Sorry, there — my acapella metal group had a series of performances that kept me busy the past few weeks so I couldn’t post like I’d planned. Rest assured I was still keeping tabs on things, ready to jump in the minute I had a free spell. Each of these mark a return from folks I used to listen to a ton, but haven’t heard from in a while (some in a loooooooooong while!) so it’s nice to see some old friends.
First up out of the gate are a couple new tracks from the National’s new album, Sleep Well Beast (due out next Friday). Thankfully there seems to be no major changes to their sound in store for us — no 80s leaning album lousy with synthesizers like virtually every other group is inexplicably releasing now — so we can rejoice in that small victory. Both sport little Edge-inspired riffs, all bright and jangly, which lighten the band’s customary gloom. Check out the tunes here — the first one’s a live performance Pitchfork posted, the second one’s a studio version off the album:
Then comes a surprise release from the legendary Wu, which catches you off guard in part because the clan’s been pretty quiet since we lost ODB (outside their strange connection to pharmaphuck Martin Shkreli), and in part because it’s so good. (What we had heard from them had been a mixed bag at best.) This one’s a solid return, though, even sporting a Redman cameo (speaking of “where the fuck ya been, yo?”) to hail back to the Red/Meth days. Give it a listen here:
Next up are a couple of tracks from trip hop vet Tricky whose classic debut (and the scene that spawned it) is unbelievably close to turning 15. (Sweet geezus I’m fucking old…) The tracks hearken back to that old glory, though, with their slow, sultry groove, Trick’s crackly whisper, and some of the same vocalists from Maxinquaye. One of the latter shows up on the first track, Martina Topley-Bird, whose voice remains a bright counterpoint to Tricky’s murky croak, while the second song is a spartan solo effort, just Trick, a little acoustic riff, and not much else. Both sound great and make me curious how the rest of the album, Ununiform, will sound when it comes out this fall. Enjoy these in the meantime:
And we’ll close with a truly back from the dead stunner, not from some long-forgotten supergroup, but from a duo that seemed certain for world domination that just suddenly disappeared. It’s the hometown tandem The Cool Kids, whose first album The Bake Sale was a surefire hit, setting the pair on the cusp of becoming hip hop’s Next Big Thing. That album is still a classic — old school hip hop beats with smart, fun verses from Chuck and Mike riding along on the pegs — and it was set to blow up. It was everywhere back home — I must have seen those two half a dozen times that summer, at festivals, book signings, bar mitzvahs — and it was great. It meant whatever dead time I had walking around with those songs coming out of my headphones was likely to be filled by their stuff coming out of the next window or doorway.
But then, for some reason, it stopped. They never blew up, the pair went dark, and the surefire smash never happened. Which is a shame (and still inexplicable to me), but thankfully the boys are back and it looks like they might get their coronation nearly a decade late. Stereogum has a nice interview with the pair where they discuss the down time and the recording of the new album, which is slated to drop in the next couple weeks and has everyone from A-Trak and Jeremih to Hannibal Buress on it. The article also has the first four singles embedded within and each of em is worth a listen. “Chop” is a big banger, but my early favorite is this post’s title track, “Connect 4.” It’s got a chill, Dre Day-style beat and strong verses from the lads — give it a listen here (and bring on the album!):
Well, it’s been another hell of a week — if you force yourself to remember that “fire and fury” nuclear annihilation was only a week ago, you’ll realize how much fun we’ve been having in the interim. At this point it no longer feels like the adage “it’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon” is appropriate anymore, because it’s too insufficient — this more feels like we’re on one of those Death Valley ultra races where we’re nearly spent 30 min in and we’ve got 187 more miles to go. In 120 degree heat. While being shot at and nearly hit by cars.
Which is a long way of saying — we’re gonna have to dig deep to make it out of this one…
Thankfully the death march had a few bright spots this week, as a couple beloved bands put out some new tracks. First up is another track off Philia, the compilation album against Islamophobia I told you about a few weeks ago (the one with the lovely Ham cover of Shane MacGowan), this one from The Dodos. Meric and Logan have been relatively quiet the past few years, not releasing much since 2015’s so-so Individ, so it was a welcome surprise to see them pop up here. The track, “Mirror Faker,” shows them sticking with what’s worked best over the years — layered, primal rhythms, elliptical, finger-picked guitar parts, and soaring, ethereal harmonies. Hopefully a new album is in the works soon. Check this out in the meantime:
Next up is a track from hometown lads Wilco released in the wake of Charlottesville to raise money for the Southern Poverty Law Center, the civil rights law firm that helps keep tabs on the country’s hate groups, in addition to the number of Confederate statues scattered around the country. It’s a nice little track — a soothing little shuffle to calm the nerves amidst all the bombast and bigotry flying around this week. Tweedy’s accompanying post says it best when dedicating the song to his father who was named after a Confederate general — “if you know better, you can do better.” So let’s get on with it…
Last up is a track from two of my favorite Canadians, Jesse and Sebastian from Death From Above (now no longer strictly from 1979), with the latest single from their upcoming album. This one hits me a little similarly to Queens’ latest in that it’s a bit more of a return to what I fiend for from this/that band after initial singles that were a little unnerving. (Though I have to admit, both of those singles have grown on me in the time since they’ve been released.) There’s nothing fancy going on here — Jesse throws down another infectious riff, Seb bashes/wails away, and two minutes later you’re quickly looking for the replay button so you can get back into the groove. Makes me more excited to see the guys in a few weeks and hear the rest of the album.
Just wanted to pop-in again throw out a couple more updates from the past week or so that I’d planned to make sooner, but was otherwise caught up rocking the cargos or getting bludgeoned by the DPM. First up is a good article on an old EP of extras from NIN, Still, which accompanied their sole live CD, And All That Could Have Been. (Which is fifteen years old?!? Sweet frickin geezus I am old…) It does a good job encouraging you to go back and revisit it, and like the author I’m glad I did because I’d completely forgotten about the song that gave the live album its title (but was not included/ever played live). It’s a lovely one — a dark, slow burner about a busted relationship that builds relentlessly over its six minute span. It’s actually a shame he never played it live because you could see it fitting in well with his other stuff, the crowd singing along to the refrain at the end en masse. Alas — at least we’ll have that moment in our heads. Fire your mental projector up and start your show now:
Next up is the single from an interesting side project (I hope) for one third of my beloved Sleater-Kinney, frontwoman Corin Tucker, who’s teaming up w/ REM’s guitarist Peter Buck and others as Filthy Friends. Their debut album Invitation is due out in a couple weeks (25 Aug) and they’ll start touring it around the same time. (Limited dates announced so far — check out the list here.) The track’s pretty good — “Despierta” — and has Tucker in her more melodic mode (ie none of her polarizing banshee wail) with some catchy guitar parts by Buck and Co. Will be interesting to hear how the rest of the album sounds. Get a taste yourself here:
And we’ll close with the latest single from beloved headwreckers Queens, which completely consumed the tail end of my week. It’s appropriate amidst all the recent talk of nuclear annihilation that these guys would swoop in with an atom bomb like this, which showcases the band doing what they do best — flat. out. rocking. Homme lures you in at the beginning with his distorted “Close — come close” lines while the band weaves its spell over you the intervening five-odd minutes. By the time you get towards the finish — right around the five minute mark — the trap has been set and you realize you’re about to get destroyed. And I’ve gotta say — if the end IS coming, I hope it feels this good — because FUCK it feels fantastic once the break happens and the band explodes for its final 90 second sprint. I defy anyone to not rock the fuck out once that happens — I’ve listened to it about 40x the past few days and still can’t stop fistpump and pogoing. If for some reason you don’t, you should go see a doctor immediately because something is seriously wrong. For the rest of you — crank this puppy to 11 and have fun. Here. it. COOOOOMES!
It’s mid-August so you know what that means — Lollapalooza has come and gone and per usual I’m back from my annual pilgrimage home to partake in the festivities and ready to fill you all in. The lineup was a little weaker this year than normal — the headliners, which are usually the least interesting part of the day, were almost completely skipworthy this time (or I wished I had after I gave them the benefit of the doubt) and of course the two I really wanted to see were playing at the same time, so that was a bummer.
The electro tent, which in years past had been one of the best parts of the festival, has recently devolved into an unchanging blob of monster noises and DJs shouting “1-2-3!” every 30 seconds before another vanilla drop, and I barely went by it this year. (The one time I did I came this close to having a true old man moment and asking one of the kids, “Explain why this is good to me — have you listened to early Daft or Chemical Brothers? Underworld? Prodigy? Soulwax? THOSE guys knew how to put together a set that’d get you moving AND had melodies to keep you coming back! Are you going to remember ANY of this? Wake up thinking about or humming any of this? ‘Man –‘member when that modem dialed in to the Internet and then a few seconds later that computer died screaming? EEEEEaahahahhahaEEEEEEoooooraaaaaaaahhhh! That was so awesome.'” But I stopped myself — barely…)
As for the rest of the fest, most of the bands I’d initially been excited to see again were coming off mediocre new releases (Spoon, Alt-J, the Districts and Shins) so that meant this year was almost entirely about discovery — a dicey proposition when acts like Lil Uzi Vert and the XX are considered headliners. Luckily, though, I was able to pretty consistently find some winners and fill my days without big deadspots. All in all I got to about 46 bands over the four days and saw some fantastic stuff — here’s the highlights so you can enjoy too! I’ll do the discoveries in a separate post since my computer’s dipped in stupid right now (like seemingly everything else around me — MF’g technology…)
Day one:
Best set of the day (and probably the festival): Cage the Elephant. These guys flat out killed it — by the second song guitarist Brad Shultz was crowdsurfing while playing and by the third or fourth lead singer Matt Shultz (who by the way came out dressed in drag with a sparkly purple dress and big fishnets) had also followed him into the crowd. After that the two spent the rest of the set alternating time in the sea of people, with Matt strutting onstage like Jagger while Brad almost willed the crowd to sing along to every song (looking a bit like Vinnie Jones from Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels). And they sounded great — the band has more good stuff than you realize, from early tracks like “Back Against the Wall” and “Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked” to newer ones like “Spiderhead” and “Cold Cold Cold.” They switch from rockers to swooners effortlessly and with the no-holds barred performance it added up to a hell of a show. Check out their set here (and skip to 54 minutes in for the communal singalong on “Cigarette Daydream” for a highlight (which of course cuts out right at the end but you get the gist — MF’g technology…)):
Day two:
Best set of the day: Run the Jewels. These guys are a close second to Cage for best set of the fest, throwing down another virtual headliner set on the same stage in the same early timeslot (630pm?!) for the second day in a row as the aforementioned crew. And they leveled the yuuuuge crowd (never before seen in yuuman history) almost as thoroughly. The guys have been touring off their excellent third album (certain to make an appearance here in a few months on my year end list) and continue to be one of the few hip hop acts worth catching live. They sound good, you can understand them, and they actually play entire songs (instead of 30 muddy seconds where the crowd does half the work and then they go on to the next micro-moment). Best part of the set was this one where Mike spotted a kid’s sign in the crowd that said “Let me come up and rap ‘Legend Has It'” so they call his bluff, get him onstage, don’t even give him the beat to get him going — and then this happens… Pure. Fucking. MAGIC!
Day three:
Best set of the day: Alvvays. These guys were part discovery in that I’d long loved the single “Archie, Marry Me” off their debut, but hadn’t gotten into much of the rest of their stuff. That changed after this set, though, which won me over with songs like “Next of Kin,” “Party Police,” and “Atop a Cake,” among others. Frontwoman Molly Rankin is ever the charmer onstage, and both she and the band have a bit of Blondie going on at times, which is never a thing to argue with. The new songs sounded good, as well, so I’m looking forward to seeing what their follow-up offers (due out 8 Sept). I gotta stick with what got me there, though, so check out their performance of “Archie” here:
Day four:
Best set of the day: (tie) Barns Courtney and Car Seat Headrest. This one was a tough one as the day actually had several really solid sets — in addition to these two there were surprisingly enjoyable ones from old favorites the Shins and Arcade Fire (who as easy as they make it to hate them closed the festival out with a bang, focusing on old favorites rather than their nu-disco offerings), as well as acts I’d largely ignored like Milky Chance (which probably threw the weekend’s best dance party, in all honesty). These two edged them out, though, if only by a hair — Barns Courtney because of his over-the-top performance and really catchy tunes, Car Seat for bringing the heat and making me reconsider my previous dismissal of their stuff.
For the former, Courtney recently broke his foot (jumping off stage in Milwaukee, apparently), so he played most of the set on a gurnee being wheeled around by his helpful “nurse.” (That is, when he wasn’t perilously jumping on one foot near the edge of the stage or momentarily using crutches before chucking them elsewhere on stage, to the increasing annoyance of his helper.) Despite being largely immobile, it was a high energy set and he had the early bird crowd singing along en masse. Songs like “Fire,” “Glitter and Gold,” “Golden Dandelions,” and “Hands” all worked well, as evidenced (in part) here. Check out a snippet of his set here (and keep your eyes peeled for yours truly around the 7:51 mark):
As for Car Seat, these guys have been one of the big buzz bands for the last couple years, but never really won me over with any of their stuff. Similar to Alvvays, though, seeing them live got me the gospel as Will Toledo and company brought the house during their set. The band has an early Beck/Eels vibe at times on the albums, but came out harder here and it worked. Songs like “Something Soon,” “Times to Die, “Maud Gone,” “Fill in the Blank,” and the epic “Vincent” all sounded great. “Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales” was the earworm I couldn’t get out of my head all week, though. I must have listened to it about 25 times, belting out the refrain at the end at the top of my lungs at times (good thing wifey’s been traveling — sorry, neighbors…) Check it out here (here’s a link to the actual Lolla performance of it, since it’s not allowing it to embed — MF’g technology…):
Nothing like another quiet, calm week to really give one a sense of perspective… sweet fucking Josephine, shit is off the rails lately. In the midst of all the craziness this week, found a couple nuggets worth relaying, though. First up is this cover by former Walkmen frontman Hamilton Leithauser of former Pogues frontman Shane MacGowan’s track “The Song with No Name.” The song is part of the upcoming compilation record Philia: Artists Rise Against Islamophobia, which will have tracks from the Dodos, Fruit Bats, and Vetiver among others. It’s a pretty great cover — Ham singing almost anything is a recipe for success, but particularly an Irish folk tune. Check it out here:
Next is a cover by the Afghan Whigs that Pitchfork posted of New Orleans band Pleasure Club this week. It’s from the latter band’s second album The Fugitive Kind and was recorded in honor of the recent passing of the Whigs’ guitarist Dave Rosser. On its own it’s a solid listen — Dulli’s vocals and mood smolder somewhat seductively before the song breaks into a glorious roar midway through — but even moreso since it’s from a band I’d never heard of. First, check the cover (and download it for free here if you like it):
That got me wondering, though, about who the heck Pleasure Club was and how they’d escaped my notice, so did a little research and really dug what I found. It was a short lived outfit — frontman James Hall and Co only released two albums, the aforementioned follow on and their debut, Here Comes the Trick, between 2002 and 2004 and disbanded around the time Katrina tore their hometown apart. Hall has done some solo stuff since then, but that was it for the band — which is a shame when you listen to the albums. It’s pretty great stuff — Hall’s voice has a reedy, punky swagger that feels instantly familiar and sounds right at home behind the muscular power of his rhythm section.
And that power is considerable. The band flat out rips — the debut album is chock full of winners that’ll have you cranking the volume and thrashing along — and I’m real glad the Whigs helped me find em. The best place to start is the beginning — they get you from the outset on their debut with the barnburner “Permanent Solution” (the opening line is “I was born into a terminal dive” — try to argue with that) and you’re rolling from there. Everything else is just extra speed on the highway. Buckle up and enjoy the ride:
Well, another week’s worth of posts slipped through my grasp until I could take a minute on the weekend to capture them, this time as I can barely hit the keyboard after smashing rocks and bricks all day yesterday. ONE of these days I’ll get into the rhythm and start dropping these posts in the moment. (Although, thinking about picking the kids up from daycare is almost as good as actually doing so, right?) So here’s what I’d thought about sharing before — if it’s old news and you don’t care anymore, blame the government. Otherwise, enjoy!
Tuesday:
NIN dropped the first song from its upcoming EP, Add Violence (out Friday), and it’s a smoldering five minute gem, with Reznor’s “Closer”-era piano plinking along amidst the swirling typhoon of vocals and strings. It’s immersive and atmospheric, as some of his best stuff tends to be — it actually wouldn’t sound out of place at the end of Downward Spiral, serving the same purpose as “Hurt” did there, giving a cool, bracing pool to sink into after the chaos and flames of the remainder of the album.
This EP is the second in Reznor’s planned trilogy of EPs, this one coming on the heels of last year’s, Not the Actual Events, with the third installment expected soon. The first one had a couple good ones on it, so we’ll see how this one sounds Friday. In the meantime…
Wednesday:
Pitchfork dropped this teaser for the Keys’ frontman Dan Auerbach’s latest side project (yes, this is in addition to his recently released solo album and his other side project The Arcs), a soundtrack to an upcoming graphic novel, Murder Ballads. The graphic novel is apparently about a record company guy who meets a couple blues musicians and then… stuff happens — killing and slow jams, I’m assuming, based on the title.
Will at least be worth a look, though, based on this offering, a track between Auerbach and Louisiana bluesman Robert Finley whose gravely, soulful voice sounds great on the upbeat number. This thing screams being used for the intro to some new TV drama — season three of True Detective maybe? Check it out in the meantime:
Friday:
Last up is the new video from Grizzly Bear and the latest single from its upcoming album, Painted Ruins, due out in August. They’ve released a mixed bag of previous tracks so far, “Four Cypresses,” “Mourning Sound,” and “Three Rings,” but this one is a lovely successor to the tracks on 2012’s excellent Shields (which ranked #3 on my year end list). The video also captures some of the greatest hits of wifey’s and my weekend cosplaying and relaxation, so it’s nice to see that catching on as well. Enjoy!
One of the sole perks of going a week on 2-3 hours of sleep a night thanks to my bodywide conflagration (aside from posting some more here) is catching up on some shows, albeit through the bleary eyed fog of 3am. Thanks to last night’s episode I polished off the 4-part HBO documentary, The Defiant Ones, which details the multi-decade partnership between famed producers Dr Dre and Jimmy Iovene.
Iovene of course is the old school, big label name known for his work in the 70s/80s w/ artists like John Lennon, Stevie Nicks, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, and U2 who subsequently teams up w/ Dre in the 90s as the latter king of gangsta rap was departing the seminal NWA. From that point the pair go on an unparalleled blitz, collaborating and breaking such monster acts as Snoop Dogg, Tupac, Eminem, NIN, and Marilyn Manson, among others. It’s an interesting watch — it meanders a bit too much at times into the business side of things (I could give a shit about contract negotiations and label swaps and selling headphones — it’s the music that matters to me), but does a good job giving insight into the creation of some of the biggest albums/acts in recent history.
Episode 3 in particular is the one to watch if you’re short on time — it does a good job reminding you of the tremendous amount of quality music coming out in the early 90s and the excitement surrounding so many of those acts. From the enormous debut of The Chronic (which I still remember hearing for the first time, having found a scratched up copy of it on the side of the road while on a jog and then obsessively listening to the skipping tracks in my room until I could get a new copy) to the thrill of discovering guys like Snoop and Tupac shortly thereafter and similarly having my head wrecked. Or remembering how much flack there was for acts like NIN and Manson and how intense (and ultimately deadly) the East Coast/West Coast beef was. (I actually wish they’d focused a little more on the former duo, since Manson in particular gets relative short shrift here and those two were equally enormous parts of the early 90s.)
For all of the noise and nonsense, though, there was some truly tremendous music being made — thanks in no small part to these two gentlemen. It’s part heartening, part dispiriting to hear how frustrated and unhappy both of them were for so long in their careers, despite having tremendous impact and success professionally — nice to know I’m not a whackadoo for feeling the same way in my world, bad to know I could be making millions of dollars and incredible music w/ an army of legends and still feel the same way. If nothing else it’s interesting to hear others talk of that frustration and unhappiness and how they try to manage it in similar ways, too. No easy fixes, but nice to know I’m not alone/off track…
So check it out if you have a chance — the trailer’s below to whet the appetite more if you’d like. Until next time, amici…
Well — since I’m awake for the sixth night in a row in the wee hours of the morning trying (and largely failing) to not claw my skin off thanks to an unrelenting case of poison something or other (acquired not in the deeps of a verdant backwoods cabin but in the rugged middle of my urban backyard — this city truly is a magical place…) — thought I’d post the quick hitters I’d contemplated posting earlier in the week, but didn’t get a chance to. So without any fuss, here’s what I’d planned to post for you during the week. Enjoy!
Sunday:
Wifey found this one and like the author of the hosting link, I have mixed feelings about Macklemore writ large. Love him or hate him (and you often do multiple times in a song, let alone album), you can never question his earnestness — and in this case the love of his grandmother turning 100 is the focus, which comes through loud and clear. A pretty great, touching little video (and not a bad song either) — check it out…
Tuesday:
Stumbled upon this one today in the feed from the upcoming American Epic documentary on PBS (arm your DVRs now) — it’s a nice little duet between Sir Elton from across the pond and fellow iconoclast Jack White. Simple little blues number w/ Elton on the ivories, Jack on acoustic, and lyrics about my beloved brown…
Thursday:
Found this one today on Pitchfork — nice little cover of an old Sparklehorse song by DIIV — which took me to the embedded jump to the article on why it’s been so long since I heard anything from the latter band. Pretty great/sad writeup on the band — I’d listened to them some back in college but lost the thread on them (obviously, as the events of the article are from 2010). The stuff frontman Mark Linkous was going through (and ultimately succumbed to) reminds me a lot of my beloved Elliott. Worth a read (and a listen to the embedded videos while you do)…
Friday:
Fuck. YASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS…
Can’t wait to see these guys again this summer. One of my absolute faves. That’s it for now — back to scratching…
It’s been a rough go lately for a range of reasons, so I figured since it’s time to celebrate our birthday — both of our country and our website — that I’d change things up a little to see if we could get on a better roll. To do so I decided to do something drastic — move the site from its home for nearly a decade and overhaul the format, which is sort of the cyber equivalent of chopping off one’s hair and getting a tattoo after a big breakup. You’ll still see me posting my scribblings on various topics as time/interest permits, but we’ll also throw in some content from other places that I find interesting (or think you will). And as was the original intent of this site, it’s supposed to be a place where multiple voices are heard — so if you’re game to step up and want to be a regular author, you know where to find me — just let me know.
So we’ll see how it goes — wifey (reader 1 of 7) has been on me for a while to take things up a notch here, in part to make it easier to link to social media and whatnot, so you’ll see handy jumps to all your favorites below, as well as some other bells and whistles going forward as I see what this puppy can do. You can still link to the old site here while I transition things over, reminiscing about all the good music (and times!) we’ve shared. So please bear with me as I tweak things here or there, and please blast away on the Twittergrams if you like what you see — maybe 2017 will be the year we break to double digits on readers. Now onto the important stuff…
For the inaugural post for the new digs, I wanted to throw out some recommendations for female artists I’ve been listening to of late, since they’ve been taking it on the chin this week thanks to the tweets and comments of some in hallowed halls. So I’m going to hurl three over the plate in an effort to strike out that type of nonsense — I think you’ll agree the only “crazy” or “dumb as a rock” thing about these ladies is to say that type of shit about them in the first place.
First up is the latest from Hurray for the Riff Raff, the band of folkies from New Orleans with their sixth album overall and first in three years, The Navigator. It’s a bit of a departure from their previous work as they ditch the campfire for a concept album loosely charting the life of lead singer Alynda Lee Segarra. As such it starts in the big city (ostensibly the New York of Segarra’s youth) and the opening tracks talk of the sadness, loss, and bustle of those early years. She sings, “I’ve been a lonely girl, but I’m ready for the world” on “Hungry Ghost,” “lost my good daddy, best friend I ever had” on the beautiful and uplifting “Life to Save,” and “I was raised by the streets, do you know what that really means” on the title track.
It’s on that latter track that the album finds Segarra starting to embrace her Latin roots more, from the audio of the Spanish appliance hawker at the beginning to the hand drums and flamenco-style guitar that follow. It sets the album down a different path, one arguably of Segarra’s later years where her heritage is a stronger part of her identity. You can hear it in several songs after that — sonically you can hear it in “Rican Beach” and “Finale” (whose break just over two minutes in reminds you why Latin music is so primally satisfying at times — TRY not to move…), while you can hear it lyrically in songs like “Fourteen Floors” and the slightly belabored “Pa’lante.” (“My father said it took a million years, well he said that it felt like a million years…just to get here,” from the former tune.)
It’s a satisfying ride. There’s enough of the simple pleasures of old to satisfy previous fans — those just looking for Segarra’s stellar voice to fill their ears with little more than an acoustic to adorn it (“Nothing’s Gonna Change that Girl” and “Halfway There” do so nicely) — while bringing in a range of new sounds and colors to broaden the sound and win over new listeners. A solid effort by Segarra and company — check out some of the highlights below (that’s right, I created playlists people. The future is HERE!):
Next up are a few tracks from Waxahatchee (otherwise known as Katie Crutchfield, who I’ve been listening to a lot lately in anticipation of her upcoming fourth album. (Due out in a couple of weeks.) I’d stumbled on her last year when she covered my beloved Elliott (an ok, grungy version of his classic “Angeles”) and then again this year when she covered Everclear with another fave, Kevin Morby. I dug her voice so started listening to her older stuff and liked what I found — her debut album American Weekend was written after a reportedly devastating breakup, and you can hear every bit of that in the music. It’s a raw, spare record — just Crutchfield, her acoustic, and her audibly damaged heart — but has some lovely melodies as well. Tracks like “Catfish,” “Grass Stain,” “Be Good,” and “Bathtub” are all standouts.
Her next album, Cerulean Salt, finds Crutchfield back on her feet again, trying to put the pieces together with a band this time and the fuller sound (in part fueled by a healthy dose of anger and bitterness) works well. She’s plugged in and pissed off here and calls to mind PJ Harvey or jaggedlittlepill-era Alanis with the venomous force she occasionally wields. Tracks like “Dixie Cups and Jars,” “Lips and Limbs,” and “Brother Bryan” stand out, as do deeper cuts like “Swan Dive” and “Peace and Quiet.”
By her third album, Ivy Tripp, Crutchfield seems to be in a better place, showing some swagger on straight-ahead rockers like “Under a Rock,” “Poison,” and “The Dirt,” while balancing them with softer, more melodic songs like “Grey Hair” and “Summer of Love.” She even throws in a dancy little number like “La Loose,” which wins you over with its Casio-style beat and catchy “hoo hoo hoos” sprinkled throughout. It’s a winning progression since the debut, both in emotions covered and musical range, so it will be interesting to see what the new album holds. Check out a couple highlights from the above albums here:
We’ll close with one of the queens, the ever-enchanting Feist who’s back with her fourth album overall and first in six years, Pleasures. Similar to her last album it’s an interesting mix of her trademark soft, romantic moments and dissonant breaks and flourishes. Take “Any Party” or the album’s second single “Century.” The former starts simple enough, just an acoustic guitar and Feist’s lovely coo telling an anonymous listener she’d leave any party for them, for no party beats their party of two — a sweet, slightly saccharine sentiment that’s nonetheless charming when it comes from her. The song quickly crashes into an electric squall and crashing cymbals, like she’s lashing out after having shown a flash of vulnerability, before settling back down into confessing her love. It follows this push-pull pattern a few more times before ultimately breaking into an odd bit at the end where the listener leaves and drives off (ostensibly to return to the other half of their party of two?)
Similarly, “Century” ebbs and flows with less sentiment and more sonic dissonance than the former before another odd break at the end, this time a spoken word section by former Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker before the song crashes to a close. They’re strange, but not off-putting aberrations that are rather reminiscent of those from occasional collaborator and Wilco frontman Jeff Tweedy, who is notorious for taking otherwise beautiful tracks and shattering them with jagged, jarring juxtapositions of noise. (“Misunderstood,” “Via Chicago,” and “Poor Places” being just three of many examples.)
And similar to Tweedy, Feist gets away with it because her voice (and lyrics) are so good — honest lyrics, winning melodies, and a knockout voice. We saw her recently in town and she played this album in its entirety before playing a second concert’s worth of older material and it holds up well live. Tracks like “I Wish I Didn’t Miss You” and “The Wind” shine, as do “Baby Be Simple” and the aforementioned tracks. In addition to an angelic voice, Feist is also a sneakily good guitar player, as demonstrated on the title track and “I’m Not Running Away” (and even moreso live). All in all, it’s another winning package from the lovely Leslie — check out a few of the tracks here:
