Author: David Medsker (Page 22 of 96)

The Divine Comedy: Bang Goes the Knighthood

June 24, 2010 /


RIYL: Scott Walker, Pulp, Belle & Sebastian

After a three-year silence, Neil Hannon has suddenly reached Jack White levels of productivity. He and fellow Irishman Thomas Walsh made last year’s dead-brilliant, ELO-riffing Duckworth Lewis Method (the only concept album about cricket you’ll ever need), and a mere ten months later, Hannon has returned with yet another album, this one under his day job the Divine Comedy. It should surprise no one familiar with Hannon’s work that he has once again made a superb record.

Bang Goes the Knighthood boasts the same chipper tone as his last album, 2006’s Victory for the Comic Muse, though the first step out of the gate is a measured one. “Down in the Street Below” is half-ballad, half-baroque pop, exploring people’s tendencies to lose themselves in the hustle and bustle. Walsh delivers his trademark honey-dipped backing vocals on the scathing “Complete Banker” (“Maybe this recession is a blessing in disguise / We can build a much much bigger bubble the next time”), but the song that will have Gen X alt-rockers chuckling is “At the Indie Disco,” Hannon’s love letter to the Stone Roses and Wannadies, which finishes with one of his best couplets ever: “She makes my heart beat the same way / As at the start of ‘Blue Monday’ / Always the last song that they play.”

The one song that might have people scratching their heads – and will give Anglophobes a scrorching case of hives – is “Can You Stand on One Leg,” which is what “Mack the Knife” might have sounded like had it been written by Monty Python, and ends with Hannon holding an obscenely high falsetto note for 28 seconds. (You read that right.) It’s a tough one to swallow, trying just a bit to hard to be silly. He redeems himself on the next, and final track “I Like,” a driving love letter to his wife about the things he, yes, likes about her. It’s all just another day at the office for Hannon; pristine ork pop with smarts for days. Even better are the extra tracks that come with the download version, where Hannon engages in some oddball electronic experimentation and Kraftwerk sampling clearly borne from the Duckworth Lewis Method sessions. He’s great the way he is, but if Hannon chose to go in that direction next time around, he would get no argument here. (101 Distribution 2010)

Divine Comedy MySpace page
Click to buy Bang Goes the Knighthood from Amazon

Adult Contemporary, Artists, CD Reviews, Melodramatic, Pop

Me, Myself, and iPod 6/23/10: A literal animal collective

June 23, 2010 /

esd ipod

!!! – AM/FM
I am admittedly late to the !!! party, as I spent a good year trying to figure out how to even say the band’s name (Jason Thompson finally set me straight by going “Ch-ch-ch”), but after hearing this Frankie Goes to Hollywood-sampling number – and if it’s not Frankie, it’s gotta be something produced by Trevor Horn – you can bet I’ll be keeping an eye on them going forward.

Joemca – Big Dreams
It’s like a glitchy Bruce Springsteen song. That’s a good thing, by the way.

Brock Enright – Maybe
Blissed out Jesus and Mary Chain? Sounds good to me.

Marco Benevento – Greenpoint
There are few things that make me roll my eyes faster than seeing “sound sculptor” in quotes in a press release. Having said that, this is a neat little instrumental.

Unicycle Loves You – Mirror, Mirror
I wrote a piece a while back about how band names have gone to shit. I cited Unicycle Loves You as an example of this. Their fans let me have it, though in a playful way, unlike the unfiltered hostility that one normally finds on the web. A few weeks later, the band sent me a friend request on MySpace. Had to give them points for that. Now they have a new album, and wouldn’t you know it, I like the first single. Still hate the band name, though.

The Rattles – Wavy Lane
These guys are animals. Literally. The album cover shows a cat, a hippo, a lizard and a goat. Not sure if this is just another Wiggles act or a really meta joke, but the song will have Nuggets fans dancing in their seats.

'60s, Alternative, Ambient, Americana, Artists, CD Reviews, Downloads, Me Myself and iPod, Pop, Power Pop, Psychedelic, Rock

Oasis: Time Flies…1994-2009

June 23, 2010 /


RIYL: The Beatles, The Faces, The Beatles

Here’s the straight statistical dope about Time Flies…1994-2009, the new 27-track two-disc set of nearly every song Oasis released as a single: they had eight #1 singles in their native UK, and 23 Top Ten singles overall. In fact, only two of their singles didn’t crack the UK Top Ten. They were even huge in America for a while; their 1996 album (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? went quadruple platinum, and the albums on each side of it, 1994’s Definitely Maybe and 1997’s Be Here Now, sold a million copies as well. Radiohead would ultimately steal their crown, but for a moment, Oasis were England’s biggest band by a mile and one of the biggest bands in the world.

They are also quite possibly the most overrated band to ever walk the earth.

Oasis - Time Flies - COLOR1

Which is not to suggest that the band had nothing to offer; principal songwriter Noel Gallagher came up with some genius moments of modern-day rock riffage when he put some effort into it, namely “Wonderwall,” “Champagne Supernova” and “Don’t Look Back in Anger.” Most of Gallagher’s songs, though, are all pomp and no heart, tailor-made to get the festival crowds waving their arms but are otherwise empty, hollow attempts at Beatlesque grandeur. Rarely have songs tried so hard to sound so effortless.

Effort is only half the problem here, though; what Oasis really could have used is an editor. Was there any reason for “All Around the World” to be over nine and a half minutes long (two key changes!), or for “D’You Know What I Mean” – which is surely the inspiration for “You All Everybody,” the one hit wonder by “Lost” castmate Charlie’s band Drive Shaft – to clock in just under eight minutes? Even the songs that have a decent hook, like “Some Might Say,” don’t know when to walk the fuck away. Thirteen of the 27 songs here have run times over five minutes, and there is frankly no reason for it. A song need not be long in order to be epic; that’s a distinction Oasis never understood.

One thing working in the favor of Time Flies… is that it’s priced to sell, going for the price of a traditional single disc. Smart move, that, since anyone casually interested in the band will now get the songs they want plus a boatload more without spending much more money. If only the band had been as economical with the songs themselves. (Big Brother/Columbia 2010)

Oasis MySpace page
Click to buy Time Flies from Amazon

Alternative, Artists, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Pop, Rock

Seen Your Video: The Coral, “1000 Years”

June 17, 2010 /

I will be the first to admit that I don’t hear every album released each year because, frankly, it’s impossible. Over 30,000 albums are put out each year. Can’t hear ’em all, and goodness knows I try.

Having said that, I at least hear about albums coming out, even if I don’t hear them. But when I saw a recent press release talking about the upcoming Butterfly House being the Coral’s sixth album, I uttered the words that piss me off when I hear them from other people: “They’re still together?” The funny thing is, I had just been thinking of the band – loved their song “Dreaming of You,” from their 2002 debut – and wondered what had happened to them. After their 2003 sophomore effort Magic and Medicine, I literally had not heard a word of their existence until the other day. You’d think I would have accidentally heard something, but no.

And if the song “1000 Years” is any indication, I’m thinking I missed a few damn good records. James Skelly’s vocals are less Eric Burdon bluesy growl than ’90s Madchester shoegazer whisper, but the song is an absolute psych-pop gem, and the video is appropriately loaded with liquid camera shots and crude good/evil symbolism (man with wolf’s head, horses, water, an ankh). Butterfly House is currently scheduled to be import-only. Here’s hoping they change their minds.

'60s, Alternative, Artists, CD Reviews, Pop, Rock, Seen Your Video, Videos

The Chemical Brothers: Further

June 17, 2010 /


RIYL: Fatboy Slim, 808 State, Crystal Method

After briefly flirting with the mainstream in 2005 thanks to their Indian-riffing rump shaker “Galvanize,” one would forgive the Chemical Brothers if they liked the look of the spotlight and decided to spend some more time there. It’s to their immense credit, then, that their post-“Galvanize” efforts have been the most noncommercial work of their career, and their latest album, Further, is the most insular album they’ve made to date, not to mention their most fitting album title.

Chemical_Brothers_04

If they recorded for anyone other than Astralwerks, one of the last artist-friendly labels left standing, the A&R man would surely be telling them “I don’t hear a single,” because Further, well, doesn’t have one. In fact, the album has a lot of “silhouette” tracks, a trick that electronic acts use where they start with an existing song and keep adding bits to it while slowly removing everything from the original track until they have something brand new. The 12-minute “Escape Velocity” is a direct descendant of “It Began in Afrika” and “The Sunshine Underground” (but not as catchy as either), while “Another World” is a slower version of “Star Guitar” and “Horse Power” sounds as if it were built from the bones of “Break Shake Bounce” and “Hey Boy Hey Girl.” The closest the album comes to a pop song is the blissed-out psychedelia of “Dissolve.” Not coincidentally, this is also the album’s finest moment.

Further is both admirable and damned frustrating. Rowlands and Simons only make music for themselves, and that is how it should be (they refrained from using guest performers this time around, which is a nice change of pace), but we’re beginning to see the limits of their range as songwriters. They’re also trying just a bit too hard to avoid anything that could be classified as Big Beat, even though those records were some of the best things they’ve ever done. It’s good to be true to yourself, but there are times when it’s not such a bad thing to give the people what they want. (Astralwerks 2010)

Chemical Brothers MySpace page
Click to buy Further from Amazon

Alternative, Ambient, Artists, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Dance, Electronica, Psychedelic

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