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Pat McGee: These Days (The Virginia Sessions)

April 24, 2009 /

Pat McGee has dropped the “Band” from his name and is going it alone, so to speak, in his solo debut and first effort for Rock Ridge Music, These Days (The Virginia Sessions). There is something breezy and easy to enjoy about McGee’s songs – they are delivered in a way reminiscent of ‘70s pop (think Jackson Browne) or akin to in more modern terms, Train or the Fray. McGee has a good, if not spectacular, voice; but as it’s always been, his songs are the driving force of his career, and he’s brought us another batch of good ones here. One of the only negative things you can say about Pat McGee is that much of the material, in melody, tone and arrangement, sounds very similar. But occasionally he steps things up, as he does on These Days with the stunning “Come Back Home,” a track originally written when McGee’s longtime drummer, John C. Williams, left the band, with the sentiment being how a military couple deals with separation during times of war. Sadly and somewhat symbolically, Williams’ younger brother lost his life in Iraq after McGee wrote the song last year. The Tonic-esque “The Hand That Holds You” is also a standout track. (Rock Ridge Music)

Pat McGee MySpace Page

Alternative, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Pop, Rock

This World Fair: This World Fair

April 24, 2009 /

It appears the next incarnation of Aware Records is here, in the form of Los Angeles-based Ping Pong Music. Ping Pong manages Epic Records’ Augustana, and they are bringing us the next wave of very talented baby bands such as This World Fair, the London, and Windsor Drive. The formula of Ping Pong’s bands is similar to Aware, which launched the careers of artists like Train, Vertical Horizon and John Mayer. And that formula is almost a no-brainer – finding talented acts with hooky, melodic songs – but it’s in stark contrast to today’s hipster-driven music industry that mostly relies on gimmicks and fabricated street cred meters. Still, there is always a demand for great bands like This World Fair, and their debut album is an absolute sonic gift to those who dig the likes of Augustana, Better Than Ezra or Keane. Chris Kalgren fronts the band with a smooth tenor that effectively delivers a balance of driving rockers such as “Can’t Stop Falling” and “Drama,” or dreamy tracks like “This is All.” But among ten tracks that are quite frankly straight A’s, This World Fair scores an A+ with the pulsing, stunning piano-driven “Seven Letters.” Despite where the music industry is headed, there is no good reason why This World Fair shouldn’t be as successful as the rest of the world will allow them to be. (Ping Pong Music)

This World Fair MySpace Page

Alternative, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Indie Labels, Pop, Rock

Michel Gondry 2: More Videos Before and After DVD 1

April 23, 2009 /

Better than the 2003 collection that bears his name, this michelgondry.com-exclusive set of music videos is simply staggering. The beauty of Gondry’s work is that his methods are surprisingly low-tech (Beck’s “Cellphone’s Dead” being this set’s exception). He uses reflective glass to create the ghosts that haunt Paul McCartney’s house in “Dance Tonight,” and Steriogram’s “Walkie Talkie Man” is a brilliant stop-motion clip, using both real people and their string equivalents. Gondry assembles a couple of clever yet completely unique one-take videos with Michael Andrews and Gary Jules’ cover of “Mad World” and the White Stripes’ “The Denial Twist,” and his videos from the pre-CGI early ’90s, namely Thomas Dolby’s “Close but No Cigar” and Sananda Maitreya’s “She Kissed Me” (otherwise known as Terence Trend D’Arby to your older brothers and sisters), look as good as any video made today. The set comes with a bunch of behind-the-scenes footage, a couple films featuring Gondry solving a Rubik’s Cube with various parts of his body (feet and nose, to be precise), and they also added the parody of Gondry’s video of the White Stripes’ “The Hardest Button to Button” that appeared on a 2006 episode of “The Simpsons.” Genius stuff, across the board. If only he could replicate this consistency in the feature film arena.(ElektroFilm)

Click here to buy “Michel Gondry 2: More Videos Before and After DVD 1

DVD Quicktakes, External Music, Songs, Videos

The Veils Release Third LP, Sun Gangs

April 21, 2009 /

The Veils, Sun Gangs

From the UK comes the brooding rock outfit The Veils, with their third LP Sun Gangs. This foursome, complete with female bassist Sophia Burn, makes up one of the most unique and emotionally intoned musical groups since U2 or Radiohead. Their depth on Sun Gangs suggests a certain growth since the last record, and their talent for embellishments and arrangements makes this band one to listen to in 2009.

There’s a certain welcoming property about The Veils. They suck you into their emotionally complex world within seconds of the opener, “Sit Down By The Fire,” which BBC called, “a very modern mixture of prayers, love letters and personal record keeping.”

Another standout on the record is “Larkspur” which Dusted Magazine said, “follows a driving picked riff through swells of noise, returning to calm several times before building to a final eruption.” The orchestration on Sun Gangs is one of the main reasons the record is so intriguing. The twists and turns of melody and harmony, tiny instrumental splashes of color, and emotions that ebb and flow through song after song take this record from mundane and repetitive to interesting and easy to listen to.
As Supreme Management wrote,

“By turns warm and ethereal, thundering and cacophonous, The Veils set Sun Gangs apart from efforts by like-minded peers such as the Arcade Fire by imbuing their lush, at times grandiose arrangements with a sense of youthful honesty and personal reflection that seems to so often get lost under the sea of ideas within similarly ambitious efforts.”

The only down side to Sun Gangs is that it’s incredibly mellow. Don’t expect a head-banger here, but then again, that’s not what The Veils are known for. This band is pure emotion and it shows through each and every one of the tracks on Sun Gangs.

If you like U2, AutoVaughn, Kings Of Leon, or Arcade Fire, make sure to check out the latest release from UK rockers, The Veils.

Adult Contemporary, Alternative, CD Reviews, Pop, Rock

iTunes Tips & Tricks: “Neglected Favorites”

April 17, 2009 /

If you’re like me and feel sometimes that your music collection is a little too vast, here’s a little trick that I learned not too long ago. I have 4000+ 4- and 5-star rated songs, and I realized that there were some personal favorites that I wasn’t hearing on a regular basis. (For all it’s features, iTunes doesn’t do the greatest job of shuffling through big playlists.)

Using iTunes’ “Smart Playlist” feature, I was able to create playlists of songs that I haven’t heard in some time (six months, a year, whatever).

1. Go to File > New Smart Playlist
2. In the first two drop-down boxes, choose “Rating” and “in the range.”
3. Choose 4 to 5 stars (or 3 to 5, if you like).
4. Hit the plus sign to the right to add a criterion.
5. Choose “Last Played” and “is not in the last” 6 “months” (or 9 months or whatever span you like).
6. Hit OK
7. Rename playlist “Neglected Favorites” (or whatever you like)

You can also add other criteria, like genre, artist or whatever.

So now you have a playlist of all of your top rated songs that you haven’t heard in the last six months. Once you start this playlist, songs will start to disappear when they’re played. As time wears on, new songs (that haven’t been played on your iTunes or iPod in the last six months) will begin to appear.

iTunes won’t let you forget a song!

External Music, iTunes, Playlists

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