IN REVIEW: She & Him “Volume Two”

A large part of the charm that She & Him’s debut Volume One carried, and of the appreciation that it garnered, was due to the novelty of discovering that Zooey Deschanel was a gifted musician in her own right and the plain “newness” of the project.  The songs were undeniably simple in composition, but the revelation was that they were also so warm and familiar in presentation.  It is the natural order of things that this novelty and newness would inherently be worn off by the time that Zooey and M. Ward finally got around to releasing their follow up, appropriately titled Volume Two, and while the songs on their sophomore effort all carry the same level of craftsmanship, some of the effect is certainly lost due to no other reason than the because you’ve heard this (or something similar) before.  It may not be fair, but the lack of fairness doesn’t alter the truth of the situation one bit.  That being said, this collection of easy to listen to and tightly wound, old-souled, pop gems is still amount to one enjoyable package.

It’s pretty accurate to suggest that Volume Two is essentially more of the same for Deschanel and Ward.  The two realized that they had a winning formula with the debut, and chose for better or ill to stick to the plan.  The songs all have a retro feel, and some of them (“Ridin’ In My Car” and “Gonna Get Along Without You Know”) are even tunes that have been around for a while that the pair decided to take out for a spin.  So clearly, the duo did not feel any need to update their sound to match current music trends, and this attitude of “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it” largely pays off for them.  Both musicians sound equally at home performing those dusted-off tracks as they do on their old-timey original tunes like “Me & You” or “Sing.”

While it’s likely M. Ward that serves as the duo’s glue, Zooey is undeniably the pair’s star.  Her lyrics and voice are what give the project its unique flavor.  As such, most of the songs live and die by her execution of lyrics and vocals, giving Volume Two its ebbs and flows.  On the first single “In The Sun,” you find her picking up right where she left off with a radio-friendly hook coupled with simple and ernest lyrics like “it’s hard to be ignored,” and “my baby, my darling, I’ve been thinking of leaving.”  As evidenced here, Volume Two also keeps on with Deschanel’s tradition of writing music about heartache and troubled relationships with a sunny and cheery sound.  If that sounds a little contradictory, that’s because it is, and this is something that Deschanel seems aware of and is occasionally reflected in her lyrics.  On “I’m Gonna Make It Better,” Zooey sings “I couldn’t stay holding your hand, hours on the sidewalk, staring at the sun, everybody is wasting away,” despite promising that “I’m gonna make it, make it better, I’m gonna get the best, lock it up and swallow the key.”  Like any maddeningly cute woman, she seems more than content to play a character who is a mess of contradictions.

As was probably unavoidable when the pair decided not to really shake things up, some of the songs do feel a bit flat.  “Band New Shoes,” for example, does indeed have a tender simplicity about it, but it ultimately seems to be a bit bland when compared to the richer sound on the rest of the album.  The same could be said for the closing song, “If You Can’t Sleep,” which also tries on a bit of a softer and more measured sound.  One understands what the musicians had set out to do with the songs, without ever really finding them all that compelling.  In addition to these criticisms, the fact that this pair of tracks is what closes-out the album also probably doesn’t help the taste that gets left in your mouth as a listener.

Fortunately, on the albums more inspired moments, it captures much of the same magic that made the initial discovery of the duo striking.  The opening track, “Thieves,” is one of these moments.  The song is a poppy, country-inspired gem that manages to hit all the most endearingly sentimental parts of the well worn breakup song genre.  Much like she had previously been on “Why Do You Let Me Stay Here,” Deschanel is almost too cute to bear when she sings (along with some subtle help from M. Ward); “I know, and you know too, that a love like ours is terrible news / but that won’t stop me crying, no that won’t stop me crying over you.”  Additionally, both of the afore-mentioned cover songs make up some of Volume Two‘s more pleasantly memorable moments.  Each track manages to take what was originally enjoyable about the initial rendition of the song, and transfer that over to the pair’s home-spun brand of folky musical yarns.  “Gonna Get Along Without You Now,” in particular, seems uniquely well suited for every one of Zooey’s considerable feminine wiles.

When music is this free of snootiness and so earnestly laid out, it’s easy to forgive any real lack of originality, and this ultimately proves to be the case on She & Him’s sophomore effort, even if something is lost in repeating the formula.  No, it may not break into anything resembling new musical territory, but Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward both sound so very comfortable with each other and with their collection of songs, that the listener is unavoidably taken in by them.  Volume Two isn’t going to shake up the world, or even the pop music scene for that matter, but a listen will probably serve to help brighten your day.

SCORE: 3.4 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

IN REVIEW: Happy Birthday “Self Titled”

For a band that hails from the snowy hills of Burlington, Vermont, there’s something intriguingly sunny about Happy Birthday’s music.  The band’s rise to success was one of those that was notoriously meteoric, as within the span of a year they found themselves snapped up by Sub Pop records and on their way to putting out a debut album.  While such an origin may produce leave some listeners skeptical and nearly all struggling bands jealous, this groups debut actually does a pretty good job of justifying that quick success.  The self-titled LP is full of breezily light DIY sounding pop music that, while it may not be the most wholly original sounding stuff on the planet, is pretty tough to dislike.

The band is fronted by Kyle Thomas, who spends most of the album leading the charge on the kind of fuzzy, beach-pop that has become increasingly popular over the last couple years.  On opening track, “Girls FM” (which is also the first single off the album), Thomas doesn’t seem terribly concerned with making any kind of huge splash or saying a whole lot of anything, but rather seems content just churning out a fun and catchy pop song.  There’s a lack of pretentiousness to a lyric like; “Baby, baby, just please change your mind, maybe we’ll understand love at the end of time, and answer won’t be hard to find, when it’s gone now baby, gone now baby” that makes it not only fun to listen to, but pretty easy on the tongue as well.  For the most part, this is the trend that Happy Birthday follows across their debut album, and it proves to be a wise choice.

The band is able to blend that haze with a funny kind of weirdness to songs like “Perverted Girl” and “Maxine the Teenage Eskimo” that give them a bit more immediacy than their simple premises would initially suggest.  Don’t get me wrong, the music is still lo-fi at its core, but even still, there’s a bit of poppy sentiment lurking here that makes these songs stand out from the barrage of similar music that so many young bands have been spewing out over the last couple years.  I mean, lets’ face it, there’s a certain visceral simplicity to somebody singing “now I wanna break shit” that you can’t help but appreciate.  Happy Birthday is able to tap into that simplicity, often in humorous and inventive (even if somewhat sophomoric) ways.  Putting aside the super-infectious “Girls FM,” my next favorite track on the album might just be “Subliminal Message” which is able to combine laid-back vocals, whining hums, and a smatter of drums into one deliciously listenable package. The song isn’t intricate, but it’s enjoyable.

Something else that I was struck by was what seemed like an almost retro quality to some of the bands music. “Pink Strawberry Shake,” for example, seemed to possess some spirit of rock and roll past that I couldn’t quite put my finger on amidst all the haze and distortion.  The song is full of winking innuendo that suggests (gasp!) Thomas might not just be singing about a strawberry shake.  This wry humor is another theme that keeps creeping up across the album, but what’s most impressive about it is that this sense of humor is continuously applied in fun and inventive ways that consistently help to elevate the music past its slight subject matter.  Not that this should come as much of a surprise on an album that boasts song titles like “Zit,” “Perverted Girl,” and “Fun.”

As I said at the outset, the band has not been together for a whole ton of time, and while having a lack of polish is what most of the music is meant to display, there are moments where things feel less than fleshed out.  “2 Shy,” for example, strikes me as being a bit more bland than most of the songs on the album. It keeps all of the simplicity of the stronger tracks, but dials back the urgency, and as such, a lot of the charm. Meanwhile, “Eyes Music” sounds a bit too scattered, almost as though the band were trying to throw too many less than complimentary pieces all into the same track.  It’s moments like these where the album tends to stumble, but fortunately, such missteps are almost certainly due to a lack of experience, and are the kind of thing that you would expect the band to start ironing out as long as band continues to play together.  Besides, on an album that is more obviously reliant on raw energy than it is on carefully measured craft, this is the kind of defect that the listener is likely going to be willing to overlook.

It’s going to be very interesting to watch Happy Birthday continue to grow and mature, and I can’t  help but wonder what path their sound will take.  Based on the raw ingredients on display here, the band (and Thomas in particular) clearly possesses all the tools that suggest a potentially bright musical future.  Of course, it doesn’t hurt one bit that the music is just poppy enough to have some of the songs (i.e. “Girls FM” and “Subliminal Message”) break through to a larger and more mainstream audience than many lo-fi bands could reasonably hope for.  None of this, though, should distract from the fact that whatever the future may hold, Happy Birthday has crafted a very self-assured debut, that is both unique and very enjoyable.  Any way that you shake it, that ain’t bad.

SCORE: 3.6 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

IN REVIEW: Yeasayer “Odd Blood”

I’m going to admit something; I was not exactly over the moon for All Hour Cymbals.  I liked it, and could appreciate what other people seemed to really love about it, but the album just didn’t seem to resonate with me like it did some listeners.  This being the case, I put off actually listening to Odd Blood for quite a while when it was released.  I kept meaning to get around to giving it a spin, but it seemed like I never quite had the motivation to do so.  That was a mistake because this album flat out kicks ass.  As enjoyable as the ambient and folky elements of the band’s debut may have been, the album veers completely off that path and right into what is my musical wheel-house.  To put it simply, Odd Blood takes everything that I enjoy about 80’s pop music and combines it with everything that I really enjoy in the modern indie and electronic genres.

The lead single should have been plenty of evidence that Yeasayer was going to go running in a slightly different direction with Odd Blood.  “Ambling Alp” with its booming hook of “stick up for yourself son, never mind what anybody else done,” was obviously meant to be more chorus driven than anything on the first album.  Yet, somehow, this managed to go right over my head.  Upon my first listen to the LP I found myself similarly tapping my foot along with the heavy drums of “Madder Red.”  Then I was completely taken in by the woozy synths of “I Remember,” as by the song’s end I found myself singing along to the chorus of “you’re stuck in my mind, all the time.”  But it was probably somewhere toward the middle of the maddeningly catchy “O.N.E.” – during which I kept finding my arm reached outward, turning up the volume – that it first started dawning on me that I was listening to something pretty special.  All in all, while I would quickly discover that the entire album was pretty damn solid, the stretch between “Ambling Alp” and “Rome,” in particular, mark one of the strongest six song sets that I have heard in years.  At this point I have probably played the grooves right off this CD, and not a single one of the songs in that group have even started to lose any of the charms that I heard on the very first listen.

Out of that group of standouts, it’s probably “O.N.E.” (which is marked to be the second single) that is probably my very favorite out of the bunch.  The song packs a serious punch, and boasts a chorus that grabs hold of your brain and simply refuses to unleash it, and at the end of the track (at about the four and a half minute mark) there is an almost Jackson-esque set of backing vocals that almost sent me spilling from my chair in excitement.  The song also provides a nice setup for “Love Me Girl,” where the bottom almost drops out from pace the album seems to be on, and throws you the perfect curveball of electronic weirdness that not only recalls their previous album but perhaps a bit of Depeche Mode for good measure.

It’s probably no small secret to anybody who has read any tangent that I have gone on regarding music in the eighties that I am a fan of David Byrne and the Talking Heads.  In fact, I probably get a bit too carried away at times using the Talking Heads as a measuring stick for bands that I like or as a basis for comparison.  However, having said that, there were numerous points across Odd Blood where I heard much of what I really loved about the Talking Heads music in Yeasayer’s songs.  This was especially true on “Rome,” where I felt like I could have been listening to a Talking Heads track, the sound was just that fucking dead on.  And believe me, while I’m probably doing Yeasayers a disservice by almost suggesting that this song was completely aping another band’s style, I really do say this with utmost of love, and consider it some pretty high praise.

While it is the middle stretch of Odd Blood that marks the album’s sweet spot, it really bears saying that the whole thing is pretty damned consistent.  The energy that the band bursts out of the gate with really doesn’t dissipate at all until the last track fades out.  “Mondegreen,” for example, seems to possess all the nervous tics and spazzy jerks of a classroom full of kindergardeners with ADHD, but it all seems strangely cohesive under the band’s watchful guidance.  The song also segues beautifully into the fuzzy blips and hums of the closing track “Grizelda,” which, similarly to “Love Me Girl,” recalls All Hour Cymbals a bit more than the rest of the album.

Really it’s pretty astonishing how drastic a change Yeasayer made in their sound between this sophomore album and their debut, which was pretty acclaimed in its own right.  It was an extremely ballsy move which could have backfired gloriously, but instead paid off with some serious dividends.  It’s nothing short of incredible how seamlessly this group of youngsters was able to shift gears and completely master a new sound after so impressively bursting onto the scene with a debut that, despite my lack of passion for it, displayed a mastery beyond their years.  It really lends even more credence to the idea that right now that Brooklyn is ground zero for the best new experimental music.  While Odd Blood comes a year after the explosion of some other Brooklyn bands (i.e. Animal Collective, Grizzly Bear, and the Dirty Projectors) into the mainstream, Yeasayer makes sure that you know that it was worth the wait.

SCORE: 4.6 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

IN REVIEW: Frightened Rabbit “The Winter of Mixed Drinks”

Frightened Rabbit’s 2008 album The Midnight Organ Fight seemed to catch most folks off-guard.  There was just something raw and emotionally honest about this little Scottish band that listeners could really connect with.  For me personally, it happened when I first heard the stellar song, “The Modern Leper,” which was enough to cause me to do a double-take.  I had to hear more music from this band.  Well, the thing about first impressions is that you can only make them once, and while there were probably a bunch of listeners who had caught Frightened Rabbit’s first album, Sing the Grey, I would be willing to wager that there were an equal number who had their introductions made by that great sophomore album.  This being the case, The Winter of Mixed Drinks is an important album for the band, where they  have the burden of proving that the excitement generated from that first impression wasn’t just a flash in the pan.

While the title of the album never ceases to make me cringe, it is undeniable that on The Winter of Mixed Drinks, Frightened Rabbit is able to largely cultivate a more robust sound.  While the band made the wise decision of bringing back Peter Katis as their producer (he also produced Midnight Organ), they clearly were determined to create a more rich sound here on their third album.  This is something that they accomplished.  This was evident even early-on from the two singles, “Swim Until You Can’t See Land” and “Nothing Like You,” which preceded the album’s release.  Both songs are more lively and crowded affairs than virtually any track off of their previous two albums, and while the bare-bones aesthetic of much of the music off Midnight Organs could be attributed as giving that album much of its charm, both tracks seem much more readily able to fill the shoes of a traditional single than anything you had previously heard from the band.

This does, however, lead to one of my complaints about The Winter of Mixed Drinks, though, in that sometimes I feel some of the wittiness and endearing tenderness of their previous couple albums was sacrificed in attempt to be a little more cute and catchy.  “FootShooter,” for example is a song that strikes me as being a bit too on-the-nose and cute for its own good.  It’s not that the song is outright “bad,” per-say, more just that it seems like the average work of a lessor band.  I found “Not Miserable,” to be similarly tedious, as it brought all the melancholy of the band’s better work, but none of the articulation that made that bleak subject matter endearing.  Both songs were the kind that were enjoyable enough on the first listen, but didn’t really hold up at all through any kind of repeat visits.

Fortunately, on the album’s high points, Frightened Rabbit seem able to combine their more intricate musical composition with the same biting lyrical content of their previous standout tracks.  Perhaps the best example of this is the track “The Wrestle,” which not only manages to be pretty damn catchy, but with lyrics like “the vice clinch of the struggle, I can’t give into the weight of, the clothe-less wrestle” it also manages to be one of the more inventive and interesting songs that I’ve heard about sex in a long, long, time — and make no mistake about it, with a subject as well worn as that, this is no small amount of praise.  Just as impressive is that when the song swells (a strange choice of words given the subject matter?) to its chorus, it is every bit as triumphantly hooky as the chorus on “Swim Until You Can’t See Land.”  I also found it worth noting that the band could be every bit as effective when the subject matter is a bit more playful, as was the case on “The Wrestle,” as when they are sounding bleak and heartbroken.

There were also some moments on this album where the band made some choices that I couldn’t help but find to be absolutely bizarre.  The forgettable “Man / Bag of Sand” is a primary example of this.  The song is essentially a loose rehash of “Swim Until You Can’t See Land” with some loose acoustic guitar and the vocals dialed way back.  This would struck me a strange choice to include as a b-side on a single, let alone being stuck in the middle of their album.  They virtually replicated this decision with the last song of the album, an alternate version of “Things,” that is basically just an acoustic version of the opener.  The fact that I wasn’t really over the moon for the first version of the track probably didn’t help to endear me too much to the this second incarnation.  Additionally, I was similarly lukewarm about the inclusion of “Skip the Youth,” which at six minutes-plus,  seems to kind of meander on far longer than necessary without ever really going anywhere in particular.  All in all, these three songs just seemed weird in contrast with the more fully-realized sound of the other nine on the album.

There is enough about The Winter of Mixed Drinks that I both really enjoyed and really did not, that I am not quite comfortable calling the LP really either a step forward or a step backward for the band.  In all actuality, it’s probably an example of the group moving sideways.  They may not have captured the same magic of Midnight Organ, but it is not as though there’s anything here that really turned me off to the band’s music. Frightened Rabbit shows signs of growth, but as often is the case, there are also some growing pains.  At least, though, the band seems as though they won’t be content with just standing still.

SCORE: 3.0 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

IN REVIEW: Broken Bells “Self Titled”

In the world of indie music, the pairing of James Mercer and Danger Mouse is a pretty huge one, even if it may seem somewhat strange on the surface.  Mercer’s work with his band The Shins is likely one of the largest, if not the largest, contributing factors to this decades trend of bringing indie music to a wider audience.  Meanwhile, Danger Mouse has not only been extremely busy, but with The Grey Album and his work as half of Gnarls Barkley, he has probably been behind some of the most “important” music in recent memory.  This being the case, there was a pretty insane set of expectations surrounding the collaboration between the two musicians.  But those who were paying careful attention probably shouldn’t have been too surprised that what they produced was a relatively understated, though mostly enjoyable, collection of songs.

It’s not an exaggeration to suggest that Broken Bells greatest attribute also probably marks their greatest defect, and that’s the bands ability to write consistently solid music.  There are not a ton of peaks and valleys across their self-titled album, all the songs are pretty steadily good.  While the plus-side of that equation is that there is not a single track that I would point to as being all that lackluster, there also aren’t any tracks that really strike the listener as standing out above the rest.  The album instead really seems to exist as a cohesive whole, something that is increasingly rare in today’s music.  Every single track seems to organically compliment the ones that come before and after it, and as a result the band seems content to thrill not in songs but in moments, in brief waves of inspiration amidst the overall sea of strong composition.

One of the ways in which the album occasionally distinguishes it’s stronger moments is through some inspired lyrics.  There are moments where there’s a certain darkness creeping into Mercer’s lyrics despite his sweet falsetto delivery of them.  On “The High Road” he sings; “a soldier is bailing out, he curled his lips on the barrel, and I don’t know if the dead can talk, to anyone.”  It is precisely lyrics like this, along with the “guts on your blouse” that Mercer croons about on “Sailing to Nowhere,” that create some of the most striking imagery on the album.  Mercer has always had the ability to make deceptively dark lyrical content sound conversely sweet, but Danger Mouse’s particularly moody production seems like it gives those moments of disturbing clarity a little extra bite.

While on the subject of Danger Mouse’s production, his work here is an interesting change of pace from some of his more hip hop and dance driven work of recent memory.  There is a murkiness to this album that is subtly different from what most listeners have probably come to expect out of the artist, and he manages to pretty on the money for the most part.  While there are moments where it seems like Danger Mouse aka Brian Burton is a bit out of his element (“Citizen” for example, where he sounds like he’s pandering to the Zero 7 crowd a bit too much), what I was most impressed with was how he largely seemed content to leave any personal flair behind and instead make music that was complimentary to Mercers voice and to the overall tone of the album.  Burton’s only real moment to shine comes on the album’s closing track “The Mall & Misery,” where it’s his shift from graceful strings to spirited guitars that mark the best aspect of the track.  The rest of the time it is about the cohesion between two different artists, who make it sound surprisingly free of any friction.

Despite the great amounts of professionalism on display across the LP, it seems to drag at times a bit more than it should.  This could probably be attributed to the fact that while the album is a great example of a flawless exercise in musical craft, it’s also pretty devoid of the hooks and messy improvisation that had made the two artists previous respective efforts noteworthy.  As such it occasionally creates the, probably unfair, impression that Burton and Mercer are just going through the motions, content to compliment each other, but never really step completely outside of their comfort zone to take any real musical risks.  I suppose that gun to my head, if I absolutely had to make a decision, I would probably pick “The High Road,” “The Ghost Inside,” and “The Mall & Misery” as being a bit stronger than the rest, but it’s really only by a hair at most.  On the whole, there are no tracks that really grab hold of the listener, demanding their attention.

This all being said, the album doesn’t have the same re-listen value that it probably should, considering how generally good it actually is, and make no mistake about it, the album is good.  Yet, perhaps because of the undeniable talent involved and because of how tight the production is, it’s at least bit disappointing. Disappointing because despite how generally enjoyable the music may be, you can’t really ever shake the suspicion that two talented musicians like these who are operating at peak form should sound a little more exciting than this.  For all of their charm, and Mercer and Burton both have an excess of that, there seems to be some small intangible element missing from this collaboration from making it truly great.  It’s one of those rare occasions where “very good” seems like settling.

SCORE: 3.5 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

IN REVIEW: Johnny Cash “American VI: Ain’t No Grave”

Here’s the thing.  I unabashedly love Johnny Cash.  If somebody were to ask me who my favorite musical artist of all time was, I would answer with his name without a single moment of hesitation. That being said, I would like to think that I’m still able to keep some perspective when it comes to his later body of work, even when there is some real sentimentalism involved in listening to it, and make no mistake about it, when it comes to American VI, sentiment is the name of the game.  I would like to think myself detached enough from even my most favorite of artists that I can judge any posthumous releases on their actual merits, and not on how good I wan them to be.  I mean, it’s not as though I run around bumping to barrel-scraping Notorious B.I.G. or bizarre Ray Charles duet mashups, regardless of the very high esteem that I hold both artists in.  I would like to think that I approach Cash’s music in this same manner.

Subtlety is not the name of Rick Rubin’s game, and this fact is hammered home by the album’s title and the fact that “Ain’t No Grave” is the song that he chooses to lead the album off with.  The saving grace in all this is that the song is kind of dark and thudding in presentation, more in the manner of “God’s Gonna Cut You Down” than “Hurt,” when compared to counterparts in the American recording lexicon.  Sadly, the same can not be said about a song like “Redemption Day,” which features the overly pandering chorus of “There’s a train that’s heading straight to heaven’s gate, to heaven’s gate, to heaven’s gate / And on the way, child and man and woman, wait and wait and wait, for redemption day.”  Are you starting to notice a theme here?  If not, then a listen to “Corinthians 15:55” will finish hammering it home for you.  I can understand why Rubin chose to release this particular collection of songs, but at the same time it seems a vaguely manipulative when all of these tracks were released together.

Now, Rubin is at something of a disadvantage, and I can acknowledge that.  The fact of the matter is that Cash music was always largely religious and concerned with topics of death and salvation, so no matter what Rubin did, he was going to be left with a bunch of recordings that were heavy on this subject matter.  But that doesn’t change the fact that a song like “Can’t Help But Wonder Where I’m Bound,” is far less effective when it is surrounding by the fistful of similar tracks that I have already mentioned.  Not only that, but there’s also the unavoidable fact that man of those songs are, well, not all that great.  It’s a common theme in posthumous releases that what we’re really getting are songs that were unreleased for a reason, and that is occasionally the case on Ain’t No Grave.

That’s not to say that they’re all bad tracks.  Cash’s work with Rubin was extremely stripped down, so it’s very hard to accuse any of the music of being only partially-realized.  I mean, how could you tell the difference?  Besides, even with the heaps of melancholy that is inherent in most every track due to no other reason than Johnny Cash’s absence from this earth, that simple rustic presentation is still pretty endearing on a number of the songs.  There’s a gentle folk simplicity to songs like “Satisfied Mind,” “Cold Water,” “Aloha Oe” that makes them very endearing.  They’re all also aided by the fact that they’re unencumbered by Rubin’s bright, flashing, neon sign basically demanding that you get misty eyed because Johnny is gone and the song is loosely about death and salvation.  It’s Johnny Cash, so the undertones are obviously there, but at least they are a little more subtle than on some of the lessor tracks on the album.

I’m aware that I’m injecting myself into this review a little more than usual, that I am making my own personal concerns about potential future choices Rubin may make about releasing any stored away recordings always very present in my discussion of this release.  I’m also aware that I may be judging the material a bit too harshly because of the fact that I cherish Johnny Cash’s music as much as I do.  In doing so, every so-so posthumous song becomes not just a slightly lackluster track, but almost an affront to his entire previously recorded catalogue in my eyes.  No matter how I shake it, that’s not fair to the music.  However, on the flipside of that equation, I went into Ain’t No Grave basically aching to like every second that I heard, I was rooting for it to be great.  I would hope that leads to some level of balance in my judgements.  But maybe not.

Ultimately, the album proves to be neither entirely great nor entirely awful on the whole.  It instead really kind exists on some level that bounces between mediocre and acceptable.  If American VI: Ain’t No Grave not bearing the name of one of music’s all-time great artists the reaction to it wouldn’t be such a knee-jerk one from the music community.  If this is how Johnny Cash’s last group of unheard recordings is going to sound, it’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened.  But in that same breathe, I would also say that I certainly hope that it Rubin doesn’t ultimately make us suffer through anything worse.

SCORE: 2.7 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

Tegan & Sara “Alligator”

If you’ve read this blog, it’s probably not news to you that I really enjoyed Tegan & Sara’s last album Sainthood (though I recently was with a lady friend who accused me of being girly for liking it). All of the songs were such tightly spun pop-masterpieces that any one of them easily could have been released as a single.  Well, the sisters Quin haven’t exactly been testing that theory with a whole flood of videos, but at least the ones that we have gotten have been of a high quality.  The video is a fun, if somewhat sparce, semi-arctic affair that really fits the tone of the song.  Give it a watch and then, as always, head over to the band’s MySpace page or their official website for more music and information on where you can see them live.

Vodpod videos no longer available.

more about “Tegan & Sara – “Alligator” Video | St…“, posted with vodpod

Read Full Post »

IN REVIEW: Surfer Blood “Astro Coast”

Before I get started, I wanted to acknowledge the fact that this review is certainly going to have to come with a “better late than never” heading.  But, well…  better late than never!   Now, on with the show.

Surfer Blood first splashed (pun oh-so intended) onto the scene last year with power-pop meets indie-rock tunes like “Swim,” that couldn’t help but draw notice from the musical community.  The fact that the band was the one good thing to come out of West Palm Beach in the last twenty years didn’t hurt either (I kid the Floridians).  The expectations surrounding the group, comprised of four  young musicians fronted by lead singer John Paul Pitts, came from the intriguing mix of fuzzy-as-fuck distortion and humming guitars and the crisp and powerful hooks that Pitts enthusiastically belted out on that lead single.  The result was a track that the music geeks could feel like belonged to them but that listeners could still pump their firsts to on the radio.  A pretty deadly mix to be sure, but the question on many minds was; what would the album sound like?

Well, turns out that the album would sound just as promising and well-executed as that very first track.  There some pretty damned impressive displays of musical knowhow on nearly every single track, but what’s most impressive to me is the way in which the young band is able to create subtle variations in what it is that’s enthralling from song to song.  The opening track aptly-titled “Floating Vibes,” for example, reminds me of some of my favorite 1990’s alt-rock with it’s powerful guitars and dark but breezy lyrics like; “When you wake up in the morning, and you hear that awful applause, put in your fuckin’ napkin, and watch it dissolve.”  Let’s just say that I’m a sucker for any sizzling diss that I can’t help but chuckle at.  Meanwhile, though, an instrumental track like “Neighbour Riffs,” with it’s thick and groovy bass guitar, reminds of some of my favorite Pavement or Dinosaur Jr tunes all without a single word being uttered.  Like I said, there are subtle differences between the two, but they achieve similarly positive returns in each instance.  To me that’s nothing if not impressive.

Something else that is on display on Astro Coast that I can’t help but find endearing is an impish sense of humor. Song titles like “Fast Jabroni” and “Slow Jabroni,” the name of the band and the album’s cover art, as well as lyric-upon-lyric buried into the tracks are all examples of this, and it almost plays like a series of easter eggs sprinkled across the LP waiting to be discovered by listeners who care to pay attention to detail.  In the great tradition of this hazy alt-rock, these guys aren’t taking themselves too seriously, they’re just writing some big hooks, some kick-ass riffs, and having a blast while they’re doing that.  That light-hearted approach seems to spill over into the music and it only enhances it further.

While the competition is tight, my favorite track on Astro Coast is probably the beachy “Take It Easy,” which I feel as though would have been equally comfortable on a shitty 1960’s surf-movie soundtrack as it is here in 2010.  It’s also probably the perfect literal example of the laid-back nature that I enjoy so much in the music as Pitts sings in the chorus; “I wish I could do whatever it takes to get along” adding “then we should just take it easy, or we will both be sorry.”  The lyrics, like the album as a whole, on the surf just seem to be so light and relaxed, but if you look for just a second longer you see that there’s an almost disgruntled sense discomfort simmering right there beneath that glossy surface.  And after all, isn’t it that ability to convey some deeper emotional state and all the while tricking the listener into singing and dancing along that’s the staple of great music?  More often than not on this debut, Surfer Blood is able to climb to that plateau with what seems like relative ease.

However, as I said at the outset, the track that is mostly likely going to be the gem for most listeners is “Swim,” and it’s certainly not tough to see what people enjoy about the tune.  Pitts’ voice echoes powerfully throughout the track, and sometimes you may even lose track of what it is that he’s saying, but the people who aren’t pumping their fists along with him when he powerfully booms “swim to reach the end” will probably be few and far between.  Additionally, there are some elements of this song to be found here and there in other tracks.  Portions of “Twin Peaks” play with a similar ear-bleeding veracity, though on the whole the song is mostly a more mellow experience.  But even the tracks that are content to be build upon a more laid-back groove, such as “Anchorage” and “Slow Jabroni,” display that same knack for crafting a tight and enjoyable song.  That’s a pretty impressive accomplishment when you take into account that both of those tracks stretch on for well over six minutes apiece.

All of the young bands out there should be pretty pissed at Surfer Blood right now, because they have set the bar pretty damn high for debut albums in 2010.  I’m half-kidding 0f course, but it’s nonetheless pretty impressive the way that Surfer Blood was able to take some of the best of pop music, 90’s alternative rock, surf rock, and the current afro-pop craze and blend it all into a debut album that was so well-executed and self-assured. Expectations were pretty high for Astro Coast, and somehow the band was able to deliver.  All that remains to be seen now is how broad an audience this exciting new band will be able to reach before the year is out.

SCORE: 4.3 out of 5.0

Read Full Post »

Vampire Weekend “Giving Up the Gun”

Oh, the rambunctious Vampire Weekend kids, just always getting into shenanigans (I feel like I may have misused shenanigans there).  Here is the latest video (courtesy of Spinner) to come from their awesome album Contra, and you may notice that it features some unconventional personalities like the RZA (aka Bobby Digital) and Jake Gyllenhaal.  The song is “Giving Up the Gun,” and is one of the stronger tracks on a very strong album (check the HItV review, which I am too lazy to link to, for more details on that), and the video is suitably weird. After checking out the fun videos for songs like “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa” and “Cousins,” I guess that’s something I should come to except from the band.  Weird and fun.  A wonderful combo.  Check out the band’s MySpace page or their official site for more details about where and when you can see the super-popular ivy-leaguers live.

Vodpod videos no longer available.

more about “Vampire Weekend, ‘Giving Up the Gun’ …“, posted with vodpod

Read Full Post »

Lissie “In Sleep”

I realized when looking back over my year-end lists somewhat recently, that there was one particularly glaring oversight on my part.  That, of course, was that I left Lissie’s fabulous EP Why You Runnin’ off of my “best EPs of 2009” list.  Her brand of spirited country-rock proved to make for one of my very favorite releases last year, and one that I’m still listening to all these months later.  Above (thanks to Under the Radar for the heads up) is a live performance video for an unreleased song by the title of “In Sleep,” which has all of the gritty down home elements that I absolutely love about Lissie’s music.  Heck, the video itself seems to be drenched in a haze that really fits the material.  Hmmmm, unreleased track…  a full length LP to follow perhaps?  Let’s hope so.  To hear more of Lissie please head to her MySpace page, and for the love of everything sacred, buy Why You Runnin’ for yourself!

Read Full Post »