I consider Clinic one of my favorite bands, and most of the songs they’ve ever recorded are on my iPod. Though to be perfectly honest, if I were to listen to all those Clinic songs on random shuffle, I’d only be able to identify maybe half of them. Their albums tend to have a few standout tracks surrounded by songs that sound awfully similar: minimally pulsating garage rock rhythms, pointy guitars, eerie organ and melodica riffs, and singer Ade Blackburn mumbling through his teeth like he’s either gonna wet his pants or slit your throat. But the thing about all those Clinic songs that sound like the same Clinic song is that it’s a really cool song. Sometimes I just want to hear that song for a half-hour straight.
The band’s 6th full-length album Bubblegum is a small but significant departure. The typical Clinic record sounds like a pleasant dream being swallowed whole by a vicious and sexy nightmare. With Bubblegum, the pleasant dream is generally in control…it’s just that every so often the demons pop back up and Bubblegum has to eat a few more Prozacs to even things out. I probably won’t give this record 10 listens anytime soon, but most of its tracks will make welcome additions to the ever-growing Clinic playlist on my iPod.
So much of this album is musical comfort food to me: the effortless, sing-along melodies; the swinging, laid-back, Music From Big Pink vibe; the sporadic flashes of religious carny spirit, like the ghost of Neutral Milk Hotel; the ample layers of nostalgic soft-focus reverb, to match the vacation slide cover art. That’s why I’m not quite sure: are these songs really the timeless gems they initially appear to be, or was I merely distracted by charms that will fade after a few more listens? I think I might examine this one a little more and find out…
For an album I was randomly recommended, Moondrifts is a winner. For a record I want to try and review anytime soon, Moondrifts might just be a loser. Not my normal cup of tea, this drifting, yet calculated sound of airiness is a fantastic background record. Unfortunately, I can’t imagine forming enough thoughts on it to make a review. Maybe a couple more runthroughs will change my mind. I hope so. This record has promise. Let’s hope it finds it way to the foreground soon enough. Until then, check them out here.
Should we pity the lyric-less? They live a hard life. They are cast aside too often for those searching for the right words. Not that the listeners are truly to blame, searching for words is so common an occurrence that most people forget they do it. Or, in the case of lyricists, they provide little to no actual clarity around 75% of the time (ballpark guess), maybe more. Sure, I made up that statistic. It seems true, right? Listeners get so caught up in what someone says, they too often forget how little need be said. I can’t ever really know if Bells had that intention in mind when they wrote/recorded There Are Crashes, but it seems like they did.
Continue reading ‘Bells: There Are Crashes EP’
For a minute there I thought Sharon Van Etten might be like dozens of other humorless, heartsick folk singers I’ve tuned out before, only with a better-than-average sense of melody. But by the end of the first verse of the first track of Epic (Van Etten’s 2nd release, but the first one I’ve ever heard), she made me think she’s a lot sharper than the average folk singer, too. By the end of track 3, I was hooked. After hearing all 7 tracks, I decided I’m going to obsess myself with this record for a week or two.
Bias is a strange thing. I try to avoid reviewing bands I’m biased about if I listen to the album enough or not. However, I feel like Superchunk’s Majesty Shredding is being dismissed as a refurbished version of the past. Of course, this style of criticism is to be expected. Listening to a veteran band and looking for something new is boring for a reviewer. We crave that fresh blood. Why really consider an album like Majesty Shredding? Who cares about Superchunk when there are new bands rehashing the sound?
It is astounding. After asking the rhetorical questions, the album is so easy to review. It’s terrific. Each song is a calculated sound smear with meaningful-yet-intently-vague lyrics. The guitars play off of each other like they always have, the drums, bass and vocals are still sharp but there’s something new and fresh about the production that doesn’t hearken to the past. It might be that production value is different after nearly a decade, sure, but I am not so quick to dismiss the fact that Superchunk has an apex in this album. Not a refresh button or a new way to record, or a attitudinal resurgence. Chalking this up to a nine year layoff or some ghostly-yet-omnipresent “refresh” seems like a cop out. Continue reading ‘Superchunk: Majesty Shredding’
Judging strictly by the singing and the songwriting, Le Noise is so quintessentially Neil Young it’s almost self-parody. Almost, but not quite. I may laugh when I hear a riff that goes halfway toward ripping off “My My, Hey Hey;” I may laugh when I hear the familiar themes in “Peaceful Valley Boulevard,” with the California gold rushing and the superficial billboards and the idling cars and the poisoning of Mother Earth and the polar bears drifting on ice floes; I may laugh when, right in the middle of it all, there’s a meta-song that seems like it’s trying to sum up an entire career (”I sang songs about love/ I sang songs about war/ since the backstreets of Toronto/ I sang for justice/ and I hit a bad chord/ but I still try to sing about love and war”). I’m not laughing at Le Noise, though. I’m not laughing with it either, because I’m pretty sure it’s not trying to laugh very hard. I guess I’m just laughing because, as I said, it’s so quintessentially Neil Young, and quintessentially, Neil Young is great.
What sets Le Noise apart from your run-of-the-mill Neil Young greatness, however, is the way it sounds, thanks to producer Daniel Lanois. It’s just Neil, his guitars, a healthy amount of cavernous fuzz and occasional digital effects- and it demands to be heard. It’s quiet and loud, usually at the same time. The feedback permeates, yet it also sounds carefully contained. It rocks without a single drum. And a mere pluck of an acoustic guitar string can feel like a tower of wistful light.
I’m still not sure if I’ll go 10 listens with Le Noise, though. If I end up eagerly going the full 10, that might mean we have yet another Neil Young classic on our hands. Right now I can safely say I’ll give it at least 5 listens. The sounds of those guitars have guaranteed that much.
Stream the new EP for free. Or download it for cheap. Then disagree with this statement:
This EP is fucking good.
Maybe you’re not an “instrumental music” person. Maybe you’re having a bad day. Maybe your dog is eating toilet paper while you are asleep. Hell, I barely know you, but I want to believe you love this EP immediately. You see, I want to respect you: as a person, as a music lover. And Bells’ debut is one of those records where I draw lines. This is only the first listen and I am already drawing lines. LINES I TELL YOU LINES.
In any event, expect a full and glowing review quite soon. Then, maybe we can talk about my judgmental nature. But not now. I got some listening to do.
I’d be foolish to spend too much of this review explaining how Black Mountain’s Wilderness Heart doesn’t quite measure up to its predecessor, 2008’s In The Future, and yet I can’t help myself, so I’ll just get that part out of the way right now. In The Future is magical and monumental, and despite its title, feels like a gateway to a past dimension where the 1970s were actually a mass hallucination orchestrated by an ancient civilization (not unlike Philip K. Dick’s theory that the the present is a hallucination of 1st Century Romans in VALIS). Wilderness Heart, however, is “merely” a pretty good album that sounds like it was made by a retro-minded but forward-thinking rock n’ roll band from right here in plain old 2010.
Right away on opening track “The Hair Song,” Black Mountain announces that we’ll be spending much of the next 42 minutes in a relatively ordinary realm. The groove is jerky and pleasant enough to make your chin dance a little, and maybe your hips too, but probably not your feet- though it does prove how hard drummer Josh Wells can drive a song without seeming to break a sweat. Singers Stephen McBean and Amber Webber happily share lyrics like “Let the whole world turn you on” and “Bang bang the drums, children/ having their fun with the blues,” sounding like a barefoot Southern rock band kicking off a sunny afternoon set at Bonnaroo- more Black Crowes than Black Sabbath. “The Hair Song” is a bit jarring for a listener like me who fell in love with the band when they were ass-kicking neo-Pagan warlocks with only subtle traces of mellow hippie warmth…but I ain’t mad at it, either. Continue reading ‘Black Mountain: Wilderness Heart’
Every time Superchunk puts out an album, an angel gets his/her wings. “Water Wings” pun not intentional. Seriously, though, I am excited about this album. So excited, in fact, that I listened to it on my shitty computer speakers rather than putting it on my ipod (which was not nearby). I just had to have it, and it seems worth it. Superchunk’s umpteenth release sounds like a damned fine one and just in time for the annual fall angst. Get excited.