Category: album review Page 16 of 22

Album Review: Kanye West – My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy [Def Jam/Roc-A-Fella]

On 11/30/2010

Nobody is denying that Kanye West is controversial. The guy steals headlines for doing shit like calling George W. Bush out, claiming he “doesn’t care about black people”. He throws temper tantrums at awards shows when he doesn’t win things he was nominated for, and on occasion when other people don’t win things he felt they should have. It was after that whole Taylor Swift incident and the subsequent backlash that West really began to realize the world doesn’t bend to his every whim and desire. Well, he probably knew that before, but refused to give the thought much creedence. He wrote missives on his website about it, essentially apologizing and confessing that he needs to take a hard look at himself and work on both controlling his anger and thinking before speaking. It was the start of a self-imposed hiatus of sorts, where he disappeared from the media, from having an online presence, from showing up at friends’ shows to make surprise cameos. He went to Hawaii, one of the most beautiful and relaxed places on Earth, and found some mental health. Playing out like your traditional movie plotline, Kanye reached the low point where all hope may have seemed lost. His storied quest to become the greatest artist that ever lived hit its biggest speedbump as suddenly he had turned from hero to villain. Given the outspoken and completely honest manner in which he’s conducted himself since the very beginning of his rise to fame though, West has probably been playing the villain for some people longer than others.

Everyone loves a tale of redemption though, and after a few months of down time and personal reflection, Kanye West began working on a proper follow-up to his last record, 2008’s “808s and Heartbreak”. There were rumblings of a record reportedly titled “Good Ass Job” that was tentatively scheduled for release in mid-2010, but that failed to happen. Instead, West officially re-emerged from exile by showing up at Facebook and Twitter headquarters to do some impromptu a capella performances of some new material. Videos began to pop up online, and that sparked some interest. Soon after began the G.O.O.D. Fridays, in which West would give away free mp3s of new music once a week, thereby earning him loads of good will and renewed respect. It would have been largely for naught had the tracks he was handing out sucked, but as Kanye himself would probably tell you, “sucking” isn’t really in his vocabulary. The big comeback tour also included a stop by the MTV Video Music Awards, where just a year earlier his on-stage interruption was what sparked his fall from grace. Performing new track “Runaway” completely solo, West spouted off lines like “Let’s have a toast for the douchebags/Let’s have a toast for the assholes/Let’s have a toast for the scumbags”. It was pretty self-deprecating with just a hint of remorse for being one of those douchebag asshole scumbag jerkoffs. And so, Kanye West is officially back, the spotlight firmly on him once again with the much-delayed but finally released fifth album “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” officially landing last week. It’s almost as if he wanted to make sure it was out just in time for all those year-end “Best of” lists.

If there’s one thing we’ve learned about Kanye West over his last few years and albums, it’s that he doesn’t do small. Case in point, the music video for his 9-minute opus “Runaway” officially runs 35 minutes and features such spectacles as fireworks and a parade. “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” runs in a similar fashion, taking a mere 13 tracks and extending out to a grand 70 minutes. Eight of the songs extend beyond the five minute mark, and a couple of the shorter ones are merely interludes attached to bigger main tracks. Take the track “All the Lights” as one of the sharpest examples of excess, with over 42 people getting credit as having contributed something to the final product. There’s a whole brass section, strings, some woodwinds and about a dozen guest vocalists, most of which are impossible to pick out individually. The track itself is deceptively simple on the surface, but a close and studied listen reveals layers that go far beyond what any reasonable person might expect. So it goes for much of the record, jumping through a multitude of stylistic hoops with a who’s-who of guests that include everyone from Jay-Z to Nicki Minaj to Rick Ross and the WTF-ness of Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon. Thankfully most of the Auto-Tune madness that completely covered “808s and Heartbreak” has vanished, though in its place are plenty of other vocal manipulations. “Gorgeous” has West sounding like he’s gone all flat with his vocals hit with a pretty strong mono filter that makes you wonder what hip hop would have sounded like were there recordings of it in the 50s and 60s. There’s also the robotic vocal breakdown near the end of “Runaway” and just a slice of Auto-Tune on “Lost in the World” thanks more to the sampling of Bon Iver’s “Woods” than anything else. But “Blame Game” features the greatest vocal acrobatics, as West’s voice goes from slow to fast to just plain weird speeds all over an Aphex Twin piano sample. It’s also one of his bleakest tracks to date, taking the album’s title and rendering it completely true from a lyrical perspective.

Kanye West spends much of “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” talking about some heavy-handed topics. While getting into superhero lore on “POWER”, West also gets into a commentary about his increased loss of innocence and childlike wonder. There was a certain playfulness that took over on his first couple records, but it’s not like thoroughly depressing (but confrontational and real) topics are new ground for him. Hell, “808s and Heartbreak” was a record born out of a tragic breakup and his mother’s death. It was not a fun experience in the least. The fun on this new record really comes in the form of pure indulgence. Whether that means drinking and partying as much as you want or sleeping with a LOT of women, these are topics motivated purely by the pleasure centers of our brain. They’re also the part of the same section that houses the angry and violent urges as well, which is why on “Blame Game” he tells a girl he misses both fucking her and choking her. One assumes the choking bit is a sexual thing, but he says it with such malicious intent that it’s difficult to know where to draw the line. Similarly, “All the Lights” comes across as a celebration of fame but also deals with the perils and pitfalls that go along with it. It’s less “I’m so famous, I’ve had to stop trying to grocery shop” and more “Restraining order/Can’t see my daughter”. This highlights the dichotomy that weighs on this record from start to finish. For every light there is a dark. For every good there is a bad. For every hero there is a villain. For every beautiful fantasy there is a dark and twisted reality. Kanye West is and is about all of these things, and the public perception of him is just as divided. We can see ourselves in it too, which is what makes West such a powerful force in music today. There’s always the intensely relatable moments, like somebody’s reading straight out of our diaries, but thanks to his unfiltered perspective, sometimes West also goes on about the things we WISH we could do or say but wouldn’t dare on account of social convention or what effect it’d have on the way others see us. West gets away with it because he’s one of the few people that simply doesn’t care…or at least not as much as we do.

For inquiring ears that simply have to know, “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” is a hip hop achievement of the highest order. Hell, it’s a musical achievement of the highest order. Kanye West once again proves he’s one of, if not the best and most talented artists in music today no matter if he’s got love from the general public or not. The whole Taylor Swift thing? You might as well wipe that from your memory because not only are both artists involved sick and tired of talking about it, but they both have extremely well-received new records that deserve your undivided attention. The one thing you can never accuse Kanye West of being is unambitious, and this new album weighs in as a highlight reel of great moments from his past, taking place in the present, with a sharp outlook towards the future. Of course where he’ll go next is anybody’s guess, but at the moment he’s taking a page straight out of his song “Stronger”. With his personal and professional life in complete shambles, West took a step back, assessed the situation, and has risen from the ashes better than ever before. Haters be damned, Kanye West is here to stay. Now if only somebody could get him to shut up about it.

Buy “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy” from Amazon
Buy it from Amazon MP3 for just $5 for a limited time

Album Review: Daft Punk – Tron: Legacy OST [Disney]

By Faronheit

On 11/29/2010

In album review, music

Daft Punk haven’t released a new album of original material since 2005’s “Human After All”. That’s not to say they haven’t been busy though. They’ve continued to perform mindblowing live shows on occasion and even released a live album in 2007. Oh, and we can’t forget the movie they made, “Electroma”, which they wrote and appeared in but did not create the soundtrack. The film wasn’t the first they’d made, and it probably won’t be the last. One of the themes that Daft Punk seem to be exploring in their various projects are the close relationships between the visual and auditory. It’s a big part of what makes their live shows so kinetic and engaging. That’s why it makes perfect sense that the duo would actually craft a movie soundtrack someday. It was just a matter of finding the right film to work on. The ideal situation finally presented itself a couple years back as Disney was preparing to make a sequel to the 1982 cult classic “Tron”. With the technology available today, recreating the futuristic video game world for “Tron: Legacy” seems like an inspired idea. Apparently Daft Punk’s Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo is a huge fan of the original film as well, so the duo cut a deal with Disney to provide a full album’s worth of new music that would serve as the official soundtrack.

Had the makers of “Tron: Legacy” chosen to use old Daft Punk music to soundtrack the film, it’d probably turn out just fine. Daft Punk is one of the best electronica groups in music today, and songs like “Around the World” and “Harder, Faster, Better, Stronger” sound very futuristic in and of themselves. Still, the prospect of entirely new Daft Punk is too good to pass up, particularly with the attention it’d bring, so it made the anticipation for the film itself that much higher. Fans of the duo have been clamoring for any material they can find from the soundtrack, and bits of excitement came in the form of the movie’s trailer, which features the song “Derezzed”. Amazon has since begun to offer 30 second preview snippets of the album, and NPR just put up a lengthy interview with the film’s music supervisor that has a few songs from the soundtrack available for streaming as well. These little bits and pieces are certainly getting more attention than, say, Hans Zimmer’s “Inception” soundtrack or Clint Mansell’s “Black Swan” soundtrack, both of which are hotly tipped for Oscar nominations. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross did attract attention for their soundtrack work on “The Social Network” this year, and that was largely because of how different it sounded compared to your average Nine Inch Nails song. But assuming you’ve paid enough attention to catch at least a small clip of the “Tron: Legacy” soundtrack, you’ll easily recognize that while it may be Daft Punk behind the music, there’s a whole big 85-piece orchestra backing them up. Two synthesizers and a drum machine just isn’t going to cut it anymore, as interesting as that might have been. So with all those extra moving pieces as part of every song, any hope that this might be a fun and danceable soundtrack like their normal albums gets thrown out pretty quickly.

Opening with “Overture”, the orchestra swells and there’s this whole grand, triumphant moment that comes across like the excitement that all the “Tron” nerds will be experiencing once that movie title is revealed on the screen. Things get decidedly more electronic after that, with Jeff Bridges doing a spoken word thing as he describes “The Grid”. The beat is downtempo, but synths come in with a little symphonic assist and the 90 second track gets a sharp Daft Punk stamp on it. The same can be said for “The Son of Flynn”, which has plenty of skittering electro-parts while a horn section quietly rises in the background. That’s sort of the way things go for the entire record; often the orchestra holds down and dominates a track with plenty of cellos and violins that race along like a light cycle on the track. Synths and other electronica elements play a significant role in most tracks too, tending to lend the entire soundtrack a very dark, epic and futuristic vibe. A dance record this is not (“Derezzed” being about the only exception), but it’s not a typical soundtrack either. Daft Punk make sure their presence is known, even if it involves a squelch here or a drum machine there. To put it another way, if you subtract the duo from every track, you end up with an extremely normal and somewhat boring collection of instrumentals that still work. As it stands though, the Daft Punk bits added will serve to compliment the film perfectly and turn this from a merely good soundtrack to an extremely good if not great one.

Where the “Tron: Legacy” soundtrack will work best is obviously within the context of the film. Given that it’s not in theatres yet, though the soundtrack isn’t out until next week anyways, just listening to it completely separated from the visual elements is really fascinating. To be able to pin certain tracks to certain scenes will only increase each track’s value as time goes by. And based on some of the track names, you can guess bits of plot information or what scene it belongs in. Will “Disc Wars” be playing when some characters throw those light-up frisbees at one another? You can probably put money on it. Whether or not you choose to put money on the “Tron: Legacy” soundtrack can be a challenging decision to make. As great as Daft Punk can be, and they prove it again here, this isn’t the sort of record you’re going to want to throw on for casual listening or at a party. A better thought would be to make a call on picking this up based on your past instrumental soundtrack experience. Does something like John Williams’ “Star Wars” soundtrack get your blood moving in the right sort of way? Perhaps you prefer a more traditional pop song, something with words and actual singing. Or maybe Daft Punk’s dance-filled records like “Homework” and “Human After All” are more your style. This album has a high possibility of disappointing you if you’re on board solely because you’ve loved everything the French duo has done in the past. It’s been 5 years since the last record and some of us are starving to hear something, anything, new from Daft Punk, but this isn’t quite what was expected. The ray of hope is that considering the complicated and epic nature of these tracks, you’ll probably never see the majority of them performed live. This soundtrack then functions as more of a one-off, and maybe a more traditional dance-filled electronica Daft Punk album isn’t too far down the line. It’s nice to know that these guys can make a pretty killer soundtrack, but perhaps next time the orchestra and enslavement to a storyline can take a break for something truly worthy of the legacy that this duo has had going for them the last decade.

Stream 21 minutes of the soundtrack at Myspace

Preorder the “Tron: Legacy” soundtrack from Amazon

Album Review: Pete Yorn – Pete Yorn [Vagrant]

By Faronheit

On 11/23/2010

In album review, mp3, music

Pete Yorn has been particularly productive the last couple years, and there’s a couple reasons why that might be the case. Is he in desperate need of money? Well, with album sales being what they are these days, most artists don’t make much if any money from them. Touring is by far the more lucrative method of getting some quick cash, though hypothetically Yorn could do a few years worth of it and maintain strong ticket sales even without some new music to back it up. Yet Yorn is now releasing his fifth album, a mere year after his last one “Back & Fourth”. Previously he’s gone at least 2 years between records. Maybe he’s just feeling exceptionally productive these days. He’s also got a brand new record label after signing to Vagrant, certainly a step down from the massive Columbia but perhaps he likes it that way. He also worked with a new producer this time around in the form of Mr. Frank Black, a name you might recognize in association with the Pixies or Black Francis or any number of other musical projects he’s associated with. It’s most likely that combination of elements, getting a fresh label with a fresh producer that pushed Yorn to make his fifth record self-titled. Given his hit-or-miss history over the past 10 years, on the surface this new one appears to have a lot going for it, the question is whether or not that’s enough.

“Precious Stone” opens the album, and as Pete Yorn tends to write love songs pretty well, this one fares as one of his best to date. Of course comparing a woman to a precious stone isn’t exactly a new concept, but cliched situation or not, Yorn’s smart writing helps greatly. Where it doesn’t aid him is on the song “Rock Crowd”, where the cheese factor is so high that it has become a new anthem for mice. The idea behind the song is this: poor Pete Yorn always feels tired and depressed and down, but then he steps on stage to adoring fans and it’s like a warm embrace that makes him feel all better. Will Yorn play it at virtually every single show from now until eternity? You can probably bet on it, and I’ve not heard a more pandering song in the last several years. “Cutesy” is another way to describe it, along with the song that directly follows “Rock Crowd”, which is “Velcro Shoes”. Surely you’ve heard the Paolo Nutini hit “New Shoes” about how he puts his “new shoes on and suddenly everything is right”. With “Velcro Shoes” he tells the story of buying the shoes, going home and taking a bath with his imaginary friend Billy, then having imaginary adventures with Billy. Let’s hope the song was written from the perspective of a little boy, or Yorn might have some unchecked mental issues. What’s most interesting about that track though is how much it sounds exactly like something that Frank Black would do either solo or with his band the Catholics. A lot of the album actually carries that Frank Black touch, and that largely comes through in the heavy electric guitar work and some of Yorn’s vocals which sometimes get to the point where it sounds like somebody else is singing. One listen to “Badman” and you’ll be left wondering what new artist you’ve just stumbled upon. The words are 100% Pete Yorn though, and there’s no doubt about that, which is good for the wordplay but just a little bland when it comes to concepts and storylines.

Speaking of concepts and storylines, this self-titled record finds Yorn trying to manage the challenges of being bipolar. What’s that, you say? Pete Yorn isn’t bipolar? Perhaps a psychologist can give this record a listen and craft a diagnosis based around that. Hell, the song “Rock Crowd”, as I’ve already attested, features both his light and dark side. But much of the album comes from a very raw and intense emotional place. He appears to be pretty down on himself in general, such as on “The Chase” where he’s pretty much an asshole to this woman he loves, and then basically admits to being a horrible person while trying to convince her to come back to him. For an opposing viewpoint, the song “Always” spends a fair amount of time talking about the challenges that come with falling in love, but maintains all the struggles are worth it in the end just to have that deep connection with another person. “Stronger Than” gets all high and mighty by proclaiming that “love is stronger than fear”, yet Yorn is extremely hesitant to even consider falling in love because “I gotta know myself before I know someone else”. Then “Future Life” takes the high road in the perspective that we’re constantly wanting more out of our lives and because that makes us miserable, we should focus on all the great things we have right this minute. It’s optimism, but the subtext is telling you to give up on your dreams. At least for this song, Yorn ascribes to the mentality of “today is a gift, that’s why they call it the present”. The album closes with a pretty straightforward folk cover of the Flying Burrito Brothers song “Wheels”, and there are two reasons why that’s amusing. First, Yorn has a song called “Burrito”, and though that and “Wheels” are completely unrelated, how weird is it that the guy has two burrito-related songs to his name? Secondly, you’ll never guess who covered that same Flying Burrito Brothers song on his last album. If you said Frank Black, you’d be right.

What “Pete Yorn” the album puts on display, if anything, is that Yorn is a rather shapeless, faceless singer-songwriter that has gotten by on his sheer ability to write a pretty damn dynamic and catchy hook. His first four records were all about that, and both brought him pain and good fortune. The best fortune he could have gotten was in the form of “musicforthemorningafter”, his debut album, which was amazing in how it took all his best hooks and lyrics, leaving everything else in the dust as he scrambled to put together two more albums as part of a proposed “trilogy”. “Back and Fourth” was a recovery of sorts, no longer constrained by the conceptual nature of his prior three records, and allowing his band to do their fair share of heavy lifting on the instrumental side. Yet if the stories are indeed true, the main reason why Pete Yorn has been so “productive” these last couple years isn’t so much because he’s writing at a speedy pace but instead because so much of his material gets shelved. The second album Yorn released last year was “The Break Up”, a duets record with Scarlett Johansson. That had been gathering dust for a number of years before it was finally put out. Similarly, word on the street is that this new album was actually recorded with Frank Black prior to “Back and Fourth”, but the songs were held back, presumably because Columbia didn’t want to release them. Vagrant put them out, and the full painting finally comes into view, but like a Monet it’s just a bit blurry. Black largely succeeds in his mission to strip Yorn down to his most basic core, the problem is what we find upon going there. It’s a man in an identity crisis, unsure about life and love while allowing himself to be easily influenced by others (such as Frank Black). What suffers most because of this are the hooks, because even though a handful of choruses may surge and swell, not much of it remains memorable. Despite this, nothing sounds outright bad either. The good news is we get to explore this different side of Pete Yorn, and it’s one of the most interesting things he’s done in awhile. The bad news is interest gets lost with relative quickness and never picks back up. Best of luck to you Pete Yorn, hopefully you truly “get to know yourself” better before setting foot into a studio to record your next album.

Pete Yorn – Velcro Shoes

Buy “Pete Yorn” from Amazon

Album Review: The Corin Tucker Band – 1,000 Years [Kill Rock Stars]

By Faronheit

On 11/22/2010

In album review, mp3, music

Let’s break down the basics before we begin. There was Sleater-Kinney, a three-piece punk rock girl group made up of Carrie Brownstein, Corin Tucker and Janet Weiss. They released a bunch of great albums, fiery and brash each one, but chose to take an “indefinite hiatus” in 2006. Going their separate ways, drummer Janet Weiss kept working hard, making albums with Quasi and Stephen Malkmus (with The Jicks). Guitarist and sometimes singer Carrie Brownstein expanded into other artful projects, blogging for NPR and doing a bit of acting work both as one half of the comedy duo ThunderAnt (with SNL’s Fred Armisen) and even starring in an upcoming indie film with The Shins’ James Mercer. All of this happened before we’d heard a word from Tucker, who had practically dropped off the face of the Earth. No worries though, she’s been working hard at that thing many of us have known as family. She’s got a couple kids and a husband and sometimes you just need to take a step back from the fame to spend time with those most important to you. The good news for fans of Corin Tucker is that she’s been working on some songs during her free time and was able to eventually piece together a small band to help her play them for a record titled “1,000 Years”. And just to keep everything completely up to date, Weiss and Brownstein have just recently announced they’ll be in a new band with Mary Timony that’s being called Wild Flag. Expect material and touring from them in 2011.

There’s this wail that Corin Tucker did on every Sleater-Kinney album that was often so intense you could stop the rest of the music and your attention would still be completely drawn to it. That’s one of the main things that set Sleater-Kinney apart from so many other punk bands as well as other girl bands. Combine that with some seriously hardcore guitar work by Carrie Brownstein and it’s little wonder why that band reached indie stardom. For those of you (like me) that have missed Tucker’s classic yell, there’s bad news afoot on “1,000 Years”. It’s a relatively quiet, introspective singer-songwriter sort of record. So much of it keeps a cool head about it that tends to bring to mind someone like Neko Case or PJ Harvey. Of course Neko Case and PJ Harvey have written some incredible solo albums, and they’re proof positive that just because your voice can reach the rafters doesn’t mean it needs to be used that way every time. Tucker’s relative calm through much of the album means there’s more time to focus on atmosphere and lyrical content, and there’s plenty of both to go around.

The first two tracks on “1,000 Years” understandably feel front-loaded to ease you into the record without taking many chances. It’s still a long way from the heavier punk that Sleater-Kinney so easily released into the world, but there’s some electric guitar that’s not half bad in these mid-tempo melodies. The song “Half A World Away” is about missing somebody you love, and Tucker’s vocals sound like she’s genuinely upset in a surprisingly emotional moment. A small bit of experimentation emerges on “Handed Love”, which starts out as a really sparse, bland and ineffective ballad with little to nothing going for it. There’s no easy verse-chorus-verse to guide you around, and just as it becomes a chore to sit through, it bursts open at the seams into a cathartic release that somehow feels worth it. The spitfire side of Tucker really starts to emerge on “Doubt”, and there are slices of her tour-de-force yelp, but the mediocre electric guitar work holds the song back from being something exceptional. Meanwhile the balladry of “Dragon” just does most everything wrong, thanks in large part to a string section that is probably one of the most ineffective and pathetic string sections you’ll ever hear. The song stands out as exceptionally poor as it’s sandwiched beween two harder rock numbers that do so much more with so much less. Near the end of the album, a couple of the songs almost start to blend into one another. “Thrift Store Coats” has some nice piano at the beginning, but the electric guitars eventually take over and ruin the mood. Thankfully that piano is given its full due on the closing track “Miles Away”, and it works quite well to become one of the album’s biggest highlights.

When she’s not driving forwards at full volume, Corin Tucker proves she’s still a very capable and strong vocalist. The passion she injects into her singing stands largely apart from everything else that’s going on throughout “1,000 Years”. There’s a number of pretty good songs on the record, but nothing quite so gripping that it’s essential listening. Arguably, the greatest problems here result from the “Band” part of The Corin Tucker Band. Whoever these people are playing on this album with her, they’re talented enough to play in a band, just a pretty crappy one that doesn’t make waves beyond a local music scene. They should be called a backing bland rather than a backing band. Perhaps, one might argue, they’re just following orders and are ensuring to give Tucker the spotlight she so richly deserves. Whatever the reasons might be, a few of the songs on “1,000 Years” had the potential to be mindblowing but just never made it that far. Or perhaps the issue isn’t so much who’s there as it is who’s not. With Carrie Brownstein digging in deep on her guitar and Janet Weiss slamming the drums like there’s no tomorrow, combined with Tucker’s vocals, Sleater-Kinney was a trinity of amazing musicians. We can’t even judge how Brownstein would do solo because she has yet to release any post-S-K music (at the moment). Weiss’s utility player role will serve her well in any band she joins, as we’ve already seen. The Wild Flag album’s going to be a small test, but that in itself is a supergroup so great things are expected from them anyways. Corin Tucker is effectively going it alone with some faceless musicians helping her out. Expectations were high anyways, and so “1,000 Years” feels like a mild disappointment. Nobody’s going to fault her for trying though, and if she keeps making music under the Corin Tucker Band name it could very well get a whole lot better. Time will tell. In the meantime, let’s keep our fingers crossed for that Sleater-Kinney reunion.

The Corin Tucker Band – Doubt

Buy “1,000 Years” from Amazon

Album Review: LCD Soundsystem – London Sessions [EMI/DFA]

By Faronheit

On 11/18/2010

In album review, live music, music

A few weeks back, my good friends in LCD Soundsystem threw me a birthday party. Okay, so maybe that wasn’t the intention when they booked their Chicago tour date on my birthday, but I turned it into a birthday party anyways with 4,500 of my closest friends. In my review of the show, which was double billed with Hot Chip opening, I pretty much called it the best show I’d seen in 2010. That’s an endorsement you can take to the bank. It marked the second time I saw LCD Soundsystem within a 6 month period, and over the course of three records they have become an extremely tight knit live force to be reckoned with. There are few bands I can recommend more these days. Naturally then, interest in an LCD Soundsystem live album should be met with a nearly equal sense of enthusiasm. Even if you can’t afford a ticket to see James Murphy and his merry band of misfits perform in a city near you, at least you can get a recorded document of what the show is like. So we have the “London Sessions”, a live record available now on iTunes that was recorded this past June at Pool/Miloco studios in South London, shortly after the band’s performance at Glastonbury.

Yes, there is a certain visual component that goes into your LCD Soundsystem live show that can only be rendered on DVD, but the audio benefits alone would seem to make a live album worthwhile. The band tends to throw a little extra into their sets, carefully planning and arranging them for the best transitional effect. Each individual album is sequenced so carefully, but when you perform, you need to put on a catalogue-spanning set. There’s a reason why the LCD Soundsystem set is exactly the same for almost every single show, and it’s for maximum effect. “London Sessions” unfortunately doesn’t feature that exact set that they’ve been doing these last few months. There’s nothing in the way of transitions here, as every song is neatly capped on both ends. The songs are spread pretty smartly across the band’s albums, with special emphasis on their latest, “This Is Happening”. In the form of an extra special treat, the live record closes with the rarity “Yr City’s A Sucker”, something that few crowds have had the privilege of bearing witness to. If there was ever a time to do it, when you’re being recorded is probably one of them.

So we have the singular issue that plagues these “London Sessions”, and that is the use of a recording studio. In most situations, you get a live album from a band that has been pristinely recorded via the soundboard at a show they played, and while it often sounds good, depending on the situation the crowd noise or overly loud singalongs can get a bit bothersome. That’s the issue with legitimate live albums, though all that stuff goes ignored when you’re right there in the crowd with everyone else. The benefits of playing your songs live in a studio are mostly in audio fidelity form, and LCD Soundsystem’s songs are pretty pristine for these “London Sessions”. It’s very possible they did multiple takes of each song and only chose the ones they liked best. It also stands to reason that though they’re noisy, crowds serve a huge purpose when it comes to pushing a performance on stage. People go to shows to get amped up over live performances of their favorites. Bands play live shows not just for the cash, but because of the love and passion their fans give back to them. This exchange of energy tends to take almost every live performance up a notch. You may be recording your songs 100% live and using no samples in a studio, but without that screaming, singing along and relentless applause, there’s just a little bit of edge missing. The “London Sessions” come remarkably close to capturing exactly what you’d see were you to actively attend an LCD Soundsystem show, but subtract that audience and a certain vitality or the mere possibility of everything going completely off the tracks gets taken away too.

The value, or the real reason why “London Sessions” is important enough for you to purchase is that you’re offered a different perspective on LCD Soundsystem than you get from their records. When the rhythm section goes completely nuts in an extended jam session at the end of the live version of “Get Innocuous!”, that’s something you can’t get on the original “Sound of Silver” version. The funkier and guitar dominant live rendition of “Daft Punk Is Playing At My House” shows just how much careful sampling went into the final album cut. The grand point is that the small little changes that happen between non-live and live editions of songs provide new insights into things you’re already familiar with from one angle or another. Given LCD Soundsystem’s prowess as a live act, this takes on additional importance. The conditions may not be ideal, but they’re about as close as you’ll get from this band. Of course after all this waxing poetic on the virtues/drawbacks of this “London Sessions” album, in the last week the band decided to make their November 10th show at Alexandra Palace in London available for purchase. That gives you the full LCD Soundsystem live audio experience, complete with crowd noise and a killer set list. Links to purchase that and the “London Sessions” are below. As James Murphy says himself in the song “Pow Pow”, there are “advantages to both (advantages! advantages!)”. Make your choice, or buy both – you’re getting quality either way. Now if only they’d do a live DVD…

Buy “London Sessions” from Amazon MP3

Buy the “Live at Alexandra Palace, London” November 10, 2010 record

Album Review: Badly Drawn Boy – It’s What I’m Thinking, Pt. 1 – Photographing Snowflakes [One Last Fruit]

By Faronheit

On 11/17/2010

In album review, music

“I’m a failure at heart/but it seems I succeed when my heart feels the need to be helpful”

The lines above are the first things that Damon Gough sings on the title track of his new Badly Drawn Boy album. The song itself is placed midway through the record, but it largely sums up his career in music thus far. Somewhere around the year 2000, Badly Drawn Boy was being touted as the “next big thing” built largely on the strength of his debut album “The Hour of Bewilderbeast”. The “About A Boy” soundtrack was an additional strong point, though the quality of his songs and songwriting in general began to decline with “Have You Fed the Fish?” and continued a downward trend all the way beyond 2006’s “Born in the U.K.”. When all that prediction of major success didn’t fully pan out, Gough felt creatively tapped out and walked away from making music, perhaps forever. Perhaps it was out of the need for some cash, or just that he was friends with people involved in the show, but last year Gough agreed to write some songs for the soundtrack to the British TV show “The Fattest Man in Britain”. Upon releasing those tracks in the form of the album “Is There Nothing We Could Do?”, it didn’t exactly re-ignite the hype that he had earned much earlier in his career, but after being forced to write music he was creatively stimulated like he hadn’t been in quite awhile. So now Badly Drawn Boy is back in full effect, and Gough has set about to release a trilogy of records, the first of which came out earlier this year, titled “It’s What I’m Thinking, Pt. 1 – Photographing Snowflakes”.

One of the most compelling and exciting things about the early Badly Drawn Boy records was how much Gough was able to do with a simple acoustic guitar and voice. Not only did his songwriting suffer in quality as time went on, but he constantly felt the pressure to expand his sound with each new album, to the point where everything became completely overblown with extensive string sections among other things. For one man his compositions were often backed with dozens of others that often hurt more than they helped. As “It’s What I’m Thinking, Pt. 1 – Photographing Snowflakes” begins with the track “In Safe Hands”, you’re left with an acoustic guitar, a light splattering of drums, a minimally invasive bit of electronic skittering, and Gough’s voice treated with a bit of an echo effect. The song probably sounds just as good with only the guitar and no vocal effects, but the added bits do make it more haunting and dramatic. It’s a minimalist song at heart, and extremely un-busy compared to what he was doing back in 2006. The same goes for the next track, “The Order of Things”, which is a bit brighter sonically and utilizes a drum machine for percussion while a hazy radio broadcast hides far back in the mix. As the swell of strings dominates over “Too Many Miracles”, it’s automatically easy to assume that Gough has fallen back into old patterns and is preparing to unleash some epic composition on you. The good news is that the strings avoid becoming too invasive or overbearing and instead just stick with the upbeat melody while Gough waxes poetic about the beauty in the world. It’s quite nice, really. Thankfully, though those strings stick around for much of the record, there’s ample restraint applied to them so they’re not problematic. The 6.5 minute title track is extremely self-loathing but well written as the words slide past amid rather pleasant balladry of piano and slide guitar. Though “You Lied” has an almost soft rock quality to it that you might find on a Seal or Sting album, its bare bones instrumental approach is again very welcome and brings back the early days of Badly Drawn Boy. Speaking of those early days, after a pretty depressing first 8 tracks, the record’s final two songs are a bit poppier and lighter on their feet, which is really what Gough does best. It’s a nice way to close things out, but you’re left wondering why there couldn’t have been more of those types of songs across the entire album rather than just confined to the end. Most albums are front-loaded with hits, but in this case, outside of “Too Many Miracles”, the hits come at the end.

Lyrically speaking “It’s What I’m Thinking, Pt. 1 – Photographing Snowflakes” deals a lot with the first half of its title. Gough does a whole lot of introspection about his life and career thus far, and a fair portion of it is from the perspective of a guy that hit his peak 10 years ago and has constantly struggled ever since. Tragic though that may be, the time away from making music these last few years sharpened his wordplay a bit, and in some respects it’s comforting to hear him lay those emotions out like he does here. He also doesn’t spend the entire album talking about himself, as that’d come off as egotistical and selfish. There are ruminations on life and nature and love as well, all big topics that are far more relatable than personal failures. The guy could use some significant cheering up though, and hopefully subsequent volumes of the “It’s What I’m Thinking” series will bring that back with greater ease. For the time being, consider this “Photographing Snowflakes” chapter as something of a rebirth for Badly Drawn Boy. If 2006 was the year Gough reached the bottom, 2010 is the year he starts clawing his way back up the mountain. Progress has been made, and this new one is by no means a redemption, but more serves as a hopeful look at things to come. It’s unlikely that Badly Drawn Boy will ever make good on that “next big thing” tag once applied to him, but with the pressure of that now fully taken away, perhaps he can finally find a consistency in his sound that will satisfy fans and critics for years to come.

Buy “It’s What I’m Thinking, Pt. 1 – Photographing Snowflakes” from Amazon

Album Review: Tim Kasher – The Game of Monogamy [Saddle Creek]

By Faronheit

On 11/16/2010

In album review, music

If the name Tim Kasher somehow rings unfamiliar to you, perhaps you’re just not aware of some of the music the guy has been behind. Kasher is at the moment responsible for two excellent and distinctly different bands, Cursive and The Good Life. It’s Cursive that has been around the longest, having put out about 8 albums worth of highly emotional punk rock with increasingly dramatic flair. The Good Life is arguably a bit quieter and personal in nature, and though the music doesn’t always fully back it up, there’s plenty of drama in that too. To call Kasher a drama “queen”/king wouldn’t be out of line, and that only becomes clearer the closer you examine his remarkably personal lyrics. Kasher is also a fan of the concept album, and he’s used everything from “The Wizard of Oz” (Cursive’s “Happy Hollow”) to chronicling the good and bad moments a relationship goes through in a year (The Good Life’s “Album of the Year”). Somehow though the main theme always seems to get back to good love gone bad and winding up desperate and alone. No matter how “impersonal” he claims these stories are, the characters in Kasher’s songs are almost never happy, or if they are, it’s not for very long. Why do we pay attention to these sad sack tales Kasher keeps throwing our way? Well, part of it is probably the relatable aspect of it all, because almost all of us have had a relationship go bad at one time or another in our lives. The other part is that Kasher always has such well-rounded wordplay. He’s not quite Shakespeare, but there’s such a vividness to the stories he tells that not many people can do or at least do well. All that said, Tim Kasher has finally decided to release an album under his own name, and true to form he’s titled it “The Game of Monogamy”.

Anyone thinking that “The Game of Monogamy” is a record looking to endorse the values of marriage should probably check the title more carefully. The word “game” is the trick here, because apparently keeping happiness and fidelity with a partner is about as challenging as Monopoly or Trivial Pursuit. So the album is by no means positive on relationships in general, though if you’re single or suffering from breakup-itis, there’s wisdom to be found in these words. Of course that “wisdom” could also put you off taking on a partner for the rest of your life, so interpret things quite liberally and without too much weight. Just because Kasher (or the “characters” he’s created) is unhappy with how his long-term relationships have turned out doesn’t mean you have to be. But lyrics do come first in any Kasher project, and this is no exception. “I’m Afraid I’m Gonna Die Alone” deals with the topic the title describes, though the main point is more about how two cheating partners stay together because of that fear. “You said baby, you worry so much about dying/you forget to really live/well maybe so/now tell me, who you been with?” he exclaims amid some rather pleasant organ and a very peppy horn section. In other words, the song has all the hallmarks of a pretty good single, save for the dark lyrical content. One of the two is probably implied sarcasm, though it’s difficult to tell exactly which. At least “Strays” has some good intentions, holding down this simple ballad with an acoustic guitar and a melodica. The storyline revolves around a man wanting to prove he still loves his partner many years into their relationship, even though they’ve seemingly grown apart. In Kasher’s world they’re just two weary people, wandering the streets together under the realization that maybe they’re best off together because they won’t find anyone better. “Cold Love” is another bouncy pop song with jangly guitars mixed among the organ and horns, and despite its apparent warmth the title describes it best. In other words it’s a whole lot of fun as Kasher talks about being “tired of this vanilla existence”. One of the most interesting songs on “The Game of Monogamy” is “There Must Be Something I’ve Lost”, in which Kasher tries to figure out where his life went from full of promise to completely marginalized. This exercise mostly involves re-examining his youth and past relationships and delivering such intricacies as “I wanna have sex with all my old girlfriends again/I swear it’s just the familiarity I miss/Aw, fuck it/It’s just typical male conquest/You know the world don’t revolve around your prick/just ask your old girlfriends”. Speaking of sex, “No Fireworks” is all about the lack of them in the bedroom. You may be surprised to learn that not every long-term relationship results in a completely satisfying sex life, so Kasher just reminds us all of that fact (as he does a few times on the album). As if you needed another reason to avoid doing something so “foolish” as to get married. And hey, “The Prodigal Husband” is about cheating on your spouse and the destruction that leads to. To sum it all up, Kasher closes the album with the 5+ minute epic “Monogamy”, which uses a full string section and virtually every instrument in between to tell the tale of a bright young couple. They get married, buy a house, furniture and a dog, lose touch with friends, attend their kids’ sporting events, lose intimacy in the bedroom, get buried underneath a mortgage, and then wonder where all the love went. So nice to end this wildly upbeat record on yet another upbeat note.

For those of you happily married, giving a listen to “The Game of Monogamy” basically tells you just how wrong things might turn out for you down the road. It’s not exactly something you should want to hear, and Tim Kasher isn’t exactly the kind of guy you want to be hearing it from. Just because the guy has so much trouble in his relationships with women doesn’t mean you’ll experience the same things. At the very least though, he’s brutally honest and deals with a reality that so many people don’t want to believe in. The divorce rate is somewhere around 50% these days, and that’s not counting those still trapped in loveless marriages or cheat on their spouses and never get caught/are forgiven. To put the nicest spin possible on this, Kasher is a realist. The thing is, we live in a world that tries so hard to look at the positives, even if watching the news gives us the opposite. And despite all the issues that tend to reveal themselves the longer you’re in a relationship with someone, there’s a distinct lack of focus on the great benefits a long-term partner or marriage can bring you. If we all bought into the hype that this album spreads, most of us would wind up far unhappier with our lives than we are now and largely alone for the majority of it. There’s something to be said for monogamy, and perhaps not listening to this album and its overall pessimism can help you avoid the pitfalls it describes. Should you be bearing the battle scars of love or just are content to call yourself single at the moment, there’s some interesting music on “The Game of Monogamy” you may want to check out. Instrumentally these songs are pretty damn good, and though unpleasant, Kasher’s way with words is second to none. Sometimes it’s fun just to hear the intense details he hands out like candy on Halloween. This certainly isn’t a record for everybody, but if you’re not too uncomfortable with a bit of anti-relationship music, there’s enjoyment to be had. Fair warning though, while you could fall head over heels in love with “The Game of Monogamy” and listen to it intently over and over again, there’s a good chance you’ll become tired of it and eventually cheat on it with another album. Ah well, you weren’t the kind of person that can commit to one record for the rest of your life anyways.

Buy “The Game of Monogamy” from Amazon

Album Review: Weezer – Death to False Metal [Geffen]

By Faronheit

On 11/15/2010

In album review, music

If you want to get technical, Weezer have released(/re-released) a total of 3 albums in 2010. If you want to get even more technical, Weezer have released(/re-released) those 3 albums within a 3 month span. Is this too much in the way of material? Hardcore Weezer fans might not think so, but really what all this material does is roll up into one massive bunch where confusion runs rampant and it’s difficult to focus on a singluar release. In other words, if you really liked “Hurley”, you may not have noticed that “Pinkerton” was re-released with 25 extra tracks attached, or that the band also put out a rarities collection in the form of “Death to False Metal”. Of course that’s also assuming your average Weezer fan could ignore the cash bait of a deluxe edition reissue of one of the band’s two greatest records. So really it’s “Death to False Metal” that suffers most, in particular because it’s an odds-and-ends collection rather than something brand new or at least previously great. Still, the 10-track record does contain a host of songs that have never been released in any official format beforehand, and bear dates of creation back to the late 90s and early 00s when they were still making relatively good music. Chances are most if not all of the record is new to you, and though it’s easy to imagine so, this is less a case of throwing music out there just for the sake of it and more a case of carefully piecing together a set of songs that work well together to give fans a gift of material that was good, but didn’t make final albums for one reason or another.

You’ve got to imagine that there’s a collection of really terrible Weezer songs out there that the band is smartly refusing to release. To put it another way, “Death to False Metal” doesn’t have much in the way of cringe-worthy music on it, and were it not touted as being a collection of unreleased material, the band could have called it a brand new record and gotten away with it. Plenty of bands have taken years upon years and released album upon album before some of their songs finally see completion. Though portions of this Weezer record were re-recorded to assist in fidelity purposes, everything was pretty much in completed form already when the decision was made to release it. That doesn’t mean there’s not a little bit of demo-like fuzz on a couple of the songs, but compared to the two albums’ worth or Rivers Cuomo “Alone” demos or even some of the studio outtakes on the deluxe edition of “Pinkerton”, there’s definitely a higher clarity of both audio and vision when it comes to “Death to False Metal”.

Anyone looking for some magical unearthed gem or perhaps thinks that Weezer has been holding their best music back from us is bound for just a shade of disappointment. Virtually all of “Death to False Metal” echoes a lot of what Weezer is doing currently, even if “Hurley” was a better album than most of us had a right to expect. Somewhere around the release of “The Red Album”, I half-assedly resigned the idea that Weezer would ever do anything truly worthwhile again, choosing instead to write mindlessly fun melodies that were easy to sing along to. In other words, they stopped challenging themselves. If you come in looking for that fun version of the band, they’re more than willing to deliver. Though there are some stylistic variations, moving from straight rock songs to ballads to heavier, angrier material, most of the songs on “Death to False Metal” follow the same format: inconsequential verse to anthemic chorus to inconsequential verse. The verses are only a means to an end, basically, as the hooks dig in and stick in your mind each time a chorus rolls around, and boy do they roll around often.

Topically, the songwriting is about as plainspoken as Rivers Cuomo tends to get. No deep, dark confessionals because he hasn’t done that since “Pinkerton”, and if you ever have trouble remembering the hook in a chorus, just look to the song title. “Turning Up the Radio” is a song about doing exactly that, and the chorus will tell you that a dozen times or more. “Blowin’ My Stack” has Rivers getting angry, but it’s one of those playful sort of angers that’s lighthearted and catchy enough to stick with you. One of the heaviest guitar songs is “Everyone”, and you get one guess as to what singular word is repeated over and over again as the hook. One of the more delightful songs, primarily because it’s so bouncy and easygoing, has to be “I’m A Robot”, with a playful little piano and some snarky lyrics that make it pretty easy to crack a smile. For such a blissful device, you’d expect Weezer’s version of “Trampoline” to be great for jumping up and down to. The tempo flags just a little bit and the guitars are just a little too crunchy to fully recreate the excitement of launching off a springy piece of fabric. One of the album’s biggest missteps comes in the form of “Autopilot”, where spacey keyboards and the use of Auto-Tune apparently seemed like good ideas. It sounds like the kind of track that was intended for “Make Believe”, and that record sucked enough without this song helping it out. Then to close there’s an interesting cover of Toni Braxton’s “Unbreak My Heart”. Weezer’s version makes the song a bit easier to admit to liking, for those afraid to acknowledge that the original version was pretty damn good in and of itself for an R&B ballad.

Should you currently own every Weezer album, or at least almost every Weezer album, “Death to False Metal” is another one to add to your collection without much shame because clearly you already have none. Hahaha, just kidding (sort of). But working on the assumption that You’re not expecting a “Blue Album” or “Pinkerton” or even “Green Album” out of this, you’ll come away from this little collection of Weezer’s past with a fresh set of songs that are plainly fun. Listening to this is like being forced to eat a vanilla ice cream cone – you’re happy just to have ice cream, but there’s definitely more exciting and better flavors out there. One thing that is nice about this record is that Weezer’s diversity is on display, along with how they’ve changed in the last 10 years. There’s some playful numbers, a few with some serious guitar crunch, a pair of ballads, a cover, and one sort of gonzo minor experiment (see: “Autopilot”). There are a few of you out there that think “Make Believe” or “Raditude” mark some of the band’s best material, and it’s almost like this album is especially for you. Everyone else take note – “Hurley” is probably the best thing Weezer has done since the “Green Album”, and you’re far better off keeping your focus on that rather than wasting your time and money on “Death to False Metal”. It’s good to see these songs find a home on an official Weezer release, but there was a reason they were dropped from other records. Perhaps the next time the band thinks about releasing another one of these compilations, they’ll remember that and make a smarter choice.

Buy “Death to False Metal” from Amazon

Album Review: The 1900s – Return of the Century [Parasol]

By Faronheit

On 11/04/2010

In album review, BNM, chicago, mp3, music

Let’s keep this straight, because it’s somewhat easy to get the two confused: there are two great indie bands making music right now. The first is The 1990s, and they’re a three-piece from Scotland. They’ve put out two records, 2007’s “Cookies” and 2009’s “Kicks”. The other band is the 1900s, and they’re a Chicago-based six piece. Their first album also came out in 2007 and was titled “Cold and Kind”, and last year they released the follow-up EP “Medium High”. The EP was more of a transitional piece however, something to keep fans interested as the band prepped their sophmore album “Return of the Century”, which sees release this week. It comes after a very tumultuous period for the band, in which they dropped two founding members and took some time recruiting proper replacements. All the in-fighting of the past couple years has resulted in a much stronger band dynamic overall though, in accordance with the “what doesn’t kill you…” mentality. They’ve also refined their sound a little bit, pushing away from the looser, more psychedelic elements of their debut and attempting something much more delicate and pop-friendly.

True to that promise, “Return of the Century” plays like a lighthearted indie pop record. None of the songs ever reach the four minute mark, hooks and choruses are everywhere, and grand orchestral swells are kept at bay. On “Cold and Kind”, there were guitar solos and small jam sessions, in addition to string sections and other extraneous elements. What was really impressive about that sound was how all those elements came together and created a very vibrant and relatively exciting collection of songs. It helped to put The 1900s on a lot of radars despite being signed to the wonderful (but small) Parasol Records. By contrast, “Return of the Century” sounds sparse. Violinist Andra Kulans is about the only strings player on the album, and she’s used much more sparingly and gently than in the past. Everything else is straight guitar and keyboards. On the surface then, this record can come across as being overly simplistic or just plain cliched within the confines of what’s become a standardized indie pop sound. What separates and elevates The 1900s from their peers in this case are two main things. First and foremost, the album is nothing short of lean. Everything is packed so neatly into each song that you can’t imagine how adding to or stretching what’s already there would make them better. It’s about focus, and The 1900s have found theirs in the best sort of way. Secondly, the vocal performances are simply out of this world good. The band has three contributing vocalists in Edward Anderson, Caroline Donovan and Jeanine O’Toole, and though one of them takes the lead on each song, the other two are always right there playing backup with intense harmonies or call-and-response scenarios. In turn a number of the tracks come off with a distinct Belle and Sebastian-esque appeal, though you can certainly hear a bit of The New Pornographers in there as well.

Highlights on “Return of the Century” are notoriously hard to come by, but that’s largely because as delightful as it is in three minute chunks, it ultimately works best as a cohesive whole of a record. When hard-pressed to pick those stand-out moments, single and opening track “Amulet” strikes immediately with an intense combination of piano, acoustic guitar, hand claps, violin and vocal harmonies. It’s a fun little toe-tapper that certainly has the potential to be a breakout hit should the right people latch onto it. Personally I might place it among the best songs of 2010. Elsewhere the near-ballad “Tucson” hits the right emotional notes vocally and possesses some of the strongest lyrics on the album. “Bmore” is notable for its three-part vocal harmonies for much of the song, and the couple of interesting left turns it makes structurally before finishing on a gorgeous high note. The same could be said for “Babies”, though the final coda breakdown into this remarkable freight train of a melody shows hints that the band responsible for “Cold and Kind” is still in there somewhere, even if things stop just short of a full-on guitar solo freak out.

At this point in the year, new music releases are supposed to be all downhill, slowly petering out to make way for the December compilation records and year-end lists. Really releasing your album anytime after the end of October is potentially problematic because you want as many ears to hear it and develop a relationship with it before the holiday season goes into full effect. The 1900s now face a small uphill battle trying to attract the right sorts of attention that “Return of the Century” deserves. With so many upbeat indie pop songs on the album as well, it doesn’t quite gel with the slow death beauty that fall and winter tend to bring. No matter the month or season though, good music is good anytime, which is what this album is. Those that have grown fond of the band thanks to their 2007 album “Cold and Kind” are right to be a little wary of the changes that have occurred in the past 3 years because in many ways The 1900s now sound like a completely different band. Despite this, their new pop-intense edge does a fantastic job of broadening their sound without dumbing it down in the least. In other words, they’re just as good as ever, only in a new way. Such are the follies of being very talented. “Return of the Century” is one of the most enjoyable indie pop albums of the year, even if it doesn’t quite possess the jaw-droppingly great peak moments or intense experimentation that some other records have. Pick up a copy sooner rather than later, for this is one you might want to fall in love with before the end of 2010.

The 1900s – Babies

Stream the entire album/buy it digitally via Bandcamp

Buy “Return of the Century” from Parasol Records

Album Review: Elliott Smith – An Introduction To… [Kill Rock Stars]

By Faronheit

On 11/03/2010

In album review, BNM, mp3, music

The day that I discovered Elliott Smith was on October 21, 2003. Not coincidentally, that was the day he died. As a fresh-faced 18-year-old with an emerging taste for indie rock, Smith hadn’t yet reached my radar when the internet was flooded with sadness over his death. With both close friends and musicians I admired all pouring in tributes to this man, I felt like I had been missing out on some truly special music. That turned out to be very much the case, as upon my first listen to his 1994 album “Roman Candle” I was instantly enchanted by this scrappy folk singer and his acoustic guitar. And while that record served as my proper introduction to Elliott Smith, I didn’t fall head over heels for the guy’s music until “XO” reached my ears. Like a small brush fire reaching a massive pool of gasoline, an obsession formed, made all the more sadder that Smith wasn’t around to keep making more amazing music. After releasing a posthumous album he was working on prior to his death along with a collection of b-sides, Kill Rock Stars is now putting out “An Introduction To…” in lieu of what might otherwise be called a “greatest hits collection”. If you’re younger or simply just very late to the party, this is expected to be your easy guide into the world of Elliott Smith.

Of course if “An Introduction To…” were a greatest hits set, there would be a bunch of songs from Smith’s two most popular records, “XO” and “Figure 8”. In the end, there’s only one song from “XO” and nothing from “Figure 8”, and presumably that’s because Kill Rock Stars is putting out this collection and those two big records weren’t released on the label. Thankfully 5 of the 15 tracks come from the also-amazing “Either/Or”, and the rest pretty much skip around his discography, hitting most every mark, however briefly. As an introduction like it claims, this provides a well-rounded view of Smith’s career, with the hope that the individual tracks you gravitate towards most are the records you should seek out first. If they really wanted to get “introductory”, they could have limited the track listing to Smith’s first 3-4 albums, or at the very least ordered everything sequentially. Does the jumbled order of the songs make that much of a difference in the end? Not really as the sound and songwriting stays pretty consistent throughout, but it would be interesting to hear the slight pieces of progression over time. If you buy digital then you can order the tracks any way you like, too.

Long-time fans of Elliott Smith may be wondering just how valuable a record like “An Introduction To…” would be in their collection. Like Jeff Buckley or Nirvana, this being the third posthumous Smith release could come off as an attempt to squeeze more money out of a corpse. Some might take that viewpoint, but given the title and absence of unreleased material, this really does seem designed for either a younger generation that hasn’t heard of Elliott Smith or people that always admired the guy from afar but never really got into his stuff. Smith’s mostly sad, acoustic folk songs are tempered back a bit to make room for some (but not all) of his poppier stuff that’s a little easier to like while still running deep with meaning. It’s the unique approach he took to making his songs sound multi-layered full despite a wispy, almost whispered singing voice and a lone acoustic guitar. It’s the heartfelt and heartbreaking words he wrote and the impact they can have on our own personal struggles, made all the more tragic by the his own life and untimely death.

For that angst-filled or depressed teenager that’s looking for a kindred spirit, getting an introduction to Elliott Smith right now could be just what the music doctor ordered. For the stunted adult, trying to find exactly where he or she fits into this crazy world of ours, here’s someone who understands you. And if you discovered the guy awhile back but his music didn’t click with you then, maybe now’s a good time to give it a second listen. This is an exceptional and smart collection of songs, even if it is missing a handful of what might be called “key” tracks. In some ways that’s for the better, because once you inevitably move on and venture deeper into Smith’s catalogue, the discovery of such additional brilliance will be a welcome surprise. What won’t be a surprise though is how this all ends, with just a limited amount of material to digest and the constant knowledge that there won’t be any more. Like the hundreds upon thousands of artists we discover just a little too late, ultimately we can just be grateful to have had these moments and found meaning in these songs that we can listen to and share with others for the rest of our lives. We may know how this story ultimately ends, but the individual journey we take getting there is what makes it so immensely worthwhile. If you’re just now discovering Elliott Smith, congratulations, there’s an amazing, possibly life-changing collection of songs just waiting and begging to reach your ears.

Elliott Smith – Between the Bars
Elliott Smith – Twilight
Elliott Smith – Last Call
Elliott Smith – Angel in the Snow

Buy “An Introduction To…” from Amazon

Album Review: Matt & Kim – Sidewalks [FADER Label]

By Faronheit

On 11/01/2010

In album review, music

Matt & Kim have a reputation to maintain, that of an insanely happy duo making indie pop that’s sugary sweet. They’re both well beyond the days of misfit childhood where diets mainly consisted of Pixy Stix and you ran around the neighborhood with water guns and stray dogs, yet their music echoes those moments in the best possible way. It’s working on that basic of a sound that has gotten them a solid following over the course of two albums and a relentless amount of touring. They’ll charm the pants off of anyone who will listen, and their third record “Sidewalks” continues in that exact same trend.

Even if you’re not familiar with Matt & Kim, chances are you’re at least lightly aquainted with them. Their song “Daylight” has permeated a number of mediums, airing as backing music for a handful of commercials, TV shows and video games soundtracks. That’s not even counting the copious amounts of radio airplay they got for the track. They’re probably hoping for a similar buzz surrounding the first single “Cameras” from the new album “Sidewalks”. It’s only slightly unconventional for Matt & Kim, with their trademark synths/guitar/drums sound accented with some tuba and a fascinating time signature. It may not be the best song they’ve ever made, but it works in its own way. So does most of the record, with at least 8 out of the 10 tracks coming off like highly marketable singles. The real question will be what on this blissful yet brief album will they choose to focus on.

For those long-term fans of Matt & Kim though, “Sidewalks” will largely serve as a disappointment. On their last record “Grand”, the duo had real problems with both overproduction and the forcing of Kim into a severely diminished role. If those were issues for you last time, they’ll be issues for you once again. The production remains fairly pristine, thereby not properly recreating what you get in a live setting. That’s something their self-titled debut did so well, and it’s what initially earned them the right kind of attention. The lack of those little imperfections and off-kilter drum hits are missed, and with a guitar or a chime coming in at exactly the right spot there’s a certain coldness that betrays the warm pop emerging from the speakers. Again it seems that Kim is given the backseat role on this record, providing very little in the way of backing vocals and even skipping out on drums altogether for a few songs. Instead of drums there are tambourines and chimes and xylophones and drum machines/electronic beats, some or all of which Kim might be playing. So much of it feels programmed in though that it’s tough to tell if a human being is even playing these extra instruments or not. These are problems that can really diminish your liking of the album if they’re important to you.

What with the popularity of “Daylight” and a new fans gained through all the touring and festival shows, “Sidewalks” is just about the perfect album for the casual Matt & Kim lover. If you’ve only heard their last album “Grand” or even just a song or two, you have no idea what you’re missing. Close listeners and fans of the duo’s debut might notice the small, glossed over problems that pepper the album’s otherwise sweet disposition. “Sidewalks” is a delight to listen to from start to finish, but only if you treat it like a really entertaining blockbuster movie. The broad appeal is certainly there, it just lacks depth and humanity. The sad thing is that in person Matt & Kim can be some of the deepest and warmest people on Earth. Outside of the studio polish applied on this record, these songs probably move from pretty good to absolutely excellent, which is enough of a reason to go see Matt & Kim live. Since you’re unlikely to see them perform more than maybe once or twice a year, this album serves as a reasonable facsimile of that experience. Is it worth a purchase? Maybe if you’ve got the spare cash and need a fun little distraction. Other than that, you’re better off spending your time and money on something a little less disposable.

Buy “Sidewalks” from Amazon

Album Review: Warpaint – The Fool [Rough Trade]

By Faronheit

On 10/28/2010

In album review, lollapalooza 2010, mp3, music

Topics that tend to come up when talking about the band Warpaint: 1) Wow, their drummer is really, really good. 2) Shannyn Sossamon used to be in the band, along with her sister Jenny Lee Lindberg, but is no longer in the band. 3) They have an interesting sound, and one you wouldn’t expect from a group of women. Please keep in mind that those are not things I personally have said about Warpaint, but in the handful of conversations I’ve had with people about them, those three topics seem to be universally mentioned. In the last few months, hype surrounding Warpaint has hit a fever pitch, and they became even more buzzed about for their set at Lollapalooza. They played a show the night before opening for The Walkmen that I attended, and having only heard a couple tracks from them beforehand, I walked away moderately impressed. Not nearly as excited as many others have been, but enough that their debut album “The Fool” seemed like it’d make for an interesting listen when it came out. Well, we’ve finally hit release week, and support for the band continues at a steady, if not frenzied pace.

Assuming you’ve caught wind of the Warpaint buzz, perhaps you’re now wondering if all the talk is backed up by a great debut album. A short while ago, the band toured with The xx, and naturally that exposed them to a whole other world of fans that could appreciate the dark and feminine songs they make. Many have tried to define exactly what Warpaint sounds like, and labels like shoegaze and dream pop have been thrown around a lot. The thing is, with a lack of fuzz on the guitars and generally sparse melodies, Warpaint lacks the waves of noise that typically define those genres of music. They have more in common with psychedelia largely thanks to the serpentine way their songs bob and weave for an average length of 4-6 minutes. Another interesting thing about the band is how few chords they use, choosing instead to craft most of their melodies by individual string picking, with bass and drums equally prominent in the mix. The equality of instruments brings all of them into closer focus, making standout performances that much more apparent. Now’s a good time to mention what a prize Warpaint has in drummer Stella Mozgawa, another great female percussionist in a long line of great female percussionists. Drummers aren’t always the most noticeable members of any band, but Mozgawa holds her own court in Warpaint. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the band’s live show, though in dealing exclusively with this album you still get a pretty good idea of what kind of force she is. And while the drumming may get its fair share of attention, all of these women are strong presences in their own rights.

“The Fool” is largely a record based around mystic energies, the sort of telepathical bonds some people share with one another. To many people such concepts are utter loads of crap, but we’ve all experienced those moments of deep connections, whether it’s saying the exact same thing at the exact same time as somebody else or trying to negotiate a small hallway with someone walking straight at you from the opposite direction. Yes, most of these things last but a second, but in Warpaint’s case it’s like these women work through their songs via brain waves. One part compliments another in just the right fashion, and it’s enough to turn these compositions from feeling like they’re drifting without purpose to ones that are intentionally directionless because they’ll find their own path anyways. Call it the natural course of things. Another purpose such a style serves is to create a bit of tension, the lucidity of it all hovering so close to the edge that you’re constantly worried things will come off the tracks suddenly and without warning. There’s a similar sense to the vocals, but that’s far more reliant on tonal inflections that dictate the eerieness of it all. There are lyrics that deserve a very harsh and angry vocal that simply float by in a disaffected manner, and the confounding of expectations is disturbing like a guy quietly sitting in a corner sharpening his knife. There’s no direct indication this guy is going to stab you, but at any second he might just leap to his feet and attack, right when you let your guard down. Songs like “Baby” and “Undertow” rely on these vocal and instrumental combos to creep you out in just the right way, and that’s something both unique and cool about Warpaint.

The thing about “The Fool”, and at this point Warpaint in general, is that as interesting as their sound might be, it can be both draining and lightly boring after awhile. There’s enough variation on the album’s 9 tracks to give each song its own identity, but you’re left wondering how long they can keep such a thing going. Their “Exquisite Corpse” EP mined the same sort of material as well, and with so much tension building and little to no release, listeners are bound to become frustrated with it sooner rather than later. That this isn’t an outwardly pop-oriented record hurts it too, as the lack of song structure and catchy verse/chorus payoff can make for problems when it comes to memorability. Outside of a whole bunch of listens that involve memorizing lyrics, if someone asks you to recall a specific Warpaint song it might prove difficult as your brain might register it as one big amorphous blob. That said, there aren’t enough amorphous blob bands making music these days, and these women have the talent to make it work for them. “The Fool” is a good start, but not quite the incredible surprise of 2010 many hype-peddlers might have been hoping for. At the very least it’s an overly solid introduction to a challenging band that certainly has the potential to one day become the toast of the indie world. For now though, maybe test the waters a little bit with this album should it strike your fancy even a little. Above all else though, should you have the ability, be sure to see them perform live, as they move from an intensity on record to pure transcendence on stage.

Warpaint – Undertow

Buy “The Fool” from Amazon

Album Review: Sun Airway – Nocturne of Exploded Crystal Chandelier [Dead Oceans]

By Faronheit

On 10/25/2010

In album review, BNM, mp3, music

Let’s get the obvious comparison out of the way right at the beginning – yes, Sun Airway sounds a whole lot like Animal Collective. Their debut album “Nocturne of Exploded Crystal Chandelier” holds many sonic similarities to “Merriweather Post Pavilion”, a record so many regarded as the best thing released in 2009. If there’s a band you’re going to try and imitate, at this point in time Animal Collective would be a smart move. The real challenge comes in the form of pulling it off without making a fool of yourself. There are oh so many artists out there that try to capture the zeitgeist of the times by pushing their sound in a certain direction for critical acclaim or popularity, but if it isn’t good enough there isn’t any point. Sun Airway is the duo of Jon Barthmus and Patrick Marsceill, both former members of the now-broken-up band The A-Sides. It’s taken them two long years of messing around with sounds and trying to put a record together while holding down jobs, but they’re finally done and Dead Oceans is psyched to be releasing it this week. Apparently all that time did them a world of good, because the tide is quickly rising on these guys and “Nocturne of Exploded Crystal Chandelier” is set to put them on everybody’s radar.

If you’ve gotten your hopes all high in hoping that “Nocturne of Exploded Crystal Chandelier” will be the new “Merriweather Post Pavilion”, don’t set yourself up for disappointment. This Sun Airway record is damn good, but one thing we’ve learned simply by paying close attention to Animal Collective these past several years is that such brilliance takes time to mature and fully develop. Of course every record is typically informed by the ones that came before it, so the proverbial Pandora’s Box has been opened and there’s no way to shove the flood of ideas back in. The noises that permeate and define Sun Airway’s sound are primarily electronic, from your typical bleeps and bloops to samples and beats that maintain tempo. Synths also play a huge role, as do a number of other instruments that are so varied and mixed that it’s nearly impossible to pick out each and every one. Pay close attention and you’ll catch a splattering of flute or a small dose of harp for good measure. It’s also important to note that probably 98% of the sounds that appear on the record are computer generated, meaning that they didn’t so much whip out a harp and hold a microphone up to it but instead used a program that created a “virtual harp” they could work with. Vocals aren’t really something you can fake though, so those were recorded live and the way they’re presented is one of the things that differentiates Sun Airway from Animal Collective. Barthmus is pretty much the only vocalist in the band, meaning that without an Avey Tare or Panda Bear to back him up, there’s less in the way of Beach Boys-esque harmonies. Echo effects are used with relative frequency though, to help add a nice dose of psychedelia to everything. When no vocal effects are used and Barthmus’s vocals come across with stark clarity it’s also effective in a different an unexpected sort of way.

When the vocals aren’t obscured or processed, the songs usually have strong pop elements to them, and compelling hooks are probably Sun Airway’s strong suit. Opening track “Infinity” may not have the band at their most energetic, but it serves as a strong, shimmery introduction to the record. The constant repetition of the lines “Woke up as a snowflake on an ocean/I looked over/I saw you floating next to me/drowned in the moonlight hours” works on you until it’s stuck in your head. With its toe-tappingly danceable beat and verse-chorus-verse style, “American West” is one of the catchiest songs on the entire record. It’d serve extremely well as a single, as does actual single “Oh, Naoko” which follows it. “Waiting On You” comes across as something of a cross between “Merriweather Post Pavilion”‘s “My Girls” and “Summertime Clothes”, though to call it equal to either of those tracks would make it one of the best songs of the year. Perhaps it is, but it’s going to take a little longer to fully earn that honor. Towards the end of the record second single “Put the Days Away” and “Your Moon” also are two sharply addictive tracks that really help balance things out from start to finish. In other words, half the album is packed with hooks, while the other half focuses more on beauty, mood and pure balladry.

For those that found “Merriweather Post Pavilion” a bit too challenging to fully embrace, Sun Airway’s “Nocturne of Exploded Crystal Chandelier” might just be the record that skates the balance between anti-pop and pop. The record is experimental without being too experimental, and catchy without being overtly pandering. These are the sorts of things that if done correctly, will generate the right sort of buzz for a band. There are a couple small shakier/almost flat-out boring moments on this album, but they come so few and far between that they’re relatively forgiveable given how well most everything else functions. It is those times though that prevent the record from attaining that much coveted “Album of the Year” nomination but still keeps it well within the “year-end list” range. That Sun Airway began working on this record in the fall of 2008 before anyone had heard a single note of “Merriweather Post Pavilion” just goes to show that they had the right ideas from the start, even if that album did eventually provide some sort of influence in the studio later on. Where Sun Airway will go from here, and how they might benefit from this ripe Animal Collective comparison will be determined in the coming months by the ever-fickle hype cycle. They may not be ushering in a musical revolution that will become the official “next big thing”, but they have made an album more than worth your time and hard-earned cash as we continue to hold a trend towards a strong finish in 2010.

Sun Airway – Put the Days Away
Sun Airway – Oh, Naoko

Buy “Nocturne of Exploded Crystal Chandelier” from Amazon

Album Review: The Extra Lens – Undercard [Merge]

By Faronheit

On 10/21/2010

In album review, mp3, music

The last time The Mountain Goats’ John Darnielle and Nothing Painted Blue/The Human Hearts’s Franklin Bruno collaborated on a project, I hadn’t heard of either band. That was the oh-so-long-ago year of 2002, when they put out the album “Martial Arts Weekend” under the band name The Extra Glenns. Since that time, The Mountain Goats have gone on to a rich history and indie-level popularity having released a grand total of SIX records. Bruno has been significantly less active band-wise, as Nothing Painted Blue is only sporadically active these days and The Human Hearts have put out only one album so far (in 2007). One of the more fascinating things about Bruno and Darnielle is that they’re both essentially solo artists with backing bands. The faces behind the guitars and drums may change, but the vocals and lyrics stay the same. With Bruno’s lack of progress on the music front in the last several years, he may be feeling a little bit pent up creatively and looking for that next big break. In Darnielle’s case, he could be on the verge of burnout having released so much music in such a short period of time, most of it with sharp thematic curves. The last Mountain Goats album, “The Life of the World to Come”, played entirely on verses in the Bible that Darnielle found fascinating. 2006’s “Get Lonely” was ostensibly a record about a tragic breakup. Those are just a couple of the many issues he’s dealt with the last 8 years, and rarely has he had a moment to let loose. Perhaps that’s why reuniting with Bruno for another album seemed like such a great idea right now. They’ve changed their name from The Extra Glenns to The Extra Lens, and the new album is almost appropriately titled “Undercard”.

In the sport of boxing, the undercard event is defined as the precursor to the main event. To put it in more easily definable music terms, an undercard band would be opening for a headliner. By calling their record “Undercard” and using the boxing ring imagery for the cover, The Extra Lens make sure to set the bar slightly lower than what you might expect from a Mountain Goats or a Nothing Painted Blue/Human Hearts. Even if these thinly veiled metaphors aren’t getting the message across, there’s not a whole lot on the record you’re going to easily mistake for either of these two guys’ bands. Okay, so the easiest thing to do is to call this another Mountain Goats album. Understandably, mostly because Darnielle has lead vocals on every song, with the occasional harmony/backing vocal from Bruno. Darnielle wrote most of the songs, and he’s a wordsmith true and true, though there are a couple of Bruno-penned tracks that are equally vivacious lyrically.

What truly differentiates this Extra Lens record from anything either of them have done are the lack of cohesive themes and the sheer pop energy. Yes, there are stories of underdogs and people “down for the count”, but there’s no firm grasp on any of it, so don’t worry about trying to understand something that purposely doesn’t make sense. The song titles give you a decent idea of what each song is about. “Adultery” is about cheating on your spouse. “Only Existing Footage” is about the filming of a movie gone horribly wrong. “Tug on the Line” is a story about a fish. You get the idea. It’s all put together in nice prose that you are free to gush over or analyza to whatever ends you like. Then there’s that “pop energy”. Those two words are deceiving when used here, but the more fleshed out idea is that most of the songs on “Undercard” are genuinely fun and have solid hooks that can stick in your head. The mere thought of John Darnielle unbuttoning a button on his shirt, chugging a beer and flashing a big smile is completely ludicrous. The guy always seems so in control and self-serious that the much looser vibe of this record is like finding out your straightlaced suit-and-tie boss moonlights as some amazing club DJ on the weekends. Not that he wasn’t great before, but now thanks to this album he seems that much more awesome. The Mountain Goats is his day job, but at night he gets together with a friend and they just jam, playing whatever feels good. One listen to that rag-tag guitar strumming on “Rockin’ Rockin’ Twilight of the Gods” and there’s no way you can confuse this with something The Mountain Goats would do. The couple quiet moments, such as the seemingly random and highly ominous Randy Newman cover of “In Germany Before the War”, make for a more layered and smart approach. Those songs are more about establishing an atmosphere or mood, which balances out the lovely toe-tappers and prevents the wheels from completely falling off the wagon.

The simplest way for you to enjoy “Undercard” is to sit back and relax. There’s some serious temptation to pore over every word and read the surprisingly extensive liner notes in which Darnielle and Bruno seem to try and explain every song in deep detail, but that’s stuff best saved for a rainy day. For the moment, just let the rather fun songs be only that and nothing more, because the tales of boxing beatdowns and suicide prevention will get you down if you don’t understand the black humor of it all. The twisted and morbid words counteract many of the upbeat melodies, and it’s a pretty sly joke not everybody will understand. That’s okay though, because plainspoken lyrics aren’t Darnielle’s or Bruno’s thing. Instead they both seem content to have a brief respite from the burdens their respective “bands” to work together as friends. Just by the way “Undercard” loosely flows you can tell these two guys have been friends for a long time. It’s nice that they’ve decided to give this project another go after the 8-year hiatus. Let’s just hope The Extra Lens doesn’t wait that long again to make another record. This one’s such a delight it only leaves you wanting more.

The Extra Lens – Only Existing Footage

Buy “Undercard” from Amazon

Album Review: Kings of Leon – Come Around Sundown [RCA]

By Faronheit

On 10/20/2010

In album review, music

Anybody that has been closely following Kings of Leon since they first emerged in 2003 with the album “Youth & Young Manhood” knows how the band has progressed in the last 7 years. They’ve gone from largely bearded and plaid-clad deep-fried Southern rock to cleaned up anthemic rock stars with enough mojo to headline a major music festival. Recent reports have the band members showing up to a festival show in separate, tinted SUVs while coming close to blows with other artists after being taunted for it. To call them big shots these days somehow doesn’t feel too out of line. They’ve gone from humble Southern gentlemen to capital letter Rock Stars thanks to finally permeating mainstream culture with their last album “Only By the Night”. The hits “Sex on Fire” and “Use Somebody” topped the charts and they’re still riding high on it. Yet for all those indie kids that supported them when “Molly’s Chamber” came around and impressed, Kings of Leon have lost their way. The small glimmer of hope left is the thought that maybe the band will return to their roots and go “old school” now that they have a much larger audience hooked on the line.

If you’ve heard Kings of Leon’s new single “Radioactive”, then you should already know it’s made from the same U2-style ingredients they’ve been working with recently. That was reason enough for long-time fans of the band to worry even before the full length “Come Around Sundown” came out this week. The scenario plays out almost exactly how you’d expect it to. Now that they are selling out giant venues and are making enough cash to sustain a much more comfortable lifestyle, there’s little to no intention of returning to those fledgling days of a struggling American rock band that was only a success in Europe. The new songs need to accurately reflect how their newest legion of fans have come to perceive them, so backing off big melodies and ultra-slick production would be detrimental to their popularity. Choruses are repeated at least three times per song, but often many more than that. They use relatively simple words and phrasing for easier memorization and sing-alongs. Matthew Followill’s guitar work is like listening to a widescreen landscape, with the reverb-touched sound just spreading out clear into the open area ahead. Caleb Followill’s vocals often soar into the upper registers, and he prefers to stretch words out like taffy now rather than cram a bunch into a small space like he used to. So the elements are all there for what feels like the setup for a sequel to “Only By the Night” under a different name.

The small surprise on “Come Around Sundown” is that there seems to be some half-hearted attempts to break away from the mold that churned out a couple of massive radio hits. They’re not leaning backwards exactly for this, but they’re continuing to try new things to broaden their stadium appeal. The first couple tracks on the album are nothing we haven’t heard from Kings of Leon before, no doubt designed to create an instant comfort zone by establishing a clear bridge with the last album. “Mary” is the first indication that something is just a little different, as there’s an almost 50’s-inspired shuffle with a modern twist happening. It’d be considered ahead of its time at an old fashioned sock hop, and just a little backwards-leaning today. Boys throw on your bow ties and girls throw on your poodle skirts and put your heads on each others’ shoulders for this slow dance. As an ode to their early days and perhaps a nod to those fans, “Back Down South” incorporates plenty of down-home slow Southern charm matched with some violin and a touch of banjo. It’s kind of like a sonic cousin to “Aha Shake Heartbreak”‘s “The Bucket”, only slower and safer aka pretty ineffective. Bass guitar dominates all over “Beach Side”, and the carefully picked electric guitar work brings out the hazy surf-and-sand vibe the title suggests. It’s one of the few songs that actually plays off a mood and feeling rather than aiming for the easy-exit chorus. And apparently “Mi Amigo” earns that Spanish title only because there’s a small splash of horns in an otherwise plain melody. It’s like cutting up a bunch of tomatoes, putting them in a bowl and calling it salsa. You need peppers and spices to give it a more legitimate edge, which is what this track doesn’t have.

Outside of the couple songs that sonically break from huge melodies and at least gracefully attempt to explore new directions, there’s a fair portion of “Come Around Sundown” that revels in lethargy and uninspired balladry. After the first few tracks, not a whole lot gets Kings of Leon energized, and it makes the second half of the record just a little bit of a sleeping pill. It’d be a positive thing, reducing the size and scope of so many tracks, but that strategy only works when the alternative has something significantly fascinating to hold your interest. Most of the slower songs are as cookie cutter as the energized anthems, the difference being those bigger and quicker ones give the listener at least the push to dance or sing along. If first single “Radioactive” doesn’t turn into a massive hit the way “Sex On Fire” did, there’s little to nothing else on this record that works any better. No matter how much they want to keep their popularity streak alive, even more recent fans of the band might walk away disappointed by the proverbial hangdog shoulder shrugging mood that permeates much of the album. Whatever the reason for how this final product turned out to be so uninspired, “Come Around Sundown” tries to be everything to everyone but yields little to nothing instead. “Easily forgettable” is the two word phrase that best describes the record, and if the mainstream music lovers out there feel the same way, it could be the words to describe Kings of Leon in a year as well. If utter failure is what it takes to reinvigorate this band to the high levels we all know they can perform at, then bring it on.

Buy “Come Around Sundown” from Amazon

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Contact information: faronheit@gmail.com

Hello, and welcome to Faronheit! I hope you enjoy your stay. Before you read onwards, let me quickly explain a couple things.

Contact information: faronheit@gmail.com