

Artist: Meat Puppets, Album: Golden Lies, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 4.3 Album review: "Don't let the cover art fool you. Golden Lies may continue the tradition of nearly every previous Meat Puppets album with its surreal cover illustration, but the consistencies end there. In fact, it's questionable whether the words "Meat Puppets" should even appear on this album's artwork, since the artist behind it is the only remaining member of the band's original lineup, guitarist Curt Kirkwood. To be fair, the outcry over the exclusion of founding members Derrick Bostrom and Cris Kirkwood is for mostly sentimental reasons. Cris' continuing downward spiral of drug addiction is an understandable if unfortunate circumstance of his absence, and Bostrom has retired to the Puppets' birthplace of Arizona, presiding over the band's legacy with an official website and last year's comprehensive series of Rykodisc reissues. In the meantime, Curt Kirkwood has relocated to Austin and enlisted a new backing band, including second guitarist Kyle Ellison, who served as an addition to the original trio's last few tours together. As such, one might hope that this Texan incarnation would recall the ZZ Top-inspired southern fried boogie of 1987's underrated Huevos. No such luck. Before we go any further, though, let's get a few things straight: a lot of the criticisms I'm levelling at this band would be rendered moot if the guys had stuck with their original name, the Royal Neanderthal Orchestra. But without the name recognition and expectations that go with the first new Meat Puppets album in five years, Golden Lies likely wouldn't even see release. And I can't say that I'd consider that such a bad thing, having heard it. Kirkwood barely even got Golden Lies issued under the Puppets' name, having been screwed on their contract to London/Polygram thanks to the Unigram merger that rendered so many of the labels' bands and workers unemployed. So, Kirkwood ended up on Breaking Records, an imprint run by none other than Hootie and the Blowfish. That's right, Hootie and the Blowfish. Yes, of Hootie and the Blowfish fame. If that isn't a severe indicator of the music industry's inability to deal with any kind of music that could be even vaguely categorized as "rootsy," I don't know what is. Contrary to the conventional wisdom about commercial breakthroughs by cult favorites, 1994's Too High to Die was actually one of the best Meat Puppets albums in years at the time of its release. Its hard-spined rock approach and Curt's top-notch soloing would have made it a great guilty pleasure if they hadn't suddenly found themselves in vogue for that fleeting moment. Unfortunately, the album's follow-up, No Joke!, was just that, placing them in another rut with a droning alt-metal sensibility. Now, with half a decade and the entire rest of the band laid to waste, the band's future seems far from gleaming. And indeed, it is. Initially, Golden Lies confuses too much to allow for disappointment. After all, confounding expectations with a tweaked, fuck-all attitude was always an active ingredient in these guys' appeal. But the album's "Intro" itself is none too promising, a bizarre sample of the forest people of Cameroon set to a mechanized dance beat. From there, the album settles into a series of unremarkable mid-tempo hard rock tunes, with an increasingly marked sense of melancholy and resignation. With Butthole Surfer Paul Leary largely absent from the proceedings, Kirkwood's self-production comes off as a pale imitation of the inspired touches Leary offered their last couple of records. Flangers and other flashy effects twirl around at random intervals as if to distract from the inescapable blandness of the songs. Atmospheric whooshes begin nearly every track. Processed drums clank and synths bubble over. It might actually be considered slick over-production if it weren't so sloppy. "Hercules," however, marks the first clear sign that something is terribly wrong. An awkward a cappella intro gives way to an even more awkward attempt at a catchy rock tune with simply awful lyrics. Later, "Pieces of Me"-- not the Jewel song-- makes the exact same mistake. But this a cappella intro suddenly and conspicuously fades out as if Kirkwood realized they'd already done it. The goonish riff rock of "Take Off Your Clothes" and the downright corny "Batwing" are also prime contenders for sending you straight to the stop button. The evolution of Curt Kirkwood's vocal delivery has been one of the least predictable in recent history. On early Meat Puppets records, he alternated between an unsteady croon and a throaty mumble. Over the years, he's cultivated a flat, almost deadpan, approach that manages not to skirt the melody, while harmonizing with Cris in a way that only brothers can. On Golden Lies, Curt's multi-tracked vocals eerily recall Cris' harmonies, though lack the chemistry that made the combination work. And often, Curt resorts to shouting in halting syllables that vaguely resemble rapping. It's representative of the sad state of affairs that the best moments on Golden Lies transparently recall highlights from later albums already past the Meat Puppets' prime. "Turantula" would be a solid contender for the best song here if not for the fact that it's a lazy fusion of the jumpy rhythm from Too High to Die's "Never to Be Found" and a melody similar to that of half the songs on No Joke. The single, "Armed and Stupid," a holdover from last year's You Love Me EP, rocks harder and more hummably than the rest of the album, but can't shake the feel of being just another No Joke outtake. Some bands display a consistency of craft that keeps them listenable even during their fallow or experimental periods. Others stumble so often and so badly that even the fans are forced to question the validity of the rewarding moments. Curt Kirkwood and the Meat Puppets have built a long career out of both disappointing and surprising, and have still managed to turn out a fair share of enduring works. But with even the identity of the band behind the name now in question, I wouldn't expect any more pleasant surprises from the Meat Puppets."

Various Artists

Well Deep: Ten Years of Big Dada Recordings

Nate Patrin

It might be going a bit too far to claim that Big Dada has an identity crisis, but as independent labels go, you can't entirely pin a single style to them. "Underground rap" is about as close as you can get, and even then, that's a nebulous term; it could cover anyone from avant-garde abstractionists to club-friendly grime offshoots. But there doesn't entirely seem to be such a thing as a readily identifiable Big Dada sound, and given how split the roster tends to be in another, equally important sense-- the geographic one, between the U.S. and the UK-- it almost makes the whole idea of a label compendium seem kind of disorienting. Well Deep: Ten Years of Big Dada Recordings attempts to reconcile those contradictions in the guise of an anniversary collection, which, at the very least, means you're almost guaranteed to love and detest some of the selections here equally. Being a London-based label does dictate a certain side of Big Dada's identity a bit, and it's no coincidence that the more accessible artists on the label tend to be British. There's Roots Manuva, whose well-aging dancehall-inflected 2001 hit "Witness (1 Hope)" still sounds like the label's (and pre-grime UK rap's) standard-bearer, benefiting from his sharply-spit patois and featuring one of the sickest assaults of subwoofer-abusing low-end in the last ten years embedded in that wobbly bassline. (Unfortunately, 1999's moody, trip-hop-styled "Movements" and 2005's balloon-squeak annoyance "Colossal Insight" don't represent him quite as well.) Ty gets four cuts here, and between his forceful smoothness and the digitally sleek future-neo-soul bent to the productions on his tracks, he sounds a bit like a technologically-advanced UK Okayplayer envoy. And even though Well Deep exhibits Big Dada's tendency to pass over straight-up grime in favor of borderline, classification-ducking groups like New Flesh and Lotek HiFi, their release of Wiley's Playtime is Over earlier this year gives them a chance to showcase one of the genre's pivotal artists; as familiar as "50/50" might be to fans already, the inclusion of Xxxchange's twitchy synth-symphonic remix of "My Mistakes" is a good move. But while Big Dada tends to play towards approachable futurist boom bap on the British side (and the French side; TTC are slick and hooky on the 8-bit throb of "Dans Le Club"), the American groups represented here are both further out there and more sonically diverse. Many tracks lean towards the backpacker side of things: there's the brilliant smart-assery of poet Mike Ladd, who delivers a couple acts of cultural sabotage for his defenders-of-rap concept group the Infesticons (the Company Flow-assisted "Night Night Theme" and Saul Williams' anxious turn on "Monkey Theme"), anticon pseudosupergroup cLOUDDEAD bring their nasal, unnerving brand of slow-motion decay rap ("Physics of a Bicycle" and the Boards of Canada remix of "Dead Dogs Two"), and Busdriver waxes logorrheic on the thrash-paced bop-jazz breakup rant "Beauty Supply & Demand" and the manic half-sequitirs of the folk-hop "Unemployed Black Astronaut". On the other end of the spectrum is the hipster-by-proxy club-rap contingent, represented by Spank Rock ("Sweet Talk") and Diplo ("Diplo Rhythm"'s Metroid dancehall and the unremarkable, previously-unreleased circa-04 drumbeat-chopfest "Now's the Time"). Hearing these two divergent musical movements in such close proximity is strange enough; it's even weirder when you pit the winking throw-ya-hands-up come-ons of "Sweet Talk" against "Fader Party", a Ladd-produced fast-rap mockery credited to the Infesticon-opposing pop-rap caricature Majesticons. Amidst all that, MF DOOM side-project King Geedorah's trad-underground "Anti-Matter" sounds like it stumbled into the wrong party. For all its stylistic multiple personality disorder, Well Deep does cover its uneven ground pretty well, and you have to give the comp a bit of credit for open-mindedness (and a demerit for coherence) when it opts against splitting the two CDs up by style, region or chronology. If Well Deep proves anything, it's that Big Dada does have a singleminded purpose: to prevent underground hip hop from moving anywhere but forward, a restless undertaking that, while not necessarily ignorant of rap's past, just doesn't seem to have a lot of inclination to reference it. If that makes the future look more splintered and baffling than it could be otherwise, that just means they're one step ahead of the rest of us.

Artist: Various Artists, Album: Well Deep: Ten Years of Big Dada Recordings, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "It might be going a bit too far to claim that Big Dada has an identity crisis, but as independent labels go, you can't entirely pin a single style to them. "Underground rap" is about as close as you can get, and even then, that's a nebulous term; it could cover anyone from avant-garde abstractionists to club-friendly grime offshoots. But there doesn't entirely seem to be such a thing as a readily identifiable Big Dada sound, and given how split the roster tends to be in another, equally important sense-- the geographic one, between the U.S. and the UK-- it almost makes the whole idea of a label compendium seem kind of disorienting. Well Deep: Ten Years of Big Dada Recordings attempts to reconcile those contradictions in the guise of an anniversary collection, which, at the very least, means you're almost guaranteed to love and detest some of the selections here equally. Being a London-based label does dictate a certain side of Big Dada's identity a bit, and it's no coincidence that the more accessible artists on the label tend to be British. There's Roots Manuva, whose well-aging dancehall-inflected 2001 hit "Witness (1 Hope)" still sounds like the label's (and pre-grime UK rap's) standard-bearer, benefiting from his sharply-spit patois and featuring one of the sickest assaults of subwoofer-abusing low-end in the last ten years embedded in that wobbly bassline. (Unfortunately, 1999's moody, trip-hop-styled "Movements" and 2005's balloon-squeak annoyance "Colossal Insight" don't represent him quite as well.) Ty gets four cuts here, and between his forceful smoothness and the digitally sleek future-neo-soul bent to the productions on his tracks, he sounds a bit like a technologically-advanced UK Okayplayer envoy. And even though Well Deep exhibits Big Dada's tendency to pass over straight-up grime in favor of borderline, classification-ducking groups like New Flesh and Lotek HiFi, their release of Wiley's Playtime is Over earlier this year gives them a chance to showcase one of the genre's pivotal artists; as familiar as "50/50" might be to fans already, the inclusion of Xxxchange's twitchy synth-symphonic remix of "My Mistakes" is a good move. But while Big Dada tends to play towards approachable futurist boom bap on the British side (and the French side; TTC are slick and hooky on the 8-bit throb of "Dans Le Club"), the American groups represented here are both further out there and more sonically diverse. Many tracks lean towards the backpacker side of things: there's the brilliant smart-assery of poet Mike Ladd, who delivers a couple acts of cultural sabotage for his defenders-of-rap concept group the Infesticons (the Company Flow-assisted "Night Night Theme" and Saul Williams' anxious turn on "Monkey Theme"), anticon pseudosupergroup cLOUDDEAD bring their nasal, unnerving brand of slow-motion decay rap ("Physics of a Bicycle" and the Boards of Canada remix of "Dead Dogs Two"), and Busdriver waxes logorrheic on the thrash-paced bop-jazz breakup rant "Beauty Supply & Demand" and the manic half-sequitirs of the folk-hop "Unemployed Black Astronaut". On the other end of the spectrum is the hipster-by-proxy club-rap contingent, represented by Spank Rock ("Sweet Talk") and Diplo ("Diplo Rhythm"'s Metroid dancehall and the unremarkable, previously-unreleased circa-04 drumbeat-chopfest "Now's the Time"). Hearing these two divergent musical movements in such close proximity is strange enough; it's even weirder when you pit the winking throw-ya-hands-up come-ons of "Sweet Talk" against "Fader Party", a Ladd-produced fast-rap mockery credited to the Infesticon-opposing pop-rap caricature Majesticons. Amidst all that, MF DOOM side-project King Geedorah's trad-underground "Anti-Matter" sounds like it stumbled into the wrong party. For all its stylistic multiple personality disorder, Well Deep does cover its uneven ground pretty well, and you have to give the comp a bit of credit for open-mindedness (and a demerit for coherence) when it opts against splitting the two CDs up by style, region or chronology. If Well Deep proves anything, it's that Big Dada does have a singleminded purpose: to prevent underground hip hop from moving anywhere but forward, a restless undertaking that, while not necessarily ignorant of rap's past, just doesn't seem to have a lot of inclination to reference it. If that makes the future look more splintered and baffling than it could be otherwise, that just means they're one step ahead of the rest of us."

Killer Mike

R.A.P. Music

Rap

Ian Cohen

Does a rapper need to make a truly great album before he's considered one of the best alive? It's a question with no objective answer. Some rappers are phenomenal with verses and punchlines but have no knack for hooks or song structure. Some can do all of those things but lack personality. Some never get the production budget they deserve; many do and just have the worst ear for beats. Some fail to capitalize on their buzz, and others are completely incapable of making themselves relevant. And yet, none of that explains why Killer Mike has been able to consistently make some of the most visceral and intellectually potent hip-hop of the past decade and a half without having a true classic under his belt. On the unimpeachable R.A.P. Music, Mike hooks up with 2012 MVP frontrunner El-P and Adult Swim subsidiary Williams Street to create what's described on the title track as "what my people need and the opposite of bullshit." It's the 2012 equivalent to Ice Cube and the Bomb Squad's similarly inspired bicoastal union on AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted. Limiting himself to one producer, legends-only guest spots, and a real sense that he'd better make this one count, Killer Mike rises to the occasion. But while this record is sure to please longtime fans, it also works as a compelling introduction. As in the past, R.A.P. Music takes a stand politically without going off the grid into conspiracy theorizing or sounding so circumspect that you'd think Mike himself was running for public office. On "Reagan", he calls out the government for spending billions of taxpayer dollars invading foreign land as "a hobby paid for by the oil lobby." To him, the "War on Drugs" is mostly an excuse for crooked cops to illegally search and seize young black men. But if you happen to be a phony rapper that's dumb enough to spit that "fiction sold by conglomerates" in Mike's neighborhood, you can expect to leave without your chain and dignity. None of this is contradictory to anyone with a lick of sense, but there's a tangible thrill in hearing someone tell it like it is with such conviction. There was enough spleen vented on the Grind mixtapes to last until the next decade; on R.A.P., there's more heart and soul, both musically and spiritually. In a recent interview with Pitchfork.tv, Mike seemed particularly fond of the scene he sets during "Untitled", wherein the women closest to him in life are placed within an epic historical scale: "Will my woman be Corretta take my name and cherish it?/ Or will she Jackie O drop the Kennedy, remarry it/ My sister say it's necessary on some Cleopatra shit/ My grandmamma said 'no, never that, it's sacrilege.'" It's part of a deep respect for family that runs throughout R.A.P. Music, whether it's to his cop father during the "fuck the police" narrative "Don't Die", or his wife amidst astonishing Southernplayalistic pimp shit on "Southern Fried". He dedicates the last verse to her ("I married a Trina/ Pretty as a singer/ Fine as a stripper"), informing all other girls that if you want a piece of Killer Mike, you gotta service his woman too. It's actually kinda heartwarming. Let's take a moment and talk about the actual rapping on R.A.P. Music. Dear lord, the rapping on this thing. When he first started appearing on dirtier OutKast tracks like "Snappin' & Trappin'", Mike might've been seen as the devil on Big Boi's shoulder opposite André. It's become clear since then he takes a backseat to no one in the Dungeon Family. Transcribing a jaw-dropping bout of dexterity like, "And what's happenin'/ Ménage-a-nage in my garage/ With these two young ladies is the reason I A.D.I.D.A.S./ That's all day I dream about that sex scene/ You textin' hopin' that they call you/ I just barbecue and call 'em up and say, 'hey fall through,'" feels about as effective as trying to explain Led Zeppelin IV with guitar tablature. Mike introduces himself on "Untitled", saying, "You are witnessing elegance/ In the form of a black elephant," and it's a perfect summation of Mike's muscular yet impossibly nimble vocals. There's no reason for him to make a two-minute, no-hook track like "Go!" other than to prove he can destroy anyone in terms of pure technique "even when I ain't sayin' sheeeit." The sheer sonic effect of the volley of words on R.A.P. could thrill a hip-hop fan who doesn't speak a word of English. Not that you shouldn't be paying attention to what Killer Mike says throughout R.A.P. Music*.*  "Reagan" is the one that names names and cites facts to denigrate the presidency as little more than "telling lies on teleprompters" to serve the "country's real masters." But on "Anywhere But Here", the trickle-down effect of corruption is felt on a more local scale. After solemnly acknowledging the police brutality and economic stratification of New York, Mike takes a look at his home city of Atlanta, seemingly a "black male's heaven" as one the most racially progressive in the nation, "Even though it's blacktop from the mayors to the cops/ Black blood still gets spilled." "Don't Die" shows a vivid example of that: Cops break into Mike's house on a hunch and things inevitably get violent. Though the concept of their being there in the first place because "a nigga on this rap shit" might initially sound trite, if you don't believe the suspicion of being a part of that culture is enough to get you harassed and then killed, you might need to start watching the news. That's really why "Don't Die" can take its place alongside anti-authoritarian classics like "Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos": The big picture is timeless; the news fills in the blanks to make it depressing in its timeliness. There are plenty of hip-hop records with worthy causes but the good intentions don't always make your car stereo knock. That's not an issue here: I don't think we'll hear a better end-to-end production job on a rap record than we do on R.A.P. Music. El-P has managed to make strides in learning to give a rapper like Mike what he needs: on 2009's ATL RMX, he reconfigured Young Jeezy's "I Got This" with a punishing beat that somehow managed to overexert its will on the guy rapping. We get wheezing organs, incessantly ticking hi-hats, guitar skronk, and soul claps tamed to do Mike and El's evil bidding whether it's B-boy boom bap ("Jojo's Chillin'") or chain-swang braggadocio ("Butane (Champion's Anthem)"). I'm tempted to call it "warm," but so is nuclear radiation, and the bass most often sounds like a monstrous, gleefully evil sandworm that could guest star on "Aqua Teen Hunger Force". On the closing title track, Mike equates R.A.

Artist: Killer Mike, Album: R.A.P. Music, Genre: Rap, Score (1-10): 8.6 Album review: "Does a rapper need to make a truly great album before he's considered one of the best alive? It's a question with no objective answer. Some rappers are phenomenal with verses and punchlines but have no knack for hooks or song structure. Some can do all of those things but lack personality. Some never get the production budget they deserve; many do and just have the worst ear for beats. Some fail to capitalize on their buzz, and others are completely incapable of making themselves relevant. And yet, none of that explains why Killer Mike has been able to consistently make some of the most visceral and intellectually potent hip-hop of the past decade and a half without having a true classic under his belt. On the unimpeachable R.A.P. Music, Mike hooks up with 2012 MVP frontrunner El-P and Adult Swim subsidiary Williams Street to create what's described on the title track as "what my people need and the opposite of bullshit." It's the 2012 equivalent to Ice Cube and the Bomb Squad's similarly inspired bicoastal union on AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted. Limiting himself to one producer, legends-only guest spots, and a real sense that he'd better make this one count, Killer Mike rises to the occasion. But while this record is sure to please longtime fans, it also works as a compelling introduction. As in the past, R.A.P. Music takes a stand politically without going off the grid into conspiracy theorizing or sounding so circumspect that you'd think Mike himself was running for public office. On "Reagan", he calls out the government for spending billions of taxpayer dollars invading foreign land as "a hobby paid for by the oil lobby." To him, the "War on Drugs" is mostly an excuse for crooked cops to illegally search and seize young black men. But if you happen to be a phony rapper that's dumb enough to spit that "fiction sold by conglomerates" in Mike's neighborhood, you can expect to leave without your chain and dignity. None of this is contradictory to anyone with a lick of sense, but there's a tangible thrill in hearing someone tell it like it is with such conviction. There was enough spleen vented on the Grind mixtapes to last until the next decade; on R.A.P., there's more heart and soul, both musically and spiritually. In a recent interview with Pitchfork.tv, Mike seemed particularly fond of the scene he sets during "Untitled", wherein the women closest to him in life are placed within an epic historical scale: "Will my woman be Corretta take my name and cherish it?/ Or will she Jackie O drop the Kennedy, remarry it/ My sister say it's necessary on some Cleopatra shit/ My grandmamma said 'no, never that, it's sacrilege.'" It's part of a deep respect for family that runs throughout R.A.P. Music, whether it's to his cop father during the "fuck the police" narrative "Don't Die", or his wife amidst astonishing Southernplayalistic pimp shit on "Southern Fried". He dedicates the last verse to her ("I married a Trina/ Pretty as a singer/ Fine as a stripper"), informing all other girls that if you want a piece of Killer Mike, you gotta service his woman too. It's actually kinda heartwarming. Let's take a moment and talk about the actual rapping on R.A.P. Music. Dear lord, the rapping on this thing. When he first started appearing on dirtier OutKast tracks like "Snappin' & Trappin'", Mike might've been seen as the devil on Big Boi's shoulder opposite André. It's become clear since then he takes a backseat to no one in the Dungeon Family. Transcribing a jaw-dropping bout of dexterity like, "And what's happenin'/ Ménage-a-nage in my garage/ With these two young ladies is the reason I A.D.I.D.A.S./ That's all day I dream about that sex scene/ You textin' hopin' that they call you/ I just barbecue and call 'em up and say, 'hey fall through,'" feels about as effective as trying to explain Led Zeppelin IV with guitar tablature. Mike introduces himself on "Untitled", saying, "You are witnessing elegance/ In the form of a black elephant," and it's a perfect summation of Mike's muscular yet impossibly nimble vocals. There's no reason for him to make a two-minute, no-hook track like "Go!" other than to prove he can destroy anyone in terms of pure technique "even when I ain't sayin' sheeeit." The sheer sonic effect of the volley of words on R.A.P. could thrill a hip-hop fan who doesn't speak a word of English. Not that you shouldn't be paying attention to what Killer Mike says throughout R.A.P. Music*.*  "Reagan" is the one that names names and cites facts to denigrate the presidency as little more than "telling lies on teleprompters" to serve the "country's real masters." But on "Anywhere But Here", the trickle-down effect of corruption is felt on a more local scale. After solemnly acknowledging the police brutality and economic stratification of New York, Mike takes a look at his home city of Atlanta, seemingly a "black male's heaven" as one the most racially progressive in the nation, "Even though it's blacktop from the mayors to the cops/ Black blood still gets spilled." "Don't Die" shows a vivid example of that: Cops break into Mike's house on a hunch and things inevitably get violent. Though the concept of their being there in the first place because "a nigga on this rap shit" might initially sound trite, if you don't believe the suspicion of being a part of that culture is enough to get you harassed and then killed, you might need to start watching the news. That's really why "Don't Die" can take its place alongside anti-authoritarian classics like "Black Steel in the Hour of Chaos": The big picture is timeless; the news fills in the blanks to make it depressing in its timeliness. There are plenty of hip-hop records with worthy causes but the good intentions don't always make your car stereo knock. That's not an issue here: I don't think we'll hear a better end-to-end production job on a rap record than we do on R.A.P. Music. El-P has managed to make strides in learning to give a rapper like Mike what he needs: on 2009's ATL RMX, he reconfigured Young Jeezy's "I Got This" with a punishing beat that somehow managed to overexert its will on the guy rapping. We get wheezing organs, incessantly ticking hi-hats, guitar skronk, and soul claps tamed to do Mike and El's evil bidding whether it's B-boy boom bap ("Jojo's Chillin'") or chain-swang braggadocio ("Butane (Champion's Anthem)"). I'm tempted to call it "warm," but so is nuclear radiation, and the bass most often sounds like a monstrous, gleefully evil sandworm that could guest star on "Aqua Teen Hunger Force". On the closing title track, Mike equates R.A."

Fields

Everything Last Winter

Marc Hogan

London quintet Fields grabbed headlines overseas last year for the label bidding war that ultimately found them a place with venerable Warner Music Group subsidiary Atlantic. If there's anything American indie rock fans have largely rediscovered in the last couple of years, it's that a jump to a major label doesn't necessarily mean a band has started to suck. Among the more recent examples, Death Cab for Cutie and then the Decemberists executed the transition with only minor stylistic changes, the latter group if anything becoming weirder. Fields haven't started to suck, either, but they have gone from winsome guitar-pop group to unwieldy big-room behemoths. Maybe they figured Muse's shift toward glammed-out dance-rock on last year's Supermassive Black Hole left room for another purveyor of overly compressed post-Radiohead mope. Everything Last Winter still has the close boy/girl harmonies, insistent songwriting, and restrained squalls of the band's early releases, including 2006's 7 From the Village EP; it's still, in the words of Pitchfork's Stuart Berman, a "Zach Braff panty-remover soundtrack." On the other hand, it's harder to get someone else naked when you keep putting on more and more layers of clothing. Like another hushed UK indie band gone arena-ready, Snow Patrol, Fields really do have the tunes and the detached grandeur to one day potentially play big venues. While their songs may lack the wounded emotional verisimilitude of Gary Lightbody's best work, they share his Glasgow band's predilection for restrained, shoegaze-indebted white-noise tendrils. Single "If You Fail We All Fail" distills the band's perpetually ascending shimmer into nearly six minutes of electronic Slowdive swirls, submerged acoustic guitars, and the vocal interplay of singer/guitarist Nick Peill with keyboardist Thorunn Antonia. "I need you as much as they do," the two murmur, their vaguely pleasant vagueness almost (but never quite) overcome by superfluous overdubs and reverb. This is where college-town babies come from. As big as the heart-swelling hooks get, though, Fields are more memorable when they let their early-1970s folk ghosts creep into the corners of their songs like dusty cobwebs. Antonia's breathy coo takes the lead amid the modal whir of "Feathers", but the song loses its way in the woods during a final crescendo of whitecapped guitar, strings, and effects. The lofty vocal harmonies of Peill, Antonia, and drummer Henry Spenner finally get some space to settle in on languid acoustic waltz "Schoolbooks". Songs such as these, the ironically sweet "Skulls and Flesh and More" and lilting campfire closer "Parasite" suggest Fields might've been like a more mystical Magic Numbers if there had never been a Doves or Elbow. The band (and producer Michael Beinhorn, whose credits include Korn, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Soundgarden along with Mew and Herbie Hancock), must have had other ideas. Surging opener "A Song for the Fields", here in its latest of many incarnations, encapsulates Fields' shift from folk-tinged British rockers to red-line anthem hawkers, thick with so many heavily compressed effects and guitar fireworks that the song has, paradoxically, gotten less direct even as it's become more radio-polished. Perhaps it's as Peill proclaims over a Snow Patrol thrum on "Charming the Flames": "Passion makes you vain." Halloween-ready rocker "The Death" is an ill-advised sojourn into demonic whispers (unsurprisingly, Beinhorn has also produced Marilyn Manson). On the Pete Yorn-like "You Don't Need This Song (To Fix Your Broken Heart)", yet another track that undercuts its catchiness with anonymizing slickness, Peill adds, "Sing this song like any other one/ 'Cause they're all the same." Thing is, they're really not, but on Everything Last Winter it eventually starts to sound that way.

Artist: Fields, Album: Everything Last Winter, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 5.9 Album review: "London quintet Fields grabbed headlines overseas last year for the label bidding war that ultimately found them a place with venerable Warner Music Group subsidiary Atlantic. If there's anything American indie rock fans have largely rediscovered in the last couple of years, it's that a jump to a major label doesn't necessarily mean a band has started to suck. Among the more recent examples, Death Cab for Cutie and then the Decemberists executed the transition with only minor stylistic changes, the latter group if anything becoming weirder. Fields haven't started to suck, either, but they have gone from winsome guitar-pop group to unwieldy big-room behemoths. Maybe they figured Muse's shift toward glammed-out dance-rock on last year's Supermassive Black Hole left room for another purveyor of overly compressed post-Radiohead mope. Everything Last Winter still has the close boy/girl harmonies, insistent songwriting, and restrained squalls of the band's early releases, including 2006's 7 From the Village EP; it's still, in the words of Pitchfork's Stuart Berman, a "Zach Braff panty-remover soundtrack." On the other hand, it's harder to get someone else naked when you keep putting on more and more layers of clothing. Like another hushed UK indie band gone arena-ready, Snow Patrol, Fields really do have the tunes and the detached grandeur to one day potentially play big venues. While their songs may lack the wounded emotional verisimilitude of Gary Lightbody's best work, they share his Glasgow band's predilection for restrained, shoegaze-indebted white-noise tendrils. Single "If You Fail We All Fail" distills the band's perpetually ascending shimmer into nearly six minutes of electronic Slowdive swirls, submerged acoustic guitars, and the vocal interplay of singer/guitarist Nick Peill with keyboardist Thorunn Antonia. "I need you as much as they do," the two murmur, their vaguely pleasant vagueness almost (but never quite) overcome by superfluous overdubs and reverb. This is where college-town babies come from. As big as the heart-swelling hooks get, though, Fields are more memorable when they let their early-1970s folk ghosts creep into the corners of their songs like dusty cobwebs. Antonia's breathy coo takes the lead amid the modal whir of "Feathers", but the song loses its way in the woods during a final crescendo of whitecapped guitar, strings, and effects. The lofty vocal harmonies of Peill, Antonia, and drummer Henry Spenner finally get some space to settle in on languid acoustic waltz "Schoolbooks". Songs such as these, the ironically sweet "Skulls and Flesh and More" and lilting campfire closer "Parasite" suggest Fields might've been like a more mystical Magic Numbers if there had never been a Doves or Elbow. The band (and producer Michael Beinhorn, whose credits include Korn, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Soundgarden along with Mew and Herbie Hancock), must have had other ideas. Surging opener "A Song for the Fields", here in its latest of many incarnations, encapsulates Fields' shift from folk-tinged British rockers to red-line anthem hawkers, thick with so many heavily compressed effects and guitar fireworks that the song has, paradoxically, gotten less direct even as it's become more radio-polished. Perhaps it's as Peill proclaims over a Snow Patrol thrum on "Charming the Flames": "Passion makes you vain." Halloween-ready rocker "The Death" is an ill-advised sojourn into demonic whispers (unsurprisingly, Beinhorn has also produced Marilyn Manson). On the Pete Yorn-like "You Don't Need This Song (To Fix Your Broken Heart)", yet another track that undercuts its catchiness with anonymizing slickness, Peill adds, "Sing this song like any other one/ 'Cause they're all the same." Thing is, they're really not, but on Everything Last Winter it eventually starts to sound that way."

Man Man

Six Demon Bag

Experimental,Rock

Nick Sylvester

What a backward sophomore record. You'd think after all the Zappa/Waits/Beefheart darts thrown his way after the band's 2004 debut, lead singer Honus Honus would cut the gravel shtick-- the stache, too. Instead, he seems to have bought all three's entire discographies over again, zeroing in on Waits' freak empathy, Zappa's klezmatics and turnarounds, the Captain's sense of surprise. We know exactly what he's building in there. In the process, though, Honus lost his former bandmates, and possibly a lot more. This big-top ringleader whose barely prophetic ramblings and nauseous yelps we delighted in last time around as mere entertainment now asks us to move closer, listen not to the sounds, but to the songs-- the pleas for help. I didn't expect people to dig The Man in a Blue Turban With a Face, same reason I wouldn't drag them to Deerhoof or put a plastic snake in their drink as a joke. Unfocused and sloppy and more of-the-moment than of-the-whole, that record was possibly the polar opposite of what some people value musically. This time out, Man Man's less sloppy but just as ramshackle, as if the snaps and crackles are the band's diversion from actually writing the record. As a song and title, the breakneck "Young Einstein on the Beach" might be more self-referential than the band intended. They're still tending to the same changes, the same high-pitched call-and-response tropes, and the waltz time, and those parts can blur together a bit. But plenty of good moments pop out by relation: that "mous-tache mous-tache mous-tache" breakdown on "Push the Eagle's Stomach" with video game power-up sounds as the retrigger, the song's "So What" ending, the guitarless Sabbath riffs, the weird keyboard sound halfway between "96 Tears", and the noise made when two rubber Little Caesars dolls are scrubbed together. Or take the accordion melody on "Banana Ghost", or the dozens of great lyrical turns, such as on the appropriately sparse "Skin Tension" ("Let down my guard/ And there goes my heart/ Straight out the window again"), or on "Black Mission Goggles", something of a misfit toy remake of "Come Together" (Beatles, not Annie): "She's a warm bodega/ High on Noreaga," Honus shouts, thus giving Jens Lekman a run for his rap ref rep. Just so you know, the line after "Noreaga" is this: "Strung out in Brooklyn cos I love her." Happens a lot here: The fun stops, the façade is dropped for a split second, and suddenly Man Man's circus act isn't nearly as interesting as the tension of them maintaining it. That push/pull is why Six Demon Bag sticks so much more than the last. Granted, the band relies on the same structure for most of these moments-- percussion drops out, locker-room singing, then the sober line-- but damnit can they do sober: "You should always run with a loaded gun in your mouth," or, "When the night breaks, and the clouds shake, and your hopes ache, to someday be redeemed," or, "I know I'll never be the man that she thinks she really needs/ But it don't stop me from trying to be." Despite/because, Man Man's most focused song here is also their most debilitating. On "Van Helsing Boombox", Honus hums and whistles along to the bell hook, delaying himself from articulating the actualities of a breakup: learning "how to speak a forgotten language", wanting "to sleep for weeks like a dog at her feet," falling in the street and howling at the moon. Think of the man you most admire-- your father, maybe-- then remember the first time you saw him cry. The song hits like that: broken and embarrassed and yards of dirt more convincing than your Glibbards and Blight Eyes. Why "Van Helsing" works so well as an album track, though, is it really heightens the sudden change of heart on closer "Ice Dogs": Starts stubborn ("Am I supposed to close my eyes as you walk away from me?") but how quickly that old love again comes back-- chirpy horns, girl group shoo-wops, smiles for smiles. It's pathetic. It's fantastic drama, too-- rare for any work, let alone a fucking rock album, to pull off so well in 40 minutes. "C'est la vie/ Don't abandon me/ When the bridge burns down and the bad blood tastes like wine." Punch-drunk and happy for now, but it's still blood.

Artist: Man Man, Album: Six Demon Bag, Genre: Experimental,Rock, Score (1-10): 8.3 Album review: "What a backward sophomore record. You'd think after all the Zappa/Waits/Beefheart darts thrown his way after the band's 2004 debut, lead singer Honus Honus would cut the gravel shtick-- the stache, too. Instead, he seems to have bought all three's entire discographies over again, zeroing in on Waits' freak empathy, Zappa's klezmatics and turnarounds, the Captain's sense of surprise. We know exactly what he's building in there. In the process, though, Honus lost his former bandmates, and possibly a lot more. This big-top ringleader whose barely prophetic ramblings and nauseous yelps we delighted in last time around as mere entertainment now asks us to move closer, listen not to the sounds, but to the songs-- the pleas for help. I didn't expect people to dig The Man in a Blue Turban With a Face, same reason I wouldn't drag them to Deerhoof or put a plastic snake in their drink as a joke. Unfocused and sloppy and more of-the-moment than of-the-whole, that record was possibly the polar opposite of what some people value musically. This time out, Man Man's less sloppy but just as ramshackle, as if the snaps and crackles are the band's diversion from actually writing the record. As a song and title, the breakneck "Young Einstein on the Beach" might be more self-referential than the band intended. They're still tending to the same changes, the same high-pitched call-and-response tropes, and the waltz time, and those parts can blur together a bit. But plenty of good moments pop out by relation: that "mous-tache mous-tache mous-tache" breakdown on "Push the Eagle's Stomach" with video game power-up sounds as the retrigger, the song's "So What" ending, the guitarless Sabbath riffs, the weird keyboard sound halfway between "96 Tears", and the noise made when two rubber Little Caesars dolls are scrubbed together. Or take the accordion melody on "Banana Ghost", or the dozens of great lyrical turns, such as on the appropriately sparse "Skin Tension" ("Let down my guard/ And there goes my heart/ Straight out the window again"), or on "Black Mission Goggles", something of a misfit toy remake of "Come Together" (Beatles, not Annie): "She's a warm bodega/ High on Noreaga," Honus shouts, thus giving Jens Lekman a run for his rap ref rep. Just so you know, the line after "Noreaga" is this: "Strung out in Brooklyn cos I love her." Happens a lot here: The fun stops, the façade is dropped for a split second, and suddenly Man Man's circus act isn't nearly as interesting as the tension of them maintaining it. That push/pull is why Six Demon Bag sticks so much more than the last. Granted, the band relies on the same structure for most of these moments-- percussion drops out, locker-room singing, then the sober line-- but damnit can they do sober: "You should always run with a loaded gun in your mouth," or, "When the night breaks, and the clouds shake, and your hopes ache, to someday be redeemed," or, "I know I'll never be the man that she thinks she really needs/ But it don't stop me from trying to be." Despite/because, Man Man's most focused song here is also their most debilitating. On "Van Helsing Boombox", Honus hums and whistles along to the bell hook, delaying himself from articulating the actualities of a breakup: learning "how to speak a forgotten language", wanting "to sleep for weeks like a dog at her feet," falling in the street and howling at the moon. Think of the man you most admire-- your father, maybe-- then remember the first time you saw him cry. The song hits like that: broken and embarrassed and yards of dirt more convincing than your Glibbards and Blight Eyes. Why "Van Helsing" works so well as an album track, though, is it really heightens the sudden change of heart on closer "Ice Dogs": Starts stubborn ("Am I supposed to close my eyes as you walk away from me?") but how quickly that old love again comes back-- chirpy horns, girl group shoo-wops, smiles for smiles. It's pathetic. It's fantastic drama, too-- rare for any work, let alone a fucking rock album, to pull off so well in 40 minutes. "C'est la vie/ Don't abandon me/ When the bridge burns down and the bad blood tastes like wine." Punch-drunk and happy for now, but it's still blood."

Nicholas Krgovich

“Ouch”

Rock

Calum Marsh

“You learn that so much of the fear and anxiety that exists about letting people know what’s going on with you is so much your own thing,” Nicholas Krgovich said in a recent interview with Discorder magazine, a realization borne of a “newfound interest in clarity and transparency.” From this he has derived a lesson: “No one cares, basically.” This well-fuck-it attitude helps account for Krogvich’s extraordinary candor. On his latest album “Ouch”, the Vancouver singer-songwriter lays everything bare, divulging private pains without a shadow of reserve or self-consciousness. “Ouch” was a provoked by a breakup—Krgovich’s first, despite being 35 at the time of the album’s writing. Over the course of 12 grief-stricken, heavy-hearted songs, he relays the anguish of being left by a man he loved a great deal. The aftermath seethes with dejection and despondency, torments that seem in the moment permanent, with no prospect of relief. “I wake up and I hate this room/And I hate this coffee/And I hate this food,” he laments with grim conviction on “Goofy,” coming off as almost childishly inconsolable. “It’s hard to imagine a time when I won’t at least feel a shade this way.” At no point on “Ouch” does this hurt ease up. The juvenile quality of Krgovich’s heartache, miserable in the most self-pitying way, is not a shortcoming. Instead, it captures truthfully the experience of being dumped—in all its callow, hair-pulling, feet-stomping injustice. “No amount of Jonathan Richman, Hafiz and Alain de Botton is stopping me/From screaming ‘fuck you’ into the air,” Krgovich croons blithely on “Spa.” “No amount of going out and spending time with friends pretending that you don’t exist/Is doing anything.” It hardly flatters Krgovich to sound this sullen and resentful. Yet he never downplays the pettiness he’s feeling, for the sake of tact or dignity, instead embracing the part of the bitterly jilted. Risking embarrassment in this way is a brave gambit, and it works on “Ouch” because Krgovich fully commits to the truth, or at least his side of it. When he confides the particulars of the relationship and its strange, uneven dynamics on “Guilt,” his reflections feel like the product of someone unflinchingly honest with his own weaknesses. “I spent all my 20s/Atrophied, barely alive,” he sings. “Thought that might even the playing field/A nice thought, but a lie.” Krgovich is honest enough about his anger to direct rancor at his ex but he is smart—and given the circumstances, gallant—enough to share the blame. Even at his most overtly forlorn Krgovich keeps things jaunty: “Everything’s fine I guess/But I wish I were dead,” he sings on “Hinoki,” but the tone is distinctly sunny, his delicate voice awash in twangy acoustic guitar and some ethereal backing “oohs” and “ahhs.” An occasional saxophone solo whisks “Ouch” into rosy yacht rock territory, or perhaps into the realm of Destroyer’s Kaputt, with which this album shares an affinity for a retro smooth-jazz and soft-rock aesthetic. And on a half-dozen tracks he makes use of analog drum loops courtesy of Owen Ashworth, whose project Casiotone for the Painfully Alone practically trademarked this kind of intimate-ebullient melancholy. In a kind of introductory essay to the album published on his Bandcamp page, Krgovich writes effusively about a “WTF With Marc Maron” podcast featuring Lorde. “She had just put out a breakup album and said something like she didn’t write about the specifics of the relationship because she didn’t want to build a totem to this one particular person,” Krgovich explains. “What I had just made with “Ouch” was all specificity.” It’s an instructive comparison. While Melodrama has the universal scope of not just a breakup but the breakup, about all breakups, “Ouch” is utterly, unapologetically about Krgovich’s own, an album of unvarnished particulars and graphic details. That doesn’t make “Ouch” less relatable. It has the opposite effect. Its specificity is what makes it ring true.

Artist: Nicholas Krgovich, Album: “Ouch”, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: "“You learn that so much of the fear and anxiety that exists about letting people know what’s going on with you is so much your own thing,” Nicholas Krgovich said in a recent interview with Discorder magazine, a realization borne of a “newfound interest in clarity and transparency.” From this he has derived a lesson: “No one cares, basically.” This well-fuck-it attitude helps account for Krogvich’s extraordinary candor. On his latest album “Ouch”, the Vancouver singer-songwriter lays everything bare, divulging private pains without a shadow of reserve or self-consciousness. “Ouch” was a provoked by a breakup—Krgovich’s first, despite being 35 at the time of the album’s writing. Over the course of 12 grief-stricken, heavy-hearted songs, he relays the anguish of being left by a man he loved a great deal. The aftermath seethes with dejection and despondency, torments that seem in the moment permanent, with no prospect of relief. “I wake up and I hate this room/And I hate this coffee/And I hate this food,” he laments with grim conviction on “Goofy,” coming off as almost childishly inconsolable. “It’s hard to imagine a time when I won’t at least feel a shade this way.” At no point on “Ouch” does this hurt ease up. The juvenile quality of Krgovich’s heartache, miserable in the most self-pitying way, is not a shortcoming. Instead, it captures truthfully the experience of being dumped—in all its callow, hair-pulling, feet-stomping injustice. “No amount of Jonathan Richman, Hafiz and Alain de Botton is stopping me/From screaming ‘fuck you’ into the air,” Krgovich croons blithely on “Spa.” “No amount of going out and spending time with friends pretending that you don’t exist/Is doing anything.” It hardly flatters Krgovich to sound this sullen and resentful. Yet he never downplays the pettiness he’s feeling, for the sake of tact or dignity, instead embracing the part of the bitterly jilted. Risking embarrassment in this way is a brave gambit, and it works on “Ouch” because Krgovich fully commits to the truth, or at least his side of it. When he confides the particulars of the relationship and its strange, uneven dynamics on “Guilt,” his reflections feel like the product of someone unflinchingly honest with his own weaknesses. “I spent all my 20s/Atrophied, barely alive,” he sings. “Thought that might even the playing field/A nice thought, but a lie.” Krgovich is honest enough about his anger to direct rancor at his ex but he is smart—and given the circumstances, gallant—enough to share the blame. Even at his most overtly forlorn Krgovich keeps things jaunty: “Everything’s fine I guess/But I wish I were dead,” he sings on “Hinoki,” but the tone is distinctly sunny, his delicate voice awash in twangy acoustic guitar and some ethereal backing “oohs” and “ahhs.” An occasional saxophone solo whisks “Ouch” into rosy yacht rock territory, or perhaps into the realm of Destroyer’s Kaputt, with which this album shares an affinity for a retro smooth-jazz and soft-rock aesthetic. And on a half-dozen tracks he makes use of analog drum loops courtesy of Owen Ashworth, whose project Casiotone for the Painfully Alone practically trademarked this kind of intimate-ebullient melancholy. In a kind of introductory essay to the album published on his Bandcamp page, Krgovich writes effusively about a “WTF With Marc Maron” podcast featuring Lorde. “She had just put out a breakup album and said something like she didn’t write about the specifics of the relationship because she didn’t want to build a totem to this one particular person,” Krgovich explains. “What I had just made with “Ouch” was all specificity.” It’s an instructive comparison. While Melodrama has the universal scope of not just a breakup but the breakup, about all breakups, “Ouch” is utterly, unapologetically about Krgovich’s own, an album of unvarnished particulars and graphic details. That doesn’t make “Ouch” less relatable. It has the opposite effect. Its specificity is what makes it ring true."

Palms

Palms

Rock

Ian Cohen

Flash back a couple of years, and it seemed like Isis and Deftones were going to converge if they didn't collaborate first. On Isis' 2009 swan song Wavering Radiant, the Los Angeles band’s increasingly accessible and grandiose doom metal started to sound like blown-out Deftones instrumentals, whereas Deftones’ increasingly lush and knotty alt-metal could pass for compressed Isis. So Palms is a sensible pairing, a partnership between Deftones vocalist Chino Moreno and three members of Isis (drummer Aaron Harris, guitarist Cliff Meyer, and bassist Jeff Caxide) that promises a Postal Service-like mutual benefit: those responsible for the backing music get a tremendous profile boost, while the lead singer is granted a modicum of cred that wrongly escapes his main band, whose diverse and progressive catalog still gets stereotyped as caricatured teen angst. It's an exciting proposition for fans of both Isis and Deftones, but more because of what might result for the participating musicians than the resulting music. On Palms, the underlying parts fit together so smoothly that there's never any friction that could lead to a spark. Based on advance single "Patagonia", Palms has been dubbed “dream metal”, which isn't very accurate: expect to temper your expectations based on the “metal” part, which is clearly tacked on due to reputation. Palms never rocks, at least not in a way that places physical demands on the listener. Moreover, while the lugubrious tempos and luxurious production ensures there’s always presence and body to Palms, there isn’t much heft. In fact, fast forward to “Tropics” and see how literal Moreno gets with the lyrics: “I kiss you goodbye/ And release in the sky/ I stare in your core/ As you rush from the shore.” Whereas Deftones' “Knife Prty”or “Romantic Dreams” maintained an edge of consensual danger that allowed both sensuality and sexuality, "Tropics" suggests Moreno may be using Palms to follow his makeout music muse to an endpoint of chillwave. Which is promising in a sense; at least you know Palms isn’t entirely redundant. But it’s more so than you might think. Glistening opener “Future Warrior” isn’t all that far off from Deftones’ more sensitive and balmy recent work-- think “Entombed” from Koi No Yokan, “Sextape” from Diamond Eyes. But without as much verse/chorus guidance, the six songs on Palms often stretch out past seven minutes, taking as much time as possible to get nowhere in particular. The titles are more new age than nu-metal, so it’s obvious they’re meant to accompany some sort of spiritual journey rather than guide you through a visceral one. It’s the sort of work most would call “exploratory," except both parties are locked into defined and familiar roles from the very beginning. Meyer can spin silvery riffs at will, slicked with delay and reverb, pinging around the stereo field. But once you’ve heard him do it once on “Future Warrior", you’ve more or less heard Palms in its entirety. The only notable shifts in texture are the result of additional delay and reverb, such as the anti-gravity, post-rock reverie that closes out “Antarctic Handshake” or the encroaching humidity achieved on “Tropics”. Moreno is every bit as complicit. While his whispery pillow talk makes Deftones stand out among their mainstream rock peers, which remain oddly neutered or disturbingly macho, P**alms proves context is key for him on multiple levels. Even the most ardent Deftones fans will admit Moreno’s only got one move in this mode, and that’s to basically rewrite “Change (in the House Of Flies)”, floating a couple of longing, breathy notes that can sound like they’re being filtered through a random pitch generator. His melodies are typically impossible to hum along with, but they're extremely effective while juxtaposed with gnarled riffs, serving as a setup for a knee-buckling chorus, or as a leadup to using his preferred vocal EQ'ing that sounds like phone sex over a walkie-talkie. These moments of catharsis or even contrast never arrive, and less than halfway through, Palms is so entrenched in a specific mood that the songs themselves become interchangeable. Whether out of mutual respect or just a stubborn adherence to a preordained ideal, no one involved does much to push each other; when Moreno allows himself a scream on “Mission Sunset", it feels overly cautious-- his backing band doesn’t follow suit. This isn’t meant to foster some debate about the superiority of Deftones over Isis, though the former is far more suited to enhancing Moreno’s strengths. The unfortunate truth is that Palms isolates and expands upon some of the least interesting attributes of its creators. Still, Palms is an admirable effort that’s entirely within Moreno’s M.O.: his first major side gig was the trip-hop inspired Team Sleep and while his Crosses witch-house project was widely mocked, that’s more the fault of witch house than Moreno. Add in the sneaky Cocteau Twins homages and Cure covers, and it’s clear Moreno is very earnest about being taken seriously as a connoisseur of “pretty” music. But the anodyne idea of beauty established on Palms can’t help but sound tame and limited in light of how Pinkish Black, Blut aus Nord, Deafheaven or even Sigur Rós’ Kveikur are establishing ways for metal to double as makeout music without skimping on the heavy petting.

Artist: Palms, Album: Palms, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.5 Album review: "Flash back a couple of years, and it seemed like Isis and Deftones were going to converge if they didn't collaborate first. On Isis' 2009 swan song Wavering Radiant, the Los Angeles band’s increasingly accessible and grandiose doom metal started to sound like blown-out Deftones instrumentals, whereas Deftones’ increasingly lush and knotty alt-metal could pass for compressed Isis. So Palms is a sensible pairing, a partnership between Deftones vocalist Chino Moreno and three members of Isis (drummer Aaron Harris, guitarist Cliff Meyer, and bassist Jeff Caxide) that promises a Postal Service-like mutual benefit: those responsible for the backing music get a tremendous profile boost, while the lead singer is granted a modicum of cred that wrongly escapes his main band, whose diverse and progressive catalog still gets stereotyped as caricatured teen angst. It's an exciting proposition for fans of both Isis and Deftones, but more because of what might result for the participating musicians than the resulting music. On Palms, the underlying parts fit together so smoothly that there's never any friction that could lead to a spark. Based on advance single "Patagonia", Palms has been dubbed “dream metal”, which isn't very accurate: expect to temper your expectations based on the “metal” part, which is clearly tacked on due to reputation. Palms never rocks, at least not in a way that places physical demands on the listener. Moreover, while the lugubrious tempos and luxurious production ensures there’s always presence and body to Palms, there isn’t much heft. In fact, fast forward to “Tropics” and see how literal Moreno gets with the lyrics: “I kiss you goodbye/ And release in the sky/ I stare in your core/ As you rush from the shore.” Whereas Deftones' “Knife Prty”or “Romantic Dreams” maintained an edge of consensual danger that allowed both sensuality and sexuality, "Tropics" suggests Moreno may be using Palms to follow his makeout music muse to an endpoint of chillwave. Which is promising in a sense; at least you know Palms isn’t entirely redundant. But it’s more so than you might think. Glistening opener “Future Warrior” isn’t all that far off from Deftones’ more sensitive and balmy recent work-- think “Entombed” from Koi No Yokan, “Sextape” from Diamond Eyes. But without as much verse/chorus guidance, the six songs on Palms often stretch out past seven minutes, taking as much time as possible to get nowhere in particular. The titles are more new age than nu-metal, so it’s obvious they’re meant to accompany some sort of spiritual journey rather than guide you through a visceral one. It’s the sort of work most would call “exploratory," except both parties are locked into defined and familiar roles from the very beginning. Meyer can spin silvery riffs at will, slicked with delay and reverb, pinging around the stereo field. But once you’ve heard him do it once on “Future Warrior", you’ve more or less heard Palms in its entirety. The only notable shifts in texture are the result of additional delay and reverb, such as the anti-gravity, post-rock reverie that closes out “Antarctic Handshake” or the encroaching humidity achieved on “Tropics”. Moreno is every bit as complicit. While his whispery pillow talk makes Deftones stand out among their mainstream rock peers, which remain oddly neutered or disturbingly macho, P**alms proves context is key for him on multiple levels. Even the most ardent Deftones fans will admit Moreno’s only got one move in this mode, and that’s to basically rewrite “Change (in the House Of Flies)”, floating a couple of longing, breathy notes that can sound like they’re being filtered through a random pitch generator. His melodies are typically impossible to hum along with, but they're extremely effective while juxtaposed with gnarled riffs, serving as a setup for a knee-buckling chorus, or as a leadup to using his preferred vocal EQ'ing that sounds like phone sex over a walkie-talkie. These moments of catharsis or even contrast never arrive, and less than halfway through, Palms is so entrenched in a specific mood that the songs themselves become interchangeable. Whether out of mutual respect or just a stubborn adherence to a preordained ideal, no one involved does much to push each other; when Moreno allows himself a scream on “Mission Sunset", it feels overly cautious-- his backing band doesn’t follow suit. This isn’t meant to foster some debate about the superiority of Deftones over Isis, though the former is far more suited to enhancing Moreno’s strengths. The unfortunate truth is that Palms isolates and expands upon some of the least interesting attributes of its creators. Still, Palms is an admirable effort that’s entirely within Moreno’s M.O.: his first major side gig was the trip-hop inspired Team Sleep and while his Crosses witch-house project was widely mocked, that’s more the fault of witch house than Moreno. Add in the sneaky Cocteau Twins homages and Cure covers, and it’s clear Moreno is very earnest about being taken seriously as a connoisseur of “pretty” music. But the anodyne idea of beauty established on Palms can’t help but sound tame and limited in light of how Pinkish Black, Blut aus Nord, Deafheaven or even Sigur Rós’ Kveikur are establishing ways for metal to double as makeout music without skimping on the heavy petting."

Throwing Muses

Throwing Muses

Rock

Chris Dahlen

Does Kristin Hersh have the most terrifying voice in rock? Many singers embrace higher drama or shred their vocal cords with icier shrieks, but there's an eerie steadiness in Hersh's voice-- an enthrallment that goes deeper than the mere sound of her singing, part crow, part Wicked Witch of the West and part vengeful alternative rock icon. Of all the artists who've invoked the cliché of losing control to their inspiration, Hersh is one of the few to make it convincing; she delivers her most harrowing lyrics with a delicate serenity, and her simplest with a frightening, reeling delirium. Her voice and surreal images were the key to the success of Throwing Muses, before the group disbanded. Hersh didn't want to break up the Muses, the band she's led since high school: It ended in the mid-90s for financial, not creative reasons. And that's the only way to explain how, when some funding came through, they could reform and cut a new album that sounds like they'd never been apart. Often, critics give a veteran band extra credit when they reunite-- props that were perhaps due long ago and never offered, or just bonus points for not having dropped dead in their autumn years. I can't think of many albums that need fewer crutches than this one. Without rivaling University or The Real Ramona, it's different from, yet far rawer than, anything since their debut. Fans will suck up the nostalgia as Hersh brings back not just her last rhythm section (Bernard Georges on bass and mainstay David Narcizo on drums), but also founding Muse Tanya Donelly, who adds seraphic harmony vocals. After several years of sporadic collaborations they jumped into the project without even rehearsing: They cut the album in just three weekends with minimal overdubs, giving it a clean and "live" sound that sticks solidly to an unembellished power trio. There are no acoustic tracks, no slow or atmospheric ballads (like University's "Crabtown")-- nothing but torrential, skidding, hard rock, right from the almost anthemic first track, "Mercury", which cuts through different ways of opening the throttle before it wrenches into the chorus. With such a consistent sound the songs bleed into each other, but Hersh's writing is still intriguingly unpredictable. Some of the songs are catchy almost after the fact-- like the perfect riff and matter-of-fact weirdness of her delivery on "Portia", or the erupting chorus on "Pretty or Not". Others sound like they were Frankensteined together from the verse, chorus and bridge of completely different songs and smoothed out by the guitars: You've got the mood change from dark to ecstatic on "Half Blast"-- if Donelly had written any songs here, this would be the one-- or the way "Solar Dip" jerks between time signatures. And that's not to ignore the grinding dirges like "Speed and Sleep" that just pound themselves into a dark hole. Throwing Muses skip the production polish that brightened up albums like University, but they've found the perfect sweetener in Donelly's backing vocals. As limited as her contribution may be-- she sticks to backup and only sings on half the songs-- her lines are melodically gorgeous, high and pure against Hersh's lower, somewhat raspy vocals. But her presence alone isn't what makes this so joyous. Throwing Muses are the counterpart-- or maybe the antidote-- to the driven, enraptured solitude of her solo material; they deliver a release and an excitement that's been missing from her work for years. Their reunion is heavy, driven stuff-- as inherently inexplicable as the best, darkest Muses work-- but it's also ecstatic. This band has seized an opportunity that may never strike for them again, and they're celebrating it as though there were no tomorrow.

Artist: Throwing Muses, Album: Throwing Muses, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 8.2 Album review: "Does Kristin Hersh have the most terrifying voice in rock? Many singers embrace higher drama or shred their vocal cords with icier shrieks, but there's an eerie steadiness in Hersh's voice-- an enthrallment that goes deeper than the mere sound of her singing, part crow, part Wicked Witch of the West and part vengeful alternative rock icon. Of all the artists who've invoked the cliché of losing control to their inspiration, Hersh is one of the few to make it convincing; she delivers her most harrowing lyrics with a delicate serenity, and her simplest with a frightening, reeling delirium. Her voice and surreal images were the key to the success of Throwing Muses, before the group disbanded. Hersh didn't want to break up the Muses, the band she's led since high school: It ended in the mid-90s for financial, not creative reasons. And that's the only way to explain how, when some funding came through, they could reform and cut a new album that sounds like they'd never been apart. Often, critics give a veteran band extra credit when they reunite-- props that were perhaps due long ago and never offered, or just bonus points for not having dropped dead in their autumn years. I can't think of many albums that need fewer crutches than this one. Without rivaling University or The Real Ramona, it's different from, yet far rawer than, anything since their debut. Fans will suck up the nostalgia as Hersh brings back not just her last rhythm section (Bernard Georges on bass and mainstay David Narcizo on drums), but also founding Muse Tanya Donelly, who adds seraphic harmony vocals. After several years of sporadic collaborations they jumped into the project without even rehearsing: They cut the album in just three weekends with minimal overdubs, giving it a clean and "live" sound that sticks solidly to an unembellished power trio. There are no acoustic tracks, no slow or atmospheric ballads (like University's "Crabtown")-- nothing but torrential, skidding, hard rock, right from the almost anthemic first track, "Mercury", which cuts through different ways of opening the throttle before it wrenches into the chorus. With such a consistent sound the songs bleed into each other, but Hersh's writing is still intriguingly unpredictable. Some of the songs are catchy almost after the fact-- like the perfect riff and matter-of-fact weirdness of her delivery on "Portia", or the erupting chorus on "Pretty or Not". Others sound like they were Frankensteined together from the verse, chorus and bridge of completely different songs and smoothed out by the guitars: You've got the mood change from dark to ecstatic on "Half Blast"-- if Donelly had written any songs here, this would be the one-- or the way "Solar Dip" jerks between time signatures. And that's not to ignore the grinding dirges like "Speed and Sleep" that just pound themselves into a dark hole. Throwing Muses skip the production polish that brightened up albums like University, but they've found the perfect sweetener in Donelly's backing vocals. As limited as her contribution may be-- she sticks to backup and only sings on half the songs-- her lines are melodically gorgeous, high and pure against Hersh's lower, somewhat raspy vocals. But her presence alone isn't what makes this so joyous. Throwing Muses are the counterpart-- or maybe the antidote-- to the driven, enraptured solitude of her solo material; they deliver a release and an excitement that's been missing from her work for years. Their reunion is heavy, driven stuff-- as inherently inexplicable as the best, darkest Muses work-- but it's also ecstatic. This band has seized an opportunity that may never strike for them again, and they're celebrating it as though there were no tomorrow."

Boom Bip

Corymb

Electronic,Rap

Liam Singer

Like a lemming at a cliff, or a fork-wielding child before a wall socket, I am forever destined to impulsively purchase remix collections and collaborative efforts touting my favorite artists as its contributors, despite the fact that such albums have disappointed for years. These releases promise the potential inherent in a wide spectrum of creative minds refining each other's best qualities, yet tend to instead showcase talented musicians on autopilot. Like anybody else, artists are prone to phoning it in when the stakes aren't high, and can be reluctant to let go of a great idea in the service of someone else's name-- sentiments bluntly summed up in the title of Aphex Twin's last release, 26 Mixes for Cash. Happily, Boom Bip's new offering, Corymb, is one of the few recent remix collections into which it is apparent the contributors have invested thought, effort and care, resulting in an appealing investigation of the variegated sounds surrounding Boom Bip's musical peer group. Corymb is a combination of two EPs released in the last two years, From Left to Right and Morning and a Day. Replicating the coffee-stained packaging concept of his debut, Mr. Bip makes it clear that this is not a new album proper. It is Seed to Sun's companion disc, offering six remixes, three B-sides, and two Peel sessions. All of Boom Bip's new tracks are appealing uptempo instrumentals sharing more in common with each other than do any three songs from his schizophrenic debut. Both "From Left to Right" and "Morning and a Day" feature spacious guitars laid over bouncy synths; "In the Tree Top" begins to explore similar territory, but ends prematurely. The included Peel session versions of Seed to Sun tracks feel a little sprawling against the tight, focused sound elsewhere on this CD, but coherence is not the goal of this collection, and the new version of "Pulse All Over" makes for an epic closer. For the most part, Boom Bip's remixers thoughtfully walk the line of augmentation vs. obliteration regarding their source material. The chilly, muzak-laden dissonance in the Boards of Canada's "Last Walk Round Mirror Lake" remix adds a sinister touch to the lo-fi guitar that closed out Seed to Sun, and recalls the Boards' 2000 single "In a Beautiful Place out in the Country". Venetian Snares' Aaron Funk coaxes a jittery, paranoid track out of "The Unthinkable", while (surprisingly) leaving the song-- featuring the voice of Buck 65-- in recognizable form. Conversely, cLOUDDEAD's deconstruction of "Closed Shoulders" jumbles Boom Bip's beat-driven original into a drone reminiscent of the instrumental passages on their self-titled debut. Four Tet's excellent take on "Third Stream" stutters through a slew of rhythmic typewriter keys before introducing the double bass that anchors both versions of the song. Lali Puna crafts a subdued, uplifting track from the darker and more expansive original "Awaiting an Accident". Mogwai's contribution, a sparse remix/retelling of "The Use of Unacceptable Colors in Nature" is the only piece without much immediate impact. Listening to it directly in conjunction with the original, however, you can get a sense of the band's intentions as they take one of the most catchy, emotive and dense tracks from Seed to Sun and strip it down to its bones. The process gives interesting insight into what a "remix" of a mostly-electronic artist by a mostly-live band can possibly entail. On both of his albums to date, Boom Bip has tended toward contributors whom he himself has remixed, collaborated with, or toured alongside. This is a good way to combat the syndrome of mediocrity often plaguing collections such as Corymb; after all, contractual commitment can compel a track into being, but it is personal commitment that will probably produce a good one. For those artists here who aren't beholden to Boom Bip, the care of their efforts is a telling sign of the respect this multifaceted figure has managed to establish for himself in the music world.

Artist: Boom Bip, Album: Corymb, Genre: Electronic,Rap, Score (1-10): 7.4 Album review: "Like a lemming at a cliff, or a fork-wielding child before a wall socket, I am forever destined to impulsively purchase remix collections and collaborative efforts touting my favorite artists as its contributors, despite the fact that such albums have disappointed for years. These releases promise the potential inherent in a wide spectrum of creative minds refining each other's best qualities, yet tend to instead showcase talented musicians on autopilot. Like anybody else, artists are prone to phoning it in when the stakes aren't high, and can be reluctant to let go of a great idea in the service of someone else's name-- sentiments bluntly summed up in the title of Aphex Twin's last release, 26 Mixes for Cash. Happily, Boom Bip's new offering, Corymb, is one of the few recent remix collections into which it is apparent the contributors have invested thought, effort and care, resulting in an appealing investigation of the variegated sounds surrounding Boom Bip's musical peer group. Corymb is a combination of two EPs released in the last two years, From Left to Right and Morning and a Day. Replicating the coffee-stained packaging concept of his debut, Mr. Bip makes it clear that this is not a new album proper. It is Seed to Sun's companion disc, offering six remixes, three B-sides, and two Peel sessions. All of Boom Bip's new tracks are appealing uptempo instrumentals sharing more in common with each other than do any three songs from his schizophrenic debut. Both "From Left to Right" and "Morning and a Day" feature spacious guitars laid over bouncy synths; "In the Tree Top" begins to explore similar territory, but ends prematurely. The included Peel session versions of Seed to Sun tracks feel a little sprawling against the tight, focused sound elsewhere on this CD, but coherence is not the goal of this collection, and the new version of "Pulse All Over" makes for an epic closer. For the most part, Boom Bip's remixers thoughtfully walk the line of augmentation vs. obliteration regarding their source material. The chilly, muzak-laden dissonance in the Boards of Canada's "Last Walk Round Mirror Lake" remix adds a sinister touch to the lo-fi guitar that closed out Seed to Sun, and recalls the Boards' 2000 single "In a Beautiful Place out in the Country". Venetian Snares' Aaron Funk coaxes a jittery, paranoid track out of "The Unthinkable", while (surprisingly) leaving the song-- featuring the voice of Buck 65-- in recognizable form. Conversely, cLOUDDEAD's deconstruction of "Closed Shoulders" jumbles Boom Bip's beat-driven original into a drone reminiscent of the instrumental passages on their self-titled debut. Four Tet's excellent take on "Third Stream" stutters through a slew of rhythmic typewriter keys before introducing the double bass that anchors both versions of the song. Lali Puna crafts a subdued, uplifting track from the darker and more expansive original "Awaiting an Accident". Mogwai's contribution, a sparse remix/retelling of "The Use of Unacceptable Colors in Nature" is the only piece without much immediate impact. Listening to it directly in conjunction with the original, however, you can get a sense of the band's intentions as they take one of the most catchy, emotive and dense tracks from Seed to Sun and strip it down to its bones. The process gives interesting insight into what a "remix" of a mostly-electronic artist by a mostly-live band can possibly entail. On both of his albums to date, Boom Bip has tended toward contributors whom he himself has remixed, collaborated with, or toured alongside. This is a good way to combat the syndrome of mediocrity often plaguing collections such as Corymb; after all, contractual commitment can compel a track into being, but it is personal commitment that will probably produce a good one. For those artists here who aren't beholden to Boom Bip, the care of their efforts is a telling sign of the respect this multifaceted figure has managed to establish for himself in the music world."

The Proper Ornaments

Wooden Head

Rock

Marc Hogan

In 2010, Argentinian songwriter Max Claps and James Hoare, of UK indie-poppers Veronica Falls, started a London band named after a song by so-square-they're-psychedelic 1960s baroque-poppers the Free Design. What the Proper Ornaments have in common with "The Proper Ornaments", from 1967 opus Kites Are Fun, isn't immediately obvious, but it starts with a penchant for hypnotic harmonies and continues with an insistence on the right decorations. Where those sunshine-y forebears quasi-ironically skewered "Mad Men"-era superficiality—"brand new car," "hat and gloves," "pretty wife who you almost love"—the '10s model proudly accessorizes itself with scruffy neo-psych. The stylistic touches on Wooden Head—billed as the Proper Ornaments' proper debut LP after last year's promisingly ramshackle Waiting for the Summer, which collected previously released singles and EPs—are extraordinarily ordinary ones for an indie band. Next to those sweet Beach Boys vocal counterpoints sit Byrds-buzzing guitar interplay and some-Velvet Underground-morning detachment. With its rickety eight-track recording, you'd be hard-pressed to guess whether the album was influenced more by the O.G.s or their offshoots: the British C86 scene, California's Paisley Underground movement, New Zealand's Flying Nun label. In woolier moments, throw in the Beta Band. In shoegazier, throw in Ride or even early the Verve. There's a song called "Stereolab"; it actually sounds a bit like a Stereolab. As that list of comparisons probably suggests, the Proper Ornaments mix and match these related yet distinct sonic accoutrements well enough that they might one day become a reference point themselves—which you might expect, considering they've shared bills with fellow magpie-connoisseurs such as Crystal Stilts, Woods, and Real Estate. As with those bands' efforts, though, Wooden Head is strongest when it leaves you remembering smart hooks rather than a clever aesthetic. Check out "Magazine," maybe the breeziest song ever from the point of view of ammunition, or elegiac finale "You'll See". Weather, a recurring theme since the previous record, is beside the point on the gentle "Summer's Gone", which applies the sepia softness of the Clientele to being "old enough to lose your own mind." For every band like Deerhunter or Los Campesinos!, who turn their indie-inclined record collections into something appealing of their own, music history is littered with others who mine the clerk-approved past without adding much to those halcyon days at all. Claps and Hoare, joined here by bassist Daniel Nellis and drummer Robert Syme, certainly skirt that risk—the guitar chimes on "What Am I to Do?" bring to mind "Dear Prudence" by the Beatles, whose enshrined-in-marble likeness rarely flatters anybody. But the Proper Ornaments may have been just as shrewd in naming their album as in naming their band: Wooden Head was the title of a 1969 odds and ends compilation by the Turtles, released after the "Happy Together" group split. As humble, tastefully appointed psych-pop goes, the Proper Ornaments surely have their hearts—and heads, wooden or not—in the right place.

Artist: The Proper Ornaments, Album: Wooden Head, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.0 Album review: "In 2010, Argentinian songwriter Max Claps and James Hoare, of UK indie-poppers Veronica Falls, started a London band named after a song by so-square-they're-psychedelic 1960s baroque-poppers the Free Design. What the Proper Ornaments have in common with "The Proper Ornaments", from 1967 opus Kites Are Fun, isn't immediately obvious, but it starts with a penchant for hypnotic harmonies and continues with an insistence on the right decorations. Where those sunshine-y forebears quasi-ironically skewered "Mad Men"-era superficiality—"brand new car," "hat and gloves," "pretty wife who you almost love"—the '10s model proudly accessorizes itself with scruffy neo-psych. The stylistic touches on Wooden Head—billed as the Proper Ornaments' proper debut LP after last year's promisingly ramshackle Waiting for the Summer, which collected previously released singles and EPs—are extraordinarily ordinary ones for an indie band. Next to those sweet Beach Boys vocal counterpoints sit Byrds-buzzing guitar interplay and some-Velvet Underground-morning detachment. With its rickety eight-track recording, you'd be hard-pressed to guess whether the album was influenced more by the O.G.s or their offshoots: the British C86 scene, California's Paisley Underground movement, New Zealand's Flying Nun label. In woolier moments, throw in the Beta Band. In shoegazier, throw in Ride or even early the Verve. There's a song called "Stereolab"; it actually sounds a bit like a Stereolab. As that list of comparisons probably suggests, the Proper Ornaments mix and match these related yet distinct sonic accoutrements well enough that they might one day become a reference point themselves—which you might expect, considering they've shared bills with fellow magpie-connoisseurs such as Crystal Stilts, Woods, and Real Estate. As with those bands' efforts, though, Wooden Head is strongest when it leaves you remembering smart hooks rather than a clever aesthetic. Check out "Magazine," maybe the breeziest song ever from the point of view of ammunition, or elegiac finale "You'll See". Weather, a recurring theme since the previous record, is beside the point on the gentle "Summer's Gone", which applies the sepia softness of the Clientele to being "old enough to lose your own mind." For every band like Deerhunter or Los Campesinos!, who turn their indie-inclined record collections into something appealing of their own, music history is littered with others who mine the clerk-approved past without adding much to those halcyon days at all. Claps and Hoare, joined here by bassist Daniel Nellis and drummer Robert Syme, certainly skirt that risk—the guitar chimes on "What Am I to Do?" bring to mind "Dear Prudence" by the Beatles, whose enshrined-in-marble likeness rarely flatters anybody. But the Proper Ornaments may have been just as shrewd in naming their album as in naming their band: Wooden Head was the title of a 1969 odds and ends compilation by the Turtles, released after the "Happy Together" group split. As humble, tastefully appointed psych-pop goes, the Proper Ornaments surely have their hearts—and heads, wooden or not—in the right place."

Cody ChesnuTT

Landing on a Hundred

Pop/R&B

Eric Harvey

On "What Kind of Cool (Will We Think of Next)", the Atlanta-born, Tallahassee-residing soul crooner Cody ChesnuTT ruminates on a question that has driven the music industry for decades. As a sultry, self-conscious slab of smooth, Memphis-style soul, the song itself doesn't quite feel "next," but that's not the point. Its power comes from its source: ChesnuTT's got experience on the other side of the equation. In 2002, as the internet and web were ready to redefine DIY promotion, ChesnuTT was working his humbly titled 36-track debut The Headphone Masterpiece any way he could, to anyone he could find. He slipped it into stereos at random L.A. parties, and gave his number to equally random people at malls, inviting them to come back to his place for listening sessions. He'd been kicking around the scene for a while (long enough to get pulled onstage to pose at a 2002 Strokes gig in L.A.), and the demo soon wound up in ?uestlove's hands. When Masterpiece highlight "The Seed" was remade into the best song on the Roots' LP Phrenology, ChesnuTT and his album were instantly all kinds of "cool" and "next." Masterpiece slotted perfectly into "neo soul" endcaps, and music nerds rushed to crown the album Sign O' the Times on Alien Lanes' budget. ChesnuTT was courted by major labels, copped a four-star Rolling Stone review that called him "a new breed of American troubadour," and was featured in the Guardian as part of a piece that (bizarrely) suggested he was the "new Hendrix." Until the release of Landing on a Hundred, Masterpiece's legacy was further defined as the sole release from the guy who subsequently disappeared, save a brief appearance in Dave Chappelle's Block Party and a quietly issued 2010 EP. In this regard, it's not just ChesnuTT's beautiful falsetto and lightly-scuffed tenor that recall Terence Trent D'Arby-- both were unconventional R&B prodigies with no shortage of swagger, who managed to drop off the pop map soon after their highly-praised debuts. According to ChesnuTT, his disappearance was planned: to start a family far away from music's exhausting business end. Landing is an apt reflection of an artist restarting after several years, but without sacrificing the eccentricity that initially made him such a compelling figure. Recorded in part with a 10-piece band in the same studio where Al Green cut "Let's Stay Together", Landing largely situates itself in the early-1970s soul tradition of Green and Curtis Mayfield-- no matter how personal or political, the music is never too far from the pulpit. Opening cut "'Till I Met Thee" is positively beatific, ChesnuTT's scratched-out funk guitar alternating with a rich brass backdrop that lends the refrain an earthy gospel overtone. "Under the Spell of the Handout" is a dizzying trip through conflicting impulses that never tips over into the finger-wagging implied by the title. ChesnuTT's at his best when he can let his own contradictory spirit move him-- that's what Headphone Masterpiece did, in bulk-- and on "Handout" he begs to be let in "the caste" one second, and asks "what am I feeding on" the next. Hundred is occasionally wayward, but you can't expect ChesnuTT, even as a father of two in his mid-40s, to ever play it straight. The eccentricities of Hundred are milder than Masterpiece, but they give the album much of its vitality. On "I've Been Life", he channels Muhammad Ali ("Since my birth/ I've been the greatest attraction on the earth") while shouting out an alphabetical roll-call of each African nation. The result sounds designed to slot between the Crusaders and James Brown in the "Zaire '74" music festival accompanying the Ali/Foreman "Rumble in the Jungle." On the peppy late album cut "Don't Wanna Go the Other Way", he rides a galloping bassline until it breaks, incorporating puffs of breath as a primary rhythmic component. Lyrically, he seems to be talking to the younger Cody ("Oh, frustrated young man/ Still carrying that load") while actively pushing himself to remain on a righteous path dotted with temptation. It's good advice: all the better because he seems to be heeding it.

Artist: Cody ChesnuTT, Album: Landing on a Hundred, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 6.9 Album review: "On "What Kind of Cool (Will We Think of Next)", the Atlanta-born, Tallahassee-residing soul crooner Cody ChesnuTT ruminates on a question that has driven the music industry for decades. As a sultry, self-conscious slab of smooth, Memphis-style soul, the song itself doesn't quite feel "next," but that's not the point. Its power comes from its source: ChesnuTT's got experience on the other side of the equation. In 2002, as the internet and web were ready to redefine DIY promotion, ChesnuTT was working his humbly titled 36-track debut The Headphone Masterpiece any way he could, to anyone he could find. He slipped it into stereos at random L.A. parties, and gave his number to equally random people at malls, inviting them to come back to his place for listening sessions. He'd been kicking around the scene for a while (long enough to get pulled onstage to pose at a 2002 Strokes gig in L.A.), and the demo soon wound up in ?uestlove's hands. When Masterpiece highlight "The Seed" was remade into the best song on the Roots' LP Phrenology, ChesnuTT and his album were instantly all kinds of "cool" and "next." Masterpiece slotted perfectly into "neo soul" endcaps, and music nerds rushed to crown the album Sign O' the Times on Alien Lanes' budget. ChesnuTT was courted by major labels, copped a four-star Rolling Stone review that called him "a new breed of American troubadour," and was featured in the Guardian as part of a piece that (bizarrely) suggested he was the "new Hendrix." Until the release of Landing on a Hundred, Masterpiece's legacy was further defined as the sole release from the guy who subsequently disappeared, save a brief appearance in Dave Chappelle's Block Party and a quietly issued 2010 EP. In this regard, it's not just ChesnuTT's beautiful falsetto and lightly-scuffed tenor that recall Terence Trent D'Arby-- both were unconventional R&B prodigies with no shortage of swagger, who managed to drop off the pop map soon after their highly-praised debuts. According to ChesnuTT, his disappearance was planned: to start a family far away from music's exhausting business end. Landing is an apt reflection of an artist restarting after several years, but without sacrificing the eccentricity that initially made him such a compelling figure. Recorded in part with a 10-piece band in the same studio where Al Green cut "Let's Stay Together", Landing largely situates itself in the early-1970s soul tradition of Green and Curtis Mayfield-- no matter how personal or political, the music is never too far from the pulpit. Opening cut "'Till I Met Thee" is positively beatific, ChesnuTT's scratched-out funk guitar alternating with a rich brass backdrop that lends the refrain an earthy gospel overtone. "Under the Spell of the Handout" is a dizzying trip through conflicting impulses that never tips over into the finger-wagging implied by the title. ChesnuTT's at his best when he can let his own contradictory spirit move him-- that's what Headphone Masterpiece did, in bulk-- and on "Handout" he begs to be let in "the caste" one second, and asks "what am I feeding on" the next. Hundred is occasionally wayward, but you can't expect ChesnuTT, even as a father of two in his mid-40s, to ever play it straight. The eccentricities of Hundred are milder than Masterpiece, but they give the album much of its vitality. On "I've Been Life", he channels Muhammad Ali ("Since my birth/ I've been the greatest attraction on the earth") while shouting out an alphabetical roll-call of each African nation. The result sounds designed to slot between the Crusaders and James Brown in the "Zaire '74" music festival accompanying the Ali/Foreman "Rumble in the Jungle." On the peppy late album cut "Don't Wanna Go the Other Way", he rides a galloping bassline until it breaks, incorporating puffs of breath as a primary rhythmic component. Lyrically, he seems to be talking to the younger Cody ("Oh, frustrated young man/ Still carrying that load") while actively pushing himself to remain on a righteous path dotted with temptation. It's good advice: all the better because he seems to be heeding it."

Alsace Lorraine

The Dark One

Pop/R&B

Eric Harvey

The cover photograph of The Dark One, the first record since 2001 from Alsace Lorraine, seems designed to represent a symbolic break with the past from the band's previous (and only other) album, Through Small Windows. Dark's picture shows a window, but from the outside of a building in disrepair, ready for renovation. The group itself has gone through a significant overhaul over the past six years-- the hiatus caused by core member Paul Francke's recovery from health problems and entrance into an Episcopalian seminary-- and Dark features a new vocalist, Isol, the former singer for Argentinean electro-pop group Entre Rios. Isol is also an illustrator of books for what she calls "smart children", and her lyrics-- highbrow narratives presented through a thick veneer of youthful wonder-- merge with Francke's hazy, weightless backdrops and wry introspection to create an muted, effervescent collection of ivory-tower indie pop. Dark's clear highlight is "Call for Papers", which favorably compares to predecessors who've also highlighted the "twee" in "tweed": the Magnetic Fields, Belle & Sebastian, and especially Camera Obscura, whose wonderfully glum academic rebuke from last year, "Lloyd, I'm Ready to Be Heartbroken", feels like its companion piece. Taking a subject line of so many inter-collegiate e-mails seeking intellectual collaboration and re-imagining it as a plea for improved interpersonal communication might seem a recipe for disaster of the ponytail/elbow-patch variety, but "Paper"'s duet is heartfelt and, in its own way, sweet. Isol responds to Francke's romantic plea ("How many times have I cut your hair?") by lamenting her silence as a "writer's block," arising as it does from a too-quantitative approach to love: "weighing facts, cataloguing dreams." "Papers" comes during the middle of Dark's first half, surrounded by likeminded songs that highlight the band's knack for wispy melodies, opaque literary pretensions, and, occasionally, bizarre yet still appropriate-sounding phrases. The chiming, xylophone-laden "As We Fight" mines the same Spectorian territory as the Pipettes, while featuring the lines "Homeskillet, does she calm your Dad?" and "There is a way that clinically sad students in love talk, my darling." "Dulce et Decorum" is a Cocteau Twins song masquerading as a Basil King motivational tract ("Vigilant bulrushes kneel before you, surround and guard you"), and "One Day, Far Off, If the World Forgot" imagines a future where "the world forgot all about rock" and "if in our teenage years, nothing changed." It's not a sad song either, just cautiously speculative, from the same emotional distance the rest of Dark employs to good effect. Like good intellectuals, Francke and Isol know in which tradition they're situated: Saint Etienne's Ian Catt and the Cocteau Twins' Robin Guthrie show up to remix "Papers" and "The Tall Grass", respectively. Unfortunately, Guthrie feels the need to create a stereotypically Cocteau-esque icy whirr, thereby sapping the original of its airy appeal, and Catt's version enriches "Paper"'s sonics, adds a zither and melodica, but not much else. This is fine, though; Catt's and Guthrie's underwhelming remixes only prove that Alsace Lorraine don't need tacked-on cameos to flesh out or draw attention to their record; their original work does well enough on their own.

Artist: Alsace Lorraine, Album: The Dark One, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 7.1 Album review: "The cover photograph of The Dark One, the first record since 2001 from Alsace Lorraine, seems designed to represent a symbolic break with the past from the band's previous (and only other) album, Through Small Windows. Dark's picture shows a window, but from the outside of a building in disrepair, ready for renovation. The group itself has gone through a significant overhaul over the past six years-- the hiatus caused by core member Paul Francke's recovery from health problems and entrance into an Episcopalian seminary-- and Dark features a new vocalist, Isol, the former singer for Argentinean electro-pop group Entre Rios. Isol is also an illustrator of books for what she calls "smart children", and her lyrics-- highbrow narratives presented through a thick veneer of youthful wonder-- merge with Francke's hazy, weightless backdrops and wry introspection to create an muted, effervescent collection of ivory-tower indie pop. Dark's clear highlight is "Call for Papers", which favorably compares to predecessors who've also highlighted the "twee" in "tweed": the Magnetic Fields, Belle & Sebastian, and especially Camera Obscura, whose wonderfully glum academic rebuke from last year, "Lloyd, I'm Ready to Be Heartbroken", feels like its companion piece. Taking a subject line of so many inter-collegiate e-mails seeking intellectual collaboration and re-imagining it as a plea for improved interpersonal communication might seem a recipe for disaster of the ponytail/elbow-patch variety, but "Paper"'s duet is heartfelt and, in its own way, sweet. Isol responds to Francke's romantic plea ("How many times have I cut your hair?") by lamenting her silence as a "writer's block," arising as it does from a too-quantitative approach to love: "weighing facts, cataloguing dreams." "Papers" comes during the middle of Dark's first half, surrounded by likeminded songs that highlight the band's knack for wispy melodies, opaque literary pretensions, and, occasionally, bizarre yet still appropriate-sounding phrases. The chiming, xylophone-laden "As We Fight" mines the same Spectorian territory as the Pipettes, while featuring the lines "Homeskillet, does she calm your Dad?" and "There is a way that clinically sad students in love talk, my darling." "Dulce et Decorum" is a Cocteau Twins song masquerading as a Basil King motivational tract ("Vigilant bulrushes kneel before you, surround and guard you"), and "One Day, Far Off, If the World Forgot" imagines a future where "the world forgot all about rock" and "if in our teenage years, nothing changed." It's not a sad song either, just cautiously speculative, from the same emotional distance the rest of Dark employs to good effect. Like good intellectuals, Francke and Isol know in which tradition they're situated: Saint Etienne's Ian Catt and the Cocteau Twins' Robin Guthrie show up to remix "Papers" and "The Tall Grass", respectively. Unfortunately, Guthrie feels the need to create a stereotypically Cocteau-esque icy whirr, thereby sapping the original of its airy appeal, and Catt's version enriches "Paper"'s sonics, adds a zither and melodica, but not much else. This is fine, though; Catt's and Guthrie's underwhelming remixes only prove that Alsace Lorraine don't need tacked-on cameos to flesh out or draw attention to their record; their original work does well enough on their own."

Gang Starr

The Ownerz

Rap

Scott Hreha

Some bands embrace consistency, others shy away, possibly fearing the alure of comfortability and the possible stagnation it might eventually result in. For established artists, there's no more sleep-depriving quandry than whether to stick with a successful, proven formula or throw it all out the window in favor of a radical change. But even for a few of those lucky superstars, it just comes naturally, without any deep contemplation. Critically speaking, bands who gravitate toward change get high marks for their willingness to continually invent and to challenge convention; the water-treaders simply get fans. It's unfair on any number of levels, I suppose, but it's with that understanding that I declare Gang Starr among the most consistent acts in hip-hop. Ever since Step in the Arena and Daily Operation laid down the law for East Coast hip-hop back in '91 and '92, Gang Starr have slowed their pace with an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" aesthetic, releasing albums every four or five years between Guru and DJ Premier's increasingly busy extracurricular schedules. And while they haven't broken any new ground since those early 90s classics, their records have been astoundingly solid in bearing the standards set by those canonical discs. In the five years since Moment of Truth, Guru and Primo have watched as the face of mainstream hip-hop hardened into a countenance chiseled out with bling-bling braggadocio and self-hating diatribes. Fortunately, for a duo that's been hard from day one-- don't let that No More Mr. Nice Guy cover fool you-- there's a distinct possibility their credibility could translate into commercial success, almost as if the rap world has finally caught up with a group that was ten years ahead of its time. The combination of Guru's tough, streetwise lyrics and delivery and Premier's highly polished production fits in perfectly as an honest alternative to today's heavy rotation; it's a situation Gang Starr are well aware of, judging from several lyrical and interlude reminders that pop up throughout The Ownerz. The record's first single, "Skills", is a prime example of its overall potential to launch Gang Starr into the mainstream with the respect they've enjoyed in the underground intact. Carried by the kind of popping bassline and sucka-challenging bravado that's powered all of their classic cuts, it's incredibly catchy without being overtly commercial. Throw in a couple of high-profile cameos-- most notably Jadakiss' firespitting verse on "Rite Where U Stand" and Snoop Dogg's right-at-home drawling over Premier's "In This Life..." beat (returning the favor of some beats Primo cooked up for his Paid tha Cost to Be da Bo$$ LP)-- and The Ownerz could accomplish that rarest of feats: commercial success that doesn't require a sacrifice of integrity. Naturally, not all of the guest spots are wildly triumphant-- back-to-back appearances by Fat Joe, M.O.P., Big Shug and Freddie Foxx on "Who Got Gunz" and "Capture (Militia Pt. 3)" make for a thuggish lag right in the middle of the record, but the flow gets right back in line with the pair of cameo-free tracks that follow. As has been customary on Gang Starr records since Daily Operation, Guru steps aside for some young emcees to prove their worth on the mic: NYG'z and H. Stax contribute solid verses to "Same Team, No Games" and Smiley the Ghetto Child absolutely tears shit up-- like a young Nas or Jeru the Damaja-- on the brief "Werdz From The Ghetto Child". Still, even though the guest spots cover a wide range of hip-hop status levels, they all work to enforce Guru and Premier's aesthetic of consistency-- whether it's Jadakiss or NYG'z, the emcee has to make his style work with Gang Starr, not the other way around. But all this talk of cameos distracts from all the unassisted cuts that prove Guru and Premier haven't lost an ounce of chemistry in their 14 years together. Primo's jazzy horn breaks underscore Guru's eloquent manifestos with assured refinement on every single track they turn on their own (which, impressively for a major-label hip-hop release, is over half the record), even redeeming what would've been the record's weakest cut with a bit of imagination: a reposession of Curtis Mayfield's "Kung Fu" that makes Guru's mack move narrative on "Nice Girl, Wrong Place" a little easier to stomach. For the record, Guru's candor and lack of romanticism are rather refreshing in this context-- just like hot pants, what you see is what you get. The Ownerz will have to hold Gang Starr fans over while Premier contracts out beats for usually the only good cuts on otherwise sub-par rap records, and Guru releases another tepid Jazzmatazz or (God forbid) Baldhead Slick & da Click LP. We can't expect a new Gang Starr record until 2007 or 2008, but in the meantime, there's plenty here to celebrate for consistency's sake-- because for what they've lacked in evolution, Guru and Premier have more than repaid in reliability. And while it's probably too late in their career for a breakout hit record, more people are definitely going to know who they are, which will hopefully translate into the same veneration from the establishment they've enjoyed from their fans since back in the day.

Artist: Gang Starr, Album: The Ownerz, Genre: Rap, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "Some bands embrace consistency, others shy away, possibly fearing the alure of comfortability and the possible stagnation it might eventually result in. For established artists, there's no more sleep-depriving quandry than whether to stick with a successful, proven formula or throw it all out the window in favor of a radical change. But even for a few of those lucky superstars, it just comes naturally, without any deep contemplation. Critically speaking, bands who gravitate toward change get high marks for their willingness to continually invent and to challenge convention; the water-treaders simply get fans. It's unfair on any number of levels, I suppose, but it's with that understanding that I declare Gang Starr among the most consistent acts in hip-hop. Ever since Step in the Arena and Daily Operation laid down the law for East Coast hip-hop back in '91 and '92, Gang Starr have slowed their pace with an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" aesthetic, releasing albums every four or five years between Guru and DJ Premier's increasingly busy extracurricular schedules. And while they haven't broken any new ground since those early 90s classics, their records have been astoundingly solid in bearing the standards set by those canonical discs. In the five years since Moment of Truth, Guru and Primo have watched as the face of mainstream hip-hop hardened into a countenance chiseled out with bling-bling braggadocio and self-hating diatribes. Fortunately, for a duo that's been hard from day one-- don't let that No More Mr. Nice Guy cover fool you-- there's a distinct possibility their credibility could translate into commercial success, almost as if the rap world has finally caught up with a group that was ten years ahead of its time. The combination of Guru's tough, streetwise lyrics and delivery and Premier's highly polished production fits in perfectly as an honest alternative to today's heavy rotation; it's a situation Gang Starr are well aware of, judging from several lyrical and interlude reminders that pop up throughout The Ownerz. The record's first single, "Skills", is a prime example of its overall potential to launch Gang Starr into the mainstream with the respect they've enjoyed in the underground intact. Carried by the kind of popping bassline and sucka-challenging bravado that's powered all of their classic cuts, it's incredibly catchy without being overtly commercial. Throw in a couple of high-profile cameos-- most notably Jadakiss' firespitting verse on "Rite Where U Stand" and Snoop Dogg's right-at-home drawling over Premier's "In This Life..." beat (returning the favor of some beats Primo cooked up for his Paid tha Cost to Be da Bo$$ LP)-- and The Ownerz could accomplish that rarest of feats: commercial success that doesn't require a sacrifice of integrity. Naturally, not all of the guest spots are wildly triumphant-- back-to-back appearances by Fat Joe, M.O.P., Big Shug and Freddie Foxx on "Who Got Gunz" and "Capture (Militia Pt. 3)" make for a thuggish lag right in the middle of the record, but the flow gets right back in line with the pair of cameo-free tracks that follow. As has been customary on Gang Starr records since Daily Operation, Guru steps aside for some young emcees to prove their worth on the mic: NYG'z and H. Stax contribute solid verses to "Same Team, No Games" and Smiley the Ghetto Child absolutely tears shit up-- like a young Nas or Jeru the Damaja-- on the brief "Werdz From The Ghetto Child". Still, even though the guest spots cover a wide range of hip-hop status levels, they all work to enforce Guru and Premier's aesthetic of consistency-- whether it's Jadakiss or NYG'z, the emcee has to make his style work with Gang Starr, not the other way around. But all this talk of cameos distracts from all the unassisted cuts that prove Guru and Premier haven't lost an ounce of chemistry in their 14 years together. Primo's jazzy horn breaks underscore Guru's eloquent manifestos with assured refinement on every single track they turn on their own (which, impressively for a major-label hip-hop release, is over half the record), even redeeming what would've been the record's weakest cut with a bit of imagination: a reposession of Curtis Mayfield's "Kung Fu" that makes Guru's mack move narrative on "Nice Girl, Wrong Place" a little easier to stomach. For the record, Guru's candor and lack of romanticism are rather refreshing in this context-- just like hot pants, what you see is what you get. The Ownerz will have to hold Gang Starr fans over while Premier contracts out beats for usually the only good cuts on otherwise sub-par rap records, and Guru releases another tepid Jazzmatazz or (God forbid) Baldhead Slick & da Click LP. We can't expect a new Gang Starr record until 2007 or 2008, but in the meantime, there's plenty here to celebrate for consistency's sake-- because for what they've lacked in evolution, Guru and Premier have more than repaid in reliability. And while it's probably too late in their career for a breakout hit record, more people are definitely going to know who they are, which will hopefully translate into the same veneration from the establishment they've enjoyed from their fans since back in the day."

The Very Best

Makes a King

Electronic

Andy Beta

In pop music years, 2008 feels like eons ago. That was the year that Radioclit—a duo of UK-based beat makers Etienne Tron and Johan Karlberg—and Malawian-born, London-based vocalist Esau Mwamwaya hopped on M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes". Sampling the Clash's "Straight to Hell", this British punk beat about Vietnamese bastard children of American GIs, as appropriated by a Sri Lankan refugee, and in turn recast by a Swede-French-African amalgam as "Tengazako" doubled as hip-pop utopia. But the world's turned plenty since then, from M.I.A.'s one-finger Super Bowl salute to a Kenyan-American presidency. And seven years on, the giddy pleasures of a Europop/African mash-up has become, if not exactly commonplace, then no longer the aural speedball it once was. The Very Best (now a duo of Karlberg and Mwamwaya) did euphoric, Afro dance pop with their 2009 debut and then widened their scope and Rolodex with 2012's MTMTMK. Their sleekest album to date, it shoehorned in the likes of Amadou & Miriam, Senegalese singer Baaba Maal, frequent David Guetta vocalist Taio Cruz, Somali-Canadian rapper K'naan, and even Bruno Mars, making them all heel to their African sun-bright sound. Guest credits on their third album, Makes a King, include another Vampire Weekend member (Chris Baio this time rather than Ezra Koenig, who contributed to their debut), the Vaccines's guitarist Freddie Cowan, and EDM newcomer Jutty Ranx, but it’s hard to pick out individual contributions. And for the most part, even the Very Best know that they can’t remain only at the ecstatic end of the musical spectrum. Much like its predecessor, Makes a King was rendered on Malawian soil, but now the Very Best are settled in the lakeside village of M’dala Chikowa rather than the country’s capital Lilongwe. And while MTMTMK at times had the odd feel of a superclub transposed to that impoverished African country, King rarely aims for the club stratosphere early on. Instead, it feels much closer to the earth and sounds most comfortable there: Low-key electronic buzzes around the opening call and response of "Nkhondo", a noticeable shift away from the explosive beats and bright glare of synths that previous albums made their trademark. That humble sound carries over to "Hear Me", Karlberg’s programmed beat and somber piano chords set somewhere between Boards of Canada’s Music Has the Right to Children and Portishead’s Dummy: slow, filtered, and at a shuffling pace. There’s the chant of a Malawian choir, some staticky voices lifted from the radio, and above it all, Mwamwaya’s strong yet controlled voice, elegant as a cloud drifting across the track. His voice interacts with that choir again on the unadorned chants of "Bilimankhwe", sounding like something Smithsonian-Folkways (or Hugh Tracey) might have captured to tape in the 1950s. The clean guitar that carries the ballad "Mwana Wanga" finds the group at its most hushed and appealing. From there though, that unassuming yet new wrinkle to the Very Best’s sound gets pushed to the side by more club-friendly fare, and the results are not nearly as charming as the first half. The break that comes three minutes into "Sweka" is an ambient oasis of wordless vocals and electronic trickles, but on either side is a generic chicken-scratch guitar and filtered thump. Where the duo’s ability to wed political African lyricism to production that might smuggle it into a DJ set once played to their strong suit, now when the chintzy synth chords and Ibiza-acceptable thump of "Mariana" lurch to the fore, it sounds like shameless pandering. There’s moments where the Very Best show that rather than merely parlay exuberance and global harmony, they can also manage the somber aspect of their music. But when Karlberg slows the beat to a crawl again on "The Dead and the Dreaming", he also sullies the clear timbre of Mwamwaya’s voice with distortion. In the process, what was once their most distinguished trait winds up sounding muddled.

Artist: The Very Best, Album: Makes a King, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 6.7 Album review: "In pop music years, 2008 feels like eons ago. That was the year that Radioclit—a duo of UK-based beat makers Etienne Tron and Johan Karlberg—and Malawian-born, London-based vocalist Esau Mwamwaya hopped on M.I.A.'s "Paper Planes". Sampling the Clash's "Straight to Hell", this British punk beat about Vietnamese bastard children of American GIs, as appropriated by a Sri Lankan refugee, and in turn recast by a Swede-French-African amalgam as "Tengazako" doubled as hip-pop utopia. But the world's turned plenty since then, from M.I.A.'s one-finger Super Bowl salute to a Kenyan-American presidency. And seven years on, the giddy pleasures of a Europop/African mash-up has become, if not exactly commonplace, then no longer the aural speedball it once was. The Very Best (now a duo of Karlberg and Mwamwaya) did euphoric, Afro dance pop with their 2009 debut and then widened their scope and Rolodex with 2012's MTMTMK. Their sleekest album to date, it shoehorned in the likes of Amadou & Miriam, Senegalese singer Baaba Maal, frequent David Guetta vocalist Taio Cruz, Somali-Canadian rapper K'naan, and even Bruno Mars, making them all heel to their African sun-bright sound. Guest credits on their third album, Makes a King, include another Vampire Weekend member (Chris Baio this time rather than Ezra Koenig, who contributed to their debut), the Vaccines's guitarist Freddie Cowan, and EDM newcomer Jutty Ranx, but it’s hard to pick out individual contributions. And for the most part, even the Very Best know that they can’t remain only at the ecstatic end of the musical spectrum. Much like its predecessor, Makes a King was rendered on Malawian soil, but now the Very Best are settled in the lakeside village of M’dala Chikowa rather than the country’s capital Lilongwe. And while MTMTMK at times had the odd feel of a superclub transposed to that impoverished African country, King rarely aims for the club stratosphere early on. Instead, it feels much closer to the earth and sounds most comfortable there: Low-key electronic buzzes around the opening call and response of "Nkhondo", a noticeable shift away from the explosive beats and bright glare of synths that previous albums made their trademark. That humble sound carries over to "Hear Me", Karlberg’s programmed beat and somber piano chords set somewhere between Boards of Canada’s Music Has the Right to Children and Portishead’s Dummy: slow, filtered, and at a shuffling pace. There’s the chant of a Malawian choir, some staticky voices lifted from the radio, and above it all, Mwamwaya’s strong yet controlled voice, elegant as a cloud drifting across the track. His voice interacts with that choir again on the unadorned chants of "Bilimankhwe", sounding like something Smithsonian-Folkways (or Hugh Tracey) might have captured to tape in the 1950s. The clean guitar that carries the ballad "Mwana Wanga" finds the group at its most hushed and appealing. From there though, that unassuming yet new wrinkle to the Very Best’s sound gets pushed to the side by more club-friendly fare, and the results are not nearly as charming as the first half. The break that comes three minutes into "Sweka" is an ambient oasis of wordless vocals and electronic trickles, but on either side is a generic chicken-scratch guitar and filtered thump. Where the duo’s ability to wed political African lyricism to production that might smuggle it into a DJ set once played to their strong suit, now when the chintzy synth chords and Ibiza-acceptable thump of "Mariana" lurch to the fore, it sounds like shameless pandering. There’s moments where the Very Best show that rather than merely parlay exuberance and global harmony, they can also manage the somber aspect of their music. But when Karlberg slows the beat to a crawl again on "The Dead and the Dreaming", he also sullies the clear timbre of Mwamwaya’s voice with distortion. In the process, what was once their most distinguished trait winds up sounding muddled."

Wilco

iTunes Session

Rock

Stephen M. Deusner

An eight-song iTunes Session EP hardly seems conducive to taking in the full scope of a band's career, especially when the tracklist primarily comprises songs from the most recent album. But we've got a few months' perspective on The Whole Love now*,* and this new release unearths a track from Wilco's 1995 debut, A.M., which suggests they're getting back to the business of being a pop band. They aren't curtailing their experimental urges so much as they're putting more emphasis on tight songs they'd want to play and you'd want to hear in a semi-live setting. There is, in other words, a retrospective undercurrent to iTunes Session, which, instead of including the 10-minute krautrock jams and noise-rock punctuations of their early-2000s heyday, looks to the song-oriented period just before and just after. Rethinking what it means to be Wilco has always been a big part of being Wilco, so the inclusion of the 17-year-old "Passenger Side" suggests a band seriously reassessing its past and drawing strong connections between the Wilco of 1995, the Wilco of 2002, and the Wilco of 2012. The band has exhibited an enduring propensity for noisy undercurrents, concise vocal hooks, and unexpected nods to pop history, all of which are animated by Tweedy's lyrics, which range from invigorated nonsense ("I Might") to semi-tragic lucidity ("Passenger Side"). Toward that end, iTunes Session emphasizes the immediate over the arty, omitting the rambling Whole Love opener "Art of Almost" in favor of that album's catchiest tracks and choosing the direly hooky "War on War" instead of some of the strident tracks from their catalog. For those of us who prefer Wilco's pop songs over their avant-garde numbers, this is a strong, short set, emphasizing buoyant momentum over digressive din. The tracks don't sound quite as full in this setting as they did on The Whole Love, but there's still a lot of charm and dynamism in the way the bass and keyboards trade off the ascending/ descending riff on "I Might", like kids taking turns on the playground slide. If this version surpasses the studio take, it's largely due to Tweedy's exaggerated sighs. Only "Black Moon" suffers in this setting, becoming so lax that it threatens to dissipate altogether. It's clear the band is less interested in that sort of high-concept noodling than they are in simply jamming. In that regard, Wilco have hijacked the iTunes Session and turned it into a document of the Whole Love tour. These are, ostensibly, crowd favorites, tightened and refined in front of big crowds. They even bring out avuncular opening act Nick Lowe for a workmanlike rendering of his 1979 hit "Cruel to Be Kind", a regular encore over the last few months. It's a fine song, a bit redundant and not quite as relevant to the band as their B-side cover of Lowe's "I Love My Label", but you can hear how much fun Wilco (or "Wilc-Lowe," as Tweedy introduced the band at a recent show in Chicago) are having just singing those doo-doo-doo's. Lowe is, in fact, an intriguing forebear for Wilco, a man who transformed himself seemingly effortlessly from a post-punk smartass into a genial country crooner. More recently, he's settled into a gentle nostalgia that lends his recent albums-- specifically At My Age and That Old Magic-- a wistful gravity that pushes against any notion of granddad rock. Similarly, Tweedy seems intent on forging a lengthy career with just as many twists and turns, dark corners, and bright avenues. Which is where this new version of "Passenger Side" comes in: Just as Lowe's country material has proven every bit as sturdy as his Stiff Records output, Wilco are pointing to some hidden gems in their own catalog, rehabbing forgotten tunes to prove that the band hasn't gotten better or worse, just different. That old song, so straightforward and unassuming, settles in remarkably well among their more recent, more celebrated material, so how long till dBpm releases a deluxe reissue of A.M.?

Artist: Wilco, Album: iTunes Session, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.7 Album review: "An eight-song iTunes Session EP hardly seems conducive to taking in the full scope of a band's career, especially when the tracklist primarily comprises songs from the most recent album. But we've got a few months' perspective on The Whole Love now*,* and this new release unearths a track from Wilco's 1995 debut, A.M., which suggests they're getting back to the business of being a pop band. They aren't curtailing their experimental urges so much as they're putting more emphasis on tight songs they'd want to play and you'd want to hear in a semi-live setting. There is, in other words, a retrospective undercurrent to iTunes Session, which, instead of including the 10-minute krautrock jams and noise-rock punctuations of their early-2000s heyday, looks to the song-oriented period just before and just after. Rethinking what it means to be Wilco has always been a big part of being Wilco, so the inclusion of the 17-year-old "Passenger Side" suggests a band seriously reassessing its past and drawing strong connections between the Wilco of 1995, the Wilco of 2002, and the Wilco of 2012. The band has exhibited an enduring propensity for noisy undercurrents, concise vocal hooks, and unexpected nods to pop history, all of which are animated by Tweedy's lyrics, which range from invigorated nonsense ("I Might") to semi-tragic lucidity ("Passenger Side"). Toward that end, iTunes Session emphasizes the immediate over the arty, omitting the rambling Whole Love opener "Art of Almost" in favor of that album's catchiest tracks and choosing the direly hooky "War on War" instead of some of the strident tracks from their catalog. For those of us who prefer Wilco's pop songs over their avant-garde numbers, this is a strong, short set, emphasizing buoyant momentum over digressive din. The tracks don't sound quite as full in this setting as they did on The Whole Love, but there's still a lot of charm and dynamism in the way the bass and keyboards trade off the ascending/ descending riff on "I Might", like kids taking turns on the playground slide. If this version surpasses the studio take, it's largely due to Tweedy's exaggerated sighs. Only "Black Moon" suffers in this setting, becoming so lax that it threatens to dissipate altogether. It's clear the band is less interested in that sort of high-concept noodling than they are in simply jamming. In that regard, Wilco have hijacked the iTunes Session and turned it into a document of the Whole Love tour. These are, ostensibly, crowd favorites, tightened and refined in front of big crowds. They even bring out avuncular opening act Nick Lowe for a workmanlike rendering of his 1979 hit "Cruel to Be Kind", a regular encore over the last few months. It's a fine song, a bit redundant and not quite as relevant to the band as their B-side cover of Lowe's "I Love My Label", but you can hear how much fun Wilco (or "Wilc-Lowe," as Tweedy introduced the band at a recent show in Chicago) are having just singing those doo-doo-doo's. Lowe is, in fact, an intriguing forebear for Wilco, a man who transformed himself seemingly effortlessly from a post-punk smartass into a genial country crooner. More recently, he's settled into a gentle nostalgia that lends his recent albums-- specifically At My Age and That Old Magic-- a wistful gravity that pushes against any notion of granddad rock. Similarly, Tweedy seems intent on forging a lengthy career with just as many twists and turns, dark corners, and bright avenues. Which is where this new version of "Passenger Side" comes in: Just as Lowe's country material has proven every bit as sturdy as his Stiff Records output, Wilco are pointing to some hidden gems in their own catalog, rehabbing forgotten tunes to prove that the band hasn't gotten better or worse, just different. That old song, so straightforward and unassuming, settles in remarkably well among their more recent, more celebrated material, so how long till dBpm releases a deluxe reissue of A.M.?"

Gentleman Jesse & His Men

Gentleman Jesse & His Men

Pop/R&B

David Bevan

A few seconds. That's about how long it should take to figure out why it makes so much sense that Gentleman Jesse & His Men's first live outing came as support for the Black Lips. Because just as those knuckleheads have earned stripes pissing and bashing out garage recordings that sound several years older than they are, Atlanta's Gentleman Jesse (neé Jesse Smith) & His Men have found love in the rich, power-pop offerings of the 1970s. By no means innovative, their self-tiled debut succeeds anyway, hitting pleasure centers like Ali tapped chins: quickly, often, and with oh so much care. Smith has become something of a local fixture in Atlanta over the years plucking bass for the Carbonas, a more abrasive punk outfit than the one he's assembled here. As Gentleman Jesse, Smith moves to the lip of the stage and softens up the approach. With an emphasis on pop more than say, power, Jesse & His Men re-imagine licks as dreamt up by the likes of Nick Lowe, the Modern Lovers, and the Nerves. But they aren't so much an update or study of 70s power-pop as a celebration of those sounds and all their jangling tentacles. While slightly less indebted to the punk kinetics of the Buzzcocks or Damned than the Exploding Hearts were, Smith and his bandmates still follow the same blueprint as the Hearts did so successfully and infectiously before their tragic end. Nobody has done it so well since. With little or no fat to be found anywhere amid its thirty minutes of slip ‘n slide chord progressions and jukebox mining, it's a thoroughbred pop album that struggles only when trying to slow down. It's almost as though there are too many hooks. In addition to being a buckshot opener, "Highland Crawler" is a worthy kid brother track to "Roadrunner". Also an effective aural compass, that song's drumkit closing links directly to the opening of "Black Hole" without seams. It's a transition that typifies the slick sequencing throughout. From the balloon animal bends of "You Don't Have To (If You Don't Want To)" to the Rickenbacker poetics of "Wrong Time", guitars double as voices for choruses in their own-very hummable-right. Not a wordsmith like much of the humorists he obsesses over, Smith tends to rely on putting up lyrical wallpaper that's heavy on babes and light on the kind of pithy humor his heroes founded cults with. But beyond that, Gentleman Jesse & His Men's major flaw isn't that that it is so unabashedly derivative or tethered so tightly to its corner in history. Many of these songs share such deep structural and lyrical similarities that they can often shimmy and bleed into one another in ways that overshadow how expertly Smith seems to have crafted them. While there isn't a truly bad song here, individual elements, when picked apart, are interchangeable. And yet, ultimately, all of that contributes to the record's familiar, and instantly lovable, appeal.

Artist: Gentleman Jesse & His Men, Album: Gentleman Jesse & His Men, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 8.1 Album review: "A few seconds. That's about how long it should take to figure out why it makes so much sense that Gentleman Jesse & His Men's first live outing came as support for the Black Lips. Because just as those knuckleheads have earned stripes pissing and bashing out garage recordings that sound several years older than they are, Atlanta's Gentleman Jesse (neé Jesse Smith) & His Men have found love in the rich, power-pop offerings of the 1970s. By no means innovative, their self-tiled debut succeeds anyway, hitting pleasure centers like Ali tapped chins: quickly, often, and with oh so much care. Smith has become something of a local fixture in Atlanta over the years plucking bass for the Carbonas, a more abrasive punk outfit than the one he's assembled here. As Gentleman Jesse, Smith moves to the lip of the stage and softens up the approach. With an emphasis on pop more than say, power, Jesse & His Men re-imagine licks as dreamt up by the likes of Nick Lowe, the Modern Lovers, and the Nerves. But they aren't so much an update or study of 70s power-pop as a celebration of those sounds and all their jangling tentacles. While slightly less indebted to the punk kinetics of the Buzzcocks or Damned than the Exploding Hearts were, Smith and his bandmates still follow the same blueprint as the Hearts did so successfully and infectiously before their tragic end. Nobody has done it so well since. With little or no fat to be found anywhere amid its thirty minutes of slip ‘n slide chord progressions and jukebox mining, it's a thoroughbred pop album that struggles only when trying to slow down. It's almost as though there are too many hooks. In addition to being a buckshot opener, "Highland Crawler" is a worthy kid brother track to "Roadrunner". Also an effective aural compass, that song's drumkit closing links directly to the opening of "Black Hole" without seams. It's a transition that typifies the slick sequencing throughout. From the balloon animal bends of "You Don't Have To (If You Don't Want To)" to the Rickenbacker poetics of "Wrong Time", guitars double as voices for choruses in their own-very hummable-right. Not a wordsmith like much of the humorists he obsesses over, Smith tends to rely on putting up lyrical wallpaper that's heavy on babes and light on the kind of pithy humor his heroes founded cults with. But beyond that, Gentleman Jesse & His Men's major flaw isn't that that it is so unabashedly derivative or tethered so tightly to its corner in history. Many of these songs share such deep structural and lyrical similarities that they can often shimmy and bleed into one another in ways that overshadow how expertly Smith seems to have crafted them. While there isn't a truly bad song here, individual elements, when picked apart, are interchangeable. And yet, ultimately, all of that contributes to the record's familiar, and instantly lovable, appeal."

Vicky Chow, Michael Gordon

Sonatra

Experimental

Seth Colter Walls

Over the last three decades, composer Michael Gordon has done as much as anyone to promote and develop the tradition of minimalist classical music. Upon his arrival in New York, in the late 1970s, he plunged head first into the scene already established by Philip Glass and Steve Reich. Along with his collaborators in the Bang on a Can collective, Gordon also helped push the style forward. His interest in no wave and punk is plain to hear in the odd harmonies and stomping profile of early works like “Four Kings Fight Five.” By the time of his 1992 composition “Yo Shakespeare,” Gordon’s work with rhythm was unusual enough to earn the excited praise of Reich himself.  (The elder composer had some memorable advice for Gordon, too: “The first thing you’ve got to do in this score is, on the front page, you’ve got to say, ‘This is the rhythm.’ Because if people look at this score, they’re going to think you’re an idiot. But if you actually tell them on the front page that you know you’re an idiot, then they’ll take you seriously.”) Ever since, one of Gordon’s great skills has been the way he keeps a crazed, obsessive concept interesting over long stretches. In recent years, Gordon has explored some comparatively mellow textures—treading closer to the dream-state effect created by some other minimalists. Gordon’s popular piece for pitched percussion, Timber, was recently remixed by a variety of electronic music stars. But his new piece for solo piano finds Gordon reconnecting with his high-intensity mode. Played by the contemporary piano virtuoso Vicky Chow, Sonatra offers a fresh glimpse of classic Gordon. It’s meticulously designed, hard-charging and in an unusual way, addictive. The 15-minute composition that forms the album’s core begins with single-note progressions, galloping up the length of the keyboard. Gordon uses both major- and minor-third intervals as his stepping stones—creating impressions of uniformity and unpredictability at the same time. When the final note in each successive line starts to change, you get a sense of how the piece will undermine its seeming emphasis on repetition. With the manic feel of the piece well established, Gordon starts engineering new sonic effects. Soon, clusters of notes in one of Chow’s hands start to sound as though fully set apart from what’s going on at the other end of the piano. Chow carries off these distinct, interlocking parts with great poise, even at a great pace. Then the two motifs gradually merge back into an unbroken line—a great, cascading rampage of melody. Keeping a sense of proportion in mind is one of the dozens of challenges facing a pianist who takes on this music. Aside from her obvious technical facility, Chow also has a poetic feel for the piece’s overall structure. The forceful quality of Gordon’s opening material sounds plenty loud, from the drop. But Chow has deep reserves of emphasis: the floor-rattling power she provides, when reintroducing some bass notes in the third minute, is gorgeous in its considered, hardcore force. In the final third of Sonatra, superimposed piano lines start to embrace jazzy harmony—it’s as though a trace of cocktail-piano noodling has infiltrated the otherwise barreling music. Gordon says the title of Sonatra amounts to a sideways embrace of Frank Sinatra (as well as the classical sonata form). But in Chow’s hands, the riffs-for-days feel can call to mind other swing references; at times, her playing conjures a vision of some vintage piano genius like Art Tatum coming back to life and getting high on post-minimalism. Gordon’s writing—and Chow’s execution—delivers a delirium state of rare potency. And then they do it all again, kinda. The album’s second half is devoted to another performance of the piece, with one significant difference. Instead of performing Sonatra on an equal-tempered piano (aka the kind of piano you’re probably used to hearing), Chow plays the second take on a “just intonation” instrument. Differences between the “pure” intervals of “just intonation” setups and common tuning are complex (and fascinating to explore). But at their essence, “just intonation” tunings just sound plain odd to most of us, today. The first wave of minimalists—including composer-performers like La Monte Young and Terry Riley—also explored “just” tunings to fantastic effect. So Gordon’s alternate version of Sonatra is part of a long-running conversation in minimalist circles. For this performance, Gordon merged two different “just” tunings pioneered by the composer and keyboardist Wendy Carlos. As this version of Sonatra moves into the middle section—in which lines of notes are played in different octaves—and then the piece’s final, more complex harmonies, this tuning begins to produce strange new effects, even as the rhythmic energy remains familiar from the initial take. Chow’s just-intonation performance of Sonatra doesn’t have quite the same jazzy exhibitionism as her first, equal-tempered take. But this makes sense—as the resulting harmonies of the “just-intonation” version sound a fair bit removed from mainstream jazz practice. And over the balance of the second performance, the composer’s snaking lines start to sound just as compelling in this alternative intonation. Gordon is used to pushing around received ideas about composition: fusing punk, jazz and classical accents. But this is the first time he’s pushed his own writing around every bit as forcefully. It’s a smart idea, executed with a thrilling degree of insight by one of our era’s most brilliant pianists.

Artist: Vicky Chow, Michael Gordon, Album: Sonatra, Genre: Experimental, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "Over the last three decades, composer Michael Gordon has done as much as anyone to promote and develop the tradition of minimalist classical music. Upon his arrival in New York, in the late 1970s, he plunged head first into the scene already established by Philip Glass and Steve Reich. Along with his collaborators in the Bang on a Can collective, Gordon also helped push the style forward. His interest in no wave and punk is plain to hear in the odd harmonies and stomping profile of early works like “Four Kings Fight Five.” By the time of his 1992 composition “Yo Shakespeare,” Gordon’s work with rhythm was unusual enough to earn the excited praise of Reich himself.  (The elder composer had some memorable advice for Gordon, too: “The first thing you’ve got to do in this score is, on the front page, you’ve got to say, ‘This is the rhythm.’ Because if people look at this score, they’re going to think you’re an idiot. But if you actually tell them on the front page that you know you’re an idiot, then they’ll take you seriously.”) Ever since, one of Gordon’s great skills has been the way he keeps a crazed, obsessive concept interesting over long stretches. In recent years, Gordon has explored some comparatively mellow textures—treading closer to the dream-state effect created by some other minimalists. Gordon’s popular piece for pitched percussion, Timber, was recently remixed by a variety of electronic music stars. But his new piece for solo piano finds Gordon reconnecting with his high-intensity mode. Played by the contemporary piano virtuoso Vicky Chow, Sonatra offers a fresh glimpse of classic Gordon. It’s meticulously designed, hard-charging and in an unusual way, addictive. The 15-minute composition that forms the album’s core begins with single-note progressions, galloping up the length of the keyboard. Gordon uses both major- and minor-third intervals as his stepping stones—creating impressions of uniformity and unpredictability at the same time. When the final note in each successive line starts to change, you get a sense of how the piece will undermine its seeming emphasis on repetition. With the manic feel of the piece well established, Gordon starts engineering new sonic effects. Soon, clusters of notes in one of Chow’s hands start to sound as though fully set apart from what’s going on at the other end of the piano. Chow carries off these distinct, interlocking parts with great poise, even at a great pace. Then the two motifs gradually merge back into an unbroken line—a great, cascading rampage of melody. Keeping a sense of proportion in mind is one of the dozens of challenges facing a pianist who takes on this music. Aside from her obvious technical facility, Chow also has a poetic feel for the piece’s overall structure. The forceful quality of Gordon’s opening material sounds plenty loud, from the drop. But Chow has deep reserves of emphasis: the floor-rattling power she provides, when reintroducing some bass notes in the third minute, is gorgeous in its considered, hardcore force. In the final third of Sonatra, superimposed piano lines start to embrace jazzy harmony—it’s as though a trace of cocktail-piano noodling has infiltrated the otherwise barreling music. Gordon says the title of Sonatra amounts to a sideways embrace of Frank Sinatra (as well as the classical sonata form). But in Chow’s hands, the riffs-for-days feel can call to mind other swing references; at times, her playing conjures a vision of some vintage piano genius like Art Tatum coming back to life and getting high on post-minimalism. Gordon’s writing—and Chow’s execution—delivers a delirium state of rare potency. And then they do it all again, kinda. The album’s second half is devoted to another performance of the piece, with one significant difference. Instead of performing Sonatra on an equal-tempered piano (aka the kind of piano you’re probably used to hearing), Chow plays the second take on a “just intonation” instrument. Differences between the “pure” intervals of “just intonation” setups and common tuning are complex (and fascinating to explore). But at their essence, “just intonation” tunings just sound plain odd to most of us, today. The first wave of minimalists—including composer-performers like La Monte Young and Terry Riley—also explored “just” tunings to fantastic effect. So Gordon’s alternate version of Sonatra is part of a long-running conversation in minimalist circles. For this performance, Gordon merged two different “just” tunings pioneered by the composer and keyboardist Wendy Carlos. As this version of Sonatra moves into the middle section—in which lines of notes are played in different octaves—and then the piece’s final, more complex harmonies, this tuning begins to produce strange new effects, even as the rhythmic energy remains familiar from the initial take. Chow’s just-intonation performance of Sonatra doesn’t have quite the same jazzy exhibitionism as her first, equal-tempered take. But this makes sense—as the resulting harmonies of the “just-intonation” version sound a fair bit removed from mainstream jazz practice. And over the balance of the second performance, the composer’s snaking lines start to sound just as compelling in this alternative intonation. Gordon is used to pushing around received ideas about composition: fusing punk, jazz and classical accents. But this is the first time he’s pushed his own writing around every bit as forcefully. It’s a smart idea, executed with a thrilling degree of insight by one of our era’s most brilliant pianists."

Lacrosse

Bandages for the Heart

Pop/R&B

Matthew Perpetua

You wouldn't need to pay attention to the lyrics on Lacrosse's sophomore album to understand that every track is about love. Not just any love, mind you-- a big, big love; the sort of gigantic feeling that threatens to distract you from everything else in your life. The music is enormous and often overwhelming, with every hook and gesture blown out to absurd extremes of joy, desire, and anxiety, emulating the heightened emotional reality of romantic comedies and teen soaps. Every moment of the album sounds incredibly exaggerated, but at their best, Lacrosse replicate the intense drama of ordinary love with uncanny accuracy. There are many ways to sound huge on record, so let's clarify: Lacrosse's approach to pop music falls at the intersection of the Arcade Fire's propulsive life-or-death anthems and Alphabeat's hyper-romantic glee, resulting in an odd but immensely appealing hybrid sound that is perhaps best described as stadium twee. The lyrical concerns and general aesthetic of the band is essentially the same as what you may expect from, say, any band on the Darla label, but the music is far more muscular and ambitious, trading in the demure self-deprecation of homegrown indie for the forthright emoting of full-blown chart pop. Every track on Bandages for the Heart is a male/female duet, with singers Nina Wähä and Kristian Dahl mostly singing in unison to add punch to their otherwise thin voices. The immediate effect of their overlapping voices is to exacerbate the urgency of the music, but in the context of their lyrics, the technique mostly serves to highlight the fact that every song is about the communication between two people. Wähä and Dahl can be quite thrilling when they sing together, but they are even better when they split into constrasting parallel parts that offer differing perspectives on the same theme. This approach is especially effective in "I See a Brightness", an uplifting rocker about one half of a couple attempting to bring the other around to a more optimistic point of view. Though many other bands can write peppy, catchy songs with anthemic choruses, Lacrosse are exceptionally gifted in dramaticizing the nuances of human relationships, and this anchors their bombast to relatable experiences rather than vague, fluffy sentiment. The characters on the record may be in different states of romantic angst, but each comes off as a real person in a specific situation, and the lyrics skillfully tip prosaic expressions of excitement, lust, and anxiety into witty asides. The lyrics are even better when they attain a level of lucidity nearly at odds with the hysterical emotion suggested by the music, as in the ebullient "Come Back Song #1", or the freakishly giddy "It's Always Sunday Around Here". Lacrosse's aggressively perky tunes about love are exceedingly well-executed, but they tend to only be endearing if you are in the right state of mind. At the wrong moments, even the most glorious and life-affirming songs on Bandages for the Heart can be overbearing and flat-out aggravating, particularly if the very last thing you want to think about are the romantic entanglements of relentlessly grinning Swedes. Of course, only the blandest music can serve all purposes. When heard in moderation, or better yet, when in perfect allignment with its sentiment, these are some of the boldest, most evocative pop tunes you are likely to hear this year.

Artist: Lacrosse, Album: Bandages for the Heart, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 7.7 Album review: "You wouldn't need to pay attention to the lyrics on Lacrosse's sophomore album to understand that every track is about love. Not just any love, mind you-- a big, big love; the sort of gigantic feeling that threatens to distract you from everything else in your life. The music is enormous and often overwhelming, with every hook and gesture blown out to absurd extremes of joy, desire, and anxiety, emulating the heightened emotional reality of romantic comedies and teen soaps. Every moment of the album sounds incredibly exaggerated, but at their best, Lacrosse replicate the intense drama of ordinary love with uncanny accuracy. There are many ways to sound huge on record, so let's clarify: Lacrosse's approach to pop music falls at the intersection of the Arcade Fire's propulsive life-or-death anthems and Alphabeat's hyper-romantic glee, resulting in an odd but immensely appealing hybrid sound that is perhaps best described as stadium twee. The lyrical concerns and general aesthetic of the band is essentially the same as what you may expect from, say, any band on the Darla label, but the music is far more muscular and ambitious, trading in the demure self-deprecation of homegrown indie for the forthright emoting of full-blown chart pop. Every track on Bandages for the Heart is a male/female duet, with singers Nina Wähä and Kristian Dahl mostly singing in unison to add punch to their otherwise thin voices. The immediate effect of their overlapping voices is to exacerbate the urgency of the music, but in the context of their lyrics, the technique mostly serves to highlight the fact that every song is about the communication between two people. Wähä and Dahl can be quite thrilling when they sing together, but they are even better when they split into constrasting parallel parts that offer differing perspectives on the same theme. This approach is especially effective in "I See a Brightness", an uplifting rocker about one half of a couple attempting to bring the other around to a more optimistic point of view. Though many other bands can write peppy, catchy songs with anthemic choruses, Lacrosse are exceptionally gifted in dramaticizing the nuances of human relationships, and this anchors their bombast to relatable experiences rather than vague, fluffy sentiment. The characters on the record may be in different states of romantic angst, but each comes off as a real person in a specific situation, and the lyrics skillfully tip prosaic expressions of excitement, lust, and anxiety into witty asides. The lyrics are even better when they attain a level of lucidity nearly at odds with the hysterical emotion suggested by the music, as in the ebullient "Come Back Song #1", or the freakishly giddy "It's Always Sunday Around Here". Lacrosse's aggressively perky tunes about love are exceedingly well-executed, but they tend to only be endearing if you are in the right state of mind. At the wrong moments, even the most glorious and life-affirming songs on Bandages for the Heart can be overbearing and flat-out aggravating, particularly if the very last thing you want to think about are the romantic entanglements of relentlessly grinning Swedes. Of course, only the blandest music can serve all purposes. When heard in moderation, or better yet, when in perfect allignment with its sentiment, these are some of the boldest, most evocative pop tunes you are likely to hear this year."

Hefner

Dead Media

Rock

Nathan Rooney

We're all suckers for sentimentality, but typically we ourselves choose the objects of our sentiment and find it irritating to have to endure another's. Listening to Hefner's latest release, Dead Media, comes across as just such a laborious experience. For whatever reason, Hefner made a conscious decision to strip down their sound, retreating to their bedrooms with analog synths and an eight-track recorder. To cop Thoreau: "to record so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not music, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive music into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms." The result of this self-imposed hermeticism is neither mean nor sublime, but simply trite. What's good for the soul isn't necessarily good for the ear. Jan Hammer and Yaz are good in small doses, but they're mostly good for a chuckle. I might download a few tracks in homage to Sonny Crockett, Ricardo Tubbs and immortal Miami pastel cool, but I'd never want to sit through an entire album of hollow, pre-programmed beats and electronic handclaps. With this release, Hefner apparently feels it's time for a revival of these clichés. Dead Media works on occasion, but primarily when Hefner revert to the traditional pop trio format of bass, guitar, drums. Songs like "The King of Summer" show off the band's potential songwriting prowess, but most of the songs here are blatantly precious and generally as awkward as their primary subject matter-- puppy love and early teenage sexuality. "Peppermint Taste" is a fine example, a reminiscence of a first kiss and feel-up under a tree which tries to counter the obvious and squeamish delivery with what I imagine are supposed to be biting comments: "Now it's been twenty years, I bet you kiss real good/ I bet you kiss your banker like a banker's wife should." As with most of the attempts at irony throughout Dead Media, it falls flat. The only track in this "experimental mode" that works is "Alan Bean," a "Major Tom"-style space adventure that's successful because the campy synths and space sounds give the song a cartoonish quality that belies its desperation and hope. There are also some passable songs, like "Junk" and "When the Angels Play Their Drums," but then there are others like "China Crisis" which are handled so ineptly that they inspire three solid minutes of cringing. It's clear that Hefner's intention was to take complete control of the creative process by living with these machines for a while, and to create a little masterpiece of Brian Wilson-esque simplicity and charm. But obviously, they're not quite so deft with this equipment as Wilson was, and it all comes off as a bunch of sophomoric tinkering. If they felt that this amateurish sound would illicit a flood of vintage memories and a collective sentimental sigh of recognition, they were just plain wrong. For me, it actually has the opposite effect: a shriek of recognition and a dash for the stop button. You're better off sticking with vintage Pet Shop Boys and ABC.

Artist: Hefner, Album: Dead Media, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 4.2 Album review: "We're all suckers for sentimentality, but typically we ourselves choose the objects of our sentiment and find it irritating to have to endure another's. Listening to Hefner's latest release, Dead Media, comes across as just such a laborious experience. For whatever reason, Hefner made a conscious decision to strip down their sound, retreating to their bedrooms with analog synths and an eight-track recorder. To cop Thoreau: "to record so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not music, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive music into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms." The result of this self-imposed hermeticism is neither mean nor sublime, but simply trite. What's good for the soul isn't necessarily good for the ear. Jan Hammer and Yaz are good in small doses, but they're mostly good for a chuckle. I might download a few tracks in homage to Sonny Crockett, Ricardo Tubbs and immortal Miami pastel cool, but I'd never want to sit through an entire album of hollow, pre-programmed beats and electronic handclaps. With this release, Hefner apparently feels it's time for a revival of these clichés. Dead Media works on occasion, but primarily when Hefner revert to the traditional pop trio format of bass, guitar, drums. Songs like "The King of Summer" show off the band's potential songwriting prowess, but most of the songs here are blatantly precious and generally as awkward as their primary subject matter-- puppy love and early teenage sexuality. "Peppermint Taste" is a fine example, a reminiscence of a first kiss and feel-up under a tree which tries to counter the obvious and squeamish delivery with what I imagine are supposed to be biting comments: "Now it's been twenty years, I bet you kiss real good/ I bet you kiss your banker like a banker's wife should." As with most of the attempts at irony throughout Dead Media, it falls flat. The only track in this "experimental mode" that works is "Alan Bean," a "Major Tom"-style space adventure that's successful because the campy synths and space sounds give the song a cartoonish quality that belies its desperation and hope. There are also some passable songs, like "Junk" and "When the Angels Play Their Drums," but then there are others like "China Crisis" which are handled so ineptly that they inspire three solid minutes of cringing. It's clear that Hefner's intention was to take complete control of the creative process by living with these machines for a while, and to create a little masterpiece of Brian Wilson-esque simplicity and charm. But obviously, they're not quite so deft with this equipment as Wilson was, and it all comes off as a bunch of sophomoric tinkering. If they felt that this amateurish sound would illicit a flood of vintage memories and a collective sentimental sigh of recognition, they were just plain wrong. For me, it actually has the opposite effect: a shriek of recognition and a dash for the stop button. You're better off sticking with vintage Pet Shop Boys and ABC."

The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die

Whenever, If Ever

Rock

Ian Cohen

By the time you've finished reading the name "The World is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die," you've likely made two assumptions about this band and both are warranted-- yes, they identify as "emo" and yes, they have little to no use for restraint and understatement. Though on a much, much smaller scale, TWIABP resemble Arcade Fire prior to Funeral, having made their name on a promising EP and unpredictable, cathartic live performances that feature nearly a dozen people making music at the same time. But the greater similarity lies in Whenever, If Ever being a rare debut that’s powered by an almost frightening will to live, a desperation that strongly suggests the people involved have no other option to deal with what's inside of them-- when Thomas Diaz screams “let's hope that this works out/ this has got to work out!" during the frantic conclusion of “Fightboat”, you realize “this” means everything. TWIABP have already become a bit of a cause célèbre as emo reemerges as a viable, visible genre of independent rock rather than just a pejorative adjective. Understandable, even if there wasn’t anything like them the first time around-- for one thing, they’re from Connecticut and roll about 10 deep, switching vocalists on the fly and utilizing strings and horns to create textures that are more based in post-rock or mid-00s indie rock. And at the risk of revisionist history, I’m just going to put this out there: Cap’n Jazz, Jazz June, and all that other jazz was never this melodic, never this instrumentally tight, and never this well-produced. But if that sound meant everything to you at some point or if you’ve been waiting for a comeback for the sole purpose of airing out old grievances, Whenever, If Ever suits your needs. They have a weakness for the emo trope of singing being the truest form of self-expression, an act even purer if you don’t have any kind of studied vocal capability-- "we sang songs/ but we never learned your words or melodies", "and when our voices fail us/ we will find new ways to sing," things like that. And on first proper track “Heartbeat in the Brain”, TWIABP sounds like the kind of band where you get the lead vocals simply by wanting it more-- there’s the adenoidal guy, the screaming guy, someone named "Shitty Greg" who might not be either of them, and they sometimes sing in tandem, initially exaggerating their hiccuping modulations to a degree that feels like trolling; you’ll know pretty quickly if you’re built for this stuff if “Kinsella” is your safe word. There are the musical cues as well-- searching arpeggios over palm-muted clean chords, spastic drum fills, nasal Casio synth leads. Hell, “Fightboat” might even cause squabbling amongst the old heads as its introductory horn line recalls the one from American Football’s “The Summer Ends”, which some people still complain about to this day. It takes a little while for Whenever, If Ever to get going, but once it does, TWIABP establish they are not an emo revival act, but more of a spiritual descendent of Danielson Famile or an early 00s Saddle Creek band, a community whose albums serve as a time capsule, a documentation of their lives. It’s unclear exactly when that click happens, but it’s definitely during “Picture of a Tree That Doesn't Look Okay”. Perhaps it’s the part where Greg Horbal asks over desiccated, detuned guitars, “Do you think the landlord’s pissed?/ We left a car parked on the lawn again”-- it’s an inside joke that doubles as a conspiratorial invitation, indicating that you’re welcome to join in and, hell, maybe you were there the whole time (the car ends up on the lawn again by the very next song). Or it could be the point where Whenever, If Ever starts to incorporate clever segues to establish a chronology and continuity to the story-- a delayed guitar resembles a bong rip as “Picture” drifts into “You Will Never Go to Space” and the final line of that song ("Did we dream when we were skeletons/ or did we just wish for our skin?") becomes foreshadowing for “The Layers of Skin We Drag Around”. Or, maybe it’s after the pace picks up and TWIABP shake off the slowcore rust, a drum roll crescendo leading into a rousing call and response coda where the hooks work out their kinks and become singalongs. Either way, once “Picture” passes, TWIABP already have accrued the confidence and wisdom to do things they seemed incapable of only minutes prior. “Ultimate Steve” distills the band’s post-rock and emo extremes into concentrate, an all-together-now, 30-second shoutalong bookended by a gorgeous build and fade. During the revolutionary final third, the stakes and consequences of this life pursuit start to push back on TWIABP. “Gig Life” bears the record’s most instantly memorable melody and lyrics, an acoustic power ballad that would’ve been intolerable if performed with the same abandon from earlier. Diaz sings, “You ran away/ You were afraid to make mistakes/ but that's the biggest one you made." It’s unclear to whom it’s pointed (a former bandmate? A high school friend? An ex?) or where "somewhere to the west, I suppose" even entails, it could be New York City or the next town over for all we know. But “Gig Life” establishes that TWIABP understand the sacrifices and the rewards of their chosen gig life and are saddened at losing this person, that it might be a personal failure on their behalf. Still, being stuck in West Virginia with the same old Rival Schools albums and food from the nearest Sheetz are their occupational hazards; those of your “gig” might entail water cooler talk and the occasional bagel, but it's still a gig. Are you satisfied? “Low Light Assembly” follows as a solemn, final hymn ("the parking lot where we lay is more than home now") before the stunning closer “Getting Sodas." A brooding, minor key bassline gives you pause to realize just how far TWIABP have come in barely a half hour-- they’ve established a community, this one’s for an audience. And it’s big room stuff: the guitars peal and ring rather than hang and drone, the low end is heavier and reverbed, the screaming sounds aimed rather than scattershot. And it closes on a chorale that the band created itself to express: "The world is a beautiful place/ but we have to make it that way... and if you're afraid to die/ Then so am I." Yeah, it sounds like Arcade Fire and it sounds like Bright Eyes too, but the intent of those words is more crucial. It reminds me of Win Butler promising to build tunnels as the world collapses around him and his lover, Conor Oberst demanding the tape roll so that he and his frien

Artist: The World Is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die, Album: Whenever, If Ever, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.8 Album review: "By the time you've finished reading the name "The World is a Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid to Die," you've likely made two assumptions about this band and both are warranted-- yes, they identify as "emo" and yes, they have little to no use for restraint and understatement. Though on a much, much smaller scale, TWIABP resemble Arcade Fire prior to Funeral, having made their name on a promising EP and unpredictable, cathartic live performances that feature nearly a dozen people making music at the same time. But the greater similarity lies in Whenever, If Ever being a rare debut that’s powered by an almost frightening will to live, a desperation that strongly suggests the people involved have no other option to deal with what's inside of them-- when Thomas Diaz screams “let's hope that this works out/ this has got to work out!" during the frantic conclusion of “Fightboat”, you realize “this” means everything. TWIABP have already become a bit of a cause célèbre as emo reemerges as a viable, visible genre of independent rock rather than just a pejorative adjective. Understandable, even if there wasn’t anything like them the first time around-- for one thing, they’re from Connecticut and roll about 10 deep, switching vocalists on the fly and utilizing strings and horns to create textures that are more based in post-rock or mid-00s indie rock. And at the risk of revisionist history, I’m just going to put this out there: Cap’n Jazz, Jazz June, and all that other jazz was never this melodic, never this instrumentally tight, and never this well-produced. But if that sound meant everything to you at some point or if you’ve been waiting for a comeback for the sole purpose of airing out old grievances, Whenever, If Ever suits your needs. They have a weakness for the emo trope of singing being the truest form of self-expression, an act even purer if you don’t have any kind of studied vocal capability-- "we sang songs/ but we never learned your words or melodies", "and when our voices fail us/ we will find new ways to sing," things like that. And on first proper track “Heartbeat in the Brain”, TWIABP sounds like the kind of band where you get the lead vocals simply by wanting it more-- there’s the adenoidal guy, the screaming guy, someone named "Shitty Greg" who might not be either of them, and they sometimes sing in tandem, initially exaggerating their hiccuping modulations to a degree that feels like trolling; you’ll know pretty quickly if you’re built for this stuff if “Kinsella” is your safe word. There are the musical cues as well-- searching arpeggios over palm-muted clean chords, spastic drum fills, nasal Casio synth leads. Hell, “Fightboat” might even cause squabbling amongst the old heads as its introductory horn line recalls the one from American Football’s “The Summer Ends”, which some people still complain about to this day. It takes a little while for Whenever, If Ever to get going, but once it does, TWIABP establish they are not an emo revival act, but more of a spiritual descendent of Danielson Famile or an early 00s Saddle Creek band, a community whose albums serve as a time capsule, a documentation of their lives. It’s unclear exactly when that click happens, but it’s definitely during “Picture of a Tree That Doesn't Look Okay”. Perhaps it’s the part where Greg Horbal asks over desiccated, detuned guitars, “Do you think the landlord’s pissed?/ We left a car parked on the lawn again”-- it’s an inside joke that doubles as a conspiratorial invitation, indicating that you’re welcome to join in and, hell, maybe you were there the whole time (the car ends up on the lawn again by the very next song). Or it could be the point where Whenever, If Ever starts to incorporate clever segues to establish a chronology and continuity to the story-- a delayed guitar resembles a bong rip as “Picture” drifts into “You Will Never Go to Space” and the final line of that song ("Did we dream when we were skeletons/ or did we just wish for our skin?") becomes foreshadowing for “The Layers of Skin We Drag Around”. Or, maybe it’s after the pace picks up and TWIABP shake off the slowcore rust, a drum roll crescendo leading into a rousing call and response coda where the hooks work out their kinks and become singalongs. Either way, once “Picture” passes, TWIABP already have accrued the confidence and wisdom to do things they seemed incapable of only minutes prior. “Ultimate Steve” distills the band’s post-rock and emo extremes into concentrate, an all-together-now, 30-second shoutalong bookended by a gorgeous build and fade. During the revolutionary final third, the stakes and consequences of this life pursuit start to push back on TWIABP. “Gig Life” bears the record’s most instantly memorable melody and lyrics, an acoustic power ballad that would’ve been intolerable if performed with the same abandon from earlier. Diaz sings, “You ran away/ You were afraid to make mistakes/ but that's the biggest one you made." It’s unclear to whom it’s pointed (a former bandmate? A high school friend? An ex?) or where "somewhere to the west, I suppose" even entails, it could be New York City or the next town over for all we know. But “Gig Life” establishes that TWIABP understand the sacrifices and the rewards of their chosen gig life and are saddened at losing this person, that it might be a personal failure on their behalf. Still, being stuck in West Virginia with the same old Rival Schools albums and food from the nearest Sheetz are their occupational hazards; those of your “gig” might entail water cooler talk and the occasional bagel, but it's still a gig. Are you satisfied? “Low Light Assembly” follows as a solemn, final hymn ("the parking lot where we lay is more than home now") before the stunning closer “Getting Sodas." A brooding, minor key bassline gives you pause to realize just how far TWIABP have come in barely a half hour-- they’ve established a community, this one’s for an audience. And it’s big room stuff: the guitars peal and ring rather than hang and drone, the low end is heavier and reverbed, the screaming sounds aimed rather than scattershot. And it closes on a chorale that the band created itself to express: "The world is a beautiful place/ but we have to make it that way... and if you're afraid to die/ Then so am I." Yeah, it sounds like Arcade Fire and it sounds like Bright Eyes too, but the intent of those words is more crucial. It reminds me of Win Butler promising to build tunnels as the world collapses around him and his lover, Conor Oberst demanding the tape roll so that he and his frien"

Apes

Baba's Mountain

Rock

Jason Crock

The Apes make a strange and sludgy stew without the help of guitars, using the distorted low-end of bassist Erick Jackson and the mushroom-fed organs and moogs of Amanda Kleinman, while Paul Weil wails like a snake-oil salesman and drummer Jeff Schid holds it all down. The bass and organ are great textures in themselves, but Apes consistently pull it all together for a unique and surprisingly dense sound. With two albums and two EPs behind them, the Apes don't change their approach much on Baba's Mountain, but it is a more ambitious record, folding new rhythms, a few moments of calm, and more than a few moments of manipulated vocal weirdness into their smirking psychedelia. It's a little less similar to heavyweights like Black Sabbath and more like Jesus Ape Superstar, especially on the organ-driven tracks such as "The Green Bus" or the sunny "Ornaments and Windchimes". Ape Amanda is flexing her muscles more, while Weil is along for the ride, echoing the themes that Kleinman outlines and just as quickly discards. Apes match their ambition on "Imp Ahh", the rhythm and melody shifting wildly while the band displays its usual swagger. Weil takes the reins on the melody and the chaos seems controlled when he's in command. Baba's Mountain still sounds more or less like Apes, but this is a band full of percussion instruments-- change the rhythm too often, you risk losing the listener. Songs that remain static, like the strutting bass line and smarmy vocal tics on "What We Do Best", leave a stronger impression. Without the band broadening their palette, you wouldn't have songs like "The Zookeeper's Night Out", where feral drumming and a cautious organ melody meet with a wall of face-melting fuzz bass, and "Imp Ahh" or "Can U Handle This" would be half as stunning without their fluid structure. However, Apes still sound best with their inimitable sound over a heavy, steady groove. Put "What We Do Best" against any other track here, and see which one you remember.

Artist: Apes, Album: Baba's Mountain, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.9 Album review: "The Apes make a strange and sludgy stew without the help of guitars, using the distorted low-end of bassist Erick Jackson and the mushroom-fed organs and moogs of Amanda Kleinman, while Paul Weil wails like a snake-oil salesman and drummer Jeff Schid holds it all down. The bass and organ are great textures in themselves, but Apes consistently pull it all together for a unique and surprisingly dense sound. With two albums and two EPs behind them, the Apes don't change their approach much on Baba's Mountain, but it is a more ambitious record, folding new rhythms, a few moments of calm, and more than a few moments of manipulated vocal weirdness into their smirking psychedelia. It's a little less similar to heavyweights like Black Sabbath and more like Jesus Ape Superstar, especially on the organ-driven tracks such as "The Green Bus" or the sunny "Ornaments and Windchimes". Ape Amanda is flexing her muscles more, while Weil is along for the ride, echoing the themes that Kleinman outlines and just as quickly discards. Apes match their ambition on "Imp Ahh", the rhythm and melody shifting wildly while the band displays its usual swagger. Weil takes the reins on the melody and the chaos seems controlled when he's in command. Baba's Mountain still sounds more or less like Apes, but this is a band full of percussion instruments-- change the rhythm too often, you risk losing the listener. Songs that remain static, like the strutting bass line and smarmy vocal tics on "What We Do Best", leave a stronger impression. Without the band broadening their palette, you wouldn't have songs like "The Zookeeper's Night Out", where feral drumming and a cautious organ melody meet with a wall of face-melting fuzz bass, and "Imp Ahh" or "Can U Handle This" would be half as stunning without their fluid structure. However, Apes still sound best with their inimitable sound over a heavy, steady groove. Put "What We Do Best" against any other track here, and see which one you remember."

Soft Circle

Shore Obsessed

Experimental,Rock

Jess Harvell

Soft Circle's first album, 2007's Full Bloom, made for an odd, entrancing hybrid. It had moments as relaxing and soothing as a new age record, yet Soft Circle mainman Hisham Bharoocha's work in neo-no-wave acts Lightning Bolt and Black Dice meant Full Bloom occasionally strayed into darker, uglier, and more abrasive terrain. Like many of his 21st-century contemporaries, Bharoocha suggested that pretty, meditative noise was only a few knob cranks away from becoming fearsome, plug-your-ears noise. That philosophy still drives Shore Obsessed. Take a cursory listen, though, and you might not even think it's the work of the same man who produced Full Bloom. Unlike that long, meandering album, Shore Obsessed is built out of short, tight dance songs. You can actually shake your stuff to these 10 synth-pop and disco tunes-- while singing along, no less-- which certainly isn't something you could have said about any of Bharoocha's other projects. Bharoocha first came to my attention as the frighteningly intense drummer behind Black Dice's early singles-- and then as the tribal virtuoso who helped the band stretch out into the glorious Boredoms-esque peaks of Beaches and Canyons-- but often on Full Bloom his drumming was reduced to a pitter-pat running through the background. On Shore Obsessed he shows off the big, bold funk chops that were often hidden in his previous work. For a guy who fractured rhythms into a zillion jagged pieces on Black Dice's Number 3, it's thrilling to hear Bharoocha revel in the bubblegum joy of a Eurodisco pulse on "Treading Water". Reading that, of course, you might be groaning: "Another dance-rock guy content to peddle well-worn disco beats?" But Bharoocha's clearly done his homework. Shore Obsessed reveals a producer and songwriter who's listened deeply to a wide variety of dance styles, figuring out the rhythmic and melodic ideas that make them tick before trying to put his own stamp on them.

Artist: Soft Circle, Album: Shore Obsessed, Genre: Experimental,Rock, Score (1-10): 7.0 Album review: "Soft Circle's first album, 2007's Full Bloom, made for an odd, entrancing hybrid. It had moments as relaxing and soothing as a new age record, yet Soft Circle mainman Hisham Bharoocha's work in neo-no-wave acts Lightning Bolt and Black Dice meant Full Bloom occasionally strayed into darker, uglier, and more abrasive terrain. Like many of his 21st-century contemporaries, Bharoocha suggested that pretty, meditative noise was only a few knob cranks away from becoming fearsome, plug-your-ears noise. That philosophy still drives Shore Obsessed. Take a cursory listen, though, and you might not even think it's the work of the same man who produced Full Bloom. Unlike that long, meandering album, Shore Obsessed is built out of short, tight dance songs. You can actually shake your stuff to these 10 synth-pop and disco tunes-- while singing along, no less-- which certainly isn't something you could have said about any of Bharoocha's other projects. Bharoocha first came to my attention as the frighteningly intense drummer behind Black Dice's early singles-- and then as the tribal virtuoso who helped the band stretch out into the glorious Boredoms-esque peaks of Beaches and Canyons-- but often on Full Bloom his drumming was reduced to a pitter-pat running through the background. On Shore Obsessed he shows off the big, bold funk chops that were often hidden in his previous work. For a guy who fractured rhythms into a zillion jagged pieces on Black Dice's Number 3, it's thrilling to hear Bharoocha revel in the bubblegum joy of a Eurodisco pulse on "Treading Water". Reading that, of course, you might be groaning: "Another dance-rock guy content to peddle well-worn disco beats?" But Bharoocha's clearly done his homework. Shore Obsessed reveals a producer and songwriter who's listened deeply to a wide variety of dance styles, figuring out the rhythmic and melodic ideas that make them tick before trying to put his own stamp on them."

Guerilla Toss

Eraser Stargazer

Rock

Aaron Leitko

Guerilla Toss may project themselves as deeply weeded hippie-punks, but they are not slackers. In just the last three years, the group has checked a number of boxes on the avant-rock bucket list: Releases on Digitalis Limited, NNA Tapes, Feeding Tube, and a CD on composer John Zorn’s Tzadik label, where they appeared as part of the Spotlight Series, a sub-imprint meant to highlight young and emerging weirdo talent. That honor is well earned. In concert, the band is wild and disorienting—a kind of punk rock "Donkey Kong" soundtrack with synthesizers ping-ponging against screeching guitars, the rhythm section halting and then churning in dialog with singer Kassie Carlson's animalistic yelps. They make brainy music that feels mmediate and visceral. Now signed to New York's DFA, Guerilla Toss have simmered down a little. The band’s first full-length for the label, Eraser Stargazer, finds them less manic and more zoned-out, augmenting pulsing repetition with heaps of gurgling psychedelic jewelry and elastic basslines. In terms of DFA’s classic catalog, they skew closer to the gonzo tradition embodied by Black Dice than the streamlined dance-punk of the Rapture. The later favored minimalism and poise, embodying a fluid and streamlined rhythmic sensibility. Guerilla Toss' music is more like the burbling glop at the top of the Slurpee machine—viscous and messy. Think Chocolate Synthesizer-era Boredoms spliced with The Uplift Mofo Party Plan-era Red Hot Chili Peppers. No, don't laugh. That's not a takedown. On Eraser Stargazer, Guerilla Toss suggests funkiness without channeling the grody and ultra-masculine energy that seems forever sewn to punk-funk. Not exactly an easy thing to do. In a way, their closest contemporary kin might be Baltimore's Dope Body—another band that has thrived on deconstructing '90s dude-rock into heady mulch. Though, Guerilla Toss’ alternative-era source material is not so much MTV as the jam band world. Which shouldn’t suggest that they are given to jamming. That kinship comes more through a lack of musical self-consciousness—the willingness to seek transcendence via improvisation and weirdo genre bending. On Eraser Stargazer, Guerilla Toss captures that crowd’s yin and yang—the blissed-out hippie vibe and also the druggy parking lot creep-out factor. But like the jam bands of yesteryear, Guerilla Toss’ on-stage appeal is not easily consumed through the thin reed of a SoundCloud single, a YouTube video, or even a LP. In concert, the band can survive on sheer intensity. But as a record, Eraser Stargazer is sometimes weirdly hookless and ponderous. There’s plenty of stoner fog, but not always much to grip. It is a forward move for the band, though. Where Guerilla Toss’ music was once driven by the push and pull between abrasive elements, Eraser Stargazer glides by in a dreamlike gonzo haze. Gentler, but no less strange.

Artist: Guerilla Toss, Album: Eraser Stargazer, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.9 Album review: "Guerilla Toss may project themselves as deeply weeded hippie-punks, but they are not slackers. In just the last three years, the group has checked a number of boxes on the avant-rock bucket list: Releases on Digitalis Limited, NNA Tapes, Feeding Tube, and a CD on composer John Zorn’s Tzadik label, where they appeared as part of the Spotlight Series, a sub-imprint meant to highlight young and emerging weirdo talent. That honor is well earned. In concert, the band is wild and disorienting—a kind of punk rock "Donkey Kong" soundtrack with synthesizers ping-ponging against screeching guitars, the rhythm section halting and then churning in dialog with singer Kassie Carlson's animalistic yelps. They make brainy music that feels mmediate and visceral. Now signed to New York's DFA, Guerilla Toss have simmered down a little. The band’s first full-length for the label, Eraser Stargazer, finds them less manic and more zoned-out, augmenting pulsing repetition with heaps of gurgling psychedelic jewelry and elastic basslines. In terms of DFA’s classic catalog, they skew closer to the gonzo tradition embodied by Black Dice than the streamlined dance-punk of the Rapture. The later favored minimalism and poise, embodying a fluid and streamlined rhythmic sensibility. Guerilla Toss' music is more like the burbling glop at the top of the Slurpee machine—viscous and messy. Think Chocolate Synthesizer-era Boredoms spliced with The Uplift Mofo Party Plan-era Red Hot Chili Peppers. No, don't laugh. That's not a takedown. On Eraser Stargazer, Guerilla Toss suggests funkiness without channeling the grody and ultra-masculine energy that seems forever sewn to punk-funk. Not exactly an easy thing to do. In a way, their closest contemporary kin might be Baltimore's Dope Body—another band that has thrived on deconstructing '90s dude-rock into heady mulch. Though, Guerilla Toss’ alternative-era source material is not so much MTV as the jam band world. Which shouldn’t suggest that they are given to jamming. That kinship comes more through a lack of musical self-consciousness—the willingness to seek transcendence via improvisation and weirdo genre bending. On Eraser Stargazer, Guerilla Toss captures that crowd’s yin and yang—the blissed-out hippie vibe and also the druggy parking lot creep-out factor. But like the jam bands of yesteryear, Guerilla Toss’ on-stage appeal is not easily consumed through the thin reed of a SoundCloud single, a YouTube video, or even a LP. In concert, the band can survive on sheer intensity. But as a record, Eraser Stargazer is sometimes weirdly hookless and ponderous. There’s plenty of stoner fog, but not always much to grip. It is a forward move for the band, though. Where Guerilla Toss’ music was once driven by the push and pull between abrasive elements, Eraser Stargazer glides by in a dreamlike gonzo haze. Gentler, but no less strange."

Supersilent

10

Experimental

Brian Howe

Norway's Supersilent is a supremely questing experimental jazz unit. Whether playing live or recording a new entry in their numbered series of albums for Rune Grammofon/ECM, they don't rehearse or make plans. Instead, they convene and explore, following their collective muse into sound-worlds that seldom fail to seem conceptually centered, despite their spontaneous nature. And in general, I'm game to follow them wherever they go. But they lost me for a minute with Supersilent 9, which sounded like someone had fallen asleep on the keys of a Hammond organ. To be fair, the quartet had recently become a trio with the departure of drummer Jarle Vespestad, and perhaps they were adjusting to the new line-up. Happily, they've bounced back strong for 10 and 11. The latter is a mite uneven, collecting leftovers from the sessions for Supersilent 8 in a vinyl-only format. The former is arguably the finest and most coherent piece of music they've ever recorded. After 12 years together, it seemed as if Supersilent had tried everything under the sun, from the spattering noise of their early issues to the ambient-inclined 5 to the daunting electro-acoustic jazz of 8. But on 10, they reveal a new direction that would be obvious for anyone else but is counterintuitive for them: a more acoustic, lyrical, almost traditional approach. As much as I admire their more "difficult" works, 10 is not only their most listenable record, but their bravest, clearing away the usual thickets of disturbance to let the technical skill and emotional acuity of the players shine through. The elegant interplay between Ståle Storløkken's often-chromatic Steinway piano and Arve Henriksen's talkative trumpet, with its inimitably airy yet ragged timbre, is front and center. As if in recognition of something special happening, producer Deathprod keeps a low profile, subtly coloring the music with quietly cosmic keyboards and hushed ambiance. The result is more similar to Henriksen's beautiful album Cartography than anything in the Supersilent catalog, with the same cold, thin air and heart-wrenching, effortlessly modulated motifs. Minimal ambient and noise passages knit together moving set pieces like the eerie "10.3", the pliant "10.6", and the penetratingly wistful "10.8". But lest anyone think that Supersilent have gone soft, 11 opens with a long and seemingly breakbeat-inspired passage of electronic mayhem. This is one of the aforementioned disturbances they favor, and it seems a right mess when compared to the impeccable poise of 10. But if you persevere through this nerve-jangling start, you'll be treated to a slow and expressive solo from Henriksen that carries into a more satisfying section of power electronics and fractured beats. Shades of postmodern lounge and rock music ensue, and the album manages to achieve an undeniable if broken throughline despite the disparate nature of its parts. If it feels a bit forced, it also represents the sort of challenging music for which many listeners value Supersilent. But it's 10 that represents a new chapter for the group, without longtime collaborator Vespestad, and so it's the ideal moment to ask: What are all these numbers adding up to? So far, the answer is a body of work that can be difficult or forthcoming, beautiful or ugly, but never anything short of fully committed. And the sequence isn't finished yet. Supersilent 12 has already been announced, and after the re-centering maneuvers of 9, 10, and 11, who knows where they'll end up next.

Artist: Supersilent, Album: 10, Genre: Experimental, Score (1-10): 8.4 Album review: "Norway's Supersilent is a supremely questing experimental jazz unit. Whether playing live or recording a new entry in their numbered series of albums for Rune Grammofon/ECM, they don't rehearse or make plans. Instead, they convene and explore, following their collective muse into sound-worlds that seldom fail to seem conceptually centered, despite their spontaneous nature. And in general, I'm game to follow them wherever they go. But they lost me for a minute with Supersilent 9, which sounded like someone had fallen asleep on the keys of a Hammond organ. To be fair, the quartet had recently become a trio with the departure of drummer Jarle Vespestad, and perhaps they were adjusting to the new line-up. Happily, they've bounced back strong for 10 and 11. The latter is a mite uneven, collecting leftovers from the sessions for Supersilent 8 in a vinyl-only format. The former is arguably the finest and most coherent piece of music they've ever recorded. After 12 years together, it seemed as if Supersilent had tried everything under the sun, from the spattering noise of their early issues to the ambient-inclined 5 to the daunting electro-acoustic jazz of 8. But on 10, they reveal a new direction that would be obvious for anyone else but is counterintuitive for them: a more acoustic, lyrical, almost traditional approach. As much as I admire their more "difficult" works, 10 is not only their most listenable record, but their bravest, clearing away the usual thickets of disturbance to let the technical skill and emotional acuity of the players shine through. The elegant interplay between Ståle Storløkken's often-chromatic Steinway piano and Arve Henriksen's talkative trumpet, with its inimitably airy yet ragged timbre, is front and center. As if in recognition of something special happening, producer Deathprod keeps a low profile, subtly coloring the music with quietly cosmic keyboards and hushed ambiance. The result is more similar to Henriksen's beautiful album Cartography than anything in the Supersilent catalog, with the same cold, thin air and heart-wrenching, effortlessly modulated motifs. Minimal ambient and noise passages knit together moving set pieces like the eerie "10.3", the pliant "10.6", and the penetratingly wistful "10.8". But lest anyone think that Supersilent have gone soft, 11 opens with a long and seemingly breakbeat-inspired passage of electronic mayhem. This is one of the aforementioned disturbances they favor, and it seems a right mess when compared to the impeccable poise of 10. But if you persevere through this nerve-jangling start, you'll be treated to a slow and expressive solo from Henriksen that carries into a more satisfying section of power electronics and fractured beats. Shades of postmodern lounge and rock music ensue, and the album manages to achieve an undeniable if broken throughline despite the disparate nature of its parts. If it feels a bit forced, it also represents the sort of challenging music for which many listeners value Supersilent. But it's 10 that represents a new chapter for the group, without longtime collaborator Vespestad, and so it's the ideal moment to ask: What are all these numbers adding up to? So far, the answer is a body of work that can be difficult or forthcoming, beautiful or ugly, but never anything short of fully committed. And the sequence isn't finished yet. Supersilent 12 has already been announced, and after the re-centering maneuvers of 9, 10, and 11, who knows where they'll end up next."

Jad Fair, Daniel Johnston

The Lucky Sperms: Somewhat Humorous

Rock,Experimental

Jason Nickey

After about seven years of silence, there's suddenly been a virtual flood of Daniel Johnston material. First, there was last year's surprisingly coherent and successful Rejected Unknown, followed by the reissue of Jad Fair and Daniel Johnston's 1989 collaboration, It's Spooky. A recent Target ad even featured Mary Lou Lord covering his "Speedy Motorcycle." And now comes The Lucky Sperms: Somewhat Humorous, the second such joint effort between Texas' favorite Captain America-worshiping troubadour of questionable mental stability and the bespectacled Half Japanese founder and Harry Potter look-a-like Jad Fair. Anyone familiar with the previous collaboration between these two-- or any of their other projects, really-- probably knows what to expect with this one: rag-tag, shambling songs, most sounding half-completed, and judging from the fidelity, recorded on a Talk Boy. The secondary title of this album has it just about right: "somewhat humorous." Somewhat annoying, somewhat brilliant, and somewhat scary, are also good ways to describe it. In a lot of ways, The Lucky Sperms sounds pretty tossed-off, interspersing maybe some leftover stuff Johnston recorded during the last seven years with a few random Jad Fair tracks, which isn't a totally bad thing. Johnston, whose material comprises about half the album, starts us off with "Movie," a typical-- and typically moving-- piano-based ode to unrequited love and melancholia. The harrowing "Death" follows, offering vivid glimpses into Johnston's idiosyncratic and highly-developed mythic system. Jad, for his part, serves up five noisy, stomping counterparts to Johnston's piano melodies. He also handles the album's production, if you want to call it that. His first contribution, "Yes, We Can," sounds more than a little like a Johnston tune, at least thematically, contemplating Batman's relative power and recalling, "'What power is in the words,'/ The Byrds asked Bob Dylan." "Coffee Cup," meanwhile, relates that "Peter Pan refused to grow up/ I want more coffee in my coffee mug/ If you want treasure you've got to dug/ You've got to dug ya dig?" And what can you really say about that? A truism if there ever was one. Mid-album, the guys also pull out their covers, including the Beatles' "Michelle" and the Stones' "Ruby Tuesday" back-to-back. The former is given and laid back with an almost reggae rhythm and the French lyrics hilariously slurred through, and "Ruby Tuesday" is given a barrelhouse piano reading by Johnston. Near the end of the album, they throw together a medley of standards and not-so-standards called "Melody," featuring bits and pieces of "On Top of Old Smokey," Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge over Troubled Water," Aerosmith's "Take Me to the Other Side," "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Ding-Dong the Wicked Witch is Dead," among others. But even these pleasures are short lived. They're enjoyable enough in the moment, but like the album as a whole, I can't say I'll be making the return trip very often.

Artist: Jad Fair, Daniel Johnston, Album: The Lucky Sperms: Somewhat Humorous, Genre: Rock,Experimental, Score (1-10): 6.1 Album review: "After about seven years of silence, there's suddenly been a virtual flood of Daniel Johnston material. First, there was last year's surprisingly coherent and successful Rejected Unknown, followed by the reissue of Jad Fair and Daniel Johnston's 1989 collaboration, It's Spooky. A recent Target ad even featured Mary Lou Lord covering his "Speedy Motorcycle." And now comes The Lucky Sperms: Somewhat Humorous, the second such joint effort between Texas' favorite Captain America-worshiping troubadour of questionable mental stability and the bespectacled Half Japanese founder and Harry Potter look-a-like Jad Fair. Anyone familiar with the previous collaboration between these two-- or any of their other projects, really-- probably knows what to expect with this one: rag-tag, shambling songs, most sounding half-completed, and judging from the fidelity, recorded on a Talk Boy. The secondary title of this album has it just about right: "somewhat humorous." Somewhat annoying, somewhat brilliant, and somewhat scary, are also good ways to describe it. In a lot of ways, The Lucky Sperms sounds pretty tossed-off, interspersing maybe some leftover stuff Johnston recorded during the last seven years with a few random Jad Fair tracks, which isn't a totally bad thing. Johnston, whose material comprises about half the album, starts us off with "Movie," a typical-- and typically moving-- piano-based ode to unrequited love and melancholia. The harrowing "Death" follows, offering vivid glimpses into Johnston's idiosyncratic and highly-developed mythic system. Jad, for his part, serves up five noisy, stomping counterparts to Johnston's piano melodies. He also handles the album's production, if you want to call it that. His first contribution, "Yes, We Can," sounds more than a little like a Johnston tune, at least thematically, contemplating Batman's relative power and recalling, "'What power is in the words,'/ The Byrds asked Bob Dylan." "Coffee Cup," meanwhile, relates that "Peter Pan refused to grow up/ I want more coffee in my coffee mug/ If you want treasure you've got to dug/ You've got to dug ya dig?" And what can you really say about that? A truism if there ever was one. Mid-album, the guys also pull out their covers, including the Beatles' "Michelle" and the Stones' "Ruby Tuesday" back-to-back. The former is given and laid back with an almost reggae rhythm and the French lyrics hilariously slurred through, and "Ruby Tuesday" is given a barrelhouse piano reading by Johnston. Near the end of the album, they throw together a medley of standards and not-so-standards called "Melody," featuring bits and pieces of "On Top of Old Smokey," Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge over Troubled Water," Aerosmith's "Take Me to the Other Side," "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "Ding-Dong the Wicked Witch is Dead," among others. But even these pleasures are short lived. They're enjoyable enough in the moment, but like the album as a whole, I can't say I'll be making the return trip very often."

Cherubino

Bird

Electronic,Rock

Christopher F. Schiel

Nostalgia's a bummer. Sappy longing for what once was, and pathetic cries in the face of temporality to reverse its unending drive forward all end up a complete waste. Wasn't it the great Oprah Winfrey that assisted millions of bourgeois housewives all over America to stop living in the past? Perhaps we should transfer such pop-psychology to our own indie living. But I just can't get past the fact that this Cherubino record's gotten me all nostalgic. The Self-Starter foundation prides itself in releasing the debut albums by Karate and Les Savy Fav, and now bringing us the debut seven-song EP from NYC-based emo trio Cherubino. That's right, the emo never dies. Just like the past, I would say. You see, Cherubino's raw rock elements and lighthearted melodies have me all distraught over the death of Pavement and that zany Malkmus, the times when Weezer weren't so damn terrible, and the fact that the electrified wails of the White Stripes aren't in my stereo at the moment. Of course, I could always change the disc and relive those Pinkerton years in a second, but it's just not the same. And it's not that Cherubino sounds anything like any of the aforementioned bands-- only that certain elements spark that sort of nostalgia in me. The quasi-lo-fi rock isn't totally lo-fi a la early Pavement, though the vague, Malkmus-inflected lyrics do aspire to that level of brilliance (without quite making it). The guitar solo of "Mercury Retrograde" screams Blue Album Weezer with its simplistic melodic sensibility soaked in overdrive. Lines like, "We could build a house just for two," from the same track, and the vocal turns in "Rocket," are delivered with an almost passionate disregard by frontman Travis Peterson that sounds like a subdued Jack White. Drummer Karen Tercho even chimes in for a vocal cameo on the latter in addition to her bangin' beats. But one must understand the divergence between these modern legends and Cherubino. For one, the lyrics are concerned with little other than failing relationships. "It's gonna take more than a kiss to make up for this," sings Peterson over the heavy shuffle of the opening track, "Kiss." The lyric is intoned with a playfulness that transcends the line's superficial banality, primarily because of its implications. And just like it takes some talent to even draw comparison to those greats, Cherubino rises above the general fodder of their contemporaries to create something that hints at potential. Hints of synth peek through the mix on a few tracks, and like the brilliant breaking of the film strip incorporated into Ingmar Bergman's Persona, the sound disintegrates in the middle of "Car Wreck." Their live performances are known for their inebriated energy, but like former Foundationeers Les Savy Fav, the sheer romp of this energy is lost in the studio. What bothers me most is that even Bird's twenty-five minutes feel a bit indulgent. Unlike Les Savy Fav, Cherubino has yet to stretch their genre's stodgy boundaries. Of course, this is only their first release, so we can hope for the best in their future, but for now I'm going to go curl up in the corner with my Wowee Zowee.

Artist: Cherubino, Album: Bird, Genre: Electronic,Rock, Score (1-10): 5.0 Album review: "Nostalgia's a bummer. Sappy longing for what once was, and pathetic cries in the face of temporality to reverse its unending drive forward all end up a complete waste. Wasn't it the great Oprah Winfrey that assisted millions of bourgeois housewives all over America to stop living in the past? Perhaps we should transfer such pop-psychology to our own indie living. But I just can't get past the fact that this Cherubino record's gotten me all nostalgic. The Self-Starter foundation prides itself in releasing the debut albums by Karate and Les Savy Fav, and now bringing us the debut seven-song EP from NYC-based emo trio Cherubino. That's right, the emo never dies. Just like the past, I would say. You see, Cherubino's raw rock elements and lighthearted melodies have me all distraught over the death of Pavement and that zany Malkmus, the times when Weezer weren't so damn terrible, and the fact that the electrified wails of the White Stripes aren't in my stereo at the moment. Of course, I could always change the disc and relive those Pinkerton years in a second, but it's just not the same. And it's not that Cherubino sounds anything like any of the aforementioned bands-- only that certain elements spark that sort of nostalgia in me. The quasi-lo-fi rock isn't totally lo-fi a la early Pavement, though the vague, Malkmus-inflected lyrics do aspire to that level of brilliance (without quite making it). The guitar solo of "Mercury Retrograde" screams Blue Album Weezer with its simplistic melodic sensibility soaked in overdrive. Lines like, "We could build a house just for two," from the same track, and the vocal turns in "Rocket," are delivered with an almost passionate disregard by frontman Travis Peterson that sounds like a subdued Jack White. Drummer Karen Tercho even chimes in for a vocal cameo on the latter in addition to her bangin' beats. But one must understand the divergence between these modern legends and Cherubino. For one, the lyrics are concerned with little other than failing relationships. "It's gonna take more than a kiss to make up for this," sings Peterson over the heavy shuffle of the opening track, "Kiss." The lyric is intoned with a playfulness that transcends the line's superficial banality, primarily because of its implications. And just like it takes some talent to even draw comparison to those greats, Cherubino rises above the general fodder of their contemporaries to create something that hints at potential. Hints of synth peek through the mix on a few tracks, and like the brilliant breaking of the film strip incorporated into Ingmar Bergman's Persona, the sound disintegrates in the middle of "Car Wreck." Their live performances are known for their inebriated energy, but like former Foundationeers Les Savy Fav, the sheer romp of this energy is lost in the studio. What bothers me most is that even Bird's twenty-five minutes feel a bit indulgent. Unlike Les Savy Fav, Cherubino has yet to stretch their genre's stodgy boundaries. Of course, this is only their first release, so we can hope for the best in their future, but for now I'm going to go curl up in the corner with my Wowee Zowee."

Orbital

Wonky

Electronic

Jess Harvell

There was no need for Orbital to release a new album. Eight years ago, The Blue Album sent Phil and Paul Hartnoll out on a moderate high note, a career-spanning compendium of their best ideas, if not always the best executed versions of those ideas. It was a perfectly acceptable cap to the decade-plus career of two reliable purveyors of strong-to-amazing dance music full-lengths. Orbital staged a seven-album run (nine if you count film scores) between 1991 and 2004 that produced only one or two outright clunkers. Looking at the ignoble history of electronic producers as album artists, this is hardly the faint praise it might seem. As one of the most beloved live acts of the first rave era, Orbital could have reunited to profitably play festivals every year without ever putting out new and potentially rep-tarnishing new music. You had to wonder if they looked at the trajectory of their one-time peers over the course of 21st-century so far and worried a little. The last 12 years have been a downer in this regard, with way too many 1990s dance titans staging major comebacks and making embarrassing attempts to look with-it, even as dance culture's hyper-accelerated trend-hopping had long since passed them by. So thank whatever god you wish that Wonky mostly finds Orbital deciding to do what they've always done best: gorgeous blends of house drive and techno precision, linking airy whoosh and stadium stomp, melodic hook and rhythmic push. These are dance tracks that hit you with the immediacy of pop singles, occasionally erring toward outright throwback territory but usually with just enough juice purloined from club culture's more recent mutations and underground niches to keep things vital. This doesn't mean the Hartnolls aren't still devoted to the sounds of the 1990s, ideas they helped either pioneer or refine, and there are indeed plenty of sonic nods to rave's (and Orbital's) most fertile decade. Orbital tap young goth chanteuse Zola Jesus for a guest spot on "New France", turning her steely, gothic vocal into the yearnings of a spooky diva in an ultra-bright world-- a tech-house anthem that would have worked just as well in the days when Alice Deejay was on the radio. Brighter still, "Stringy Acid" is a rush of all the shiniest, most emotional bits from the first few years of Orbital's career, a track so beautifully constructed and 3-D rich that you can forgive how unrepentantly stuck in 1991 it is. But Orbital's great trick was always to fold the sound of the moment-- whether it was the epic sweep or prog trance or the tricky rhythm programming of jungle-- into the architecture of their own brand of mass-appeal anthems. It's a strategy that served them well as pop ambassadors during the ever-shifting 90s, beholden to no one scene but able to communicate some of the thrill to folks who got most of their dance music from Columbia House. They deploy that trick again on Wonky, except now they seem to be translating the current codes of for-the-kids club sounds for an aging audience of Orbital fans who might not be paying as close attention as they did in the past. And so "Distractions" is their take on the half-time lurch of recent techno-tinged dubstep, stripped of the bass drop, but with enough heart-tugging and Orbital-esque melodic curlicues filling up the haunted space that remains, so that it scans more as unique twist than desperate homage. The only time this pick-and-mix approach to contemporary dance really falters is "Beelzedub", which attempts to take the distortion of brostep to an almost comically snarling extreme, complete with a headbanging burst of nasty breakbeats in the final third-- the kind we haven't heard since Alec Empire was smashing jungle and feedback together. The problem is that the extreme parts aren't quite extreme enough, distracting wannabe tough-guy kitsch and a desperate reversion to a played-out style. It's the only time the Hartnolls come off like old dudes struggling to outdo the young roughnecks. And yet despite occasionally stumbling in this quest to keep things short and immediately ear-grabbing, the Hartnolls haven't lost their knack for gracefulness, tracks that seem to effortlessly build to goosebump-inducing climaxes. If anything, they've managed to work within mainstream dance music's current vogue for radio-friendly track lengths without abandoning their patented crest-to-the-big-release style. Nor have they forgotten how to extend the live act's seemingly preternatural knack for pop-rave pacing across the peaks-and-valleys arc of the listening in your bedroom experience, where even the bridge between the shimmer of "Stringy Acid" and the ugliness of "Beelzedub" feels natural. Wonky has the one-jolt-after-another vibe of a great collection of familiar hits but without the disconnected feeling you get when a bunch of obviously Big Moment singles are slapped together and called an album, rather seamlessly covering a whole lot of musical ground without sacrificing concision or intensity. It's not perfect, but it is an unexpectedly great comeback album that manages to seem utterly "Orbital," occasionally backward-looking, and yet up-to-the-minute in a not-embarrassing way.

Artist: Orbital, Album: Wonky, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "There was no need for Orbital to release a new album. Eight years ago, The Blue Album sent Phil and Paul Hartnoll out on a moderate high note, a career-spanning compendium of their best ideas, if not always the best executed versions of those ideas. It was a perfectly acceptable cap to the decade-plus career of two reliable purveyors of strong-to-amazing dance music full-lengths. Orbital staged a seven-album run (nine if you count film scores) between 1991 and 2004 that produced only one or two outright clunkers. Looking at the ignoble history of electronic producers as album artists, this is hardly the faint praise it might seem. As one of the most beloved live acts of the first rave era, Orbital could have reunited to profitably play festivals every year without ever putting out new and potentially rep-tarnishing new music. You had to wonder if they looked at the trajectory of their one-time peers over the course of 21st-century so far and worried a little. The last 12 years have been a downer in this regard, with way too many 1990s dance titans staging major comebacks and making embarrassing attempts to look with-it, even as dance culture's hyper-accelerated trend-hopping had long since passed them by. So thank whatever god you wish that Wonky mostly finds Orbital deciding to do what they've always done best: gorgeous blends of house drive and techno precision, linking airy whoosh and stadium stomp, melodic hook and rhythmic push. These are dance tracks that hit you with the immediacy of pop singles, occasionally erring toward outright throwback territory but usually with just enough juice purloined from club culture's more recent mutations and underground niches to keep things vital. This doesn't mean the Hartnolls aren't still devoted to the sounds of the 1990s, ideas they helped either pioneer or refine, and there are indeed plenty of sonic nods to rave's (and Orbital's) most fertile decade. Orbital tap young goth chanteuse Zola Jesus for a guest spot on "New France", turning her steely, gothic vocal into the yearnings of a spooky diva in an ultra-bright world-- a tech-house anthem that would have worked just as well in the days when Alice Deejay was on the radio. Brighter still, "Stringy Acid" is a rush of all the shiniest, most emotional bits from the first few years of Orbital's career, a track so beautifully constructed and 3-D rich that you can forgive how unrepentantly stuck in 1991 it is. But Orbital's great trick was always to fold the sound of the moment-- whether it was the epic sweep or prog trance or the tricky rhythm programming of jungle-- into the architecture of their own brand of mass-appeal anthems. It's a strategy that served them well as pop ambassadors during the ever-shifting 90s, beholden to no one scene but able to communicate some of the thrill to folks who got most of their dance music from Columbia House. They deploy that trick again on Wonky, except now they seem to be translating the current codes of for-the-kids club sounds for an aging audience of Orbital fans who might not be paying as close attention as they did in the past. And so "Distractions" is their take on the half-time lurch of recent techno-tinged dubstep, stripped of the bass drop, but with enough heart-tugging and Orbital-esque melodic curlicues filling up the haunted space that remains, so that it scans more as unique twist than desperate homage. The only time this pick-and-mix approach to contemporary dance really falters is "Beelzedub", which attempts to take the distortion of brostep to an almost comically snarling extreme, complete with a headbanging burst of nasty breakbeats in the final third-- the kind we haven't heard since Alec Empire was smashing jungle and feedback together. The problem is that the extreme parts aren't quite extreme enough, distracting wannabe tough-guy kitsch and a desperate reversion to a played-out style. It's the only time the Hartnolls come off like old dudes struggling to outdo the young roughnecks. And yet despite occasionally stumbling in this quest to keep things short and immediately ear-grabbing, the Hartnolls haven't lost their knack for gracefulness, tracks that seem to effortlessly build to goosebump-inducing climaxes. If anything, they've managed to work within mainstream dance music's current vogue for radio-friendly track lengths without abandoning their patented crest-to-the-big-release style. Nor have they forgotten how to extend the live act's seemingly preternatural knack for pop-rave pacing across the peaks-and-valleys arc of the listening in your bedroom experience, where even the bridge between the shimmer of "Stringy Acid" and the ugliness of "Beelzedub" feels natural. Wonky has the one-jolt-after-another vibe of a great collection of familiar hits but without the disconnected feeling you get when a bunch of obviously Big Moment singles are slapped together and called an album, rather seamlessly covering a whole lot of musical ground without sacrificing concision or intensity. It's not perfect, but it is an unexpectedly great comeback album that manages to seem utterly "Orbital," occasionally backward-looking, and yet up-to-the-minute in a not-embarrassing way."

Konx-om-Pax

Caramel

Electronic

Andy Beta

There’s no exact English translation for the Greek phrase Κόγξ ὀμ πὰξ, though it has been repurposed by English occultist Aleister Crowley and by Italian composer-mystic Giacinto Scelsi. “Light in extension” or “Light rushing out in a single ray” is the rough translation of Konx-om-Pax, which is also the handle for animator, graphic designer and electronic music maker Tom Scholefield. Scholefield’s visuals have informed many artists over the years, be they as cover art for Oneohtrix Point Never and Rustie, videos for Mogwai and Hudson Mohawke, or as part of Lone’s live show. His debut album Regional Surrealism was for the most part slow and downcast, but his four-years-in-the-making follow-up Caramel embodies the project name by embracing that notion of “light” in all its manifold meanings. As he recently stated in an interview, “this record was almost a therapy…an attempt to be aggressively positive.” It’s also about the flashing lights of the bygone rave era, and much like Jamie xx, Special Request, Lone et al., Scholefield approached his music as an homage and idealization of an era that ended well before he could experience it. As he admits in the same interview: “[It’s] kind of an imaginary nostalgia because I was just a kid at the time.” That fantasia of rave’s lights and strobes informs Caramel. Like these aforementioned acts, it's not so much about replicating those sounds—much less the ferocious drum programming—but rather the faded tracers and cornea-seared after images that remain. So while there are beats and thumps embedded in Konx-om-Pax’s tracks, they are secondary to the neon hues that wiggle atop them, bright as gummy worms. That sense of distance can make a tape-hiss heavy track like “Video Club” sound like dance music going chillwave, its infomercial-style melody and laser sounds a bit too on-the-nose. But on “Perc Rave,” Scholefield changes up that strategy, dropping a lashing rhythm that would scan as furious, if it didn’t sound like it was emitted by a drum machine left by the side of the road to sputter. Throughout, Konx-om-Pax toggles between the bliss of dance music and the visceral surge of noise, suggesting he’s taken the lessons of both Lone and Mogwai to heart. Some tracks even embrace that dichotomy: the first half of “Oren’s Theme” is a woozy loop of “ooo baby” as all manner of Aphex chimes blip about it. But just as it’s about to turn whimsical, belches of great noise overtake it, allowing just enough of those chimes back in to strike a balance. “Mega Glacial” suggests the Fairlights, Mallets and Bamboo mix as filtered through Boards of Canada’s murky melodicism. Too often, the album’s melodies suggest end credits, so that you might mistake the album winding down even at the midway point. And sometimes when the drums rise in the mix, it’s not to move your body but more to remind you of the underlying theme, distracting from the other textures. But for all of the album’s moments of luminous noise and rave earmarks, Caramel is at its best in its quieter moments, with “At the Lake” and “Rainbow Bounce” layering arpeggiated melodies until they shimmer like oil on a puddle. It’s fitting that its most gorgeous track is entitled “Radiance.” Beatless but gridded by what sounds like gently stroked rebar, Scholefield layers these blurry sounds carefully, the effect not unlike sunrise after a rave has wound down, when dawn light imbues everything with its glow.

Artist: Konx-om-Pax, Album: Caramel, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 7.4 Album review: "There’s no exact English translation for the Greek phrase Κόγξ ὀμ πὰξ, though it has been repurposed by English occultist Aleister Crowley and by Italian composer-mystic Giacinto Scelsi. “Light in extension” or “Light rushing out in a single ray” is the rough translation of Konx-om-Pax, which is also the handle for animator, graphic designer and electronic music maker Tom Scholefield. Scholefield’s visuals have informed many artists over the years, be they as cover art for Oneohtrix Point Never and Rustie, videos for Mogwai and Hudson Mohawke, or as part of Lone’s live show. His debut album Regional Surrealism was for the most part slow and downcast, but his four-years-in-the-making follow-up Caramel embodies the project name by embracing that notion of “light” in all its manifold meanings. As he recently stated in an interview, “this record was almost a therapy…an attempt to be aggressively positive.” It’s also about the flashing lights of the bygone rave era, and much like Jamie xx, Special Request, Lone et al., Scholefield approached his music as an homage and idealization of an era that ended well before he could experience it. As he admits in the same interview: “[It’s] kind of an imaginary nostalgia because I was just a kid at the time.” That fantasia of rave’s lights and strobes informs Caramel. Like these aforementioned acts, it's not so much about replicating those sounds—much less the ferocious drum programming—but rather the faded tracers and cornea-seared after images that remain. So while there are beats and thumps embedded in Konx-om-Pax’s tracks, they are secondary to the neon hues that wiggle atop them, bright as gummy worms. That sense of distance can make a tape-hiss heavy track like “Video Club” sound like dance music going chillwave, its infomercial-style melody and laser sounds a bit too on-the-nose. But on “Perc Rave,” Scholefield changes up that strategy, dropping a lashing rhythm that would scan as furious, if it didn’t sound like it was emitted by a drum machine left by the side of the road to sputter. Throughout, Konx-om-Pax toggles between the bliss of dance music and the visceral surge of noise, suggesting he’s taken the lessons of both Lone and Mogwai to heart. Some tracks even embrace that dichotomy: the first half of “Oren’s Theme” is a woozy loop of “ooo baby” as all manner of Aphex chimes blip about it. But just as it’s about to turn whimsical, belches of great noise overtake it, allowing just enough of those chimes back in to strike a balance. “Mega Glacial” suggests the Fairlights, Mallets and Bamboo mix as filtered through Boards of Canada’s murky melodicism. Too often, the album’s melodies suggest end credits, so that you might mistake the album winding down even at the midway point. And sometimes when the drums rise in the mix, it’s not to move your body but more to remind you of the underlying theme, distracting from the other textures. But for all of the album’s moments of luminous noise and rave earmarks, Caramel is at its best in its quieter moments, with “At the Lake” and “Rainbow Bounce” layering arpeggiated melodies until they shimmer like oil on a puddle. It’s fitting that its most gorgeous track is entitled “Radiance.” Beatless but gridded by what sounds like gently stroked rebar, Scholefield layers these blurry sounds carefully, the effect not unlike sunrise after a rave has wound down, when dawn light imbues everything with its glow."

Paul Westerberg

Besterberg: The Best of Paul Westerberg

Rock

Stephen M. Deusner

The Replacements were a teenager's band. Led by Paul Westerberg, who yearned for high notes more often than he actually hit them, they gave voice to all those knotty emotions that overwhelmed your 16-year-old self. Any band can do that, but Westerberg sang with the benefit of hindsight, and the message he sent from his twenties was crucial and reassuring; all those bursting, longing feelings were worthwhile and even useful out in the real world. In fact, the Replacements presented that emotional confusion as a kind of moral code with which the world could be understood, a compass with which to navigate life's disappointments and tragedies. Heard at the right age, this band truly could be your life. On his first collection of post-Replacements material, Besterberg: The Best of Paul Westerberg (which is a great title and begs a companion rarities comp called Resterberg), the former Replacement no longer sounds like a teenager in a twentysomething body. He's resolutely adult, more mature and perhaps more cautious of the world. He gives himself over completely to the na-na-na's on the "cutesy" (his word, not mine) "Dyslexic Heart" and the piss-and-vinegar of "World Class Fad", but Westerberg sings songs like "Runaway Wind" and "Love Untold" from a distance, a mere observer rather than a participant. Even the B-side "Man Without Ties", about spending Friday night with a frozen pizza, seems to be about someone else. "A Star Is Bored" (ironically, from the Friends soundtrack) trades adolescent disaffection for celebrity disaffection-- maybe Winona digs it, but the rest of us can't really identify with four-star hotel anomie. There are, however, a few moments on Besterberg when Westerberg deftly captures that sense of youthful confusion: On "Stain Your Blood" he sings "Stay the night just for fun" with the desperation either of a kid whose parents are away for the weekend or of an adult who really doesn't want to face the morning alone. His characters are essentially the same no matter how many years separate them, but searching for the boy inside the man proves much more fruitful for Westerberg than finding the adult in the boy. On "Love Untold" he sings of a young romance that ends before it starts, but besides the grinding guitar solo, the song sounds saccharine. Amazingly, Besterberg works better as an album than his first three proper albums. Not only does it reject the worsterberg, but it also presents its own solid story of high hopes and low pay-off. The first half of the album finds him playing it relatively safe, perhaps in a bid for post-Replacements respectability (and who doesn't deserve it more?), but as 14 Songs and Eventually tank, he grows pricklier and his music sounds rawer and more inhabited, his trajectory mirroring that of his idol, Alex Chilton. This prickliness becomes Westerberg, even when he assumes his Grandpaboy persona. As a result, Besterberg gets better as it proceeds and as Westerberg grows more comfortable just left of the spotlight. "Let the Bad Times Roll" roils with offhanded resignation, and he sings "What a Day (for a Night)" with the dreamy sigh of someone who can't believe his dumb luck. On "All That I Had", which was inexplicably relegated to B-side status, Westerberg erases any distance between himself and the song and explains himself better than anyone else can: "Didn't follow my dreams/ I lost the map/ I lived my fantasy instead/ Until I found it was a trap/ Gave a life, got a living/ Hey, that's all right, all's forgiven."

Artist: Paul Westerberg, Album: Besterberg: The Best of Paul Westerberg, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.9 Album review: "The Replacements were a teenager's band. Led by Paul Westerberg, who yearned for high notes more often than he actually hit them, they gave voice to all those knotty emotions that overwhelmed your 16-year-old self. Any band can do that, but Westerberg sang with the benefit of hindsight, and the message he sent from his twenties was crucial and reassuring; all those bursting, longing feelings were worthwhile and even useful out in the real world. In fact, the Replacements presented that emotional confusion as a kind of moral code with which the world could be understood, a compass with which to navigate life's disappointments and tragedies. Heard at the right age, this band truly could be your life. On his first collection of post-Replacements material, Besterberg: The Best of Paul Westerberg (which is a great title and begs a companion rarities comp called Resterberg), the former Replacement no longer sounds like a teenager in a twentysomething body. He's resolutely adult, more mature and perhaps more cautious of the world. He gives himself over completely to the na-na-na's on the "cutesy" (his word, not mine) "Dyslexic Heart" and the piss-and-vinegar of "World Class Fad", but Westerberg sings songs like "Runaway Wind" and "Love Untold" from a distance, a mere observer rather than a participant. Even the B-side "Man Without Ties", about spending Friday night with a frozen pizza, seems to be about someone else. "A Star Is Bored" (ironically, from the Friends soundtrack) trades adolescent disaffection for celebrity disaffection-- maybe Winona digs it, but the rest of us can't really identify with four-star hotel anomie. There are, however, a few moments on Besterberg when Westerberg deftly captures that sense of youthful confusion: On "Stain Your Blood" he sings "Stay the night just for fun" with the desperation either of a kid whose parents are away for the weekend or of an adult who really doesn't want to face the morning alone. His characters are essentially the same no matter how many years separate them, but searching for the boy inside the man proves much more fruitful for Westerberg than finding the adult in the boy. On "Love Untold" he sings of a young romance that ends before it starts, but besides the grinding guitar solo, the song sounds saccharine. Amazingly, Besterberg works better as an album than his first three proper albums. Not only does it reject the worsterberg, but it also presents its own solid story of high hopes and low pay-off. The first half of the album finds him playing it relatively safe, perhaps in a bid for post-Replacements respectability (and who doesn't deserve it more?), but as 14 Songs and Eventually tank, he grows pricklier and his music sounds rawer and more inhabited, his trajectory mirroring that of his idol, Alex Chilton. This prickliness becomes Westerberg, even when he assumes his Grandpaboy persona. As a result, Besterberg gets better as it proceeds and as Westerberg grows more comfortable just left of the spotlight. "Let the Bad Times Roll" roils with offhanded resignation, and he sings "What a Day (for a Night)" with the dreamy sigh of someone who can't believe his dumb luck. On "All That I Had", which was inexplicably relegated to B-side status, Westerberg erases any distance between himself and the song and explains himself better than anyone else can: "Didn't follow my dreams/ I lost the map/ I lived my fantasy instead/ Until I found it was a trap/ Gave a life, got a living/ Hey, that's all right, all's forgiven.""

Various Artists

Saint Heron

Miles Raymer

The Weeknd's House of Balloons is one of the more influential records of this decade, but thanks to Solange Knowles, “alt-R&B” would have happened without it. The sonic aesthetic she’s pieced together—a crackling experimental streak with potent pop hooks—is deeply pleasurable, and though she hasn't recorded anything as monumental as House of Balloons, people have increasingly taken notice. It's unknown whether or not Solange was attempting to claim the credit she’s owed while curating her Saint Heron compilation, but listening to it, it certainly has that result. Although most of its songs are previously released, she’s assembled them into a coherent piece that transcends the usual odds-and-sods nature of the compilation format. It's an aesthetic manifesto of a specific corner of a rapidly expanding scene—the Flex Your Head or No New York of ambitious, minimalist R&B that possesses considerable mainstream ambition and appeal. Those loose parameters contain a broad range of sounds and styles. B.C. Kingdom’s album-opening “Lockup” and Kingdom’s “Bank Head” (featuring vocals by Kelela, whose “Go All Night” also appears) both give off a stiffly robotic funkiness—the latter through a juddering bass synth, and the former via the tasteful application of Robocop noises. Sampha’s “Beneath the Tree” is a jazzy piano ballad set to drum programming that combines elements of two-step, footwork, and Burial-style found-sound beats. Jade de la Fleur’s “Jaded” has the brutally stripped-down arrangement and smoky paranoia of a top-tier Tricky song. Spanish producer Pional's remix of South African artist Petit Noir's “Noirse" clears away the comp’s nocturnal moodiness with bright, syncopated staccato melodies passed down from township music. Despite their different approaches, the tracks all share a few basic commonalities: deep bass unimpeded by fussy arrangements, stoner-friendly electronic textures, and a willingness to borrow from pretty much any musical style that can project stylishly understated sexiness, whether it’s post-dubstep or 4AD-style atmospheric goth. Above all, these songs are also song-focused—the artists assembled here may all have deep experimental streaks, but they never ignore pop’s pleasure principle, and there are hooks all over the place on this near-flawlessly sequenced compilation. Solange wrote and co-produced her own wryly titled contribution, “Cash In”, and the track's one of the most aesthetically conservative songs on the compilation, featuring a straightforward beat, a relatively lush arrangement, and the kind of gracefully building, inspirational melody that slow-jam R&B hits are made from. It's the one song on Saint Heron that I could see getting radio rotation, a swaggering, graceful power move. It may have taken her a while to get to the point where she can pull such a gesture off, but in this insurgent territory, Solange reigns supreme.

Artist: Various Artists, Album: Saint Heron, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 8.1 Album review: "The Weeknd's House of Balloons is one of the more influential records of this decade, but thanks to Solange Knowles, “alt-R&B” would have happened without it. The sonic aesthetic she’s pieced together—a crackling experimental streak with potent pop hooks—is deeply pleasurable, and though she hasn't recorded anything as monumental as House of Balloons, people have increasingly taken notice. It's unknown whether or not Solange was attempting to claim the credit she’s owed while curating her Saint Heron compilation, but listening to it, it certainly has that result. Although most of its songs are previously released, she’s assembled them into a coherent piece that transcends the usual odds-and-sods nature of the compilation format. It's an aesthetic manifesto of a specific corner of a rapidly expanding scene—the Flex Your Head or No New York of ambitious, minimalist R&B that possesses considerable mainstream ambition and appeal. Those loose parameters contain a broad range of sounds and styles. B.C. Kingdom’s album-opening “Lockup” and Kingdom’s “Bank Head” (featuring vocals by Kelela, whose “Go All Night” also appears) both give off a stiffly robotic funkiness—the latter through a juddering bass synth, and the former via the tasteful application of Robocop noises. Sampha’s “Beneath the Tree” is a jazzy piano ballad set to drum programming that combines elements of two-step, footwork, and Burial-style found-sound beats. Jade de la Fleur’s “Jaded” has the brutally stripped-down arrangement and smoky paranoia of a top-tier Tricky song. Spanish producer Pional's remix of South African artist Petit Noir's “Noirse" clears away the comp’s nocturnal moodiness with bright, syncopated staccato melodies passed down from township music. Despite their different approaches, the tracks all share a few basic commonalities: deep bass unimpeded by fussy arrangements, stoner-friendly electronic textures, and a willingness to borrow from pretty much any musical style that can project stylishly understated sexiness, whether it’s post-dubstep or 4AD-style atmospheric goth. Above all, these songs are also song-focused—the artists assembled here may all have deep experimental streaks, but they never ignore pop’s pleasure principle, and there are hooks all over the place on this near-flawlessly sequenced compilation. Solange wrote and co-produced her own wryly titled contribution, “Cash In”, and the track's one of the most aesthetically conservative songs on the compilation, featuring a straightforward beat, a relatively lush arrangement, and the kind of gracefully building, inspirational melody that slow-jam R&B hits are made from. It's the one song on Saint Heron that I could see getting radio rotation, a swaggering, graceful power move. It may have taken her a while to get to the point where she can pull such a gesture off, but in this insurgent territory, Solange reigns supreme."

SONOIO

Fine

Electronic

Ben Cardew

For Alessandro Cortini, naming a solo project SONOIO feels like a conspiratorial wink. “Sonoio” means “it’s me” in his native tongue, Italian, and SONOIO is where he grants free reign to his personality, synthesizing everything that has come before it in his musical career. The tireless Cortini is a veteran of industrial pop giants Nine Inch Nails and New Order-ish emotionalists Modwheelmood, while under his own name he makes opulent ambient records that worship at the altar of the Buchla synthesizer. Elements of all of these projects appear on Fine, his third and final SONOIO record. But, as might be expected of someone who spends his nights strapped to the NIN touring machine, their influence dominates. The album combines the brooding intensity and coiled aggression of Trent Reznor’s band with grandstanding arena-rock melodies that owe more to U2’s “big music” and Depeche Mode’s stadium-sized angst than to Skinny Puppy’s deviant thrash. By and large, these are the kind of solidly written, satisfyingly thick pop songs that would have Albuquerque row ZZ singing along; it’s easy to imagine Reznor bellowing out “Thanks for Calling” or “Bad Habit” on his latest Enormo-Dome trek. Cortini, however, possesses neither Reznor’s aggressive authority nor Bono’s buffed-up emotional sincerity. His voice more closely resembles that of Sparks’ Russell Mael or Wild Beasts’ Hayden Thorpe, all quivering intensity and twitchy falsetto. When it works—as on the sunstroke ballad “What’s Before” and the electronic shoegaze track “Left”—this unlikely fusion of music and vocals creates a wonderfully dramatic hybrid that’s somewhat akin to the synth-pop foppery of John Maus’ recent album Screen Memories. At other times, though, the theatrical sheen undermines the songs’ emotional heft. A line like, “Thanks for calling/Thanks for letting me go,” from “Thanks For Calling,” might be a barbarous kiss-off when delivered by Trent Reznor. But Cortini sounds petulant, like a teen whining at parents who wouldn’t let him go to a party. That the vocals sometimes grate is a shame, considering that the best moments on this album have the instrumental grace of Cortini’s eponymous synth work. “I Don’t Know (Coda)” rests on a subtly burbling TB-303 line—a surprisingly delicate use of an instrument too often employed for its shrieking impact—that trails off into a duet between machine and glockenspiel. “Bad Habit” has a nebulous synth sound that wobbles around like a tired toddler, in a throwback to the dreamy world of Sonno, a 2014 solo album that grew out of lullabies Cortini composed while on tour. This is Fine at its best, though even it could have done without the vocals. “I Don’t Know (Coda)” provides a fitting end to SONOIO’s charming but underdeveloped run. Whereas NIN regularly leave stages slick with sweat and littered with broken keyboard parts, this agreeably noodling closer suggests that Cortini would return to sweep up any mess he’d made after the house lights came back on. SONOIO turns out to be the Nine Inch Nails you can take home to meet the parents: a pleasant diversion that may leave you craving more illicit excitement.

Artist: SONOIO, Album: Fine, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 6.1 Album review: "For Alessandro Cortini, naming a solo project SONOIO feels like a conspiratorial wink. “Sonoio” means “it’s me” in his native tongue, Italian, and SONOIO is where he grants free reign to his personality, synthesizing everything that has come before it in his musical career. The tireless Cortini is a veteran of industrial pop giants Nine Inch Nails and New Order-ish emotionalists Modwheelmood, while under his own name he makes opulent ambient records that worship at the altar of the Buchla synthesizer. Elements of all of these projects appear on Fine, his third and final SONOIO record. But, as might be expected of someone who spends his nights strapped to the NIN touring machine, their influence dominates. The album combines the brooding intensity and coiled aggression of Trent Reznor’s band with grandstanding arena-rock melodies that owe more to U2’s “big music” and Depeche Mode’s stadium-sized angst than to Skinny Puppy’s deviant thrash. By and large, these are the kind of solidly written, satisfyingly thick pop songs that would have Albuquerque row ZZ singing along; it’s easy to imagine Reznor bellowing out “Thanks for Calling” or “Bad Habit” on his latest Enormo-Dome trek. Cortini, however, possesses neither Reznor’s aggressive authority nor Bono’s buffed-up emotional sincerity. His voice more closely resembles that of Sparks’ Russell Mael or Wild Beasts’ Hayden Thorpe, all quivering intensity and twitchy falsetto. When it works—as on the sunstroke ballad “What’s Before” and the electronic shoegaze track “Left”—this unlikely fusion of music and vocals creates a wonderfully dramatic hybrid that’s somewhat akin to the synth-pop foppery of John Maus’ recent album Screen Memories. At other times, though, the theatrical sheen undermines the songs’ emotional heft. A line like, “Thanks for calling/Thanks for letting me go,” from “Thanks For Calling,” might be a barbarous kiss-off when delivered by Trent Reznor. But Cortini sounds petulant, like a teen whining at parents who wouldn’t let him go to a party. That the vocals sometimes grate is a shame, considering that the best moments on this album have the instrumental grace of Cortini’s eponymous synth work. “I Don’t Know (Coda)” rests on a subtly burbling TB-303 line—a surprisingly delicate use of an instrument too often employed for its shrieking impact—that trails off into a duet between machine and glockenspiel. “Bad Habit” has a nebulous synth sound that wobbles around like a tired toddler, in a throwback to the dreamy world of Sonno, a 2014 solo album that grew out of lullabies Cortini composed while on tour. This is Fine at its best, though even it could have done without the vocals. “I Don’t Know (Coda)” provides a fitting end to SONOIO’s charming but underdeveloped run. Whereas NIN regularly leave stages slick with sweat and littered with broken keyboard parts, this agreeably noodling closer suggests that Cortini would return to sweep up any mess he’d made after the house lights came back on. SONOIO turns out to be the Nine Inch Nails you can take home to meet the parents: a pleasant diversion that may leave you craving more illicit excitement."

Hoax

Hoax

Jenn Pelly

Don't get your hopes up too high about Hoax, nihilistic hardcore punks of Western Massachusetts; with half the band's impending move to Los Angeles, there have been rumors of a break up. Over three years, Hoax have remained firmly underground on principle, playing remote locations like a cave and a now-legendary recycling plant gig. Jesse Sanes, the perpetually-fuming 27-year-old singer, habitually bleeds from the head on stage and gets crowds of primarily young men to shout lines like "I'M A FAGGOT" (I have interpreted this song, from their debut 7", as an indictment of homophobic bullying). There has been nearly as much discrediting punk-world chatter about Hoax and their supposed "hype" as tracks from the band—its previous output has spanned just over a dozen songs with such titles as "Discipline" and "Living on the Brink of Suicide". This debut full-length transcends the noise. Sanes typically sounds as though he's about to implode, with tough, raw growls that cover the most morbid shit. Self-deprecation doesn't quite hit it; with his bleak lyrics comes the evocation of guilt for just existing. Hoax's brooding sound is steeped in mutant destruction and caustic anger—a mid-tempo hardcore foundation with thick, chainshaw guitars and gruff grunts, pummeling towards metal. You could see fans of the recent brutal Nails record liking Hoax as much as followers of more accessible strains of dark punk; the band is self-loathing but not self-sabotaging. Placing headphones blaring Hoax into your eardrums has the empowering effect of plugging a phone charger into an outlet; you’re struck with a visceral surge of energy that is possibly dangerous. Play Hoax while walking down the hall at school, and no one is going to fuck with you. "Drive", the record's peak, has one of the most tense breakdowns you'll find anywhere (complete with an endearing prefacing chant of "BREAK-DOWN!"). There is crank, build, and release—momentum made of a militaristic drum march and slow, searing, sinister guitar solos. The record's "Intro", from New York noise artist Margaret Chardiet aka Pharmakon, sculpts vile hacks and nauseting industrial clangs. On Hoax, there is liberation in running to hide from treacherous society; themes of hopelessness, ruinous behavior, and well-served anxieties abound. Sanes searches for answers in the vastness of the sky because he's hateful and hollow inside. He's not fearful of death but makes the incredibly more harrowing assertion of being "terrified to try at life." Sanes' existential missives are so precisely articulated that even without the screaming and scowling they'd still be grating. "How can I die?/ I'm already dead," he roars on the dread-laced "Anesthetize", just clear enough to be decipherable. Slow, abrasive, and poetic, the closer "Los Angeles" pulverizes both heart and ears; while the band's material is always realistic, this feels especially human and vulnerable, like a twisted lullaby on paper. "There's a place I go in my sleep," Sanes screams, describing dreams of Los Angeles and its potential, he feels, for self-reinvention. With much juxtaposed beauty and grit, the song's real emotional killer—"I can't go on if there's nowhere on earth/ Where heaven is cheap"—conveys an essential dream and dilemma of all artists. Elsewhere Sanes is directly political, calling out men of power who destroy the planet; "Fear" deconstructs the economic concept of "scarcity" and blames it on "whites trapped in fear" while linking race and poverty to the prison-industrial complex. Political anger fueld earlier Hoax material, all refreshing but unsurprising considering Sanes is also an environmental activist, a position that could offer endless frustration for unadulterated all-caps rage. It seems apt, too, that Hoax's debut 7" was getting its second pressing around the same time the Occupy movement exploded. A resilient ethos is inherent to any worthy hardcore band, and Hoax defends its complete independence fully, endeavoring to function outside the scope of what they consider corporate leeches. Nothing about the total misery of Hoax suggests a narrator with a lot of friends, but the album's package makes its 100-strong "Thank You" list a central part of its ambitious art concept, along with impressive posters from 14 punk illustrators. The album resists being stripped of its context, meticulously outlining this network of labels and radio DJs and festival-organizers and bands from Brooklyn and Olympia and Barcelona and Copenhagen and Tampa and Toronto and Japan, women and men who helped Hoax be a band on its own terms, gravitating very close to the nucleus of this global community. As a teenager hardcore changed my life because it ultimately repulsed me—girls were sidelined at shows and it seemed a maddening microcosm for the world in general—but Hoax remind me how I was drawn to it in the first place, how the ideas rearranged the way I thought and gifted me a necessary sense of skepticism. You need this even more in adulthood, and with records like Hoax, one need not travel to spin-kicking pits of testosterone at shows to hear it loud.

Artist: Hoax, Album: Hoax, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 8.1 Album review: "Don't get your hopes up too high about Hoax, nihilistic hardcore punks of Western Massachusetts; with half the band's impending move to Los Angeles, there have been rumors of a break up. Over three years, Hoax have remained firmly underground on principle, playing remote locations like a cave and a now-legendary recycling plant gig. Jesse Sanes, the perpetually-fuming 27-year-old singer, habitually bleeds from the head on stage and gets crowds of primarily young men to shout lines like "I'M A FAGGOT" (I have interpreted this song, from their debut 7", as an indictment of homophobic bullying). There has been nearly as much discrediting punk-world chatter about Hoax and their supposed "hype" as tracks from the band—its previous output has spanned just over a dozen songs with such titles as "Discipline" and "Living on the Brink of Suicide". This debut full-length transcends the noise. Sanes typically sounds as though he's about to implode, with tough, raw growls that cover the most morbid shit. Self-deprecation doesn't quite hit it; with his bleak lyrics comes the evocation of guilt for just existing. Hoax's brooding sound is steeped in mutant destruction and caustic anger—a mid-tempo hardcore foundation with thick, chainshaw guitars and gruff grunts, pummeling towards metal. You could see fans of the recent brutal Nails record liking Hoax as much as followers of more accessible strains of dark punk; the band is self-loathing but not self-sabotaging. Placing headphones blaring Hoax into your eardrums has the empowering effect of plugging a phone charger into an outlet; you’re struck with a visceral surge of energy that is possibly dangerous. Play Hoax while walking down the hall at school, and no one is going to fuck with you. "Drive", the record's peak, has one of the most tense breakdowns you'll find anywhere (complete with an endearing prefacing chant of "BREAK-DOWN!"). There is crank, build, and release—momentum made of a militaristic drum march and slow, searing, sinister guitar solos. The record's "Intro", from New York noise artist Margaret Chardiet aka Pharmakon, sculpts vile hacks and nauseting industrial clangs. On Hoax, there is liberation in running to hide from treacherous society; themes of hopelessness, ruinous behavior, and well-served anxieties abound. Sanes searches for answers in the vastness of the sky because he's hateful and hollow inside. He's not fearful of death but makes the incredibly more harrowing assertion of being "terrified to try at life." Sanes' existential missives are so precisely articulated that even without the screaming and scowling they'd still be grating. "How can I die?/ I'm already dead," he roars on the dread-laced "Anesthetize", just clear enough to be decipherable. Slow, abrasive, and poetic, the closer "Los Angeles" pulverizes both heart and ears; while the band's material is always realistic, this feels especially human and vulnerable, like a twisted lullaby on paper. "There's a place I go in my sleep," Sanes screams, describing dreams of Los Angeles and its potential, he feels, for self-reinvention. With much juxtaposed beauty and grit, the song's real emotional killer—"I can't go on if there's nowhere on earth/ Where heaven is cheap"—conveys an essential dream and dilemma of all artists. Elsewhere Sanes is directly political, calling out men of power who destroy the planet; "Fear" deconstructs the economic concept of "scarcity" and blames it on "whites trapped in fear" while linking race and poverty to the prison-industrial complex. Political anger fueld earlier Hoax material, all refreshing but unsurprising considering Sanes is also an environmental activist, a position that could offer endless frustration for unadulterated all-caps rage. It seems apt, too, that Hoax's debut 7" was getting its second pressing around the same time the Occupy movement exploded. A resilient ethos is inherent to any worthy hardcore band, and Hoax defends its complete independence fully, endeavoring to function outside the scope of what they consider corporate leeches. Nothing about the total misery of Hoax suggests a narrator with a lot of friends, but the album's package makes its 100-strong "Thank You" list a central part of its ambitious art concept, along with impressive posters from 14 punk illustrators. The album resists being stripped of its context, meticulously outlining this network of labels and radio DJs and festival-organizers and bands from Brooklyn and Olympia and Barcelona and Copenhagen and Tampa and Toronto and Japan, women and men who helped Hoax be a band on its own terms, gravitating very close to the nucleus of this global community. As a teenager hardcore changed my life because it ultimately repulsed me—girls were sidelined at shows and it seemed a maddening microcosm for the world in general—but Hoax remind me how I was drawn to it in the first place, how the ideas rearranged the way I thought and gifted me a necessary sense of skepticism. You need this even more in adulthood, and with records like Hoax, one need not travel to spin-kicking pits of testosterone at shows to hear it loud."

Okkervil River

In the Rainbow Rain

Rock

Brad Shoup

Will Sheff walks into a bar. Let’s say it’s your local and there’s an empty stool beside you. The past couple of years have sheared nerves and petrified muscles; bad news passes through you both, like radio waves, at all times. But Sheff has some wisdom to offer you. So, do you want to hear that you gotta lose a little pride to love somebody, that we probably won’t ever have all the answers? Or would you rather learn about a bunch of celebrities’ emergency respiratory surgeries? Sheff takes both tacks on In the Rainbow Rain, Okkervil River’s ninth album. It’s telling, though, that “Famous Tracheotomies” is the icebreaker. The track is an ideal reminder of his talents: his surefooted navigation of jagged cadences, his obituarist’s judicious sense of detail, his reverent rifling of cultural back pages. (The final tracheotomy detailed is Ray Davies’, which allows the band to vamp on the chorus to “Waterloo Sunset.”) Even though Sheff leads with his own story—he had a tracheotomy before turning two—there’s nothing mawkish about the song. Layering soft-rock melodies over gospel backing vocals, it’s an alternately tender and stark inventory of frailty that demonstrates how mortality snaps everyone to attention. “I wanted to make a record where a sense of kindness felt encoded into the music,” Sheff has said. And he has. The current iteration of Okkervil River, composed of Sheff’s touring band for 2016’s Away, casts the songs in warm, dusky light. The album’s sound is confident yet gentle, like the War on Drugs’ tricked-out AOR engine powering a languid Sunday drive. For his part, Sheff avoids the vocal exhibitionism that goosed previous albums. Sometimes you have to lean in to catch the takeaway—but that careful attention is too often rewarded with platitudes. He adopts a beatific, drunken burble on the twinkling “Family Song,” which closes with a statement —“You’re alive, I’m alive”—that is life-affirming in only the most literal sense. It’s one of three tracks that, perhaps in a callback to Okkervil River’s early releases, have “song” in their titles. The best of these is the dog adoption story “Shelter Song,” which tempers the human and animal characters’ relief at finding each other with Sheff’s acknowledgment of how precarious survival can be: “I thought that nobody loved me at 10/Sad kid, scared animal/A nasty word and I’m back there again.” The drum machine pads apprehensively. At the close, bassist Benjamin Davis traces wary circles that give way to a yowling guitar solo from Will Graefe. You can win over a dog with kindness, but sizing up people proves more difficult. On “Human Being Song,” which closes the album, Sheff is so stuck between the competing urges to embrace others (“It’s hard to be a human being/Just seeking, needing, feeling pain”) and to push them away (“It’s hard to open up your heart/And face the fact that you could fail”) that it’s up to the band to nudge him beyond this impasse, shifting from the sway of classic rock to the benediction of gospel. But, since the former genre exists to conjure the unnameable and the latter speaks the language of certainty, neither quite provides the answers Sheff seeks. In the Rainbow Rain isn’t always this thematically dense, though, and its more laid-back songs help loosen the philosophical knots that tracks like “Human Being Song” tie. The epic “The Dream and the Light” takes the E Street Band on a nighttime limo ride straight out of Don DeLillo’s Cosmopolis. On “Pulled Up the Ribbon,” keyboardist Sarah Pedinotti suspends synth lines from a high ceiling and Davis’ basslines nail them to the earth. “External Actor” is a backwoods trek that celebrates “moments of opaque-eyed, knocked-out rapture” and traces a line from your beer can to zodiacal light. The song may be a bro-country writing exercise under the influence of mushrooms, but it plays to Sheff’s strengths. Like the bar’s most beloved regular, he has a gift for shoving drinkers’ shared uncertainties under the stools and making old stories do new work.

Artist: Okkervil River, Album: In the Rainbow Rain, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.9 Album review: "Will Sheff walks into a bar. Let’s say it’s your local and there’s an empty stool beside you. The past couple of years have sheared nerves and petrified muscles; bad news passes through you both, like radio waves, at all times. But Sheff has some wisdom to offer you. So, do you want to hear that you gotta lose a little pride to love somebody, that we probably won’t ever have all the answers? Or would you rather learn about a bunch of celebrities’ emergency respiratory surgeries? Sheff takes both tacks on In the Rainbow Rain, Okkervil River’s ninth album. It’s telling, though, that “Famous Tracheotomies” is the icebreaker. The track is an ideal reminder of his talents: his surefooted navigation of jagged cadences, his obituarist’s judicious sense of detail, his reverent rifling of cultural back pages. (The final tracheotomy detailed is Ray Davies’, which allows the band to vamp on the chorus to “Waterloo Sunset.”) Even though Sheff leads with his own story—he had a tracheotomy before turning two—there’s nothing mawkish about the song. Layering soft-rock melodies over gospel backing vocals, it’s an alternately tender and stark inventory of frailty that demonstrates how mortality snaps everyone to attention. “I wanted to make a record where a sense of kindness felt encoded into the music,” Sheff has said. And he has. The current iteration of Okkervil River, composed of Sheff’s touring band for 2016’s Away, casts the songs in warm, dusky light. The album’s sound is confident yet gentle, like the War on Drugs’ tricked-out AOR engine powering a languid Sunday drive. For his part, Sheff avoids the vocal exhibitionism that goosed previous albums. Sometimes you have to lean in to catch the takeaway—but that careful attention is too often rewarded with platitudes. He adopts a beatific, drunken burble on the twinkling “Family Song,” which closes with a statement —“You’re alive, I’m alive”—that is life-affirming in only the most literal sense. It’s one of three tracks that, perhaps in a callback to Okkervil River’s early releases, have “song” in their titles. The best of these is the dog adoption story “Shelter Song,” which tempers the human and animal characters’ relief at finding each other with Sheff’s acknowledgment of how precarious survival can be: “I thought that nobody loved me at 10/Sad kid, scared animal/A nasty word and I’m back there again.” The drum machine pads apprehensively. At the close, bassist Benjamin Davis traces wary circles that give way to a yowling guitar solo from Will Graefe. You can win over a dog with kindness, but sizing up people proves more difficult. On “Human Being Song,” which closes the album, Sheff is so stuck between the competing urges to embrace others (“It’s hard to be a human being/Just seeking, needing, feeling pain”) and to push them away (“It’s hard to open up your heart/And face the fact that you could fail”) that it’s up to the band to nudge him beyond this impasse, shifting from the sway of classic rock to the benediction of gospel. But, since the former genre exists to conjure the unnameable and the latter speaks the language of certainty, neither quite provides the answers Sheff seeks. In the Rainbow Rain isn’t always this thematically dense, though, and its more laid-back songs help loosen the philosophical knots that tracks like “Human Being Song” tie. The epic “The Dream and the Light” takes the E Street Band on a nighttime limo ride straight out of Don DeLillo’s Cosmopolis. On “Pulled Up the Ribbon,” keyboardist Sarah Pedinotti suspends synth lines from a high ceiling and Davis’ basslines nail them to the earth. “External Actor” is a backwoods trek that celebrates “moments of opaque-eyed, knocked-out rapture” and traces a line from your beer can to zodiacal light. The song may be a bro-country writing exercise under the influence of mushrooms, but it plays to Sheff’s strengths. Like the bar’s most beloved regular, he has a gift for shoving drinkers’ shared uncertainties under the stools and making old stories do new work."

Liberteer

Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees

Metal

Brandon Stosuy

Matthew Widener, who played in the gory grind crew Exhumed in the mid 1990s, formed the Carcass-inspired grind trio the County Medical Examiners, and still performs in Cretin, the trio fronted by guitarist/vocalist Marissa Martinez (one of the only transgender people I can think of in extreme metal), shifted the name of his longtime political grindcore band Citizen to Liberteer as he got deeper into anarchism. He handles everything on Liberteer's debut, Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees, a compact but exceedingly expansive grind record packed with major-key riffs, digitized horns, real-life banjos, mandolin, martial drumming, blast beats, and the lyrics you'd expect from the setup and the CrimethInc.-like vibe of the album title. His words are unrelenting. Widener isn't one for metaphor or couching things in poetry. You can delve into the lyric sheet ("To birth a world, the first must die," "Killing never justified itself/ But sometimes you must fight/ When peaceful protests choke in tear gas/ Blitz in black bloc squads," "To be happy, god damn it, kill those who own property") or focus on songs with titles such as "We Are Not Afraid of Ruins" and "Class War Never Meant More Than It Does Now". (Then there's the booklet that comes with the album and gives instructions on how to use the case, the CD, and said booklet as a weapon, as a way to hop barbed wire fences, as a stencil for graffitti, as a bomb, etc.) Better to Die opens with "The Falcon Cannot Hear the Falconer", a short instrumental that takes its name from W.B. Yeats' much-quoted poem "The Second Coming". Despite its context, anarchy, in the descriptive sense, doesn't come across in the music itself: Widener, who also records classical music, carefully composed these 27 minutes. Repeated motifs echo throughout the collection; specific guitar parts resurface. The 17 songs bleed and blend. There's an overall arc as well as the in-song drama. It's a tightly contained outburst. The first proper track, "Build No System", incorporates triumphant horns and flutes into its final section, and it comes over like Napalm Death clobbering John Philip Sousa. Another track, "Usurious Epitaph" basically breaks into "Yankee Doodle Dandy" at the 42-second mark. "99 to 1" works in some electronics that would sound dance-y even without transforming into the weirdo "Chariots of Fire" grind of instrumental "Sweat for Blood". If not for the crunchy distorted guitars, the banjo and horn-lined "Rise Like Lions After Slumber" would make sense at a Stare Fair hoedown. Thing is, even when he's not incorporating these oddball flourishes, Better to Die is a memorable, staggeringly detailed, shout-along collection. (Grindcore doesn't often sound this big.) Widener's decision to place his very real call for action in this anthemic, angry, surprisingly catchy (and just plain surprising) grindcore was a smart one. More than any album I've heard in recent years, Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees reminds me of the more idealistic, early-20s version of myself who moved West with a sleeping bag and some books, to basically dumpster dive, write, and read anarchist theory and Beckett, who I thought could teach me something very real with his expansive use of minimalism. I got older and more cynical, and rejected anarchism for various reasons, but Better to Die is the kind of record that draws that line in the sand again. It reminded me how good it feels to want to tear things down; more importantly, Widener has the intelligence and ambition to create something new in the process.

Artist: Liberteer, Album: Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees, Genre: Metal, Score (1-10): 7.8 Album review: "Matthew Widener, who played in the gory grind crew Exhumed in the mid 1990s, formed the Carcass-inspired grind trio the County Medical Examiners, and still performs in Cretin, the trio fronted by guitarist/vocalist Marissa Martinez (one of the only transgender people I can think of in extreme metal), shifted the name of his longtime political grindcore band Citizen to Liberteer as he got deeper into anarchism. He handles everything on Liberteer's debut, Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees, a compact but exceedingly expansive grind record packed with major-key riffs, digitized horns, real-life banjos, mandolin, martial drumming, blast beats, and the lyrics you'd expect from the setup and the CrimethInc.-like vibe of the album title. His words are unrelenting. Widener isn't one for metaphor or couching things in poetry. You can delve into the lyric sheet ("To birth a world, the first must die," "Killing never justified itself/ But sometimes you must fight/ When peaceful protests choke in tear gas/ Blitz in black bloc squads," "To be happy, god damn it, kill those who own property") or focus on songs with titles such as "We Are Not Afraid of Ruins" and "Class War Never Meant More Than It Does Now". (Then there's the booklet that comes with the album and gives instructions on how to use the case, the CD, and said booklet as a weapon, as a way to hop barbed wire fences, as a stencil for graffitti, as a bomb, etc.) Better to Die opens with "The Falcon Cannot Hear the Falconer", a short instrumental that takes its name from W.B. Yeats' much-quoted poem "The Second Coming". Despite its context, anarchy, in the descriptive sense, doesn't come across in the music itself: Widener, who also records classical music, carefully composed these 27 minutes. Repeated motifs echo throughout the collection; specific guitar parts resurface. The 17 songs bleed and blend. There's an overall arc as well as the in-song drama. It's a tightly contained outburst. The first proper track, "Build No System", incorporates triumphant horns and flutes into its final section, and it comes over like Napalm Death clobbering John Philip Sousa. Another track, "Usurious Epitaph" basically breaks into "Yankee Doodle Dandy" at the 42-second mark. "99 to 1" works in some electronics that would sound dance-y even without transforming into the weirdo "Chariots of Fire" grind of instrumental "Sweat for Blood". If not for the crunchy distorted guitars, the banjo and horn-lined "Rise Like Lions After Slumber" would make sense at a Stare Fair hoedown. Thing is, even when he's not incorporating these oddball flourishes, Better to Die is a memorable, staggeringly detailed, shout-along collection. (Grindcore doesn't often sound this big.) Widener's decision to place his very real call for action in this anthemic, angry, surprisingly catchy (and just plain surprising) grindcore was a smart one. More than any album I've heard in recent years, Better to Die on Your Feet Than Live on Your Knees reminds me of the more idealistic, early-20s version of myself who moved West with a sleeping bag and some books, to basically dumpster dive, write, and read anarchist theory and Beckett, who I thought could teach me something very real with his expansive use of minimalism. I got older and more cynical, and rejected anarchism for various reasons, but Better to Die is the kind of record that draws that line in the sand again. It reminded me how good it feels to want to tear things down; more importantly, Widener has the intelligence and ambition to create something new in the process."

TOPS

Sugar at the Gate

Pop/R&B

Kevin Lozano

When they formed in 2011, TOPS were among a crop of Montréal indie bands involved with Arbutus Records, a label that came into prominence after releasing Grimes’ early albums and co-releasing 2012 breakout Visions with 4AD. Following Grimes’ success, watchful eyes turned their sights to her peers, looking to crack the code in the city’s scene. Among their compatriots—Blue Hawaii, Sean Nicholas Savage, Braids, and Majical Cloudz—TOPS were the most aligned to conventional notions of rock and pop, a throwback AM-rock band amid a sea of indie-tronica. Their fuzzy, honey-dipped songs were straight out of the school of Fleetwood Mac and Mazzy Star: eminently listenable, easy to digest, romantic, and catchy. For their third record, Sugar at the Gate, the band relocated to Los Angeles and recorded at a former brothel in Jewel City. Sugar at the Gate mirrors this sordid and light-filled clime—which is wholly appropriate for a band that has always been a lot sunnier than the city they hail from. TOPS is anchored by the singer Jane Penny, whose voice embodies the deep nostalgia that the band’s music projects. Something about her style feels anachronistic—contemporary rock music always draws on previous eras, be it 1990s indie or 1980s punk, but rarely do singers have such a vintage warmth. Her soprano luxuriates in its own imperfections, and some sly production allows it to sound fuzzy and blown out, mimicking the feeling of a cassette you found at a garage sale. In fact, the whole album bears this considered lo-fi sound: like vaseline rubbed along a camera’s lens to give a photo an old-timey aesthetic, the songs on Sugar at the Gate are perfectly old feeling. Take, for example, “Petals”—with its strutting guitar riffs, sweet choruses, and rinky-dink synths, it would not have sounded out of place on drive-time soft-rock radio circa 1977. It’s the kind of rock song that would be perfect for a David Lynch film, smokey and slightly kitschy—absolutely redolent of the past. If anything, Sugar at the Gate represents the perfection of a formula; TOPS are workmanlike in their insistent repetition. It’s hard to distinguish one song from the next, and instead they flow into each other like syrup falling from a glass bottle. This is in part due to David Carriere’s impossibly catchy guitar riffs and Riley Fleck’s understated drumming. In tandem, the two create a plush atmosphere for Penny’s singing. Carriere’s guitar lines are simple and well-executed—generous in their grooves, but filled with static, recalling Jim Reid at one moment and Lee Ranaldo the next. This especially evident on songs like “Dayglo Bimbo,” which channel Sonic Youth at their poppiest. But Sugar at the Gate proves that TOPS are not out to reinvent the wheel. Lyrically, none of the lines Penny and Carriere write are all that memorable. Even in surreal moments (“I was hypnotized by why/We could not kill the light”), they mostly kowtow to convention (“It’s time to start again/I know I’ll never win”), writing standard-fare love songs. What sets TOPS apart is their consistency—across three records, they've sharpened their clean hooks and clarified their aesthetic—making soft rock songs that sound good on repeat. Overall, Sugar at the Gate is a compact record from a band chugging along smoothly, unspooling sweet rhythms like it is finally their job.

Artist: TOPS, Album: Sugar at the Gate, Genre: Pop/R&B, Score (1-10): 7.4 Album review: "When they formed in 2011, TOPS were among a crop of Montréal indie bands involved with Arbutus Records, a label that came into prominence after releasing Grimes’ early albums and co-releasing 2012 breakout Visions with 4AD. Following Grimes’ success, watchful eyes turned their sights to her peers, looking to crack the code in the city’s scene. Among their compatriots—Blue Hawaii, Sean Nicholas Savage, Braids, and Majical Cloudz—TOPS were the most aligned to conventional notions of rock and pop, a throwback AM-rock band amid a sea of indie-tronica. Their fuzzy, honey-dipped songs were straight out of the school of Fleetwood Mac and Mazzy Star: eminently listenable, easy to digest, romantic, and catchy. For their third record, Sugar at the Gate, the band relocated to Los Angeles and recorded at a former brothel in Jewel City. Sugar at the Gate mirrors this sordid and light-filled clime—which is wholly appropriate for a band that has always been a lot sunnier than the city they hail from. TOPS is anchored by the singer Jane Penny, whose voice embodies the deep nostalgia that the band’s music projects. Something about her style feels anachronistic—contemporary rock music always draws on previous eras, be it 1990s indie or 1980s punk, but rarely do singers have such a vintage warmth. Her soprano luxuriates in its own imperfections, and some sly production allows it to sound fuzzy and blown out, mimicking the feeling of a cassette you found at a garage sale. In fact, the whole album bears this considered lo-fi sound: like vaseline rubbed along a camera’s lens to give a photo an old-timey aesthetic, the songs on Sugar at the Gate are perfectly old feeling. Take, for example, “Petals”—with its strutting guitar riffs, sweet choruses, and rinky-dink synths, it would not have sounded out of place on drive-time soft-rock radio circa 1977. It’s the kind of rock song that would be perfect for a David Lynch film, smokey and slightly kitschy—absolutely redolent of the past. If anything, Sugar at the Gate represents the perfection of a formula; TOPS are workmanlike in their insistent repetition. It’s hard to distinguish one song from the next, and instead they flow into each other like syrup falling from a glass bottle. This is in part due to David Carriere’s impossibly catchy guitar riffs and Riley Fleck’s understated drumming. In tandem, the two create a plush atmosphere for Penny’s singing. Carriere’s guitar lines are simple and well-executed—generous in their grooves, but filled with static, recalling Jim Reid at one moment and Lee Ranaldo the next. This especially evident on songs like “Dayglo Bimbo,” which channel Sonic Youth at their poppiest. But Sugar at the Gate proves that TOPS are not out to reinvent the wheel. Lyrically, none of the lines Penny and Carriere write are all that memorable. Even in surreal moments (“I was hypnotized by why/We could not kill the light”), they mostly kowtow to convention (“It’s time to start again/I know I’ll never win”), writing standard-fare love songs. What sets TOPS apart is their consistency—across three records, they've sharpened their clean hooks and clarified their aesthetic—making soft rock songs that sound good on repeat. Overall, Sugar at the Gate is a compact record from a band chugging along smoothly, unspooling sweet rhythms like it is finally their job."

Nadine Shah

Fast Food

Rock

Jayson Greene

Nadine Shah has a dark, plum-tart voice, with a generous vibrato that trembles on "warble"; in a recent Quietus profile, even her own mother mistook her for a man (Drenge was playing on BBC, and her mother thought it was her, to Shah’s amusement). When her voice enters, the atmosphere changes. She can make almost anything sound remarkable, or at least interesting, and her sharp, incisive rock songs shimmer with a ripe theatricality every time she opens her mouth. Each song on Fast Food, her second LP, feels offered up and expertly framed, a series of rock songs given the lighting and treatment of museum objects. There is nothing particularly surprising or unsual going on in the makeup or her composition, which combine acoustic guitars with reverb’ed electric, a pretty time-honored and standard backing. But the band, which is excellent and intuitive, feel mostly in place to set the stage for Shah, who stands at the footlights on Fast Food and creates a powerful sense of intimacy and vulnerability. The best songs here zero in on a single evocative moment and spellbind you with it. She has been compared, often, to PJ Harvey and Nick Cave ("That damn Nick Cave" even gets a wry-sounding shout-out from Shah on "Fool") and while you can’t exactly hear Rid of Me or The Boatman’s Call resounding in Fast Food, she shares a certain sea-swept melancholy and a preoccupation with power. On "Matador" she moans about hooded eyes and nightfall over spaghetti-western guitars, which swell into a slightly cartoony blood-moon peak. "I heard you were a man who does not cry," she sings with an audibly curled lip on "Washed Up". Maybe because her voice is already so distinct, and such a larger-than-life character, the songs that dial back to smaller moments tend to hit the hardest. They feel the most humane, and the most affecting. She can sing with tremendous tenderness, and "Divided" is a terrific love song, full of specific feeling. "I let my hair loose for you, but I would scrape it back as soon as I would leave," she sings huskily. Something about the catches and crags in her delivery, her halting phrasing, carries the weight of real conversation, something between lovers over morning coffee. She told Rookie that the song "Stealing Cars" is about her struggles with panic attacks, and how irrational thoughts manifest themselves in her dreams. The song moves at a leisurely pace, while her vocal traces a drowsy arc around three or four notes. It doesn’t feel like anxiety, but it invites you close anyhow, using an admission of struggle as a sort of invitation into an inner circle. It’s gorgeous, especially when the harmonies sail in and flesh out the main melody with a downward tug of yearning. There isn’t much going on in the lyrics, just a few images about finding solace in the arms of another; Shah’s best work hangs on simple gestures. "And there was nothing else to do but fall in love with you"—those are the only words to the five-minute, two-chord "Nothing Else to Do". It’s a gorgeous, fairly time-stopping song, a moment that doesn’t need any elaboration to transfix you. It just needs the sentiment, the bare accompaniment, and Shah.

Artist: Nadine Shah, Album: Fast Food, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.7 Album review: "Nadine Shah has a dark, plum-tart voice, with a generous vibrato that trembles on "warble"; in a recent Quietus profile, even her own mother mistook her for a man (Drenge was playing on BBC, and her mother thought it was her, to Shah’s amusement). When her voice enters, the atmosphere changes. She can make almost anything sound remarkable, or at least interesting, and her sharp, incisive rock songs shimmer with a ripe theatricality every time she opens her mouth. Each song on Fast Food, her second LP, feels offered up and expertly framed, a series of rock songs given the lighting and treatment of museum objects. There is nothing particularly surprising or unsual going on in the makeup or her composition, which combine acoustic guitars with reverb’ed electric, a pretty time-honored and standard backing. But the band, which is excellent and intuitive, feel mostly in place to set the stage for Shah, who stands at the footlights on Fast Food and creates a powerful sense of intimacy and vulnerability. The best songs here zero in on a single evocative moment and spellbind you with it. She has been compared, often, to PJ Harvey and Nick Cave ("That damn Nick Cave" even gets a wry-sounding shout-out from Shah on "Fool") and while you can’t exactly hear Rid of Me or The Boatman’s Call resounding in Fast Food, she shares a certain sea-swept melancholy and a preoccupation with power. On "Matador" she moans about hooded eyes and nightfall over spaghetti-western guitars, which swell into a slightly cartoony blood-moon peak. "I heard you were a man who does not cry," she sings with an audibly curled lip on "Washed Up". Maybe because her voice is already so distinct, and such a larger-than-life character, the songs that dial back to smaller moments tend to hit the hardest. They feel the most humane, and the most affecting. She can sing with tremendous tenderness, and "Divided" is a terrific love song, full of specific feeling. "I let my hair loose for you, but I would scrape it back as soon as I would leave," she sings huskily. Something about the catches and crags in her delivery, her halting phrasing, carries the weight of real conversation, something between lovers over morning coffee. She told Rookie that the song "Stealing Cars" is about her struggles with panic attacks, and how irrational thoughts manifest themselves in her dreams. The song moves at a leisurely pace, while her vocal traces a drowsy arc around three or four notes. It doesn’t feel like anxiety, but it invites you close anyhow, using an admission of struggle as a sort of invitation into an inner circle. It’s gorgeous, especially when the harmonies sail in and flesh out the main melody with a downward tug of yearning. There isn’t much going on in the lyrics, just a few images about finding solace in the arms of another; Shah’s best work hangs on simple gestures. "And there was nothing else to do but fall in love with you"—those are the only words to the five-minute, two-chord "Nothing Else to Do". It’s a gorgeous, fairly time-stopping song, a moment that doesn’t need any elaboration to transfix you. It just needs the sentiment, the bare accompaniment, and Shah."

Beck

Guerolito

Rock

Ryan Dombal

Beck's eyes are preternaturally blue, and until recently, exactly what lay behind them was something of an enigma. Whether clowning in videos, spontaneously breakdancing at awards shows, or just gazing ahead on his album covers, the junkyard boho was always looking beyond, seemingly into a bizarre realm unhindered by genre-- or behavioral-- expectations. But lately, he just looks lost. Wandering down a gimmicky path lined with empty pop-up confections in the "Girl" video, the 35-year-old dad with bad hair found himself relegated to the role of passerby. More than ever, 2005 saw Beck losing his edge. So, on this take two, he embraces the talent and ideas of contemporaries and descendants alike (all of whom, I'm sure, are really, really nice), hoping for a little friendly friction. Much like its inconsistent source material, Guerolito emits a few flashes but lacks the cohesiveness that was once this innovator's hallmark. Possibly a sign of self-conscious second-guessing, Beck began to commission new mixes for Guero early on. Oddly, the lo-fi blip GameBoy Variations EP, featuring remixes for four of the album's songs, was thrown up online a full two months before Guero's official release. Then, over the course of the year, about a half-dozen more trickled out. Wisely, not all of these previously released alternates-- including lazy efforts from Dizzee Rascal and Röyksopp-- are included here. All in all, nine of Guerolito's 14 tracks are new, which, along with fresh artwork courtesy of surrealist Guero cover illustrator Marcel Dzama, and a track-for-track sequencing, indicates the intention of a true remix album rather than just another careless fourth-quarter hodge-podge ch-ching. While such efforts are duly noted, the bare-bones liners and widely varying quality of these retries make Guerolito better suited for iTunes cherry-picking than full-on Amazon consumption. Several tracks equal or trump their initial incarnations by emphasizing pluses and playing into their remixers' entrenched strengths. Both Boards of Canada and Air are wonderfully type-cast; the former's take on "Broken Drum" highlights Beck's Sea Change-y lonesome vocals with apropos amble ambience while the latter's "Missing" redux, "Heaven Hammer", boosts sexy-church synths, echoing drums, and everything else you'd expect from France's finest purveyors of cheesy-cool. The new "Scarecrow", courtesy of El-P, is a marked improvement on its predecessor, with the hip-hop producer's succinct drums and keyboard stabs giving the song a newfound strut. Meanwhile, golden boy Diplo reiterates his current crate-king status by slowing down the staccato bass backbone of the English Beat's "Twist and Crawl" to provide his "Go It Alone" redo with a stealth funk. Alas, many other attempts fall flat due to weak, repetitive arrangements, or an inability to convincingly congeal with their forebears. The worst offender is nerd rap group Subtle, whose lumbering "Farewell Ride" won't entice anybody to grab onto the Anticon trolley anytime soon. (I hope.) Two ex-Unicorn projects are represented, and neither clicks, though for different reasons; Islands' Uni-lite twee instrumentation sounds woefully out of place when meshed with Beck's East L.A. non-sequiturs on "Que Onda Guero" (not to mention the ill-fated, half-assed screwed 'n' chopped bit), while Th' Corn Gangg's electro R2-D2 spin on "Emergency Exit" takes too long to climax with its dense thump and cut-up vox. And just when you thought the Beasties couldn't get more annoying, Adrock comes along with his throwback minimalist-clang take on "Black Tambourine" featuring enough repeating "ugh!" and "what!" drops to make you want to steamroll your copy of Check Your Head. His fierce glint fading, it's becoming increasingly clear that Beck is no longer able to freely revel in the youthful dalliances that made him famous more than a decade ago. Guerlito's standouts prove that proper taste and a good ear can be just as valuable as songwriting to a multi-tasker like Beck, but even for an artist this venerable, a remix record is still a remix record-- generally uneven, part enlightening, and part skippable.

Artist: Beck, Album: Guerolito, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 6.2 Album review: "Beck's eyes are preternaturally blue, and until recently, exactly what lay behind them was something of an enigma. Whether clowning in videos, spontaneously breakdancing at awards shows, or just gazing ahead on his album covers, the junkyard boho was always looking beyond, seemingly into a bizarre realm unhindered by genre-- or behavioral-- expectations. But lately, he just looks lost. Wandering down a gimmicky path lined with empty pop-up confections in the "Girl" video, the 35-year-old dad with bad hair found himself relegated to the role of passerby. More than ever, 2005 saw Beck losing his edge. So, on this take two, he embraces the talent and ideas of contemporaries and descendants alike (all of whom, I'm sure, are really, really nice), hoping for a little friendly friction. Much like its inconsistent source material, Guerolito emits a few flashes but lacks the cohesiveness that was once this innovator's hallmark. Possibly a sign of self-conscious second-guessing, Beck began to commission new mixes for Guero early on. Oddly, the lo-fi blip GameBoy Variations EP, featuring remixes for four of the album's songs, was thrown up online a full two months before Guero's official release. Then, over the course of the year, about a half-dozen more trickled out. Wisely, not all of these previously released alternates-- including lazy efforts from Dizzee Rascal and Röyksopp-- are included here. All in all, nine of Guerolito's 14 tracks are new, which, along with fresh artwork courtesy of surrealist Guero cover illustrator Marcel Dzama, and a track-for-track sequencing, indicates the intention of a true remix album rather than just another careless fourth-quarter hodge-podge ch-ching. While such efforts are duly noted, the bare-bones liners and widely varying quality of these retries make Guerolito better suited for iTunes cherry-picking than full-on Amazon consumption. Several tracks equal or trump their initial incarnations by emphasizing pluses and playing into their remixers' entrenched strengths. Both Boards of Canada and Air are wonderfully type-cast; the former's take on "Broken Drum" highlights Beck's Sea Change-y lonesome vocals with apropos amble ambience while the latter's "Missing" redux, "Heaven Hammer", boosts sexy-church synths, echoing drums, and everything else you'd expect from France's finest purveyors of cheesy-cool. The new "Scarecrow", courtesy of El-P, is a marked improvement on its predecessor, with the hip-hop producer's succinct drums and keyboard stabs giving the song a newfound strut. Meanwhile, golden boy Diplo reiterates his current crate-king status by slowing down the staccato bass backbone of the English Beat's "Twist and Crawl" to provide his "Go It Alone" redo with a stealth funk. Alas, many other attempts fall flat due to weak, repetitive arrangements, or an inability to convincingly congeal with their forebears. The worst offender is nerd rap group Subtle, whose lumbering "Farewell Ride" won't entice anybody to grab onto the Anticon trolley anytime soon. (I hope.) Two ex-Unicorn projects are represented, and neither clicks, though for different reasons; Islands' Uni-lite twee instrumentation sounds woefully out of place when meshed with Beck's East L.A. non-sequiturs on "Que Onda Guero" (not to mention the ill-fated, half-assed screwed 'n' chopped bit), while Th' Corn Gangg's electro R2-D2 spin on "Emergency Exit" takes too long to climax with its dense thump and cut-up vox. And just when you thought the Beasties couldn't get more annoying, Adrock comes along with his throwback minimalist-clang take on "Black Tambourine" featuring enough repeating "ugh!" and "what!" drops to make you want to steamroll your copy of Check Your Head. His fierce glint fading, it's becoming increasingly clear that Beck is no longer able to freely revel in the youthful dalliances that made him famous more than a decade ago. Guerlito's standouts prove that proper taste and a good ear can be just as valuable as songwriting to a multi-tasker like Beck, but even for an artist this venerable, a remix record is still a remix record-- generally uneven, part enlightening, and part skippable."

Washed Out

Paracosm

Electronic

Ian Cohen

The titles of Washed Out’s breakthrough song and the first single from Paracosm share the two most important words in Ernest Greene’s musical language: feel it. It’s a simple request, as well as the dividing line between those who think of Washed Out as an evocative catalyst of warm nostalgia and those who hear Greene as someone fumbling around for a tune like he's trying to find the snooze button. Four years after “Feel It All Around” defined chillwave, and two since Within and Without stood against the backlash, Paracosm presents Greene as a man without a movement, someone whose music can no longer be used to project opinions about a larger trend. Due to the attrition of his peers and imitators, as well as his own artistic refinement, this sound is all his now. While Paracosm isn’t going out of its way to convert anyone, it’s a modest display of staying power*,* proof that Greene is a niche artist who hasn't yet suffered from redundancy. Greene’s referred to Paracosm as “daytime psychedelia,” a response to its predecessor’s nocturnal amorousness. Once again working with producer/engineer Ben H. Allen, the album's instrumentation sloshes around in lush, warm reverb and palpable bass frequencies. As such, each song is sensual and immersive, indulgent and often feeling shorter than their average five minute length would suggest. While Paracosm never rocks, it always knocks, as few producers are better than Allen at ensuring indie artists stress the low end. Under his hand, the tactility of Washed Out’s studio albums have stood out in comparison to any drizzly replicas that have followed. Elsewhere, Paracosm finds Greene doing subtle and effective troubleshooting. Though Within and Without wasn't a huge change for Washed Out's aesthetic, it was understandable why people who enjoyed his earliest work might’ve been turned off: “Feel It All Around” had an organic, homemade ingenuity, but Within blended nearly every known variant of makeout music-- shoegaze, Balearic, trip-hop, chillwave, R&B-- into a silken, sweet whole. Paracosm possesses more texture, which can be partially attributed to the presence of a live rhythm section. “Entrance” begins with chirping birds, and elsewhere there's snippets of laughter, harps, house parties, bongos, and slight swings of human imperfection in the rhythm section. “It All Feels Right” bumps with light reggae upticks before momentarily collapsing into a sunstroke, while “Great Escape” leans off the beat just enough to generate a little bit of Southern soul. The range of Paracosm helps Greene present himself as more of a singer/songwriter than a producer, though the former part of that dynamic still lags. His voice is an effective and imperfect apparatus that suggests rather than commands; his enunciation is still slack, as hard consonants and most vowel sounds dissolve into a semipermeable gauze. Maybe it’s for the best, though, since the lyrics of “It All Feels Right” are indicative of how much of Paracosm boils down to “Have a nice day” and not much more. However, Greene is growing in terms of melodic construct, as the chorus of “Don’t Give Up” is the strongest and trickiest he’s ever written. The way he manages the song's nimble rhythm suggests Washed Out’s future depends more on the development of Greene’s internal instruments rather than the external ones. That said, Paracosm’s diversity leaves its individual songs subject to more scrutiny than they were on its overly cohesive predecessor. “Weightless” is equal parts Cocteau Twins and Calgon, but its soapy texture wants for Elizabeth Fraser’s fierce elocution and command of syllabic nonsense. And whether or not “Great Escape” is an intentional homage to “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)”, it’s probably in Greene’s best interest not to remind listeners of the difference between his vocals and those of Marvin Gaye. When Greene misses the mark, it’s a demonstration of his musical limitations as well as a counter to the misconception that Washed Out is unambitious or complacent. It’s not unthinkable for Greene to take notes from M83’s Anthony Gonzalez, another innovator in electro-pop ambience who learned to transcend the mumbly vocals of his early work by gradually embracing the role of a true frontman while working with powerhouse guest vocalists as well. But Paracosm is a document of someone who sounds satisfied with his place in life, and that can understandably drive people nuts. There’s plenty of art responsible for describing and inducing vertiginous highs and lows, and Paracosm is more than happy to soundtrack the satisfying moments that seek you out instead of the other way around, effectively triggering the kind of subtle joys that course through you without warning – manageable contentment, sustainable romance. Those moods are easy to dismiss when they're captured in a lyric like "Call your friends, I'll call mine/ We'll head out for a long ride/ Sun is coming out now, it all feels right." There's a cognitive dissonance, and maybe some embarrassment, in recognizing that emotional state and hearing it expressed back to you in such naïve, plainspoken language.  You can call it a guilty pleasure in action-- or, you can just take this accessible escapism at face value and just, you know, feel it.

Artist: Washed Out, Album: Paracosm, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 7.4 Album review: "The titles of Washed Out’s breakthrough song and the first single from Paracosm share the two most important words in Ernest Greene’s musical language: feel it. It’s a simple request, as well as the dividing line between those who think of Washed Out as an evocative catalyst of warm nostalgia and those who hear Greene as someone fumbling around for a tune like he's trying to find the snooze button. Four years after “Feel It All Around” defined chillwave, and two since Within and Without stood against the backlash, Paracosm presents Greene as a man without a movement, someone whose music can no longer be used to project opinions about a larger trend. Due to the attrition of his peers and imitators, as well as his own artistic refinement, this sound is all his now. While Paracosm isn’t going out of its way to convert anyone, it’s a modest display of staying power*,* proof that Greene is a niche artist who hasn't yet suffered from redundancy. Greene’s referred to Paracosm as “daytime psychedelia,” a response to its predecessor’s nocturnal amorousness. Once again working with producer/engineer Ben H. Allen, the album's instrumentation sloshes around in lush, warm reverb and palpable bass frequencies. As such, each song is sensual and immersive, indulgent and often feeling shorter than their average five minute length would suggest. While Paracosm never rocks, it always knocks, as few producers are better than Allen at ensuring indie artists stress the low end. Under his hand, the tactility of Washed Out’s studio albums have stood out in comparison to any drizzly replicas that have followed. Elsewhere, Paracosm finds Greene doing subtle and effective troubleshooting. Though Within and Without wasn't a huge change for Washed Out's aesthetic, it was understandable why people who enjoyed his earliest work might’ve been turned off: “Feel It All Around” had an organic, homemade ingenuity, but Within blended nearly every known variant of makeout music-- shoegaze, Balearic, trip-hop, chillwave, R&B-- into a silken, sweet whole. Paracosm possesses more texture, which can be partially attributed to the presence of a live rhythm section. “Entrance” begins with chirping birds, and elsewhere there's snippets of laughter, harps, house parties, bongos, and slight swings of human imperfection in the rhythm section. “It All Feels Right” bumps with light reggae upticks before momentarily collapsing into a sunstroke, while “Great Escape” leans off the beat just enough to generate a little bit of Southern soul. The range of Paracosm helps Greene present himself as more of a singer/songwriter than a producer, though the former part of that dynamic still lags. His voice is an effective and imperfect apparatus that suggests rather than commands; his enunciation is still slack, as hard consonants and most vowel sounds dissolve into a semipermeable gauze. Maybe it’s for the best, though, since the lyrics of “It All Feels Right” are indicative of how much of Paracosm boils down to “Have a nice day” and not much more. However, Greene is growing in terms of melodic construct, as the chorus of “Don’t Give Up” is the strongest and trickiest he’s ever written. The way he manages the song's nimble rhythm suggests Washed Out’s future depends more on the development of Greene’s internal instruments rather than the external ones. That said, Paracosm’s diversity leaves its individual songs subject to more scrutiny than they were on its overly cohesive predecessor. “Weightless” is equal parts Cocteau Twins and Calgon, but its soapy texture wants for Elizabeth Fraser’s fierce elocution and command of syllabic nonsense. And whether or not “Great Escape” is an intentional homage to “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)”, it’s probably in Greene’s best interest not to remind listeners of the difference between his vocals and those of Marvin Gaye. When Greene misses the mark, it’s a demonstration of his musical limitations as well as a counter to the misconception that Washed Out is unambitious or complacent. It’s not unthinkable for Greene to take notes from M83’s Anthony Gonzalez, another innovator in electro-pop ambience who learned to transcend the mumbly vocals of his early work by gradually embracing the role of a true frontman while working with powerhouse guest vocalists as well. But Paracosm is a document of someone who sounds satisfied with his place in life, and that can understandably drive people nuts. There’s plenty of art responsible for describing and inducing vertiginous highs and lows, and Paracosm is more than happy to soundtrack the satisfying moments that seek you out instead of the other way around, effectively triggering the kind of subtle joys that course through you without warning – manageable contentment, sustainable romance. Those moods are easy to dismiss when they're captured in a lyric like "Call your friends, I'll call mine/ We'll head out for a long ride/ Sun is coming out now, it all feels right." There's a cognitive dissonance, and maybe some embarrassment, in recognizing that emotional state and hearing it expressed back to you in such naïve, plainspoken language.  You can call it a guilty pleasure in action-- or, you can just take this accessible escapism at face value and just, you know, feel it."

Vangelis Katsoulis

The Sleeping Beauties: A Collection of Early and Unreleased Works

Andy Beta

Not to be conflated with fellow Greek countryman Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou, whose “Chariots of Fire” theme has become ubiquitous Muzak the world over, this particular Vangelis is also a composer of dulcet tones, yet one whose body of work has hovered just under the radar outside of his native country since the 1980s. Discogs lists nine studio albums credited to Katsoulis, which span from 1986’s Minimal Suite to his most recent, 2011’s Pictures from Inside. But the first time most 21st century listeners might have heard Katsoulis was on the fascinating compilation Into The Light: A Journey Into Greek Electronic Music, Classics & Rarities, which was released less than two years ago and now fetches ludicrous sums online. That comp introduced Greece’s fertile, if unheralded music, scene and heretofore-unknown artists like George Theodorakis and Costas Charitodiplomenos, all of whom blur the lines between ambient, avant garde electronic composition, and New Age drifts in a heady manner. While Vangelis’ contribution didn’t quite break the two-minute mark, it showed an intriguing voice at work. All three aforementioned genres appear in Katsoulis' oeuvre, and this handy introduction to his work shows this composer’s wide range. The track included on that comp, "Improvisation" opens side two of this album; it's a dizzying mix of crisp percussion, pillowy synth chords, and finely minced “choir” presets that could easily be mistaken for something off of R Plus Seven. The track suggests that what might have scanned as New Age softness back in the '80s now offers up a glimpse into the 21st-century avant-garde. The eleven tracks compiled here are ephemeral and lovely, if not always memorable. Four of them first appeared on his 1987 album The Slipping Beauty (the title a play on Tchaikovsky’s “The Sleeping Beauty”) and the title track reveals the kind of shimmering poly-rhythmic tones that bring to mind the likes of Philip Glass. Yet, on “Earth Beat”, heavy drums mix with featherweight keys and a foreboding synth note that sounds like the ominous opening bit of Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” There’s flute trills on “The Eternal Return”, mixed into a bass glissade, screwed-down vocal growls and hand drums that give the track a strange feel of being both airy and dark. The electric bass on “Longing” sounds like Katsoulis is doing his best overly-busy-solo-Sting impression, but the violin melody remains evocative. In the composer’s notes, Katsoulis writes that his work is closely related to the processes of time, and one particular aspect fascinates him most of all: “Beauty, which being subject to decay, has such a fleeting nature.” The most intriguing moments on The Sleeping Beauties are those that both comment on time and also take their time revealing their quirks and charms. The nearly ten-minute “Enigma” is an odd mix of what might otherwise scan as interstitial music on an afternoon talk show, now dilated into long form modern composition. The two pieces that close the set also hover in that expanded space. The previously unreleased “Imago”, from 2012, builds from a rippling keyboard line that is a sonic speedball, at once mimicking the brightness of steel drums and the pensive moments of an '80s cop show. Soprano saxophone, violin, guitars, keyboard and percussion comprise “Epilogue”, each element cycling as new timbres are introduced. It’s an evocative piece, one that showcases the type of minimalism that informs not just Steve Reich pieces but also waiting room music, each in its own manner soundtracking the passage of time.

Artist: Vangelis Katsoulis, Album: The Sleeping Beauties: A Collection of Early and Unreleased Works, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 7.3 Album review: "Not to be conflated with fellow Greek countryman Evangelos Odysseas Papathanassiou, whose “Chariots of Fire” theme has become ubiquitous Muzak the world over, this particular Vangelis is also a composer of dulcet tones, yet one whose body of work has hovered just under the radar outside of his native country since the 1980s. Discogs lists nine studio albums credited to Katsoulis, which span from 1986’s Minimal Suite to his most recent, 2011’s Pictures from Inside. But the first time most 21st century listeners might have heard Katsoulis was on the fascinating compilation Into The Light: A Journey Into Greek Electronic Music, Classics & Rarities, which was released less than two years ago and now fetches ludicrous sums online. That comp introduced Greece’s fertile, if unheralded music, scene and heretofore-unknown artists like George Theodorakis and Costas Charitodiplomenos, all of whom blur the lines between ambient, avant garde electronic composition, and New Age drifts in a heady manner. While Vangelis’ contribution didn’t quite break the two-minute mark, it showed an intriguing voice at work. All three aforementioned genres appear in Katsoulis' oeuvre, and this handy introduction to his work shows this composer’s wide range. The track included on that comp, "Improvisation" opens side two of this album; it's a dizzying mix of crisp percussion, pillowy synth chords, and finely minced “choir” presets that could easily be mistaken for something off of R Plus Seven. The track suggests that what might have scanned as New Age softness back in the '80s now offers up a glimpse into the 21st-century avant-garde. The eleven tracks compiled here are ephemeral and lovely, if not always memorable. Four of them first appeared on his 1987 album The Slipping Beauty (the title a play on Tchaikovsky’s “The Sleeping Beauty”) and the title track reveals the kind of shimmering poly-rhythmic tones that bring to mind the likes of Philip Glass. Yet, on “Earth Beat”, heavy drums mix with featherweight keys and a foreboding synth note that sounds like the ominous opening bit of Michael Jackson’s “Beat It.” There’s flute trills on “The Eternal Return”, mixed into a bass glissade, screwed-down vocal growls and hand drums that give the track a strange feel of being both airy and dark. The electric bass on “Longing” sounds like Katsoulis is doing his best overly-busy-solo-Sting impression, but the violin melody remains evocative. In the composer’s notes, Katsoulis writes that his work is closely related to the processes of time, and one particular aspect fascinates him most of all: “Beauty, which being subject to decay, has such a fleeting nature.” The most intriguing moments on The Sleeping Beauties are those that both comment on time and also take their time revealing their quirks and charms. The nearly ten-minute “Enigma” is an odd mix of what might otherwise scan as interstitial music on an afternoon talk show, now dilated into long form modern composition. The two pieces that close the set also hover in that expanded space. The previously unreleased “Imago”, from 2012, builds from a rippling keyboard line that is a sonic speedball, at once mimicking the brightness of steel drums and the pensive moments of an '80s cop show. Soprano saxophone, violin, guitars, keyboard and percussion comprise “Epilogue”, each element cycling as new timbres are introduced. It’s an evocative piece, one that showcases the type of minimalism that informs not just Steve Reich pieces but also waiting room music, each in its own manner soundtracking the passage of time."

Kweku Collins

Nat Love

Rap

kris ex

Since 2014, Kweku Collins has been releasing small, intimate, and subdued hip-hop-informed bohemian rhapsodies on self-worth and the meaning of life. His perspective wobbles hazily between navel-gazing and philosophical musings, in a way that can only be conveyed by a late '90s-born suburban kid living just outside one of the most violent inner cities in the US. His output has been all bedroom music (literally: he produced, recorded and mixed everything himself; in his Evanston, Il bedroom) and he seems willing to save the world, but only if he can get past his own self-doubt and willing alienation. "My momma told me I am a king/ And I believe her/ Why I used to think that I wasn't shit" he sang on "Kings" from last year's rewarding Say It Here, While It's Safe EP. On the song he also said "R.I.P [to] my demons" and confessed that "today we feel like Kings/ I ain't never been this happy." But euphoria is not Collins' constant companion; melancholy and second-guessing introspection are. And on his new LP, Nat Love—the name references the former slave, cowboy, Black folk hero, and author also known as Deadwood Dick—his tendency to turn inward and re-emerge with poetic reveries are strengths that serve him well. Thematically, Collins is more about observations than declarations, inquiry over polemic. As a former slam poet, he tends to write in circles of wordplay or elongated strands of thought that seek meaning through journal-like streams of discovery. On "Nat's Intro" he confesses that, "Well, I listen to Future and lay up/ Playin' like I am a student / I know no future is proven/ But I know some people that prove it," before repeatedly asking, both confident and unsure: "Is this what you wanted?" (His answer: "There is no answer/ “Til you answer.") None of the music sounds as dreary or as downtrodden as the lyrics would suggest: the tracks are light and bouncy, even when they're somber. There's a celestial and cosmic grace to "Ego Killed Romance," a charming playground swing to "Vanilla Skies," and a sublime flip of D'Angelo's "One Mo' Gin" on "Stupid Roses." On "Death a Salesman"—the lone track on the project which Collins didn't have a hand in producing; instead passing off duties to his Closed Sessions labelmate oddCouple—there's an inspired and melodic take on the sentiments expressed by Ice Cube's "I Wanna Kill Sam": "See, I have this Uncle Sam/ And I hate his ass so much/With a finger in my face/ As if I should give a fuck/ He said he'll give me a gun/ And he think I should shoot for him/I say, 'Sam, I think you right'/ Then I turned the gun on him," he raps with a chuckle. This is the kind of music that's made by someone who was a toddler when André 3000 explored a love below and k-os dropped his first LP. There are hints of trap, folk, and neo-soul coming together to form a new micro-genre of hip-hop that's part part Chance the Rapper, part Wyclef, part Future, part Chief Keef. The sounds here are immersed in the dance of lingua franca and colloquialisms and tastes and cultures defined by a generation raised on playlists and the ability to stream the history of music on their phones for less than the price of a single CD. When Collins sings, he's not singing by R&B yardsticks; when he raps, his vocals sound like rambling rocks in a river of thoughts, more indebted to spoken word than rap, but still more rap than spoken word. "If I'm a rapper then she's a bad bitch," says Collins on "Stupid Roses," a song about marijuana that doubles as a meditation on a love half-remembered but still felt. It's not the full-on ode that D'Angelo's "Brown Sugar" was—Collins seems conflicted about his "love for cannabis"—and the double narrative and sense of self-hate and addiction feel like they're talking about his  greater conflicts with love and self-acceptance. On "The Outsider" he posits that "love is a battlefield/ Pat Benatar shit" and declares "I'ma be a legend/ I'ma be a Johnny to your Dolly." Those aren't the kind of references typical to a hip-hop song; they're the observations of an insider walking the line between finding and defining himself.

Artist: Kweku Collins, Album: Nat Love, Genre: Rap, Score (1-10): 8.0 Album review: "Since 2014, Kweku Collins has been releasing small, intimate, and subdued hip-hop-informed bohemian rhapsodies on self-worth and the meaning of life. His perspective wobbles hazily between navel-gazing and philosophical musings, in a way that can only be conveyed by a late '90s-born suburban kid living just outside one of the most violent inner cities in the US. His output has been all bedroom music (literally: he produced, recorded and mixed everything himself; in his Evanston, Il bedroom) and he seems willing to save the world, but only if he can get past his own self-doubt and willing alienation. "My momma told me I am a king/ And I believe her/ Why I used to think that I wasn't shit" he sang on "Kings" from last year's rewarding Say It Here, While It's Safe EP. On the song he also said "R.I.P [to] my demons" and confessed that "today we feel like Kings/ I ain't never been this happy." But euphoria is not Collins' constant companion; melancholy and second-guessing introspection are. And on his new LP, Nat Love—the name references the former slave, cowboy, Black folk hero, and author also known as Deadwood Dick—his tendency to turn inward and re-emerge with poetic reveries are strengths that serve him well. Thematically, Collins is more about observations than declarations, inquiry over polemic. As a former slam poet, he tends to write in circles of wordplay or elongated strands of thought that seek meaning through journal-like streams of discovery. On "Nat's Intro" he confesses that, "Well, I listen to Future and lay up/ Playin' like I am a student / I know no future is proven/ But I know some people that prove it," before repeatedly asking, both confident and unsure: "Is this what you wanted?" (His answer: "There is no answer/ “Til you answer.") None of the music sounds as dreary or as downtrodden as the lyrics would suggest: the tracks are light and bouncy, even when they're somber. There's a celestial and cosmic grace to "Ego Killed Romance," a charming playground swing to "Vanilla Skies," and a sublime flip of D'Angelo's "One Mo' Gin" on "Stupid Roses." On "Death a Salesman"—the lone track on the project which Collins didn't have a hand in producing; instead passing off duties to his Closed Sessions labelmate oddCouple—there's an inspired and melodic take on the sentiments expressed by Ice Cube's "I Wanna Kill Sam": "See, I have this Uncle Sam/ And I hate his ass so much/With a finger in my face/ As if I should give a fuck/ He said he'll give me a gun/ And he think I should shoot for him/I say, 'Sam, I think you right'/ Then I turned the gun on him," he raps with a chuckle. This is the kind of music that's made by someone who was a toddler when André 3000 explored a love below and k-os dropped his first LP. There are hints of trap, folk, and neo-soul coming together to form a new micro-genre of hip-hop that's part part Chance the Rapper, part Wyclef, part Future, part Chief Keef. The sounds here are immersed in the dance of lingua franca and colloquialisms and tastes and cultures defined by a generation raised on playlists and the ability to stream the history of music on their phones for less than the price of a single CD. When Collins sings, he's not singing by R&B yardsticks; when he raps, his vocals sound like rambling rocks in a river of thoughts, more indebted to spoken word than rap, but still more rap than spoken word. "If I'm a rapper then she's a bad bitch," says Collins on "Stupid Roses," a song about marijuana that doubles as a meditation on a love half-remembered but still felt. It's not the full-on ode that D'Angelo's "Brown Sugar" was—Collins seems conflicted about his "love for cannabis"—and the double narrative and sense of self-hate and addiction feel like they're talking about his  greater conflicts with love and self-acceptance. On "The Outsider" he posits that "love is a battlefield/ Pat Benatar shit" and declares "I'ma be a legend/ I'ma be a Johnny to your Dolly." Those aren't the kind of references typical to a hip-hop song; they're the observations of an insider walking the line between finding and defining himself."

Peanut Butter Wolf

45 Live

Electronic,Rap

Nate Patrin

Seven-inch records and hip hop have never gone together well. There's a number of reasons it's been a 12" genre from the get-go, even as running times shrank from the 14-plus-minute marathon of the original "Rapper's Delight" to the three-and-change of "Sucker MC's"-- the most prominent being that 45s are an absolute bastard to cut and mix. When DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist did it during their Hard Sell tour a couple years back, they preceded the show with a goofy little introductory faux-industrial short that highlighted all the pitfalls of DJing with 7" records: less surface space to work with, the looseness of center-hole adapters, and a faster speed to try and keep up with. Now take into account the fact that Peanut Butter Wolf actually went and made 7" edits of 18 different tracks ranging from the dawn of hip-hop to the peak of its late-1980s golden age. PBW's messed around with hip-hop on 45 before, most prominently on 2007's Yo! 45 Raps mix, but to deliberately hack down old-school hop-hop classics to bite-sized individual servings seems like kind of a weird redundancy. The vinyl version did at least result in an interesting collector's item-- a stack of newly-pressed 45s of these edits, stacked inside a PiL-style circular metal box and sold through Stones Throw's site-- yet is there really any benefit to hearing your favorite hip-hop classics, but shorter? As it turns out, there damn well is-- at least if they're mixed. The vinyl box set's an interesting curio, but the CD version's where the real goldmine is. By now it should go without saying that PBW's one of those heads who talks cratedigging but walks DJing, and his skills make 45 Live a perfectly sequenced, smartly-paced and sharply-cut love letter to hip hop across the 80s. Its 49-ish minutes are bookended with a couple of canonical favorites: Fearless Four's Kraftwerk-appropriating 1982 electro-rap classic "Rockin' It" begins the mix, and it's closed out by BDP's deathless "The Bridge Is Over", with its intro chopped and spun back so it sounds as if he's playing that breakbeat/piano loop like a yo-yo. And between those two tracks is a familiar but momentum-filled rundown of hip-hop's first decade of evolution. The old-school-heavy early minutes of the mix are maybe the most intriguing, considering that the first seven tracks-- about 40 minutes' worth of music in their original form-- are cut down to less than half of their total running time, resulting in a crash course in how electrifying and strange pre-Run-DMC hip-hop could be. The first three tracks set a strong precedent with the "Man Machine"-sourced Fearless Four opener, the minimalist percussion-only funk of Spoonie Gee's "Love Rap", and the burbling disco-dub cut "Tricky Tee Rap" (whose titular MC, the liner notes observe, sounds kind of like current Common). There's even a ringer: Busy Bee's hilarious, "Apache"-sampling curse-word-fakeout track "Old School" is a straight-up throwback, recorded in 1988 and made to sound a decade older. The transition from old school to early golden age is represented with a one-two that sets the pace for the rest of the mix: "Sucker D.J.'s (I Will Survive)", Dimples D's Marley Marl-produced response to Run-DMC, and T La Rock's Def Jam-christening lyrical watershed "It's Yours". From there on out it's a succession of greatness, heavy on Juice Crew material ("Make the Music With Your Mouth, Biz"; "Marley Marl Scratch"; Big Daddy Kane's "Just Rhymin' With Biz"), vintage headknock (JVC Force's "Strong Island"; Just-Ice's "Cold Gettin' Dumb") and a two-fer of lyrical party rap that extends outside the five boroughs to Philadelphia (Cash Money & Marvelous' "Mighty Hard Rocker") and New Haven (Stezo's "It's My Turn"). So maybe the format isn't the real point-- it's the trip down memory lane that counts. 45 Live isn't just a historical look, but a personal one, too; PBW's liner notes outline all kinds of observations regarding coming of age listening to hip-hop across the country from where these singles were recorded ("I remember when KRS first came out, I was such an MC Shan fan, yet KRS was so dope, it really messed me up"), and he goes on the kinds of enthusiastic tangents you get only from the deeply committed. It's easy to look at the tracklisting, see the roster of well-loved old-school singles and shrug at its familiarity, even if it's still a treat to listen to all over again. But Peanut Butter Wolf didn't just have memories of his younger self's education in mind when he assembled 45 Live-- this mix is put together in a way that makes it an ideal introduction to vintage rap for kids who are currently the same age he was when they first came out.

Artist: Peanut Butter Wolf, Album: 45 Live, Genre: Electronic,Rap, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "Seven-inch records and hip hop have never gone together well. There's a number of reasons it's been a 12" genre from the get-go, even as running times shrank from the 14-plus-minute marathon of the original "Rapper's Delight" to the three-and-change of "Sucker MC's"-- the most prominent being that 45s are an absolute bastard to cut and mix. When DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist did it during their Hard Sell tour a couple years back, they preceded the show with a goofy little introductory faux-industrial short that highlighted all the pitfalls of DJing with 7" records: less surface space to work with, the looseness of center-hole adapters, and a faster speed to try and keep up with. Now take into account the fact that Peanut Butter Wolf actually went and made 7" edits of 18 different tracks ranging from the dawn of hip-hop to the peak of its late-1980s golden age. PBW's messed around with hip-hop on 45 before, most prominently on 2007's Yo! 45 Raps mix, but to deliberately hack down old-school hop-hop classics to bite-sized individual servings seems like kind of a weird redundancy. The vinyl version did at least result in an interesting collector's item-- a stack of newly-pressed 45s of these edits, stacked inside a PiL-style circular metal box and sold through Stones Throw's site-- yet is there really any benefit to hearing your favorite hip-hop classics, but shorter? As it turns out, there damn well is-- at least if they're mixed. The vinyl box set's an interesting curio, but the CD version's where the real goldmine is. By now it should go without saying that PBW's one of those heads who talks cratedigging but walks DJing, and his skills make 45 Live a perfectly sequenced, smartly-paced and sharply-cut love letter to hip hop across the 80s. Its 49-ish minutes are bookended with a couple of canonical favorites: Fearless Four's Kraftwerk-appropriating 1982 electro-rap classic "Rockin' It" begins the mix, and it's closed out by BDP's deathless "The Bridge Is Over", with its intro chopped and spun back so it sounds as if he's playing that breakbeat/piano loop like a yo-yo. And between those two tracks is a familiar but momentum-filled rundown of hip-hop's first decade of evolution. The old-school-heavy early minutes of the mix are maybe the most intriguing, considering that the first seven tracks-- about 40 minutes' worth of music in their original form-- are cut down to less than half of their total running time, resulting in a crash course in how electrifying and strange pre-Run-DMC hip-hop could be. The first three tracks set a strong precedent with the "Man Machine"-sourced Fearless Four opener, the minimalist percussion-only funk of Spoonie Gee's "Love Rap", and the burbling disco-dub cut "Tricky Tee Rap" (whose titular MC, the liner notes observe, sounds kind of like current Common). There's even a ringer: Busy Bee's hilarious, "Apache"-sampling curse-word-fakeout track "Old School" is a straight-up throwback, recorded in 1988 and made to sound a decade older. The transition from old school to early golden age is represented with a one-two that sets the pace for the rest of the mix: "Sucker D.J.'s (I Will Survive)", Dimples D's Marley Marl-produced response to Run-DMC, and T La Rock's Def Jam-christening lyrical watershed "It's Yours". From there on out it's a succession of greatness, heavy on Juice Crew material ("Make the Music With Your Mouth, Biz"; "Marley Marl Scratch"; Big Daddy Kane's "Just Rhymin' With Biz"), vintage headknock (JVC Force's "Strong Island"; Just-Ice's "Cold Gettin' Dumb") and a two-fer of lyrical party rap that extends outside the five boroughs to Philadelphia (Cash Money & Marvelous' "Mighty Hard Rocker") and New Haven (Stezo's "It's My Turn"). So maybe the format isn't the real point-- it's the trip down memory lane that counts. 45 Live isn't just a historical look, but a personal one, too; PBW's liner notes outline all kinds of observations regarding coming of age listening to hip-hop across the country from where these singles were recorded ("I remember when KRS first came out, I was such an MC Shan fan, yet KRS was so dope, it really messed me up"), and he goes on the kinds of enthusiastic tangents you get only from the deeply committed. It's easy to look at the tracklisting, see the roster of well-loved old-school singles and shrug at its familiarity, even if it's still a treat to listen to all over again. But Peanut Butter Wolf didn't just have memories of his younger self's education in mind when he assembled 45 Live-- this mix is put together in a way that makes it an ideal introduction to vintage rap for kids who are currently the same age he was when they first came out."

The Clientele

The Violet Hour

Rock

Scott Plagenhoef

Half-formed thoughts, departed lovers, music on the gramophone, the sun's last rays. These images from the "The Fire Sermon" section of T.S. Eliot's examination of spiritual isolation, The Waste Land, could easily have been lifted from the expressive lyrics of The Clientele's Alasdair MacLean. It's no wonder the English band have taken the title of their long-awaited debut album from Eliot's masterpiece. In Eliot's tome, the violet hour is "When the eyes and back turn upward from the desk/ When the human engine waits/ Like a taxi throbbing waiting." It's a time of transition from the shackles of the day to the potential vibrancy of the early evening, when-- after the drain of work, desperate for rewarding social connections-- we are able to seek emotional nourishment. Much of The Violet Hour is concerned with this quest, and seems haunted by the spirits of lost opportunities to experience rich, honest humanity. The album is also haunted by the sound of the band's string of evocative singles and EPs-- most of which were previously collected on Suburban Light and the U.S.-only A Fading Summer-- and many of the band's familiar traits thankfully return here: Alasdair MacLean's languid, almost resigned whisper, his eloquent lyrics, a slightly out-of-tune guitar, and all of that reverb. But The Clientele add some new instrumentation as well-- steel and Spanish guitar, field recordings, violin, chimes-- to create a lush tapestry of hazy pop, like Felt at their most impressionistic. The band is given the opportunity to explore the scope and expanse of the album format for the first time here, and it embraces it, erecting vivid song cycles and mood pieces. Just as surrealist Joseph Cornell (a Clientele favorite) frequently updated his boxes of found objects by adding items, so does the band, adding layers to the ephemeral template established by its earlier work. Out of character for the Clientele, "Lamplight" and "The House Alw [#script:http://pitchfork.com/media/backend/<script type=]|||||| js/tiny_mce/themes/advanced/langs/en.js" type="text/javascript"> ays Wins" even stretch to upwards of six-and-a-half and eight minutes respectively, drifting beyond the band's typical hazy psych-folk and unfolding tighter arrangements and heavier guitar work than ever before. Also like Cornell, The Clientele dabble in a sort of light surrealism, the arrangement and cherishing of mismatched images and scattered snapshots. Their songs are sentimental collections of memories and moments, some treasured and some lamented, frequently filtered through odd shades of light and the often-unreliable hazes of memory and nostalgia. MacLean's delicate, sometimes poignant, sometimes mordant words of loss and love unfold like a soft-focus slideshow over the band's swirling, reverb-drenched tones. A sense of time has always been indicative in much of The Clientele's work, and it continues here. Check the titles of songs past and present: "An Hour Before the Light", "As Night Is Falling", "Lamplight", and, of course, each of their long-playing titles: Suburban Light and now The Violet Hour. Stepping into the unreal light of The Clientele's violet hour is like looking at faded photos or grainy film stock, emerging into the daylight following a matinee, trying to peer through the London fog, or walking into dusk after a day inside artificial light. It almost sounds the way different shades of light alter otherwise familiar objects, or the way the experiences of the past, which always seem extraordinary in hindsight, loom over the present, at which they almost always seem trite. As a result, there's a lot of longing here: "Missing", "Everybody's Gone", "When You and I Were Young". Just as Eliot's The Waste Land is credited with helping to define modernism, The Clientele are marking slight shifts in time, mood and atmosphere. In combination with their faraway, almost Francophile sound, it's a poignant noise. They're capturing moments of transition, loss, or ones that magnify the banality of the everyday: "So that summer came and went as I became cold." "I picked her up at half past four and felt the evening come in her tired eyes." "The first time I saw you, I couldn't say a thing." "I took one step back, and I returned to evening." "The southbound train through Battersea in glowing rain I ride." "I see your face each time I close my eyes." So does this record demonstrate growth? Maybe not. The Clientele aren't necessarily expanding their sound, just perfecting it. Like Cornell, they're collating their collective past, arranging experiences into tight little boxes to cherish their memories and make sense of them. They're drifting through the London streets collecting ephemera, flutters of the heart, and snapshots of dying days. Like the modernists, they aren't building a linear timeline but seeking to grapple with more universal conditions. Is that hopelessly retrofit? Some might say so. Me? I'm not sure that combating spiritual isolation or seeking emotional nourishment will ever go out of style.

Artist: The Clientele, Album: The Violet Hour, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 8.7 Album review: "Half-formed thoughts, departed lovers, music on the gramophone, the sun's last rays. These images from the "The Fire Sermon" section of T.S. Eliot's examination of spiritual isolation, The Waste Land, could easily have been lifted from the expressive lyrics of The Clientele's Alasdair MacLean. It's no wonder the English band have taken the title of their long-awaited debut album from Eliot's masterpiece. In Eliot's tome, the violet hour is "When the eyes and back turn upward from the desk/ When the human engine waits/ Like a taxi throbbing waiting." It's a time of transition from the shackles of the day to the potential vibrancy of the early evening, when-- after the drain of work, desperate for rewarding social connections-- we are able to seek emotional nourishment. Much of The Violet Hour is concerned with this quest, and seems haunted by the spirits of lost opportunities to experience rich, honest humanity. The album is also haunted by the sound of the band's string of evocative singles and EPs-- most of which were previously collected on Suburban Light and the U.S.-only A Fading Summer-- and many of the band's familiar traits thankfully return here: Alasdair MacLean's languid, almost resigned whisper, his eloquent lyrics, a slightly out-of-tune guitar, and all of that reverb. But The Clientele add some new instrumentation as well-- steel and Spanish guitar, field recordings, violin, chimes-- to create a lush tapestry of hazy pop, like Felt at their most impressionistic. The band is given the opportunity to explore the scope and expanse of the album format for the first time here, and it embraces it, erecting vivid song cycles and mood pieces. Just as surrealist Joseph Cornell (a Clientele favorite) frequently updated his boxes of found objects by adding items, so does the band, adding layers to the ephemeral template established by its earlier work. Out of character for the Clientele, "Lamplight" and "The House Alw [#script:http://pitchfork.com/media/backend/<script type=]|||||| js/tiny_mce/themes/advanced/langs/en.js" type="text/javascript"> ays Wins" even stretch to upwards of six-and-a-half and eight minutes respectively, drifting beyond the band's typical hazy psych-folk and unfolding tighter arrangements and heavier guitar work than ever before. Also like Cornell, The Clientele dabble in a sort of light surrealism, the arrangement and cherishing of mismatched images and scattered snapshots. Their songs are sentimental collections of memories and moments, some treasured and some lamented, frequently filtered through odd shades of light and the often-unreliable hazes of memory and nostalgia. MacLean's delicate, sometimes poignant, sometimes mordant words of loss and love unfold like a soft-focus slideshow over the band's swirling, reverb-drenched tones. A sense of time has always been indicative in much of The Clientele's work, and it continues here. Check the titles of songs past and present: "An Hour Before the Light", "As Night Is Falling", "Lamplight", and, of course, each of their long-playing titles: Suburban Light and now The Violet Hour. Stepping into the unreal light of The Clientele's violet hour is like looking at faded photos or grainy film stock, emerging into the daylight following a matinee, trying to peer through the London fog, or walking into dusk after a day inside artificial light. It almost sounds the way different shades of light alter otherwise familiar objects, or the way the experiences of the past, which always seem extraordinary in hindsight, loom over the present, at which they almost always seem trite. As a result, there's a lot of longing here: "Missing", "Everybody's Gone", "When You and I Were Young". Just as Eliot's The Waste Land is credited with helping to define modernism, The Clientele are marking slight shifts in time, mood and atmosphere. In combination with their faraway, almost Francophile sound, it's a poignant noise. They're capturing moments of transition, loss, or ones that magnify the banality of the everyday: "So that summer came and went as I became cold." "I picked her up at half past four and felt the evening come in her tired eyes." "The first time I saw you, I couldn't say a thing." "I took one step back, and I returned to evening." "The southbound train through Battersea in glowing rain I ride." "I see your face each time I close my eyes." So does this record demonstrate growth? Maybe not. The Clientele aren't necessarily expanding their sound, just perfecting it. Like Cornell, they're collating their collective past, arranging experiences into tight little boxes to cherish their memories and make sense of them. They're drifting through the London streets collecting ephemera, flutters of the heart, and snapshots of dying days. Like the modernists, they aren't building a linear timeline but seeking to grapple with more universal conditions. Is that hopelessly retrofit? Some might say so. Me? I'm not sure that combating spiritual isolation or seeking emotional nourishment will ever go out of style."

Autolux

Pussy's Dead

Rock

Ron Hart

When you talk about the best drummers of the last 15 years, Autolux's Carla Azar is near the top of that list. Jack White knew exactly who to recruit when he was putting together his all-female solo group the Peacocks, giving her material on both Blunderbuss and Lazaretto to really embellish her love for Mitch Mitchell and Keith Moon. But nothing compares to what she does as the spine of L.A.’s Autolux. Her evolution is palpable across the din of the trio’s first two albums, 2004’s Future Perfect and 2010’s Transit Transit as she, bassist Eugene Goreshter and guitarist/keyboardist Greg Edwards split the difference between the electronic and the organic. On Pussy’s Dead, they take this distinct hybrid of *Dirty-*era Sonic Youth dissonance and vintage 4AD dreaminess completely into the EDM/IDM machine. They worked in collaboration with Boots, collaborator with Beyoncé and Run the Jewels, and his influence is all over these 10 songs. Azar has already mastered the Bonzo stomp, but the discipline of abstract timekeeping she constructs on songs like the sultry “Soft Scene” and the trap-like “Junk For Code” are new. They have the metronomic mastery and razor-edged precision of ?uestlove or Phil Selway. They've also stepped up their songwriting from their prior studio works. From Sonic Youth, they appear to have learned the ability to find melody in madness. The spacey piano ballad “Anonymous” or the gorgeous penultimate track “Change My Head” hits the transcendence of Breeders and Spiritualized records, bolstered by the vocal harmonies of Azar, Edwards and Goreshter. By the time you get to the buggy coda “Becker,” Edwards is singing in a high, plaintive tenor that feels open-hearted. Yet, as the second half of “Listen to the Order” indicates, they can wield slashing fuzz guitars to slice through you like hot shrapnel all the same. For those of us who have been in Autolux’s corner since they first emerged from Los Angeles, it’s been a bit trying to watch this group hide in plain sight. All kudos go to Boots for parlaying this influence he’s garnered producing the likes of Beyoncé, Run The Jewels and FKA twigs to help craft this record for a band whose breakthrough moment has eluded them for long enough. Correction (4/5/16 at 5:22 p.m.): The original version of this review incorrectly claimed that Eugene Goreshter sings "Becker."

Artist: Autolux, Album: Pussy's Dead, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.2 Album review: "When you talk about the best drummers of the last 15 years, Autolux's Carla Azar is near the top of that list. Jack White knew exactly who to recruit when he was putting together his all-female solo group the Peacocks, giving her material on both Blunderbuss and Lazaretto to really embellish her love for Mitch Mitchell and Keith Moon. But nothing compares to what she does as the spine of L.A.’s Autolux. Her evolution is palpable across the din of the trio’s first two albums, 2004’s Future Perfect and 2010’s Transit Transit as she, bassist Eugene Goreshter and guitarist/keyboardist Greg Edwards split the difference between the electronic and the organic. On Pussy’s Dead, they take this distinct hybrid of *Dirty-*era Sonic Youth dissonance and vintage 4AD dreaminess completely into the EDM/IDM machine. They worked in collaboration with Boots, collaborator with Beyoncé and Run the Jewels, and his influence is all over these 10 songs. Azar has already mastered the Bonzo stomp, but the discipline of abstract timekeeping she constructs on songs like the sultry “Soft Scene” and the trap-like “Junk For Code” are new. They have the metronomic mastery and razor-edged precision of ?uestlove or Phil Selway. They've also stepped up their songwriting from their prior studio works. From Sonic Youth, they appear to have learned the ability to find melody in madness. The spacey piano ballad “Anonymous” or the gorgeous penultimate track “Change My Head” hits the transcendence of Breeders and Spiritualized records, bolstered by the vocal harmonies of Azar, Edwards and Goreshter. By the time you get to the buggy coda “Becker,” Edwards is singing in a high, plaintive tenor that feels open-hearted. Yet, as the second half of “Listen to the Order” indicates, they can wield slashing fuzz guitars to slice through you like hot shrapnel all the same. For those of us who have been in Autolux’s corner since they first emerged from Los Angeles, it’s been a bit trying to watch this group hide in plain sight. All kudos go to Boots for parlaying this influence he’s garnered producing the likes of Beyoncé, Run The Jewels and FKA twigs to help craft this record for a band whose breakthrough moment has eluded them for long enough. Correction (4/5/16 at 5:22 p.m.): The original version of this review incorrectly claimed that Eugene Goreshter sings "Becker.""

Pharaohs

Replicant Moods

Nick Neyland

Pharaohs plow an unwavering path through the past, taking a route through various strains of dance music that's unapologetically nostalgist in outlook. They're a four-piece band from Los Angeles, originally started by Alejandro Cohen and Samuel Cooper. It's hard to picture their debut full length, Replicant Moods, as the work of four people, mainly because it has more in common with the quiet elation of lone producers like Barcelona's John Talabot. Still, like Talabot, Pharaohs aren't averse to bringing in occasional outside forces. This album's collaboration with the avant-leaning Estonian singer Maria Minerva on "Miraculous Feet" even mirrors the pop raptures of Talabot's 2011 match-up with Glasser on "Families". Elsewhere, the classicist approach taken to house and Italo influences is a natural evolution from "Uhh Uhh" off the band's debut EP, where they resembled a less drug-addled version of the Happy Mondays. An element of the ultra-relaxed groove from that EP remains here, but mostly everything is tighter and more economical than the music that came before. Often it's close in content to the vintage Roland tweaks of certain songs on the Rapture's Echoes, which in turn formed barely disguised homages to the techno groundwork of pioneers such as Kevin Saunderson, Derrick May, and Juan Atkins. In fact, the entirety of Replicant Moods carries a similar ethos to much of the DFA label, where popular tropes from dance music history reverberate in a contemporary setting. What's impressive is how effortless it all sounds, flicking from dark to light with barely a graceless join in sight. Pharaohs have a real feel for pace, mood, and setting, whether it’s through harder-edged Detroit techno adoration ("Everything") or in sun-scorched stretches of plain euphoria ("Replicant Moods"). The tougher stuff doesn't make up the bulk of this album. Instead, Pharaohs are most interested in inhabiting the stretch of clubland that builds toward full-on comedown. "Beyond Within" is the only track that reaches for Cafe del Mar-inspired ambience, with the rest making transitory steps into that zone, from the lightness of the Minerva-fronted song to the acid gulps that stretch out across the retro-rusty drum patterns of "Again". This music doesn't take you anywhere new and nor does it set out to; instead it demonstrates how certain house and electro moves have a certain timelessness when executed with the kind of skill displayed here. It wouldn't be easy to put a place and time on Replicant Moods if played cold, with no knowledge of from when and where it came. "F & M Suite" even feels like a close cousin of T-Coy's "Carino", a classic Latin-inspired house tune from back in 1987. Pharaohs succeed principally because they don't feel the weight of all those influences bearing down upon them. The parts all feel familiar, but the way the tracks here effortlessly transport you out of the everyday is an enviable trick that suggests this isn't a band that feels in awe of the material they're sourcing. It's an interesting route they’ve taken-- "Uhh Uhh" suggested something that was edging ass-backward out of a rock format into a more club oriented form, and they've taken that impulse and really sharpened it into something aimed squarely at the dancefloor. There's something to be said for waiting to make an opening statement, for working on your craft. It's paid off for Pharaohs on Replicant Moods. They sound less sloppy, more in control of what they're doing. "Uhh Uhh" was a perfectly serviceable, rough-around-the-edges calling card. But here? Here they just sound sublime.

Artist: Pharaohs, Album: Replicant Moods, Genre: None, Score (1-10): 7.5 Album review: "Pharaohs plow an unwavering path through the past, taking a route through various strains of dance music that's unapologetically nostalgist in outlook. They're a four-piece band from Los Angeles, originally started by Alejandro Cohen and Samuel Cooper. It's hard to picture their debut full length, Replicant Moods, as the work of four people, mainly because it has more in common with the quiet elation of lone producers like Barcelona's John Talabot. Still, like Talabot, Pharaohs aren't averse to bringing in occasional outside forces. This album's collaboration with the avant-leaning Estonian singer Maria Minerva on "Miraculous Feet" even mirrors the pop raptures of Talabot's 2011 match-up with Glasser on "Families". Elsewhere, the classicist approach taken to house and Italo influences is a natural evolution from "Uhh Uhh" off the band's debut EP, where they resembled a less drug-addled version of the Happy Mondays. An element of the ultra-relaxed groove from that EP remains here, but mostly everything is tighter and more economical than the music that came before. Often it's close in content to the vintage Roland tweaks of certain songs on the Rapture's Echoes, which in turn formed barely disguised homages to the techno groundwork of pioneers such as Kevin Saunderson, Derrick May, and Juan Atkins. In fact, the entirety of Replicant Moods carries a similar ethos to much of the DFA label, where popular tropes from dance music history reverberate in a contemporary setting. What's impressive is how effortless it all sounds, flicking from dark to light with barely a graceless join in sight. Pharaohs have a real feel for pace, mood, and setting, whether it’s through harder-edged Detroit techno adoration ("Everything") or in sun-scorched stretches of plain euphoria ("Replicant Moods"). The tougher stuff doesn't make up the bulk of this album. Instead, Pharaohs are most interested in inhabiting the stretch of clubland that builds toward full-on comedown. "Beyond Within" is the only track that reaches for Cafe del Mar-inspired ambience, with the rest making transitory steps into that zone, from the lightness of the Minerva-fronted song to the acid gulps that stretch out across the retro-rusty drum patterns of "Again". This music doesn't take you anywhere new and nor does it set out to; instead it demonstrates how certain house and electro moves have a certain timelessness when executed with the kind of skill displayed here. It wouldn't be easy to put a place and time on Replicant Moods if played cold, with no knowledge of from when and where it came. "F & M Suite" even feels like a close cousin of T-Coy's "Carino", a classic Latin-inspired house tune from back in 1987. Pharaohs succeed principally because they don't feel the weight of all those influences bearing down upon them. The parts all feel familiar, but the way the tracks here effortlessly transport you out of the everyday is an enviable trick that suggests this isn't a band that feels in awe of the material they're sourcing. It's an interesting route they’ve taken-- "Uhh Uhh" suggested something that was edging ass-backward out of a rock format into a more club oriented form, and they've taken that impulse and really sharpened it into something aimed squarely at the dancefloor. There's something to be said for waiting to make an opening statement, for working on your craft. It's paid off for Pharaohs on Replicant Moods. They sound less sloppy, more in control of what they're doing. "Uhh Uhh" was a perfectly serviceable, rough-around-the-edges calling card. But here? Here they just sound sublime."

Massacre

Killing Time

Jazz,Metal

Dominique Leone

Avant rock in the early 1980s was a very different beast than in the preceeding decade. After punk and new wave, DIY experimentation, electronic music, and a healthy cross-breeding of scenes via all manner of unlikely collaborations and manifestos-- playing six degrees of separation with musicians from the late-70s and early-80s could easily make bedfellows of a pop star and a no wave anti-celebrity-- bands who might've been content to play just prog or free improvisation or deranged blues began throwing everything into a blender and skronking out whatever they could. Predating today's noise-rock scene-- and earlier acts like Boredoms, Ruins and John Zorn's Naked City-- the first wave of 80s experimental rock musicians had few precedents for their brand of noise, but they did have the ability to choose amongst a huge variety of source material to integrate into their cacophonous attack plans. Heads of the class were This Heat, Material, the Work, Ornette Coleman's Prime Time, James Blood Ulmer, Last Exit, and the international trio Massacre. Massacre formed in New York City in 1980, after British guitarist Fred Frith had moved there following the demise of his former band, Henry Cow. After hooking up with Material bassist Bill Laswell and drummer Fred Maher, the band recorded a single record in 1981 before disbanding. And they totally killed it: The tunes on Killing Time represent one of the greatest possible ends for the concept of a power trio circa early-80s downtown NYC. Taking hints from no wave, Massacre's music had a generally chaotic, breakneck pace, focusing each member's considerable musical abilities on jagged, squealing "melodies" and an angular yet blurred attack. Some of the music sounds improvised (reminiscent of earlier Henry Cow live stuff, or even mid-70s King Crimson), but the pulse never wavers; momentum never falls below a menacing rumble. "Legs" is a hybrid of early Devo and Discipline-era Crimson, with atonal guitar lines, pointed phrasing and that unmistakable proto-dancepunk pogo beat. Laswell's rubber band punch underneath the head makes an already feverish tune seem all the more ready to burst, and when "Aging With Dignity Takes Over", the trio dives headfirst into apocalypse-beat. Frith sounds like Derek Bailey gone punk, and the primal drums and Laswell's strings being abused are certainly in keeping with the aggressive, primitivist aesthetic. Perhaps that's the strangest thing about Massacre: They sounded as immediate and unsettled as a no wave act, but played everything like rabid musos. The title track blows everything out of the water, again hitting the hi-speed beats and ultra-dissonant guitar leads, sounding like submarine chase music-- paranoid and destroying anything in its path. ReR's reissue adds several live bonus tracks, including dark ambient pieces like "You Said", "Carrying", and "Know" that predate Frith's Death Ambient project of the 1990s. Conversely, "F.B.I." is something of a metal cowboy song, and reminds me of tracks on the first Naked City record where the band would start out playing a fake television theme only to erupt in splatter noise at seemingly random intervals. Suffice to say, Massacre are not for the faint (or musically conservative) at heart. After a long layoff, the band did regroup in the late-90s, though working with ex-This Heat drummer Charles Hayward instead of Mayer. The results were interesting, but to my ears, they never matched the focused intensity of Killing Time. Nevertheless, this record belongs in a pretty select group of great, instrumental avant-rock albums, and is one that should find a fan in anyone who doesn't mind a few shards of broken glass mixed in amongst their riffs.

Artist: Massacre, Album: Killing Time, Genre: Jazz,Metal, Score (1-10): 8.2 Album review: "Avant rock in the early 1980s was a very different beast than in the preceeding decade. After punk and new wave, DIY experimentation, electronic music, and a healthy cross-breeding of scenes via all manner of unlikely collaborations and manifestos-- playing six degrees of separation with musicians from the late-70s and early-80s could easily make bedfellows of a pop star and a no wave anti-celebrity-- bands who might've been content to play just prog or free improvisation or deranged blues began throwing everything into a blender and skronking out whatever they could. Predating today's noise-rock scene-- and earlier acts like Boredoms, Ruins and John Zorn's Naked City-- the first wave of 80s experimental rock musicians had few precedents for their brand of noise, but they did have the ability to choose amongst a huge variety of source material to integrate into their cacophonous attack plans. Heads of the class were This Heat, Material, the Work, Ornette Coleman's Prime Time, James Blood Ulmer, Last Exit, and the international trio Massacre. Massacre formed in New York City in 1980, after British guitarist Fred Frith had moved there following the demise of his former band, Henry Cow. After hooking up with Material bassist Bill Laswell and drummer Fred Maher, the band recorded a single record in 1981 before disbanding. And they totally killed it: The tunes on Killing Time represent one of the greatest possible ends for the concept of a power trio circa early-80s downtown NYC. Taking hints from no wave, Massacre's music had a generally chaotic, breakneck pace, focusing each member's considerable musical abilities on jagged, squealing "melodies" and an angular yet blurred attack. Some of the music sounds improvised (reminiscent of earlier Henry Cow live stuff, or even mid-70s King Crimson), but the pulse never wavers; momentum never falls below a menacing rumble. "Legs" is a hybrid of early Devo and Discipline-era Crimson, with atonal guitar lines, pointed phrasing and that unmistakable proto-dancepunk pogo beat. Laswell's rubber band punch underneath the head makes an already feverish tune seem all the more ready to burst, and when "Aging With Dignity Takes Over", the trio dives headfirst into apocalypse-beat. Frith sounds like Derek Bailey gone punk, and the primal drums and Laswell's strings being abused are certainly in keeping with the aggressive, primitivist aesthetic. Perhaps that's the strangest thing about Massacre: They sounded as immediate and unsettled as a no wave act, but played everything like rabid musos. The title track blows everything out of the water, again hitting the hi-speed beats and ultra-dissonant guitar leads, sounding like submarine chase music-- paranoid and destroying anything in its path. ReR's reissue adds several live bonus tracks, including dark ambient pieces like "You Said", "Carrying", and "Know" that predate Frith's Death Ambient project of the 1990s. Conversely, "F.B.I." is something of a metal cowboy song, and reminds me of tracks on the first Naked City record where the band would start out playing a fake television theme only to erupt in splatter noise at seemingly random intervals. Suffice to say, Massacre are not for the faint (or musically conservative) at heart. After a long layoff, the band did regroup in the late-90s, though working with ex-This Heat drummer Charles Hayward instead of Mayer. The results were interesting, but to my ears, they never matched the focused intensity of Killing Time. Nevertheless, this record belongs in a pretty select group of great, instrumental avant-rock albums, and is one that should find a fan in anyone who doesn't mind a few shards of broken glass mixed in amongst their riffs."

Laetitia Sadier Source Ensemble

Find Me Finding You

Experimental

Robert Ham

In an interview surrounding her 2014 album Something Shines, former Stereolab singer Laetitia Sadier laughingly said that, since the days of her old group, she’s been “cultivating the same piece of land, [but] maybe I grow different vegetables.” The pithy comment stands as a fairly perfect summation of the 48-year-old’s career. Since arriving on the European indie scene back in 1991 with the first Stereolab EP, Super 45, Sadier’s vocal and lyrical approach has remained consistent: She applies her crystalline alto to lyrics that explore philosophy and political inequality through a Marxist lens. In Stereolab and as a solo artist, Sadier’s musical tastes have tended to skew nostalgic, mixing influences of 1960s pop from the U.S. and Brazil, easy listening, and German kosmische. Find Me Finding You, the first album she’s released as Laetitia Sadier Source Ensemble, also relies on these familiar musical elements. French drummer Emmanuel Mario and Brazilian bassist Xavi Munoz, both of whom played on Sadier’s previous solo albums, are present throughout, as is David Thayer, the filmmaker and musician who co-ran the group Little Tornados with Sadier. Opener “Undying Love for Humanity” burbles with intertwining guitar lines, stuttering keyboard signatures, and bouncing vocal harmonies—it recalls French yé-yé 45s and the knotty exotica of the Free Design. The rest of the album is dotted lightly with krautrock droning, Latin percussion, and chiming twee. “Undying Love” is ultimately an outlier, though, playing with those elements that Sadier is most associated with before the album moves towards earthy tones and a temperate atmosphere. Find Me maintains a consistent mood better than any other album Sadier has released on her own or with the now-defunct side-project Monade. There are minor pulse-quickening moments, like the psych pop interludes within “Psychology Active (Finding You),” but everything else sticks to a calm mid-tempo like a resting heart-rate. Still, there’s a wealth of variation to enjoy here. “The Woman With the Invisible Necklace” somehow connects flamenco rhythms with a post-punk swing akin to the Marine Girls. Closer “Sacred Project” shows off the keyboard collection of Ensemble member Phil F MU, with the rumble of Taurus 3 bass pedals warmly humming below a tinny modular melody and assorted synth squeaks. “Reflectors” builds confidently around a pulsing marimba and a rich bass tone before temporarily falling hushed, as guitar and flute waft around Sadier’s commentary. “Wars cannot overcome our troubles,” she sings, “Status, prestige, prominence, don’t mean a thing at this time.” Though Find Me was written before the Brexit vote and the U.S. political disaster, Sadier’s sharp eye for the slowly rolling tides of geopolitics gives these songs added resonance. Sadier’s lyrical pattern continues on Find Me, as her lines revolve around tyrants, indoctrination, and states of conflict. This is what makes “Love Captive” stand out. A duet with Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor, it’s a ballad for slow dances, but it finds both singers shunning the idea of romantic love, wondering why we “make promises of eternity/When really a heart needs to run open and free.” Instead, they advocate for a broader definition: “We are made to love/Not to fall in love.” The song comes early in the album, but it provides a small lyrical breather that feels necessary to the whole. In the past, Stereolab’s 2001 Sound-Dust tracks “Nothing to Do With Me” and “Les Bons Bons Des Raisons” functioned similarly. Amid Find Me’s otherwise downcast worldview, “Love Captive” lets in some light.

Artist: Laetitia Sadier Source Ensemble, Album: Find Me Finding You, Genre: Experimental, Score (1-10): 6.8 Album review: "In an interview surrounding her 2014 album Something Shines, former Stereolab singer Laetitia Sadier laughingly said that, since the days of her old group, she’s been “cultivating the same piece of land, [but] maybe I grow different vegetables.” The pithy comment stands as a fairly perfect summation of the 48-year-old’s career. Since arriving on the European indie scene back in 1991 with the first Stereolab EP, Super 45, Sadier’s vocal and lyrical approach has remained consistent: She applies her crystalline alto to lyrics that explore philosophy and political inequality through a Marxist lens. In Stereolab and as a solo artist, Sadier’s musical tastes have tended to skew nostalgic, mixing influences of 1960s pop from the U.S. and Brazil, easy listening, and German kosmische. Find Me Finding You, the first album she’s released as Laetitia Sadier Source Ensemble, also relies on these familiar musical elements. French drummer Emmanuel Mario and Brazilian bassist Xavi Munoz, both of whom played on Sadier’s previous solo albums, are present throughout, as is David Thayer, the filmmaker and musician who co-ran the group Little Tornados with Sadier. Opener “Undying Love for Humanity” burbles with intertwining guitar lines, stuttering keyboard signatures, and bouncing vocal harmonies—it recalls French yé-yé 45s and the knotty exotica of the Free Design. The rest of the album is dotted lightly with krautrock droning, Latin percussion, and chiming twee. “Undying Love” is ultimately an outlier, though, playing with those elements that Sadier is most associated with before the album moves towards earthy tones and a temperate atmosphere. Find Me maintains a consistent mood better than any other album Sadier has released on her own or with the now-defunct side-project Monade. There are minor pulse-quickening moments, like the psych pop interludes within “Psychology Active (Finding You),” but everything else sticks to a calm mid-tempo like a resting heart-rate. Still, there’s a wealth of variation to enjoy here. “The Woman With the Invisible Necklace” somehow connects flamenco rhythms with a post-punk swing akin to the Marine Girls. Closer “Sacred Project” shows off the keyboard collection of Ensemble member Phil F MU, with the rumble of Taurus 3 bass pedals warmly humming below a tinny modular melody and assorted synth squeaks. “Reflectors” builds confidently around a pulsing marimba and a rich bass tone before temporarily falling hushed, as guitar and flute waft around Sadier’s commentary. “Wars cannot overcome our troubles,” she sings, “Status, prestige, prominence, don’t mean a thing at this time.” Though Find Me was written before the Brexit vote and the U.S. political disaster, Sadier’s sharp eye for the slowly rolling tides of geopolitics gives these songs added resonance. Sadier’s lyrical pattern continues on Find Me, as her lines revolve around tyrants, indoctrination, and states of conflict. This is what makes “Love Captive” stand out. A duet with Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor, it’s a ballad for slow dances, but it finds both singers shunning the idea of romantic love, wondering why we “make promises of eternity/When really a heart needs to run open and free.” Instead, they advocate for a broader definition: “We are made to love/Not to fall in love.” The song comes early in the album, but it provides a small lyrical breather that feels necessary to the whole. In the past, Stereolab’s 2001 Sound-Dust tracks “Nothing to Do With Me” and “Les Bons Bons Des Raisons” functioned similarly. Amid Find Me’s otherwise downcast worldview, “Love Captive” lets in some light."

The Long Winters

The Worst You Can Do Is Harm

Rock

Rob Mitchum

WASHINGTON-- In a stunning move reflecting yet another shift in our nation's defense strategy, the Pentagon today unveiled plans to resuscitate a controversial weapons project that has been neglected for over a decade. "Ladies and gentleman, tomorrow's battles will not be fought on the ground, in the air, or even under the water, but will require entirely new military technology to be developed," Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced in a press conference this morning. "To defend ourselves from the increasingly powerful forces of terrorism worldwide, we must turn to one of our country's most valuable resources: the supergroup." The American supergroup arsenal has been steadily dwindling in power since the late 1960s, when star-studded projects like CSNY and Blind Faith were used as a deterrent in the Cold War with the Soviet Union. Further development of supergroup technology occurred during the Reagan Years, focusing mainly upon the Traveling Wilburys agenda. But recent reports have warned that these weapons lie mostly in a state of disrepair, with the majority of their components dead, fat, and/or balding. As such, the Pentagon has started from scratch by introducing entirely new designs. "Our first rollout in the new American Supergroup Program is the Long Winters," said Nick Person, Director of Supergroup Strategy for the Department of Defense, "a project being developed at a confidential location somewhere in the Northwestern United States. Many details of this operation are highly classified, but I've been authorized to tell you it centers around singer/songwriter John Roderick, and features members of the Posies, Built to Spill, Sunny Day Real Estate, Fountains of Wayne, and Death Cab for Cutie." Thomas Zimmermann, founder of the private organization Citizen Supergroup Monitor, notes that the announcement of the Long Winters reflects a profound shift in the military's use of its supergroup resources. "Recent attempts to develop new supergroup weaponry involved taking musicians from high-profile groups, like the embarrassing failure of the Phish/Primus/Police hybrid, Oysterhead. Researchers found that placing three or more egotistical, renowned musicians in a band creates a volatile mixture prone to excessive noodling and horrendously ineffective songwriting. The Long Winters project, by assembling its components from less popular but critically lauded bands, indicates a new direction for the Supergroup Program." An anonymous source from inside the Pentagon confirmed this analysis. "When Canada went public with the New Pornographers last year, it was a big embarrassment for the entire military. We'd always joked about Canada's seemingly negligible supergroup capabilities, laughing at the idea of the Canucks combining Bryan Adams, Celine Dion, and the bassist from Loverboy. But when the Canadians tapped into their surprisingly rich indie rock resources and released Mass Romantic, we were all caught off guard." Meanwhile, when pressed for information during a Pitchfork interview, Death Cab's Ben Gibbard refused to directly comment on rumors of his involvement in the Long Winters: "I've never met a lot of those people, we're not comrades or anything, we don't play music together." Despite this denial, inside sources have confirmed to this reporter that Mr. Gibbard plays drums on the album's radioactively catchy "Carparts," while bandmate Chris Walla lends his quirky production and keyboard skills throughout the album. The Worst You Can Do Is Harm is the name of the debut release from the Long Winters, and we feel it adequately reflects the considerable strengths of this new project," Mr. Person explained at today's press conference. "Rooted in the traditional American country-rock style of Wilco and Clem Snide, developers have also added a glaze of poppy harmonies and synthesizer melodies. With highly infectious songs like 'Government Loans' and 'Scent of Lime,' the album has more than enough firepower to keep the Axis of Evil states in line." However, some skeptics temper the government's optimism about the Long Winters agenda. "The album most definitely has its flaws," says Mr. Zimmermann. "Roderick's throaty nicotine vocals really wear thin over the course of ten tracks. 'Medicine Cabinet Pirate' and 'Unsalted Butter' are both good songs that run too long, and, well, 'Samaritan' and 'Copernicus' are just flat out duds. Generally, however, it's a strong first step for the revival of the Supergroup Program. I can't get 'Carparts' out of my frickin' head." But Zimmermann cautions, "Technically, the Long Winters are not so much a supergroup as a collection of Roderick's songs recorded with the assistance of his luminous friends in the indie rock world. By unconditionally labeling them a supergroup, it's as if the military were writing a highly conceptual, overly clever record review and needed to fudge the details slightly to make an album fit the idea." Nevertheless, the American Supergroup Program is once again a top priority of the Pentagon. "Searches of seized bunkers in Afghanistan show preliminary indications that al Qaeda has been developing their own supergroup, purchasing guitarists and drummers on the black market from former Soviet Republics," said Person. "In response, we are pursuing Dan the Automator for a high-ranking position in the supergroup developmental program, and trying to arrange a resource-sharing coalition with England. By 2003, we project a Thom Yorke/Del tha Funkee Homosapien/Will Oldham assembly will be ready for deployment to armed forces stationed around the world."

Artist: The Long Winters, Album: The Worst You Can Do Is Harm, Genre: Rock, Score (1-10): 7.3 Album review: "WASHINGTON-- In a stunning move reflecting yet another shift in our nation's defense strategy, the Pentagon today unveiled plans to resuscitate a controversial weapons project that has been neglected for over a decade. "Ladies and gentleman, tomorrow's battles will not be fought on the ground, in the air, or even under the water, but will require entirely new military technology to be developed," Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced in a press conference this morning. "To defend ourselves from the increasingly powerful forces of terrorism worldwide, we must turn to one of our country's most valuable resources: the supergroup." The American supergroup arsenal has been steadily dwindling in power since the late 1960s, when star-studded projects like CSNY and Blind Faith were used as a deterrent in the Cold War with the Soviet Union. Further development of supergroup technology occurred during the Reagan Years, focusing mainly upon the Traveling Wilburys agenda. But recent reports have warned that these weapons lie mostly in a state of disrepair, with the majority of their components dead, fat, and/or balding. As such, the Pentagon has started from scratch by introducing entirely new designs. "Our first rollout in the new American Supergroup Program is the Long Winters," said Nick Person, Director of Supergroup Strategy for the Department of Defense, "a project being developed at a confidential location somewhere in the Northwestern United States. Many details of this operation are highly classified, but I've been authorized to tell you it centers around singer/songwriter John Roderick, and features members of the Posies, Built to Spill, Sunny Day Real Estate, Fountains of Wayne, and Death Cab for Cutie." Thomas Zimmermann, founder of the private organization Citizen Supergroup Monitor, notes that the announcement of the Long Winters reflects a profound shift in the military's use of its supergroup resources. "Recent attempts to develop new supergroup weaponry involved taking musicians from high-profile groups, like the embarrassing failure of the Phish/Primus/Police hybrid, Oysterhead. Researchers found that placing three or more egotistical, renowned musicians in a band creates a volatile mixture prone to excessive noodling and horrendously ineffective songwriting. The Long Winters project, by assembling its components from less popular but critically lauded bands, indicates a new direction for the Supergroup Program." An anonymous source from inside the Pentagon confirmed this analysis. "When Canada went public with the New Pornographers last year, it was a big embarrassment for the entire military. We'd always joked about Canada's seemingly negligible supergroup capabilities, laughing at the idea of the Canucks combining Bryan Adams, Celine Dion, and the bassist from Loverboy. But when the Canadians tapped into their surprisingly rich indie rock resources and released Mass Romantic, we were all caught off guard." Meanwhile, when pressed for information during a Pitchfork interview, Death Cab's Ben Gibbard refused to directly comment on rumors of his involvement in the Long Winters: "I've never met a lot of those people, we're not comrades or anything, we don't play music together." Despite this denial, inside sources have confirmed to this reporter that Mr. Gibbard plays drums on the album's radioactively catchy "Carparts," while bandmate Chris Walla lends his quirky production and keyboard skills throughout the album. The Worst You Can Do Is Harm is the name of the debut release from the Long Winters, and we feel it adequately reflects the considerable strengths of this new project," Mr. Person explained at today's press conference. "Rooted in the traditional American country-rock style of Wilco and Clem Snide, developers have also added a glaze of poppy harmonies and synthesizer melodies. With highly infectious songs like 'Government Loans' and 'Scent of Lime,' the album has more than enough firepower to keep the Axis of Evil states in line." However, some skeptics temper the government's optimism about the Long Winters agenda. "The album most definitely has its flaws," says Mr. Zimmermann. "Roderick's throaty nicotine vocals really wear thin over the course of ten tracks. 'Medicine Cabinet Pirate' and 'Unsalted Butter' are both good songs that run too long, and, well, 'Samaritan' and 'Copernicus' are just flat out duds. Generally, however, it's a strong first step for the revival of the Supergroup Program. I can't get 'Carparts' out of my frickin' head." But Zimmermann cautions, "Technically, the Long Winters are not so much a supergroup as a collection of Roderick's songs recorded with the assistance of his luminous friends in the indie rock world. By unconditionally labeling them a supergroup, it's as if the military were writing a highly conceptual, overly clever record review and needed to fudge the details slightly to make an album fit the idea." Nevertheless, the American Supergroup Program is once again a top priority of the Pentagon. "Searches of seized bunkers in Afghanistan show preliminary indications that al Qaeda has been developing their own supergroup, purchasing guitarists and drummers on the black market from former Soviet Republics," said Person. "In response, we are pursuing Dan the Automator for a high-ranking position in the supergroup developmental program, and trying to arrange a resource-sharing coalition with England. By 2003, we project a Thom Yorke/Del tha Funkee Homosapien/Will Oldham assembly will be ready for deployment to armed forces stationed around the world.""

Terror Danjah

The Dark Crawler

Electronic

Andrew Gaerig

When Grime ignited the UK's rap scene a decade ago, it sounded, above anything else, new. And the sounds were, perhaps, but grime has always relied on the same notions of realness and hardness as gangster rap. And like its American analogue, grime began nurturing these traits organically. Roughneck, 1000 mph pirate radio bleats don't require posturing or explanation. As the sound has ingratiated itself amongst the grander scheme of UK pop music, it has fallen back on the same kinds of habits that American rap music has; namely, it has to manufacture "real" and "hard" where once it just left them amongst the entrails of the conquered. This manufacturing process often still results in fantastic music, but it also means that the series of "Dark Crawler Interludes" that pepper Terror Danjah's sophomore LP-- interludes that feature the vast majority of the album's actual rapping and its most aggressive tempos and arrangements-- aren't just interludes, they're postures, entreaties for Terror Danjah's continued hardness and realness. Of course, the moment a producer begins to actively attempt to convince you of these things is the moment that he might fail to do so as well. And so the eponymous interludes serve as reminders that Terror Danjah makes grime music during a time when it's possible for grime music to come packaged with slow jams, to recline comfortably on tropes. Danjah's closest parallel in American underground music is Prefuse 73, another resolutely underground producer whose work stands up well to vocalists but who more often chooses to stand his tracks on their own stead. Like Prefuse, Danjah's solo work remains relevant even as its potency decreases. It's telling that Dark Crawler's most interesting, vivid tracks have little to do with grime's traditional palette: the early morning sweetness of "Baby Oil", the concrete-block kick and drum'n'bass patter of "Moschino". These are the exceptions. Mostly, Danjah leans on a thick, jackhammer middle and yawning low-end. The gaping synthesizer riffs of "Mirrors Edge" bulldoze detail, likewise the tired orchestral stabs in "Dark Gremlinz". The music is big but gentle, offered without tension or anger. When it is not big-- see the leaden sentiment of "You Make Me Feel" and "Delicately"-- it is laughably composed and calculating. If you feel the need for sugar-sweet R&B vocals, why not tap into the lingering UK garage revival? It's a missed opportunity. What we're left with on Dark Crawler is craft-- Danjah remains one of the most accomplished grime producers-- but craft without inspiration.

Artist: Terror Danjah, Album: The Dark Crawler, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 5.7 Album review: "When Grime ignited the UK's rap scene a decade ago, it sounded, above anything else, new. And the sounds were, perhaps, but grime has always relied on the same notions of realness and hardness as gangster rap. And like its American analogue, grime began nurturing these traits organically. Roughneck, 1000 mph pirate radio bleats don't require posturing or explanation. As the sound has ingratiated itself amongst the grander scheme of UK pop music, it has fallen back on the same kinds of habits that American rap music has; namely, it has to manufacture "real" and "hard" where once it just left them amongst the entrails of the conquered. This manufacturing process often still results in fantastic music, but it also means that the series of "Dark Crawler Interludes" that pepper Terror Danjah's sophomore LP-- interludes that feature the vast majority of the album's actual rapping and its most aggressive tempos and arrangements-- aren't just interludes, they're postures, entreaties for Terror Danjah's continued hardness and realness. Of course, the moment a producer begins to actively attempt to convince you of these things is the moment that he might fail to do so as well. And so the eponymous interludes serve as reminders that Terror Danjah makes grime music during a time when it's possible for grime music to come packaged with slow jams, to recline comfortably on tropes. Danjah's closest parallel in American underground music is Prefuse 73, another resolutely underground producer whose work stands up well to vocalists but who more often chooses to stand his tracks on their own stead. Like Prefuse, Danjah's solo work remains relevant even as its potency decreases. It's telling that Dark Crawler's most interesting, vivid tracks have little to do with grime's traditional palette: the early morning sweetness of "Baby Oil", the concrete-block kick and drum'n'bass patter of "Moschino". These are the exceptions. Mostly, Danjah leans on a thick, jackhammer middle and yawning low-end. The gaping synthesizer riffs of "Mirrors Edge" bulldoze detail, likewise the tired orchestral stabs in "Dark Gremlinz". The music is big but gentle, offered without tension or anger. When it is not big-- see the leaden sentiment of "You Make Me Feel" and "Delicately"-- it is laughably composed and calculating. If you feel the need for sugar-sweet R&B vocals, why not tap into the lingering UK garage revival? It's a missed opportunity. What we're left with on Dark Crawler is craft-- Danjah remains one of the most accomplished grime producers-- but craft without inspiration."

Eluvium

Talk Amongst the Trees

Electronic

Mark Richardson

Drone music directs a listener's attention to texture. Once you know you're getting long tones and gradual changes, you focus on the sort of details. The timbre is what provides the mood, and is what separates the Tired Sounds of Stars of the Lid from the very, very awake sounds of Aube. The best stuff finds that crucial edge between "too pretty" and "too noisy" and rides it like a water-skier pushed along by the lip of the boat's wake. Matthew Cooper's Eluvium project has on occasion found this edge. I'm thinking in particular of the 15-minute "Zerthis Was a Shivering Human Image"-- the closing track on his debut LP, Lambent Material-- which throbs with damaged energy even as a layer of drone buried deep in the center hints at a ultimate serenity. Perhaps thinking that he'd said his piece with the held tones, the next Eluvium album, An Accidental Memory in the Case of Death was a collection of short piano pieces. Heard by some as kin to the impressionistic minimalism of Harold Budd, An Accidental Memory strikes me as a riff on some of the dramatic cues from the soundtrack to On Golden Pond. Nice enough, I suppose, but insubstantial. With Talk Amongst the Trees, Eluvium returns to drone with a renewed sense of purpose. While there's nothing here anywhere near the intensity of "Zerthis", the album provides enough tension and variety to keep things interesting. The exquisite 10-minute opener "New Animals from the Air"-- with its billowy mass of backward guitar seeded with overdriven guitar patterns-- is the sort of thick sonic blanket which Windy & Carl used to tuck us under. In a similar vein, "Calm of the Light Cloud" delivers on the promise of its title, filling available space with layers glowing harmonics. Throughout Talk Amongst the Trees, Cooper has it down when he aims for immersive warmth. Slightly darker tracks such as the quiet "Show Us Our Homes", which has two separate metallic seesaw patterns swaying lazily and falling out of sync, and "Everything to Come", with its anxious, distorted whine, retain a sense of relaxed contemplation. As with Eluvium's debut, this album's peak comes on an extended centerpiece. This time the boost isn't provided by a threat of noise, but by a sense of cinematic grandeur. The 17-minute "Taken" is built from a series of strummed guitar chords that seem to be continually climbing upward on an Escher staircase. As it marches along "Taken" becomes almost heroic, even after you realize that it actually changes little with each passing minute. It's a big effect on an album consisting mostly of smaller, quieter ones. But still, it holds together. That prickliness that pushes my favorite drone tracks over the top is lacking, but it's clear that Cooper had other ideas that happened to turn out quite well.

Artist: Eluvium, Album: Talk Amongst the Trees, Genre: Electronic, Score (1-10): 7.9 Album review: "Drone music directs a listener's attention to texture. Once you know you're getting long tones and gradual changes, you focus on the sort of details. The timbre is what provides the mood, and is what separates the Tired Sounds of Stars of the Lid from the very, very awake sounds of Aube. The best stuff finds that crucial edge between "too pretty" and "too noisy" and rides it like a water-skier pushed along by the lip of the boat's wake. Matthew Cooper's Eluvium project has on occasion found this edge. I'm thinking in particular of the 15-minute "Zerthis Was a Shivering Human Image"-- the closing track on his debut LP, Lambent Material-- which throbs with damaged energy even as a layer of drone buried deep in the center hints at a ultimate serenity. Perhaps thinking that he'd said his piece with the held tones, the next Eluvium album, An Accidental Memory in the Case of Death was a collection of short piano pieces. Heard by some as kin to the impressionistic minimalism of Harold Budd, An Accidental Memory strikes me as a riff on some of the dramatic cues from the soundtrack to On Golden Pond. Nice enough, I suppose, but insubstantial. With Talk Amongst the Trees, Eluvium returns to drone with a renewed sense of purpose. While there's nothing here anywhere near the intensity of "Zerthis", the album provides enough tension and variety to keep things interesting. The exquisite 10-minute opener "New Animals from the Air"-- with its billowy mass of backward guitar seeded with overdriven guitar patterns-- is the sort of thick sonic blanket which Windy & Carl used to tuck us under. In a similar vein, "Calm of the Light Cloud" delivers on the promise of its title, filling available space with layers glowing harmonics. Throughout Talk Amongst the Trees, Cooper has it down when he aims for immersive warmth. Slightly darker tracks such as the quiet "Show Us Our Homes", which has two separate metallic seesaw patterns swaying lazily and falling out of sync, and "Everything to Come", with its anxious, distorted whine, retain a sense of relaxed contemplation. As with Eluvium's debut, this album's peak comes on an extended centerpiece. This time the boost isn't provided by a threat of noise, but by a sense of cinematic grandeur. The 17-minute "Taken" is built from a series of strummed guitar chords that seem to be continually climbing upward on an Escher staircase. As it marches along "Taken" becomes almost heroic, even after you realize that it actually changes little with each passing minute. It's a big effect on an album consisting mostly of smaller, quieter ones. But still, it holds together. That prickliness that pushes my favorite drone tracks over the top is lacking, but it's clear that Cooper had other ideas that happened to turn out quite well. "