September 2008

Neil Halstead
Oh! Mighty Engine

Acoustic alternative isn’t exactly musical calculus. A sparse arrangement, double-tracked vocals, a little unrequited love and you’re halfway there. Why do you think every sensitive guy with an acoustic guitar does it? But there’s one thing the goateed masses can’t ape - good songs. The songs on Neil Halstead’s new album Oh! Mighty Engine clearly separate him from the sensitive kid in your English Lit class that sells his CD’s after gigs at the local coffee shop. With no bombastic drumming, crunchy guitar riffs or strutting persona to hide behind, each song must live and die on its merits. When it comes to the beauty of the melodies, the subtlety of the lyrics and the emotions evoked, Oh! Mighty Engine simply delivers. The folkie selections stop just short of indie navel-gazing (title track, “Mercy for the Muse”), and the fuller numbers (“Paint a Face”, “Always the Good”, “Queen Bee”) are reminiscent of Halstead’s best work with his band Mojave 3. And the sound you hear at the end? That’s the collective groan of a million discouraged songwriters who will never write an album as good as Oh! Mighty Engine.

Jh

August 2008

One Day as a Lion
One Day as a Lion

One of rock music’s great tragedies is that for 8 years we didn’t have Rage Against The Machine to turn the screw on the George W. Bush administration. We’ll just have to enjoy One Day As A Lion serenading them out the door. One Day As A Lion is the brainchild of former Mars Volta drummer Jon Theodore and Rage Against The Machine frontman Zack de la Rocha. While One Day As A Lion lack the full-body punch of their former outfits, they are able to make impressively gritty funk using only Theodore’s gift for groove and de la Rocha’s guitar-like keyboard noise. But, like Rage Against The Machine, the element that burns brightest is the combustible lyrics of de la Rocha. It’s more then simple fire breathing. The title track and the single “Wild International” are less commentary and more raw documentary. Both songs detail the people, places and psyches damaged by years of war, torture, wiretaps and moral decay. Good thing this is an EP, because an albums worth would incite riots. Jh

July 2008

The Hold Steady
Stay Positive

If the Sex Pistols swallowed the East Street Band, a handful of religious pamphlets, and the collected works of Brett Easton Ellis, the satisfied belch would sound a lot like The Hold Steady’s new album Stay Positive. As always, the greatness of The Hold Steady isn’t in the vicious crunch of the guitars or the surprising beauty of the keyboards, but in the dense storytelling of singer/songwriter Craig Finn. His lurid comic/tragic junkie tales contain the sort of unexpected details that come from first hand experience, or a great writer’s imagination. Like a lot of great novels, much of Stay Positive is obsessed with amoral people searching for a moral center. For Finn it seems to always come back to religion, and always ends in unasked for scars (“Both Crosses”, “Lord, I’m Discouraged). That’s not to say the band isn’t having any fun. On “Sequestered in Memphis” Finn’s knack for eliciting sympathy for even the most loathsome characters is nothing short of astonishing. Being interrogated by the cops never sounded like so much fun.

June 2008

Oppenheimer
Take the Whole Midrange and Boost It

If the Sex Pistols swallowed the East Street Band, a handful of religious pamphlets, and the collected works of Brett Easton Ellis, the satisfied belch would sound a lot like The Hold Steady’s new album Stay Positive. As always, the greatness of The Hold Steady isn’t in the vicious crunch of the guitars or the surprising beauty of the keyboards, but in the dense storytelling of singer/songwriter Craig Finn. His lurid comic/tragic junkie tales contain the sort of unexpected details that come from first hand experience, or a great writer’s imagination. Like a lot of great novels, much of Stay Positive is obsessed with amoral people searching for a moral center. For Finn it seems to always come back to religion, and always ends in unasked for scars (“Both Crosses”, “Lord, I’m Discouraged). That’s not to say the band isn’t having any fun. On “Sequestered in Memphis” Finn’s knack for eliciting sympathy for even the most loathsome characters is nothing short of astonishing. Being interrogated by the cops never sounded like so much fun.

Jh

May 2008

R.E.M. Accelerate

As a general rule good things happen when great rock bands are desperate and pissed-off. After the lagging sales and poor reviews of their last few albums R.E.M. is both. Gone are the slow, vague headphone meditations of 2001’s Reveal and 2004’s Around the Sun. Instead, Accelerate is pure, unprocessed punk energy. New producer Jacknife Lee has the good sense to get out of the way as R.E.M. gnashes their teeth at everything from former lovers to George Bush. The seething “Living Well is the Best Revenge” and “Horse to Water” might be the angriest songs R.E.M. has ever recorded. The distorted drums and menacing organ in “Houston” perfectly frame the rage and paranoia of a Hurricane Katrina victim (“If the storm doesn't kill me the government will”). Even the ballad “Hallow Man” carries an unexpected touch of venom. Aging rock bands are not supposed to make albums this good.

April 2008

Kathleen Edwards Asking For Flowers

The record company drivel that accompanied the latest album from Canadian alt-country firebrand Kathleen Edwards paints a picture of an artist living in perfect domestic bliss.  During the 3 years since her last release, Back to You, Edwards learned to play the piano, worked at a winery, started jogging, and took up gardening.  Thank God none of this tranquility made its way on to her latest album Asking For Flowers.  Instead, the album is a monument to bad decisions and almost redeemable lovers.  As always, Edward’s potency is in her smart and blunt lyrics.  She moves beyond the I-been-wronged country chick clichés, and details dark and painful scenes with heartbreaking acceptance.  That Edwards sings in a fragile voice that always seems to be searching for strength only makes the narratives more compelling.  While Nashville churns out cartoonish country songs about boots and tractors, Kathleen Edwards and her alt-country peers are making the kind of gritty, honest music that drew people to country music in the first place. 

February 2008

Robert Francis One By One

Like all great young artists, singer/songwriter Robert Francis demonstrates remarkably uncluttered observation skills despite his lack of experience (or maybe because of it).  On the song "Little Girl" Francis sings, "you're a little too young and a little too smart/probably the best candidate for a broken heart" but he could just as easily be singing about himself. At only 19, Francis lacks the age for the lifetime of regrets and heart break he sings about on the title track, yet he pulls it off with ease and grace.  Musically One By One is restrained and low key allowing Francis’ songwriting to take center stage.  Despite the fact that the albums artwork bears more then a passing resemblance to Bob Dylan’s The Times They Are A-Changin', Francis manages to sidestep the “next Dylan” kiss-of-death by bringing a California country vibe to the album. One By One has the feel of driving home from a funeral with the top down.  For all the sadness present it’s impossible to imagine that the sun wasn't shining when the songs were recorded.

January 2008

Band of Horses Cease To Begin

Band of Horses has a thing about ghosts.  Not the Scooby-Doo/Poltergeist kind that haunt old houses, but the personal sort that haunt your old house.  Their second album Cease to Begin is a bitter-sweet take on the past with a lot more bitter than sweet.  Thankfully singer Ben Bridwell crafts melodies so engaging that even the darkest moments hint at the veiled grin that comes with distance and time.  Musically Band of Horses mixes the lush appeal of latter-day Britpop with a dash of southern charm.  And they’ve done it without an ounce of fluff.  Cease to Begin’s 10 tracks zip by in a tidy 35-minutes, and there’s not a dud among them.  This refreshing brevity adds depth to the album by leaving more questions then answers:  Is it possible to be haunted by something that hasn’t happened yet?  Can we ever really shed our emotional baggage?  How can one of the sweetest love songs ever written bear the name of a retired German-born NBA small forward (“Detlef Schrempf”)?  Alas, the final threads of banjo in “Window Blues” are like watching a charming storyteller leave the party before we get any satisfying answers.   The songs on Cease to Begin are so innate and well crafted that you can’t believe there isn’t just one more.

December 2007

Soulsavers It's Not How Far You Fall, It's the Way You Land

Soulsavers might not be the first artists to examine the two most alluring themes in religion:  Redemption and Damnation.  What sets It’s Not How Far You Fall, It’s The Way You Land apart is the understanding that the struggle between them is a solitary one.  Here that lonely voice is the gravely bass-baritone of grunge legend Mark Lanegan.  Lanegan features prominently on 8 of the albums 11 tracks and they are clearly the standouts.  The sounds and melodies of “Revival” are so recognizable they might just be encoded in our collective DNA.  Like a well-loved but long forgotten lullaby.  On "Kingdoms Of Rain" Lanegan’s voice carries the weight of a million disappointments in a way a younger voice couldn’t even begin to touch.  It’s a worthy sequel to Johnny Cash’s version of “Hurt”.   Other songs like “Ghosts of You and Me” and “Jesus of Nothing” blend the disparate sounds of trip-hop and blues in ways that are both haunting and erotic.  It’s Not How Far You Fall… finishes with a spectacular cover of the often overlooked Rolling Stones classic “No Expectations”.  The song’s casual resignation is the perfect way to close this weighty album. 

November 2007

Nada Surf Let Go

How does an alt-rock band from the mid-nineties succeed when their only “hit” is a gimmicky novelty song featuring sardonic advice to teens in a spoken word arrangement?   They don’t, even when they deserve to.  Nada Surf will likely always be associated with their 1996 single “Popular” even if it isn’t at all indicative of their catalog.  In fact, when Nada Surf’s record label discovered that the band made no attempt to repeat the formula on their second album, they were unceremoniously dumped.   While the follow-up did eventually get released on an indie label, it wasn’t until 2003’s Let Go that we heard the bands true potential.   The best songs on Let Go dance deviously around a theme until singer Matthew Caws finds just the right lyric and melody to bring it home.  The albums opening track “Blizzard of ‘77” is slightly psychedelic and vague until Caws works up the nerve to declare, “I miss you more than I knew…”   Musically Let Go is a virtual tour of subtle influences.  Punk makes an appearance on “Happy Kid.”  “Hi-Speed Soul” and “Killians Red” feature a new-wave vibe, and Paul McCartney’s melodic touch emerges on “Blonde on Blonde” and “La Pour Cas.”  But, like the Beatles, the glue is Nada Surf’s impeccable pop instincts.  There are hooks and hits all over Let Go.  Not that any record executive would notice.

October 2007

Pela Anytown Graffiti

One of the enduring mysteries of the modern music industry is why so many great bands and great albums languish in obscurity while Bon Jovi continues to make money.  Any music nerd worth his weight in bootlegs can name hundreds of bands and albums more worthy of attention.  Pela’s Anytown Graffiti certainly qualifies.    The album shines with the kind of loose, swing-for-the-fences qualities that can make indie rock positively gripping.   Imagine Coldplay with a little more punk and a lot less writers block, or U2 without all that stuffy stoicism and politics.  Lead singer Billy McCarthy wails with a confidence and machismo way above his weight class while the band reaches for the sort of dramatic crescendos that bring arenas to their feet.  When the shuffle of “Waiting on the Stairs” finally explodes into rock-n-roll bliss, or halfway through the galloping sing-a-long of “Cavalry” it’s hard to understand why Pela isn’t selling out arenas all over the world.   Until then, music nerds will have to be content to enjoy the goosebumps alone. 

September 2007 - Classic

Rage Against the Machine The Battle of Los Angeles

It’s hard to reconcile how one of the most political (and left leaning) bands in more than a generation never released an album during the George W. Bush Administration. Terrorism, war, illegal wiretaps, corporate greed, political corruption, immigration disputes…What exactly is Rage Against the Machine waiting for? Nothing as it turns out. They covered those subjects and more two years before Bush would take office. In fact, 1999’s The Battle of Los Angeles is so prophetic it’s chilling. Lead singer Zack de la Rocha was singing about oil dependence back when a gallon of gas was under $2. Today the lyrics in “Calm Like a Bomb” would earn him a one-way ticket to Gitmo for a week of water boarding with Dick Cheney.  But despite its diverse and inflammatory subject matter, one theme emerges.  Power – who has it and who does not. What happens when a poor, oppressed, uneducated, or disenfranchised populace has had enough.  When de la Rocha screams, “This is no oasis!” at the end of “Ashes in the Fall” he’s not telling us to run for our lives.  He’s ordering us to turn and fight. Musically, Rage’s mix of punk, hip-hop and funk never sounded tighter. The music and message are focused like a laser beam, and the powerful should be terrified. The Battle of Los Angeles could easily inspire a revolt, or at least an impeachment. A fire in the master’s house is set.

August 2007

Interpol Our Love to Admire

Calling Paul Banks lyrics “a little oblique” is a bit like saying Britney Spears “just hasn’t been herself lately”. Take the intro to the song “All Fired Up”: I dream of you draped in wires/And leaning on the breaks/As I leave you with restless liars and dealers on the take. I don’t know what he’s singing about, but I’m sure it doesn’t end well. Such is the Interpol experience. While Our Love to Admire is hardly a stylistic departure from 2004’s Antics, there are some subtle and rewarding variations. One is the refreshing directness of songs like the drug-weary “Rest My Chemistry” and the bored-lover anthem “No I in Threesome”. There are also some restrained musical additions like the dusting of piano in “Pace is the Trick” and some unexpected harmonica on the album-opener “Pioneer to the Falls”. But the growth that made Antics such a vast improvement over their cloudy debut album is everywhere on Our Love to Admire. The melodies are crisp and memorable, bassist Carlos D and drummer Sam Fogarino are easily the tightest rhythm section in rock, and the unexpected changes and unconventional song structures reward repeat listens. Together Interpol continues to be one of the few truly distinctive bands on the mainstream alternative scene. Sadly, alternative bands that disregard the typical alt-rock cookie cutters are rarely rewarded commercially. But isn’t that why we have alternative rock?

July 2007

The National Boxer

For the most part, modern popular music was born when adolescent British hooligans discovered American blues and twisted its dark, sexual emotion into rock-n-roll.  That magic interplay between America and Great Britain continues to this day. And it works both ways. There is hardly a musical trend that can’t be made better by shipping it, one way or the other, across the Atlantic.   Such is the case with the British post-punk movement of the late 70’s. It may have taken nearly 30 years, but America is finally taking the cavernous sound and tortured baritones of Ian Curtis and Joy Division and bending them into something great. With their fourth proper album the Brooklyn-based indie rock band The National have married the politics, wide-open spaces, and gluttony of America to the gloomy precision of British goth. And the results are dramatic.  Matt Berninger and company have created an anthemic yet subtle ode to the ache of missing out and bliss of not knowing what’s really happening. It’s the perfect soundtrack to this country’s three favorite pastimes fear, paranoia, and occasionally, love.

June 2007

The Cure Disintegration

Nothing about The Cure’s 1989 masterpiece Disintegration could ever be called typical. Cure mastermind Robert Smith seemed to ignore every instinct toward conventional pop music (and he has many). The songs are too long, too dark and too short on catchy choruses. The entire album is an A&R mans worst nightmare. Yet it remains the most compelling album in rock history, and inexplicably spawned a hit single (“Love Song”). Despite The Cure’s vast back catalog, Disintegration was a singular achievement. No Cure album, before or since, has sounded quite like it. The drums are hypnotic and the instrument and vocal melodies weave around one another like snakes in slow motion. But despite the albums coherent sound, each song still manages to be unique. The album begins with “Plainsong’s” hushed lonely wind chimes before exploding into a crush of synthesizers that could knock the wind out of you. “Lullaby” is a childhood fairy tale twisted into an arthouse horror flick. The 10-minute poisoned-lover lament “Same Deep Water As You” might be the most depressing song ever committed to tape. And on the galloping title track Smith nearly breaks down while singing a eulogy to a strung-out liar. The entire album has the uncomfortable feel of an unsolicited confession.  Smith is not just telling you sad, sinister secrets about “a friend.” He’s telling you about himself.

May 2007

Arcade Fire Neon Bible

The second album from this seven-member indie rock collective is all about the art of the veiled menace. Whether it’s war (“mirror mirror on the wall show me where the bombs will fall”), the government (“And when you finally disappear we'll just say you were never here”), or nature (“The sound is not asleep, it's moving under my feet”) there is always a nameless threat lurking just out of earshot. But husband and wife songwriters Win Butler and Régine Chassagne save their most interesting venom for the subject of religious fanaticism. It’s no small irony that most of Neon Bible was recorded in a church. Yet, despite the weight of subject matter and the crushing pipe organ in songs like "Black Mirror", "Intervention" and "My Body is a Cage", the music still manages to be uplifting. This is how Springsteen would have sounded if a cloud of radiation were slowly making its way to Asbury Park. The characters on Neon Bible aren’t just escaping authority figures and dead-end futures. They’re fleeing for their lives. Keep the car running indeed.

April 2007

Modest Mouse We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank

Modest Mouse leader Isaac Brock has spent the last decade redefining “optimist” and “pessimist” by challenging what it means to be either. The inside cover of the bands spectacular new album We Were Dead Before the Ship Even Sank simply says “We Were Lucky.”  In fact, Brock has turned himself into one of rock music’s premier lyricists mining this kind of contradiction. Every cloud on We Were Dead... has a silver lining (“the dashboard melted, but we still have the radio”), and every silver lining has a dark cloud (“We made ourselves a pillar, but we just used it as a crutch”). The back-and-forth of the lyrics is mirrored by the sound of Brock’s singing.  One minute he’s sweet and sincere, the next he’s barking the albums nautical themes like an angry David Bryne.  It’s as if the open ocean offers Brock salvation and peace as well as chaos and despair. And it’s impossible to tell which one he likes more.

March 2007

Neko Case Fox Confessor Brings the Flood

Dark, rich, forceful and hypnotic—Neko Case is what a great red wine would sound like if it could sing. Fox Confessor Brings the Flood is one of those rare occasions when the authority and attentiveness of the songwriting is actually equal to the sheer beauty of the singer’s voice.  Call it a kind of gothic Americana. On the title track and the sublime “John Saw That Number” Case twists her gospel touch into a dark, hot, southern apocalypse. Her gorgeous harmonies and unconventional song structures are all infused with reverbs that are equal parts lush and lonely. Still, Fox Confessor Brings the Flood is more than just a platform for Case’s voice.  She plays multiple instruments and writes most of her own songs. Her lyrics are poetic and insightful which is a welcome change from the school-girl, bubblegum-soda platitudes that most of today’s great vocalists seem content to sing (I’m looking at you Christina Aguilera!). On “Margaret Vs. Pauline” Case weaves a pair of character sketches into an ode to populism and female jealously (“One left her sweater sittin' on the train/The other lost three fingers at the cannery/Everything's so easy for Pauline”). Later, on the title track, Case wonders, “Who married me to these orphaned blues?” I don’t know, but I’m glad they did. 

February 2007

The Hold Steady Boys and Girls in America

What do alcohol, drugs, religion and long-gone teenage crushes sound like? They sound like The Hold Steady. This New York-by-way-of Minneapolis band manages to combine the raw guitar power of Never Mind the Bollocks with the somber story telling of Springsteen’s Darkness on the Edge of Town. Lead singer and songwriter Craig Finn (sounding exactly like Sordid Humor’s Tom Barnes) spits out his lines like a guy telling stories in a bar. And what great stories they are. Finn’s keen observations, subtle wit and seemingly endless parade of heartbreaking junkies reveal how engaging and poetic a downward spiral can be.  But it’s the many overt references to religion (“lost in fog and love and faithless fear/I've had kisses that make Judas seem sincere”) that turn Boys and Girls in America into a mature rock masterpiece. Every character is looking for redemption, and each one passes a church on the way to the bar.