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29 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Minneapolis legend Michael Yonkers has been busier than ever lately, releasing two new albums as well as reissuing an essential lost classic from the '70s. On the all-new Carbohydrates Hydrocarbons, he is backed by heavy-hitters The Blind Shake. Having first played together when paired randomly at a club, the experience was so much fun that playing more shows and recording together seemed inevitable. Thank the stars for random occurrences, because this album of pounding anthems and mind-melting guitar frenzy is easily one of Yonkers' best releases yet.

Go Johnny Go

They are a remarkably tight unit, sounding like they have been playing together far longer than the facts would indicate. The Blind Shake seem to know what makes Yonkers tick by the way they augment the strengths of his particular style of songwriting while still remaining distinctly themselves. They accent all the right moments without obfuscating the focus, adding complementary texture and rhythm that serve the songs perfectly. There's no filler on this album, free of both digression and bullshit.

Yonkers is in exquisite form here, his singing and songwriting particularly well-suited for this band. Many of the song titles are half-formed, unanswerable questions such as "Can It Be," "Why Don't," "Don't I Get," or "When Will We," and the anxiety caused by such imponderables fuels the songs' insistent, driving rhythms that pull listeners along like a riptide into deeper waters. Similarly entrancing are the discordant moments like "Don't Even Try" or the bluesy dirge "Here's What I'm." Even brief but fascinating instrumentals such as "Mega Folly" and "This One Again" induce ecstasy through blissful washes of effects and monstrous slabs of distortion.

Yonkers has persevered through periods of obscurity, not to mention some debilitating health issues, only to prove that his idiosyncratic take on psychedelic rock has remained consistently ahead of the curve the whole time. This album, not to mention its more experimental counterpart Circling the Drain, is essential proof that Yonkers is just as relevant and important today as ever.

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29 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Balancing between brittle noise and gauzy ambience, this album has a spacious atmosphere that stays even in its most clamorous moments. This lightness makes the album listenable throughout, but it saps the intensity of the music. The electronic arrangements are often engaging, but they dissipate into formlessness too soon to reach catharsis.

Carpark

Dour ambience aside, WZT Hearts have a jokey fixation with nerd culture, evident from the candy colored artwork and adolescent titles like "Jeep Uzi" and "Lava Nile." The thin line between laptop musicians and geeks in general has been regurgitated enough not to merit much discussion here, but that influence is felt in the music. "Hearth Carver" uses the neon twitterings of a Commodore 64 as a sound source, and a careful listener will find the call sign for Public Radio International buried in the digital sediment of "Lava Nile."

For such a chaotic album, there is quite a bit of restraint. In more vehement hands, the sputtering sheets of static would roar right in front of the mix, but thick layers of reverb and lower volumes dull the music's sharper edges. Yet the band is most effective when they turn up the intensity. "Spells" lives up to its arcane title, unleashing gusts of warbling electronics and ghostly moans. They crash over each other like the wake of a ghost ship, each wave building on the previous, until the song vanishes abruptly.

More often, the songs fizzle out before than can reach a crescendo. "Hassler" begins with some nimble drum flailing, but it peters out mid song, leaving the attendant clatter to drift without a rhythmic backbone. The closer, "Viszla," is more engaging. A lone shaker hashes out a lazy beat while languid guitar strums and crackling electronics bloom in the foreground.

It is tough to pass judgment on this record. It certainly snaps and pops in the way that a good abstract electronic music should, but there is a lack of muscle behind the layers of noise. In each case, turning up the volume, repeating a phrase, or adding a beat would conduct the energy needed. With a bit more forcefulness, WZT Hearts could make something very compelling.

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29 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

This double album sees Ruth Rosenthal's poetry set to music by her musical partner, Xavier Klaine. Her words and his music create a delicate whole although moments of black humour and irony break through the elegiac moods. Winter Family deal with weighty issues from the most personal to a haunting passage on the Holocaust. Yet this album is surprisingly easy to listen to, despite the serious nature of the words.

Sub Rosa

While Rosenthal's poetry is more often than not enthralling, there are times when it does seem a little amateurish. This tends to be mostly due to her delivery rather than her words, on "Ray of Light/No Bad Animals" her voice sounds a little off as she tries to instil some drama into the piece. It does not quite work but it is far from a disaster. Elsewhere, her intonation suits the poetry far better. On "Auschwitz" she plays the part of a child trying to comprehend the incomprehensible, "something for grown-ups I guess." Klaine's jaunty piano is a million miles away from the horror of the concentration camp, much like a child's innocence should be.

Klaine's beautiful arrangements are what make this album work so well. I feel that on its own the poetry does not really stand up to scrutiny, it is good but for the most part nothing particularly special (at least when the poems are in English, I cannot comment on the segments in Hebrew). However, with musical backing the poems are stronger, the weaker passages have something to anchor to and the already strong passages become magnificent. Rosenthal's vocals over the harmonium drones of "Psaume" make for a sacred atmosphere; it is exceptionally beautiful.

Although all of the pieces could have easily fit on one disc, the album has been split into two rather short chunks across the two CDs. This is probably just as well as Winter Family's musical poems can be pretty intense. The break between switching over the CDs provides a welcome breather in the middle of the album. I must admit that by the time the album ends I am in no rush to put it back on but this is not due to it being bad or difficult, rather that it is a lot to take in. Overall, Rosenthal and Klaine have created a wonderful document of their work, it is a very natural and human sounding album.

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29 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Perhaps I am just not as well versed in my post-punk as I thought I was, or it is a direct result of their short career, but I must admit to have never even hearing of the Young Marble Giants until this box set, but now having heard them, it is safe to say their legacy should be appreciated, and their contributions to music should not be neglected.

Domino

The post-punk era of the late 1970s and early 1980s expanded the boundaries of punk, and the likes of Wire, Cabaret Voltaire and Public Image Ltd. integrated a great deal of other elements into a more experimental framework. However, while those bands had long careers that continued exploring new styles and routes, Young Marble Giants broke up after the release of just a single full length album, Colossal Youth, and a few singles and compilation appearances. In that regard, this set is like a time capsule, an in-depth study of a band at a particular point in time.

Given that this is for all intents and purposes a compilation of their entire body of work, there is a decent amount of redundancy, with some tracks appearing in album forms, alternate/demo takes, and a single John Peel session. With this in mind, there is a great deal of opportunity to hear tracks taking shape, and how different approaches were taken to the sound.

The three discs that make up this set are structured very logically: disc one is the band's sole full length, Colossal Youth, while the second disc is the Testcard EP, the "Final Day" single, a compilation track from Is The War Over?, and finally the Salad Days compilation of demos and unreleased tracks. The final disc is reserved for an August, 1980 Peel Session that draws on the studio material.

As a whole, YMG worked with a very Spartan palette: guitar, bass, an electric organ, and a chintzy drum machine that could have been stolen from a Bar Mitzvah band. This skeletal instrumentation was used to create tracks that, at their core, were pop songs. Usually driven by the disconnected vocals of Alison Statton, they were simple, yet catchy songs that managed to show the post-punk penchant for dub at times ("Eating Noddemix," "Include Me Out"), while also mixing in elements of rudimentary industrial as well.

Both "N.I.T.A." and "Wind in the Rigging" on the Colossal Youth album are reminiscent of YMG's touring partners Cabaret Voltaire in their drum machine/bass drone and cheap organ leads. However, while the Cabs used that setup on the aggressive Mix Up and purely evil Red Mecca albums, YMG keep things much lighter and buoyant throughout, an entirely different approach. Other tracks are less experimental and more conventional, the shared male/female vocals on "Brand-New-Life" and the Peter Hook-style bass work on "The Man Amplifier" will surely be familiar ground for many listeners.

In spite of their short career, the band were far ahead of their time in some regards: the repetitive kick drum backing of "Clicktalk" meshed with the funk bass lines and scraggly guitar predate the likes of LCD Soundsystem by some 20+ years is but one example. Other nods to contemporaries are interesting to hear as well, the synth and rhythm focused "Have Your Toupee Ready" could resemble the rough demos of Kraftwerk or Suicide (without the confrontational aspects of the latter, of course). The Peel Session disc that closes the collection is by no means revelatory or ground breaking, but shows a more immediate version of the band, possibly due to the use of a BBC producer.

While in some ways a sprawling collection, Colossal Youth & Collected Works is a fascinating document of a band who did quite a bit in their short career, and it isn't common that a band is able to release an entire discography in such a small, affordable package. The booklet included with liner notes penned by Simon Reynolds also provides a complete history of the band that is well worth reading, along with photos, flyers, original cover art, and even the full lyrics. For the price Domino is selling this at, anyone with an interest in the so-called post-punk era would be remiss to not pick this up.

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29 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

This collaboration between cellist/electronics wizard Rawlings and percussionist/mixer Feeney lays out its agenda immediately on the first part: swelling, high pitched sine waves that pierce and barely relent. However, for the listener willing to endure the harshness, there is a vast array of subtleties to be found.

Sedimental

In this first track, a subtle click of percussion emerges from the din, which begins to shift in pitch and channel, bouncing from left to right. It is a cruel joke on the part of the artists, because the shifts mimic hearing loss. I caught myself pausing the track and taking off my headphones, just to make sure. The shrill tones become a recurring motif throughout, coming up a bit more moderated in the second part, and yet louder and more piercing in the final piece.

The artists appreciate the lower frequency tones as much as the higher ones, as the second, third and sixth pieces all feature a massive sub-bass rumble that will give woofers a workout. A lot of the other sounds are far less easy to describe however. The wet rattling and cloth ripping sounds towards the latter half of the disc are among the oddest I have heard in recent memory, and though I know a treated cello makes up a sizable portion of this disc, I'll be damned if it is recognizable on too many of the tracks other than the fifth one.

Throughout the entire disc there is an alien, yet organic sense to the tracks that propels the listener towards the final, long piece that combines the previous punishing tones, occasional bursts of noise, and pulses of the previous pieces into a grand finale, with the addition of percussion treated to be a massive industrial roar. Not industrial in the genre sense, but in the cavernous warehouse full of dying machinery sense.

Feeney and Rawlings have made a disc that is purely of the beard stroking academic variety, and I doubt either of them would take offense to it being called such. However, a degree from INA-GRM is not required to appreciate the sheer variety of sounds and subtle textures that are on this album.

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23 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Devendra Banhart's fifth album finds him abandoning many of the idiosyncrasies that fueled his earlier work and instead adopting a variety of broader influences. As a result, he reaches neither the ecstatic heights obtained previously nor the jokey lows that plagued Cripple Crow. Apart from a handful of exceptions, Banhart instead settles for something in between for much of this middling effort.

Banhart is all over the place stylistically on these 16 tracks. Sometimes it works, and other times it sounds like he's trying to impersonate someone rather than just being himself. "Samba Vexillographica" sounds quite a bit like a watered-down tropicalia, and he draws upon the Caribbean for inspiration on the dub "The Other Woman." He sticks closer to home for other influences, like gospel on "Saved," pop funk on "Lover," doo-wop crooning on "Shabop Shalom," and even '60s rock on "Seahorse." That's not to say that he doesn't do any of these things well, but the selection of genres seems more calculated than inspired.

Yet Banhart still shows some flashes of what drew me to him in the first place. The lengthy, three-part "Seahorse" has some great multitracked vocals in its center, and the electric guitar section is uncharacteristically thrilling. "Tonada Yanomaminista" is a decent yelping rock song, not something I've heard Banhart do often. "The Other Woman," the album's reggae track, is actually pretty good, the bass particularly well done and the vocal feedback memorable. Even the three songs winding the album down are pretty enjoyable, especially the brief droning bit on "My Dearest Friend." My favorite track, though, is "Carmencita." It starts quietly and then kicks in after a dramatic pause, sustained by dramatic lyrics and an emotional quality for the most part lacking elsewhere on the album.

Like Cripple Crow, Banhart utilizes a band for most of this recording. His backing musicians are competent if indistinguishable as separate personalities, proving that it's still entirely Banhart's show even if he has expanded his sound beyond his singer-songwriter, acoustic guitar beginnings. Banhart's lyrics in both English and Spanish remain, apart from an awkward forced rhyme or two, one of his biggest strengths even if they may get lost in ordinary songwriting.

If Banhart seeks mainstream acceptance, this album may work in his favor with its blend of familiarity and gentle exoticism. That it is sufficiently relaxing to play at the end of the night and poses little challenge to the listener doesn't hurt. Yet as someone hoping for something a little more unique, I found it to be fairly ordinary but for the few excellent tracks that made it worthwhile.

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22 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Akron/Family's best material can be found here. Their varied musical proclivities mingle with one another effortlessly; their songwriting is stellar and their performances even better. Their most outstanding record is this one and it's a cycle dedicated to the only mystery on equal footing with death: love.

Young God

The hippies never got it right. They stewed in a cesspool of confused sexuality and proclaimed (free) love the monument of and cure for the woes of human existence. To make matters worse a great deal of uninteresting music was spawned in the interest of spreading this amorous gospel and the whole mess thus became the object of many corporate attempts at recapturing an imagined liberty, attempts to which we are all now subjected in recycled form. Akron/Family scared me the second I saw the title of their newest album, but then I heard it and I felt it and I internalized it and damn it, it feels great.

The group has utilized every available means to sing their ode to this great and mysterious force so I won't bother with the laundry list of instruments, studio trickery, and oddball wizardry employed to bring the whole thing to life. This is an album that seeps into the skin, moves the muscles, animates the bones, and opens up a wellspring deep in the soul all in the name of joyous celebration and near Dionysian frenzy; only the orgiastic quality isn't something you share with three of your buddies and their partners in a feast of the flesh.

It all starts with one of the oldest bits of advice on record: "Love, love, love everyone." Go ahead and let that sink in. In its brightest and truest form that maxim is still radical: love your family, love your neighbors, love your brothers and sisters, love your enemies, love the people that love you, and most importantly love the ones that don't return the favor. It's easy to see it as a simple statement, as a suggestion that means something like, "Help others out, don't do anything bad to them, and maybe take their trash out once in awhile if their old and in need of help." Luckily the band doesn't treat it that way and after the brief introduction of "Love, Love, Love (Everyone)" ends, the band kicks into some super-hyper-stellar-warp-ludicrous-speed overdrive and ascends Diotima's ladder right into the realm of truth, beauty, and the forms. "Ed Is a Portal" is where the album begins to fly. I don't know who Ed is, what he is a portal to, or if it is even proper to give him a gender like I am, but the portal of the title is a transcendent one that eliminates all prejudices and lifts the listener up to some abstract portrait of the universe and all its places as a manifestation of love. It is a circle of hollered rhythms, pulsing drums, buzzing guitar, and ascending chants that performs the function of a guru teaching the student how to eliminate the self. It's a hymn to the world we are all occupying; it is suitably epic and propulsive, spilling over with plenty and covering the room with its unceasing energy.

The album reaches dizzying heights in no more than a few minutes. It seems impossible that the band could follow this song with an entire album worthy of its power. "Don't Be Afraid, You're Already Dead" brings Love Is Simple out of the stratosphere right back to earth with a simple guitar melody and a classic rhythm that gallops along with ease. We have seen the image of beauty and love and now it's back to real life and the mundane. The album proceeds to search out different locations, ideas, and feelings by bringing together just about every musical style the band's covered... and then some. There are moments where all the chanting and singing is covered in a thick dust of noise and intensity, other moments where the music relaxes into a zen-like hum, and still other moments where traditional musical references stand side by side with strange meditative mantras and psychedelic meandering. Instead of narrowing their album into an overly refined concept record, Akron/Family let their imaginations fly and in the process capture a whole host of moments that emphasize all the passion, frenzy, comfort, and knowledge associated with a deep love or friendship.

As the album draws to its end an unusual satisfaction settles into my mind and I find that I'm happier, maybe even rested from the bang and crash that has been the previous hour of music. After all the drama, strange twists and turns, and humorous blitzkriegs, the music turns out to be a blissful therapy. Amongst the strange sounds, unpredictable shifts, and manic tempo bursts there lies a softly beating heart and it is slowly pumping out each lovely sound and each incondensable expression with a steady and reasoned hand. Akron/Family are a careful band that wield chaos like any other instrument, but on this album their song writing and keen ear for tension and progression shines through most obviously. By the end of the album you may or may not believe that love really is simple, but there will be little doubt that it is the force behind this group's music. This is not some lame love, some purely physical expression, it is a deep-seated, fully felt entity holding them and their music together. As a result it pours back out of them with beautiful results.

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22 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Better known for his electronic rhythm and bruise work, Mammal's Gary Beauvais moves his project into loner doom blues territory. Not as radical as move as it first reads, Mammal may have changed their palette for a bass and guitar but it is still steadily brooding and unsettled work. The electronic ruts are gone in favor of stringed instrument grooves, his music channelled into a gloomy simplicity.

Animal Disguise

Recorded during a period of isolation, the record reeks of life strung-out on stress, grime and modern living. "Drifter in the City" is the clearest distillation of his case, a vision filled with fumes and solitude during a sonic youth type lull. Even With only half the tracks featuring lyrics, the theme is solidly represented; the instrumental material is just as, if not more, clear in its intent. The furrowed brow sound of Lonesome Drifter begins in earnest on opener "Repulsion" and its bounced-ball digital beat. The loose strings of the instruments tracing the edges of the notes like a trail of regrets.

"Cyclops" continues to seep feedback, pink scar tissue fingers garrotting notes. There is a mood of doom metal across the album, but without any of its associated clichés. Only seconds into "Fatherlands" visuals of bleak desert horizons are thrown up, in fact the whole album has a heavy (in both senses) visual sense. Mammal's slow and simple riffs crawl along, the spurned frequencies scrambling between the heavy chew of notes.

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22 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

The latest release from Kip Uhlhorn and Simon Wojan's Cloudland Canyon is far too brief which means that each precious moment on this CD is cherished more than ever. The two pieces on this EP are astounding; both are slowly evolving epics with a heavy hint of Krautrock under a very modern sheen. The end result can only be described as cosmic.

Kranky

"Dambala" starts as a heady landscape, all rough edges and dark patches. As it progresses it gives way to a perfect synth rhythm, different loops all going in and out of the mix, locking and unlocking the music. The shifting and pulsating nature of the song makes it feel alive. It is like a giant superorganism: each component of the song being drones (in the insect sense, not the La Monte Young sense) working singularly for the good of the music.

The title track is similarly multifaceted, starting off seamlessly where the sedate "Dambala" leaves off. However, there is a startling change of pace as the drums kick in with a powerful rhythm with a strong bass foundation. The guitar conjures up an ether around this iron backbone. The icing on the cake are the vocals which are in German so I have not a clue what they mean but they sound the business. On "Silver Tongued Sisyphus" there is a thrilling energy that propels the music onward and upward, like a rocket powering up to leave earth and go hurtling through the solar system (and we are all lucky passengers).

Silver Tongued Sisyphus is an absolute stonker of an EP that should be blasted from every available audio speaker. The sound samples below may not give a full impression of the pieces as it is the repetition and shifts in tone and timing that make the music so intense. However, I readily admit that this release has truly whetted my appetite for the duo's next album. With any luck their forthcoming album will pick up where this EP leaves off and Cloudland Canyon can move together beyond the reaches of our galaxy.

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22 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

Throughout the history of life, humans are faced with the mortality of our parents, it's simply natural that we outlive our parents if everything goes normally. However, I can't think of anybody who is or was quite ready to deal with the life altering effects that extreme illness (an aggressive "terminal" cancer) has on everybody close. After weeks of dealing on a daily basis with medical uncertainty, insane drug side effects, mental instability, and a "care" system which ejects patients prematurely from necessary hospitalization, I finally had a window of opportunity for a break, and Tiny Mirrors will live forever in my memory for the soundtrack for that weekend.

Constellation

A friend of mine was working and living in New Hampshire for the summer and kept trying to get me up. I couldn't make it there until August but the day before I departed, Sandro Perri's second non-Polmo Polpo release arrived in the mail. It didn't land in the CD player until I had actually arrived in the beautiful little tourist town of North Conway, usually overpopulated during ski season but comfortably busy during the summer. Over the course of the weekend my friend and I were like two kids free from parents and without a worry in the world: we swam in a river, a lake, and a waterfall, bicycled around, drove up a steep mountain, took numerous photos, and drank. Tiny Mirrors didn't leave the player.

The gently moving whimsical melodies are perfect for a getaway weekend where the music and mood are all completely carefree. Driving through a comfortably congested town at 5 miles per hour with the windows all the way down in the warm summer air as fat tourists walk slowly the streets was a far more amazing experience than I could have ever dreamt. Every song on Tiny Mirrors sounds un-electronic and un-amplified, like a room of friends enjoying their time playing together (operant word: play - this music doesn't sound like work to the musicians, but it sounds like fun). It's quite a departure from the first Polmo Polpo recordings but hardly unexpected from Perri's last release, the fantastic Sandro Perri Plays Polmo Polpo EP. The drums are quiet and subtle, shuffling with gently brushed cymbals and a lighlty tapped tympani or kick; a faint bass provides more rhythmic backbone while guitars are a combination of acoustic strumming, nylon string picking, and Hawaiian-like pedal-steel sounds. Occasionally other non-electronic instruments make their appearance, like a flute melody on "The Mime" or brass instruments like the euphonium and trombone on the catchy "White Flag Blues" or the '70s-sounding "Love Is Real," respectively, but they're never overpowering. Perri isn't afraid to sing and let the vocals lead the songs. It's unique as this is what I feel is one of the most tragic down sides to non-top-40 pop music: the burial of the voice.

It's almost eerie, too, for me personally, that the subject matter of Perri's lyrics move from familial reflection in "Famiy Tree" to the summery lazy longings on "City of Museums," where Perri sings "As I pay to dream an empty beach where my spirit combs the sand, Where I am a bum." It's September now but the mere sound of the first notes of the first song bring me back to a simple weekend that I will never forget. I have Sandro Perri to thank for that. I can't promise this album will be as important in anybody else's life but for mine, it will always be close to my heart.

For the record, my mom's doing much better right now both physically and mentally and all who got to see her at the last Brainwaves know she's always been supportive in my music endeavors. Expect to see her next year at the fest again in the balconies.

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22 September 2007

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Albums and Singles

It is a long time since I have heard Vic Chesnutt, first becoming aware of him like I would expect many people my age did by way of a tribute album in the mid-90s bought on the strength of the artists covering him. That this is his 11th album is a big surprise and listening to it I lament not giving him the attention he obviously deserves previously. This album is filled with tender, witty, funny and heart wrenching moments of lyrical clarity.

Constellation

Chesnutt's lyrics are by far and away some of the most impressive I have heard in a long time. On North Star Deserter his singing is like a tired Townes Van Zandt but his humor is not a million miles away from Leonard Cohen's but sharper, particularly on the acidic "You Are Never Alone," where he croons about all the bad things and mistakes people can do but it is OK because you can always fall back on surgery, an abortion or some other "Get out of jail free" card. On a more sombre note, the epic "Splendid" more than lives up to its name but the jewel in the album's crown is the stunning "Debriefing." Chesnutt's vocals are given in quiet and earnest tones while a storm of music and feedback sweeps past him. It is soul stirring stuff to say the least.

The use of Thee Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra + Tra-La-La Band as a backing group is both a surprising and excellent choice. I did not really cop that it was them playing until I happened to be looking at the sleeve notes, the songs they are present on are a far cry from the distinctive sound they have cultivated on their own. They play sensitively and respectively within Chesnutt's world, adding details that build on his words to make them shine even brighter than before. The double tracking of Chesnutt's voice on "Glossolalia" and the howling backing vocals of the others is as close as it ever sounds to a traditional Silver Mt. Zion song but it is still worlds apart thanks to Chesnutt's unique take on writing lyrics.

If there are any faults present on North Star Deserter, they are well hidden. The production is beyond pristine, as one would expect from Constellation and their commitment to quality. The liner notes state that the sessions for this album were among the last made at the original Hotel2Tango and really there could not be a more fitting and beautiful epitaph for the legendary premises. However, hopefully this will be the start of a continued working relationship between Chesnutt and the Constellation crew. More albums like this are not just welcome, they are begged for.

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