Tag: Headlines (Page 54 of 76)

Steal This Song: Oh Mercy, “Lay Everything on Me”

April 5, 2010 / David Medsker

There are few ways to get our attention faster than comparing an artist to Neil Finn. It’s a double-edged sword, though; there are scores of artists who try to emulate Finn brothers Neil and Tim, but almost none of them succeed in replicating his signature blend of rich melodcism with a healthy dose of neurosis. Still, when someone dares to make the comparison, we listen.

And, if the song turns out to sound more like the Go-Betweens than the Finn Brothers, we listen again. And again.

Alexander Gow and Tom Savage. The new McLennan and Forster?

“Lay Everything on Me,” the first single from Melbourne quartet Oh Mercy, feels like a lost track from 1987, the kind of thing that would have received heavy airplay in the early days of 120 Minutes. Think the Immaculate Fools, Danny Wilson, the aforementioned Go-Betweens, or if you want a modern-day comparison, Jupiter One. It’s insanely melodic guitar pop, with a simple, driving drum beat (and lots of cowbell) and a bare-bones scratch guitar line. But this is no retro hipster douchebag band cashing in on a movement; they simply favor melody over an ironic pose or sonic gimmicks – as it should me, damn it.

The band’s debut album, Priviledged Woes, is set to drop in the States soon, and after a dozen spins of this song and a quick glance of the songs on their MySpace page (which features a nifty cover of the Cardigans’ “Lovefool” that they recorded for an Australian radio station), it can’t come soon enough.

Oh Mercy – Lay Everything on Me

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Barenaked Ladies: All in Good Time

April 2, 2010 / Jeff Giles

RIYL: Camper Van Beethoven, Moxy Fruvous, The Housemartins

From the outside, it always looked like the Barenaked Ladies got most of their goofy humor from Ed “One Week” Robertson, and most of their moody depth from Steven “The Old Apartment” Page – so when Page quit the band last year, it might have seemed safe to conclude that subsequent BNL albums would contain a lot of tongue-in-cheek rapping and punny wordplay. Creative dynamics are never that simple, of course, but it still may come as a surprise to many fans that BNL’s first post-Page effort, All in Good Time, contains some of the band’s darkest, most mature work.

Even better, Time goes a long way toward correcting the blandly pleasant drift of the Ladies’ recent efforts, restoring some of the bite and emotional depth that lurked beneath their sunny pop hooks. For the first time in recent memory, Barenaked Ladies sounds like an honest-to-goodness band here, and not just because songwriting credits are split relatively democratically between Robertson and his fellow remaining BNLers (Kevin Hearn, Tyler Stewart, and Jim Creggan). There’s an organic, lived-in feel to these performances that shines through the band’s usual production gimmicks; even the album’s requisite rap number, “Four Seconds,” sounds more authentically funky.

There are a number of tracks that sling arrows at departed friends and lovers, and it’ll be hard for fans to resist the temptation to wonder how many of them were inspired by Page’s absence. “I tried to be your brother / You cried, and ran for cover,” Robertson sings on the opening track and leadoff single, “You Run Away”; later, he spits “Can you forgive me for / What I had to do? / I’d use a metaphor / But I’m done with you” in the charging “I Have Learned.” But how truly personal these songs are isn’t as important as the breadth of their appeal – and both of those tracks offer more resonance, boast more feeling, than the band has shown in years. The same is true for much of the rest of All in Good Time. Call it addition through subtraction. (Risin’/EMI 2010)

Barenaked Ladies MySpace page

CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Pop

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Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings: I Learned the Hard Way

April 2, 2010 / Jeff Giles

RIYL: Aretha Franklin, Black Joe Lewis, Mavis Staples

From the outside, it might seem like putting together an honest soul record isn’t such a hard thing to do – all you need is a nice-sounding room, a band of talented musicians, and some, y’know, soul – and from that point of view, it might be tempting to wonder just where in the hell Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings have been since releasing the magnificent 100 Days, 100 Nights in 2007.

Making real soul music is sort of tricky, though; if it weren’t, the genre wouldn’t be in the mess it’s been in since the mid-to-late ‘70s. A lot of things have changed since soul’s heyday, leaving us in a musical bizarro world where people are more accustomed to hearing digital clatter than analog sweat, and as a result, it’s become extremely difficult to cut a soul record that doesn’t sound like a cheap pastiche. What can anyone add to the style of music that gave us Aretha, Otis, and Pickett?

Nothing, probably. Which is why it’s to Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings’ immense credit that they’ve been able to amass such a deeply satisfying catalog. They record using vintage gear, an affectation that sounds like a gimmick in the wrong hands – but their songs, while not as resonant as the true soul classics, deserve the retro treatment. Put another way: the band’s albums never sound like they’re trying to reach for the past – their traditional soul vibe sounds honest and earned, and the songs sound like they could have been recorded in 1968 or yesterday. You know, timeless – the way music is supposed to sound.

If you’re familiar with the band, you know what to expect from I Learned the Hard Way – raw, punchy rave-ups and bluesy ballads, all carried by an airtight rhythm section, shot through with bright brass, and topped off with Jones’ exhilarating vocals. You don’t listen to one of these albums expecting surprises; you expect some sweet soul music, and these songs deliver. These aren’t greenhorns imitating the form of those old classics and forgetting the function – like the title says, they learned the hard way. Let ‘em give you a lesson or two. (Daptone 2010)

Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings MySpace page

CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Soul

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Martin Sexton: Sugarcoating

April 1, 2010 / Jeff Giles

RIYL: Bruce Springsteen, The Jayhawks, Joe Henry

Martin Sexton has a small army of devoted fans who spend a lot of time wondering why Martin Sexton isn’t world-famous – which isn’t unusual when it comes to musicians who aren’t world famous, but Sexton’s fans have more of a point than most. He has a sharp songwriter’s eye, he’s a gifted instrumentalist, and he has one of the supplest, most versatile voices in rock ‘n’ roll – seriously, why isn’t this guy world-famous?

Whatever the reasons for Sexton’s continued obscurity, we can at least be glad he hasn’t let it stop him from building one of the more compelling discographies you’ve probably never heard – and his latest release, Sugarcoating, stands shoulder-to-shoulder with his finest work.

More straightforward than 2007’s Seeds, which found Sexton using a one-man band approach to serve up everything from Tuvan singing to a cover of “Will It Go ‘Round in Circles,” Sugarcoating finds Sexton hewing closer to the confessional singer/songwriter end of the spectrum, addressing topics like love, politics, and fatherhood. The arrangements are a little looser and more expansive, thanks to the involvement of a group of musicians that included guitarist Duke Levine, keyboard player Tom West, and Sexton’s sister Colleen, as well as Sexton’s decision to record without rehearsals and keep production to a bare minimum. It’s a warm blanket of an album, one that makes room to display Sexton’s prodigious vocal talent while also delivering some of his strongest material – perhaps most notably the title track, which hurls vicious barbs at the so-called “mainstream media” against a jaunty, country-flavored backdrop that sounds more like Buck Owens than Rage Against the Machine.

If you’re already a fan, Sugarcoating will give you 13 more reasons to love Sexton’s music. If you haven’t yet been inducted to the cult, it’s as good a place as any to start. What’s stopping you? (Kitchen Table 2010)

Martin Sexton MySpace page

CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Folk, Pop, Rock

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Codeine Velvet Club: Codeine Velvet Club

March 30, 2010 / David Medsker

RIYL: The New Pornographers, Nancy Sinatra, John Barry

Here’s the awful truth about life as a musician: when they’re not recording, touring, shooting a video, or doing press – in other words, when they’re not acting like a musician – they get bored, really quickly. It only took Jon Fratelli, lead singer and guitarist from Scottish trio the Fratellis, a couple days of down time after a lengthy tour commitment to get the itch, and before he knew it, we was recording an entire album of ’60s-styled boy/girl pop with a friend of his wife.

All people should be so productive at the brink of exhaustion; the resulting collaboration, Codeine Velvet Club, is a swinging collection of soundtrack music for an imaginary film. (Think Madonna’s I’m Breathless, only cooler, and ballsier.) Fratelli’s partner, chanteuse-in-the-making Lou Hickey, is like a poor man’s Neko Case, but the imperfections of her voice work in her favor more often than not. (Contrary to what the suits would have you believe, personality matters just as much as technique, if not more.) The vampy “Vanity Kills” slinks like a film noir femme fatale, and the charging “I Would Send You Roses” has an unforgettable, if breathless, chorus. Two showstopping ballads anchor the album’s middle, as “Nevada” and “Reste Avec Moi” could both pass for lost Bacharach compositions. The cheeky bastards even did a period-piece cover of the Stone Roses’ “I Am the Resurrection”; amazingly, that works, too.

Codeine Velvet Club is a most pleasant surprise, especially considering it comes hot on the heels of Fratelli’s underwhelming sophomore effort. There’s a statement in here somewhere about how it took a couple Scots to make a good old-fashioned American pop record, but we’re not really in the mood to point fingers – we’re just glad someone still remembers how it’s done. (Dangerbird 2010)

Codeine Celvet Club MySpace page
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'60s, Alternative, Artists, CD QuickTakes, CD Reviews, Pop

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