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Brett Terry: Instant History

May 19, 2009 /

Brett Terry probably means well, but there’s so much going against him on this album that he almost needn’t have bothered. The production is dangerously thin and Terry’s voice isn’t one that’s going to incite excitement in anyone’s mind in the long run. The man’s no Bob Dylan, unfortunately for him. But away he goes nevertheless crooning away on such ditties as “Unharmed” and limping through embarrassments like “Rock Star” that strive to be something (lyrically, anyway) along the lines of the Who’s “Success Story,” but fails in a terrible fashion. You just can’t believe Terry when he sings this stuff because he’s absolutely unconvincing as both a singer and a songwriter. Unfortunately, he even feels the need to attempt the Beatles classic “If I Needed Someone” by multi-tracking his vocals against his bare acoustic guitar. He completely kills it, like other people have done when covering the Fab Four. One of these days there will be a law against committing such a musical crime. Not that Terry hasn’t done enough damage here with his own tunes. Pass. (Leverkuhn Records)

Brett Terry MySpace page

Americana, CD Reviews, Pop

True Nature: Feels Like Centuries

May 18, 2009 /

True Nature, fronted by Lou Barlow (not to be confused with the man of the same name in Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh, et al) and featuring other talented musicians such as Aaron Comess, Gerry Leonard, and Tony Levin have come together to release this, the group’s second CD. At five tracks, this EP packs more punch than many full-length albums released these days with “The Color of Day Light” easily being the disc’s standout track. Barlow weaves strong melodies with smart lyricism, allowing a song like “My Freedom Lies Behind the Sun” to resonate passionately in today’s era of political change and societal shifting without falling over on its own message. “Woman” and “Truth I Have To Steel (Simple Heart)” also mark Barlow as a gifted lyricist and musician. With tunes this solid, it’s not hard to imagine True Nature being able to conquer an entire album’s worth of songs and sounds. Here’s looking forward to that moment. (Fire Sign Records)

True Nature MySpace page

CD Reviews, Pop, Rock

You know what’s better than Coldplay?

May 15, 2009 /

Free Coldplay.

Beginning today, coinciding with the band’s North American tour, Coldplay fans can download LeftRightLeftRightLeft, a nine-song live album, for free on the band’s web site. As you might imagine, the track listing favors their latest album Viva la Vida, however – and the fans will love this – it focuses on album tracks over singles. “Strawberry Swing” and “42” are here, while “Talk” and “Yellow” are not. Bravo, gentlemen.

Fans have until the end of their US tour to download LeftRightLeftRightLeft, while the band will be giving away CD copies of the album at their concerts. Dig in, kids.

To download LeftRightLeftRightLeft, click here.

Alternative, Artists, Concerts, Downloads, External Music, Pop, Rock, Songs

Green Day’s “21st Century Breakdown” meets the critics

May 15, 2009 /

Green Day - 21st Century BreakdownFive years after releasing 2004’s career-defining American Idiot, Green Day is back with their follow-up, 21st Century Breakdown, hitting stores today. Does it live up to the considerable hype?

According to Bullz-Eye’s David Medsker, Breakdown is a solid 3.5-star affair — perhaps not the towering achievement that Idiot was, but as he says, you have to “give the band credit … for not shying away from the impossible expectations that have been thrust upon them, and trying their damndest to make an album every bit as massive” as their last outing, even if their reach exceeds their grasp a bit:

The problem is that this time around, that whole reach-exceeds-their-grasp thing comes back to haunt them. The band simply bit off more than they could chew, and had they been willing to pare down the track listing to a more reasonable length (18 songs! 69 minutes!), we could be talking about Breakdown and Idiot the same way that people compare and contrast The Bends and OK Computer.

These sentiments are more or less in line with the qualified praise doled out in reviews from a number of outlets, including the UK’s Guardian (“a little less bold, a little less surprising than its predecessor”), Entertainment Weekly (“The band seem oddly immune to the fact that success … has rendered Berkeley’s gutter-boys-done-good accidental targets of their own ire”), and Popdose (“bucks the current trend of churning out singles in favor of creating deep tracks that beg for repeated listens — and may the gods bless ‘em for it!”)

And what does the band say? Well, watch this Total Assault interview clip to hear directly from the boys themselves:

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CD Reviews, News

Operation Aloha: Operation Aloha

May 15, 2009 /

They’re being called a supergroup, but Operation Aloha doesn’t carry the odor of a manager-brainstormed corporate rock merger, like, say, Damn Yankees; instead, it sounds like a bunch of guys dicking around between trips to the beach – which is appropriate, because that’s exactly how Operation Aloha came together. Sprung from a month-long vacation to a “treehouse compound” in Maui, Aloha loosely strings together contributions from a staggering 14-member crew whose members count Maroon 5, Phantom Planet, and Gomez among their respective day gigs, and the music is relaxed to a fault – though hooks occasionally poke through the mellow haze, for the most part, the album consists of perfectly pleasant sketches that sound like they might be on their way to becoming songs at some point. Not the type of record that’s going to grab you right away, in other words (or maybe not at all) – but given enough spins, it starts to feel awfully comfortable, like an old, patchouli-drenched poncho at a beachside campfire. It’s ultimately a little bit like a 21st-century version of the Traveling Wilburys – without the songs, mind you, but with more than enough charm to get by. (Operation Aloha 2009)

Operation Aloha MySpace page

CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Pop, Rock

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