Tuesday, June 29, 2004
Some brief post-election musings. Good news: I'm very glad the Conservatives didn't eke out a win. Bad news: Ontario decided the election (again) after everyone said it would go down to the final hours during the Western count. Good news: Jim Pankiw was booted out of office. So long, bigot. Bad news: The vote in my riding was split four ways, and the local Conservative canidate scored a fluke win. Good news: The NDP made some big strides last night. Bad news: Nearly all of Saskatchewan went to the Tories, shutting out the NDP. Scary news: Pankiw managed 20% of the vote, exposing a frightening number of idiots in this area. Wonderful news: No more of his slanderous mailouts every week!!!
Back to the tunes...my review of the recent Godsmack cd has appeared. Like I said a few weeks ago, it's not bad, but it really could have been better.
Yeah, it sure was a hectic June, and am I ever glad to have gotten through it with my sanity intact. Thirteen album reviews, my big dumb essay, the monthly huge Stylus thing, and 19 new cd arrivals in all (including the huge Priest box set), which has to be some kind of personal record. It was exhausting, but for the most part, man, it's fun. So anyway, it's fair to assume that my July will be a whole lot mellower, and as a result, the frequency of my posts here will diminish somewhat. That said, something tells me I'll be obsessing about some new cd sooner than later...
Monday, June 28, 2004
It's a huge day for Canadians today, as today's fderal election will prove to be one of the most exciting in ages. Probably in my entire lifetime so far. Make sure you do your part...anyone who shirks their right to vote out of mere apathy doesn't deserve to live in this country. GET OUT AND VOTE!!!
Stephen Harper, you're going down. The majority of Canadians don't want another Mulroney on their hands, and we certainly don't want a leader who's desperate to become another toadie for the Bush administration, one who'll lick Dubya's shoes...that is, if Tony Blair can be pried away first.
And as for you, "Doctor" Jim Pankiw, you obnoxious, racist, bigoted, inept, apathetic, fanatical, extremist, sorry excuse for a Member of Parliament, we have had enough of your hateful mailouts, your complete lack of clout, your complete ignorance of your constituents' needs, your sniveling, your muckraking, your slandering, and your downright PATHETIC and EMBARRASSING representation of this consituency. How can someone who was kicked out of their own party, who has the worst attendance record out of all MPs, and who was voted by his peers as the WORST, most ineffective Member of Parliament, hang on to his job for so long??? Northeast Saskatoon and the surrounding farmland might have a frightening number of gullible simps who are buying into your campaign of hatred, but I'd like to believe that most of us here in this constituency are better, smarter people than that. The time is nigh, pal, the jig is up. We have had enough. Oh, and when you lose tonight, please do let the door hit your butt on the way out. Consider it the kick in the pants tens of thousands of us have been wanting to do for so long.
Sorry, that's three and a half years of frustration that I just let out. Back to the business at hand...
I can't remember the last time I was so exhausted by a concert. Last May's Metallica show was tiring, but more because of the rampant use of pyro than the music. Nah, last night's Manitoba show might have only lasted an hour, but it was an hour of such overwhelming, relentless, euphoric, excruciatingly loud music as I've witnessed in ages. The sheer volume and ferocity of Dan Snaith and his power trio alone had me drenched with sweat at the end.
If you're one of the three people who frequent this blog, you'll know that I'm a huge fan of Manitoba's masterful Up in Flames album, so much so that I made it my 2003 album of the year, and I was indeed aware of how Snaith and his bandmates are trying to take the whole "folktronica" to new levels, incorporating live instrumentation with Snaith's laptop arrangements, and I had heard a full concert this past March recorded for CBC Radio Two. So I knew precisely what to expect. But then, the backing track on the band's sequencer kicked in, Snaith and his drummer sat down on two drumkits, and started slamming away on a frantic double drum solo, and I was nearly blown off-balance. The trio, two on drums, one on guitar, all wearing animal masks, plowed along like a combination of Sonic Youth and Rush. For the rest of the set, all three members were all over the stage, switching instruments left and right: Snaith played drums, keyboards, glockenspiel, sequencer, and some electronic dealy I have no idea what's called; the guitarist played electric and acoustic guitar, keyboards, and mouth organ (the little keyboard you blow into); the drummer flailed wildy on his kit, but also handled acoustic guitar and recorder. Notable performances included "I've Lived on a Dirt Road All My Life", a great, earbleeding version of "Jacknuggeted" (complete with the song's video projected behind the band), a soaring version of "Bijoux", "Crayons", and an absolutely incredible, thunderous version of "Every Time She Turns Round it's her Birthday", which went on and on and on, the double drums careening toward a wild climax. After a very cool encore that had the band improvising over the vocal track from rapper Big L's "Put it On", Snaith exhaustedly confessed the band didn't know any other songs, which was a bit of a relief, because I don't know if I could have taken any more, so pummeling was the entire set. Soaked through my shirt, I walked wearily back to the car, and headed home, windows wide open, the sweet summer night air drying me off. Overwhelming, yes, but also thoroughly satisfying, making me love that silly album of theirs even more. Manitoba's crossing Canada right now...do not miss these guys.
Saturday, June 26, 2004
Got yet another cd in the mail yesterday, the new 2004 CD maxi-single of Strict Machine, by my beloved Goldfrapp. Funny how it sometimes takes a while for a really cool cd to catch on, but it looks like folks in both the UK and the US are starting to pay some attention to the terrific Black Cherry, which as you may or may not know, I was just a leeetle bit crazy about a year ago. These days, it's all about tv commercials, not music videos, as the music channels are all but ignoring the good stuff in favour of corporate pop, and Goldfrapp scored a real coup, as "Tiptoe" was snagged for a Diet Coke ad, and as you probably have seen, both "Strict Machine" and "Train" have been used in some very good Game Boy Advance commercials. People have indeed taken notice, especially with "Strict Machine" leaving folks wondering, "what's that amazing song?", and a few weeks ago, the single hit #1 on the US club charts, which is no small feat. Alison and her band just played Glastonbury, and are slated to appear at other UK festivals, not to mention the new Duran Duran tour, so things are finally looking up.
Anyway, back to this CD thingy here. Mute Records has never been afraid to beat a catchy song to within an inch of its death, Goldfrapp being no exception, as dozens of remixes of Goldfrapp songs have been done over the past four or five years. Strict Machine, consequently, bears a strong similarity to 2001's Utopia EP, as it's absolutely loaded with more than an hour of slick, Goldfrappy fun. You've got the stripped-down single mix of "Strict Machine", a beautiful live performance of "Hairy Trees", and a very freakydeaky B'side called "White Soft Rope", which seems to feature a childrens' choir singing out of key. After that, though, it's strictly (tee hee) remix time, so you'd better like this song, because you're going to get Strict Machined up the yinyang. There's the Rowan Oliver Mix, two mixes by Peter Rauhofer (an intense, almost tranceleike "NYC Mix", and a slightly more laid-back "UK Mix"), and a lengthy treatment by Bebby Benassi, who wields his "Satisfaction" schtick with all the subtlety of Captain Caveman for the umpteenth time (is that all the guy is capable of, nothing but endless, undulating, rumbly synth lines???). Most noteworthy is an all-out epic dance mix by Victor Calderone and Astrid Suryanto, and as the final coup de grace, a terrific, ultra-slick, Giorgio Moroder-inspired mix by Ewan Pearson that isolates several distinct vocal tracks, and mashes them with a pounding synth beat, making the whole exercise sound completely different from the original. The only downer is the fact that the superb "We Are Glitter Mix" has not been included, a brilliantly heavy dose of 70s glam rock that Goldfrapp has recently incorporated into their live sets. It does get a touch repetitive, but overall, a mostly enjoyable disc that fans (like myself) will thoroughly enjoy.
And as much as I love Rachel Stevens' upcoming single "Some Girls", it sure does seem to "borrow" a fair bit from "Strict Machine", doesn't it?
Friday, June 25, 2004
New review time again. Yeah, they're appearing fast and furiously these days. I'm just churning these suckers out. This time around, it's my review of Bohren & der Club of Gore's outstanding album Black Earth. Everyone I've told to listen to this is loving this cd as much as I am. Take my word for it, this is a keeper.
Well, my insane June is nearly over, and I'm glad to say the worst is over. July should be considerably more laid-back. In a week or so, keep your eyes open for my fourth annual Best Albums of the Year So Far blurb...
Thursday, June 24, 2004
I've been doing this blog for three and a half years now, and all this time, I've never mentioned Anthrax, one of the more noteworthy bands during my metal days in the late 80s. They were simply a band who was impossible to hate back then, and while I obessed over the likes of Metallica, Iron Maiden, Megadeth, and Queensryche, I always found time for Anthrax. Yeah, they were a key influence on both thrash metal and the merging of rap and metal, but to me, they were always the lesser band in the highly vaunted "Big Four" of American metal. Still, their music was so much fun, you couldn't resist their stuff.
In my mind, though, Anthrax never put out a truly classic album. Like Slayer's debut Show No Mercy, 1984's Fistful of Metal was a very faithful Judas Priest clone, but unlike Slayer's album, Anthrax just didn't sound confident, as they slogged through a bunch of metal-by-numbers tunes. Only "Metal Thrashing Mad" provided some thrills, thanks to Charlie Benante's driving beat and Neil Turbin's Halfordesque screams. When Turbin departed, things changed drastically, as new singer Joey Belladonna completely changed the dynamic of the band, his fantastic vocal range allowing Anthrax to stretch its sound out a bit further, something you hear begin to take shape on the Armed & Dangerous EP, and especially the 1985 breakthrough Spreading the Disease, led by the melodic "Madhouse" and "Medusa", not to mention the Maiden-like "Armed and Dangerous". 1987's Among the Living would prove to be the band's finest album, buoyed by the classics "Caught in a Mosh" and "I Am the Law", not to mention the goofy, yet sincere "Indians". Everything just came together well for the band, as even their one-off novelty rap-metal EP I'm the Man did shockingly well on the charts. When 1988's State of Euphoria came along, though, the band was reduced to self-parody, as their trademark funny, cartoony image seemed to be emphasized more than the music, something you heard on the record, as only "Be All End All" and the cover of Trust's "Antisocial" held up. By the time the 90s rolled around, the band got its groove back with the superbly heavy Persistence of Time, but by then, I was drifting away from Anthrax, and metal in general, and despite such good trakcs as "Belly of the Beast" and the potent cover of Joe Jackson's "Got the Time", I soon lost interest. In 1992, I did hear Sound of White Noise, the first album with ex-Armored saint vocalist (and personal fave of mine) John Bush, but the music failed to impress me at all, and I basically ignored Anthrax for the next decade.
Wiich brings us to the present day. Over the past five years, my metal passion has returned with a vengeance, but still, Anthrax has been pretty much forgotten during my own personal metal renaissance. All this while, the band had been soldiering along with their no-frills metal, delivering album after album, and shocking many like yours truly with the success of 2003's We've Come For You All. So this past spring, they've put out a combination live album and concert dvd, so I leaped at the chance to revisit a band I was once so fond of. And whaddya know, but I'm loving this thing to bits.
To put it bluntly, Music of Mass Destruction is an eye-opener, both an intense reminder of just how good this band still is, as well as a testament to the band's ultra-loyal following. Just listen to that Chicago crowd go nuts during "What Doesn't Die", as they shout out the chorus in impassioned unison. The band simply tears through a taut, fiery set, the songs coming mainly from the 90s, Bush-era albums, but with some oldies thrown in as well. Bush does a great job on songs like "Got the Time", "Caught in a Mosh", and "I Am the Law"...I've always thought he's one of the best metal singers around, going all the way back to the first Armored Saint album. As for the new stuff, the band has converted me. Songs like "Safe Home", "Refuse to Be Denied", "Fueled", and even "Only", the 1992 single that failed to win me over way back when.
The dvd is even more fun. Whereas the hour-long cd only has 12 songs, the dvd has the entire set, and is very well filmed, putting you right in the middle of the extremely intense action in the tiny club. Notable songs we're treated to that didn't make the cd include "Belly of the Beast", "Indians", "Be All End All", the raucous cover of Public Enemy's "Bring the Noise, and best of all, the special bonus performance of "Metal Thrashing Mad", which is a real treat for us old-schoolers. Not only does the concert look and sound great, but there are tons of bonus features, including two multi-angle songs, an extensive interview with comic book artist Alex Ross (who did the cool cover art), and four terrific short films profiling each member of the band. You get to see the always likeable Charlie Benante go shopping for collectibles (the dude knows his comics and horror flicks), John Bush have fun with his buds in his bar at home, guitarist Scott Ian show clips from the band's tours while providing some very funny commentary, and as one of the best "new guy" initiations I've ever seen, an extensive clip of new lead guitarist Rob Caggiano caught in various extremely embarrassing situations (including an hilarious clip of him eating three quarters of an, erm, "doctored" Subway sandwich before muttering, "There's something wrong with my sandwich").
Only two original members remain with the band (longtime bassist Frank Bello, who joined in 1985 after the departure of Dan Lilker, left the band early this year), but it's more than clear that the proverbial fire still burns. This cd/dvd combination is one of the best bargains I have come across in a long time, a real treat for all Anthrax fans, as the band has presented a heartfelt gift to everyone who has stood by them. As for those of us unfortunate souls like myself who have missed out on Anthrax over the past ten years, this marvelous live album is guaranteed to re-ignite the love for this great band we had thought was long gone. As they sing, "One more place at the table/Always room for one more." Skooch over, boys. I'm coming back...for good, this time.
Wednesday, June 23, 2004
My review of the good new Tangiers album is now up. Go take a look, and go give the album a listen. It's a big improvement over their first one.
I finally got to see Live Forever: The Rise and Fall of Britpop ondvd tonight. I was really looking forward to seeing the documentary, since I followed whole UK music very obsessively from 1994-1998 (as many others here have, too), with so much great music, so many great stories, but what surprised me was just how empty this film felt at the end. It glossed over everything, and only scrathed the surface. You have all these people saying how great this time was, but you're given very few reasons why it was such a great time...it's as if the director's just shrugging his shoulders and saying, "I guess you hadda be there." Too many quick edits, not enough focus on music (crucial Brit artists like Elastica, PJ Harvey, Tricky, The Prodigy, Radiohead, and many, many others were completely ignored), and far, far too much emphasis on Noel Gallagher, who's not exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer. There were good parts, the background stories like Spike Island and the Thatcher 80s, for instance, as well as Tony Blair's shameless embracing of Britpop during his 96-97 campaign, but the rest just felt too hollow. Interviews focused on Gallagher, who obvliously relished being the centre of attention, and Damon Albarn, who was in full "I don't give a crap" mode. Only Jarvis Cocker and Louise Wener offered some real insight, and the clips wth 3D weren't nearly long enough. Rent this one, don't buy it. Maybe Michael Winterbottom should do a docudrama on the Britpop glory days, a sequel of sorts to 24 Hour Party People...
Oh, and Happy Birthday, Erin!
Tuesday, June 22, 2004
I'm about three months late with this, but my review of Broken Social Scene's fine odds & sods collection Bee Hives appeared yesterday. Well, better late than never. It's a good cd..."Backyards" will feature prominently on any best of 2004 mix cd's I happen to make, if I ever get to make them...
Got one of the four new Bjork live albums yesterday. First off, I have to say that it's mind-boggling how Bjork continues to gouge her fans by putting out box sets, DVDs, best-of collections, etc. over and over over the past couple years...if you consider yourself a "loyal" fan, you'd better be ready to fork out the cash. Released last year as a four-CD + DVD box set, the single discs are now available individually. It's an interesting idea, as each disc documents the lovely Ms. Gudmudsdottir in various phases of her career. A pretty good idea, albeit a sloppy one.
I chose Post Live because of my longtime affection for Bjork's 1995 Post album, which I've always found to be her most immediately charming, not to mention stylistically varied, thanks to songs like "Isobel", "It's Oh So Quiet", "I Miss You", and my own personal favourite, "Hyper-Ballad". Post Live compiles live performances from 1996 and 1997, with nine tracks coming from her February 1997 concert at London's Shepherd's Bush, the other four tracks lifted from various television appearances. On the opening track "Headphones", Bjork starts to sing too early, a bit of an indication of just how bumpy this album is. It's only a minor glitch, as she and her six piece band really settle in quickly, delivering a fiery "Army of Me", a beautiful accordion-and-tabla performance of "The Modern Things", a stirring version of "Isobel", and most noticeably, a rendition of Debut's "Big Time Sensuality" that's more of a hyperactive, jungle interpretation than the original, bouncy single version. As for the TV performances, they're a bit more inconsistent, as "Hyper-Ballad" (from Later...With Jools Holland) is gorgeous, but "It's Oh So Quiet" is disappointingly limp, the horn section totally lacking any of the punch that the album version has, as it sticks out uncomfortably among the other tracks on the album. It's still a very enjoyable disc, as the Shepherd's Bush performances show Bjork and her band on fire (not to mention the outstanding sound of the live recording), but the album should have been longer than the mere 54 minutes, or even better, presenting the London concert in its entirety. Imperfect in the end, but Bjork is so darn hard to hate, it's still worthwhile, just so you can her her stretch that phenomenal voice of hers. I want to get the Homogenic Live CD now...
Monday, June 21, 2004
What a week, as I've completely been immersing myself in two of the best anthologies of 2004. I can't say enough about Judas Priest's Metalogy...it is as close to perfect as a box set compilation can get. Peek over at my top five in the left margin, where I've listed my five all-time esseintial Priest tunes. If you're new to the Priest, download those tracks, and if you like, go buy the Metalogy set, posthaste!
Okay, time to talk about the other great new anthology I've been obsessed with, the one by The Fall. If you asked any obsessive Fall fan (is there any other kind?) just what their favorite song is, or what album is the best place for beginners to start, they'd give a different answer every time. This is a band who has released something around 50 singles, 25 studio albums, and dozens and dozens of live albums and compilations since 1977, so looking for a album to start off with is so daunting, most just give up, thinking it's not worth the effort. Sure, there's the smaller singles collection and last year's compilation of their stuff recorded for the Rough Trade label, but no attempt at a quality, definitive best-of compilation. Thanks to Beggars banquet, however, at long last we have the very first career-spanning Fall anthology, the ironically-titled 50,000 Fans Can't Be Wrong: 39 Golden Greats. It's exactly what many curious Fall newbies need, as every phase of Mark E. Smith's long career is documented, the tracks neatly laid out on chronological fashion, comprising one of the finest best-of compilations that I Have come across in years.
Fans will definitely bicker about what was left off on this album (I can hear the complaints about the omission of "I Am Damo Suzuki" right now), but this double cd isn't for them, it's strictly intended for beginners, and although some noteworthy songs are indeed left off, you simply can't argue with the selections here. You've got the dark "Fiery Jack", the caffeinated intensity of "Totally Wired", and Hex Enduction Hour's spectacular "The Classical", an intense, double drum-propelled jam inspired by both the Velvet Underground and Can. From the infamous "Brix years" (when Smith's wife was part of the band from 1983-89), you have the jittery "Kicker Conspiracy", and the insanely catchy "C.R.E.E.P.", with Brix's backing vocal melody, and a synth melody that's actually gorgeous. "Cruiser's Creek", from 1985's This Nation's Saving Grace is one of the band's finest moments, with its thunderous drum beat and the cool Stooges guitar riffs, while the great "Hit the North" sounds downright anthemic, while the 1988 cover of The Kinks' "Victoria" is their most immediately endearing tune. It's a pleasure to see their post-1990 output so well-represented, too, such tracks as "High Tension Line", the ska tinged "Why Are People Grudgeful?" (with the snarky wordplay of "different/death for rent"), "M5", and the flat-out terrific "Touch Sensitive".
Really, if you've always wanted to know just what all the fuss was about The Fall, seek out this compilation immediately. I guarantee you'll be inspired to delve deeper into this band's massive catalogue. Instead of being one of those best-of albums that you buy just so you can say that yes, you have a record by these guys, this cd serves as a primer, allowing you to choose which album to listen to next. Like the Judas Priest set, this one is highly, highly recommended.
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
My review of the heavily hyped new album by The Killers appeared yesterday. It's been quite a while since I've been as annoyedby an album as I am with this one. It's just a wasted opportunity, as it gets off to such a fantastic start, and then, poof. Do not buy this album. I mean it, stay away. Download the five good songs (no, I'm not going to tell you which ones, go look at my review to see which ones...I'm too tired), slap 'em on a mix cd, and forget the rest.
Sad, sad news about Johnny Ramone. It's gutwrenching to have seen what's happened to one of my favourite bands over the last three years. You hang in there, Johnny.
When I'm not fine-tuning this gorilla of an essay of mine (no, I'm not going into details, I'm too darn tired), or watching Euro 2004, or digging the new Judas Priest box set (so incredibly awesome, I'll be gushing about this thing for weeks, months even), I've been enjoying the brand new anthology by one of the greatest post punk bands ever, The Fall. I'll post more thoughts on it when I'm more awake, but I am so completely smitten with the first disc, which covers Mark E. Smith's output from 1978 to 1985. The world needed this anthology badly. You've got to like the cover art, which slyly rips off the original, which also happened to inspire this cover, and this one, and this one, and this one, too.
Tuesday, June 15, 2004
My review of the Kill Rock Stars compilation Tracks and Fields is now up. An excellent collection of the best of today's indie rock...if you listen to this double cd, I guarantee you'll find at least one new favourite band.
Quick, go download the new Pixies song! So what do I think of "Bam Thwok"? It's as fun and goofy as its title, the most upbeat Pixies recording we've heard since, when...Doolittle, perhaps? Don't get me wrong, it doesn't match any of their classic stuff, but it's a very enjoyable little tune sung by Kim Deal. The whole feel of the song reminds me of when I saw them two months ago, how they were all smiles, joking around, laughing, enjoying the ecstatic crowd's reception. This song sounds just as jubilant...it's all there in Deal's lyrics: "I can hear
the buzz and modulations of the universe/But you're the first to make me feel it/I love the universe/I love all the listeners/Watch it/Here's fifty thousand watts of good will."
Well, my extremely busy week just got a whole lot busier, as yesterday I received the mother of all distractions: the new Judas Priest Metalogy box set. This thing is a metalhead's dream...how on earth am I supposed to finish my huge essay now, with this thing calling to me at all hours??? It's gonna take some willpower, though I'm not exercising any right now!
This anthology is incredible. I've loved Priest for 20 years now (eee-yikes, I'm old), but I've always thought that there are few Judas Priest albums that are really great enough to deem essential. Among those, I've always thought Sad Wings of Destiny, Stained Class, Hell Bent For Leather, and Defenders of the Faith were the four best albums in the band's huge catalogue, and the rest of their records, while for the most part being good, were too flawed to call classics. So when I first saw the tracklisting for Metalogy back in February, I knew this would be the set to have, as the band has finally culled the best material from all their albums to provide a definitive career overview. With four cd's and one dvd, there's over six and a half hours' worth of scorching METAL, making this not only one of the best metal box set compilations , but one of the best I have ever seen, period.
Disc One covers Priest's key Seventies period, where, along with Rainbow and the Scorpions, they led the second wave of heavy metal, on the heels of Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin, and right before the important New Wave of British Heavy Metal. After a token nod to 1974's Rocka Rolla, you're hit with three tracks from the important 1976 album Sad Wings of Destiny, including "Tyrant", "Deceiver", and a searing live performance of the timeless "Victim of Changes", from the Unleashed in the East album. Sin After Sin gives us the awesome "Sinner" and the ultraheavy "Dissident Aggressor" (which was covered by Slayer in 1988), but it's the music from 1978's Stained Class that wins out on this disc, especially the sinister cover of "Better By You, Better Than Me" and arguably their greatest ever song, "Beyond the Realms of Death", the intricate arrangements of the latter having a huge influence on younger bands like Diamond Head and Iron Maiden.
The second disc chronicles the band's rise in America in the early Eighties, as they veered away from the ambitious, operatic style of their first four albums, simplifying their sound for American radio, while at the same time remaining brutally heavy. Hell Bent For Leather is an album I've always preferred over the much more popular British Steel, with such songs as the thrashy title track, "Delivering the Goods", the insanely goofy "Take on the World", and "Killing Machine". Along with British Steel highlights like "Metal Gods" and "Living After Midnite", there are the Point of Entry standouts "Desert Plains" and "Heading Out to the Highway".
Disc Three covers Priest at their absolute commercial peak. There's (a very inconsistent album, in my books), a whopping eight selections from the ultra-heavy Defenders of the Faith (only the lacklustre "Heavy Duty/Defenders of the Faith" is left off), and four tracks from the ill-advised sellout album Turbo, including "Out in the Cold", a song off that lousy album I've always loved. The fourth cd revisits the disastrous Ram it Down, their worst album, their 1990 comeback album Painkiller (how awesome a song is "Painkiller"?), as well as a kind nod to their Ripper Owens years, with four selections featuring the erstwhile singer.
The bonus live dvd is a stunner, the highlight of the entire set, as we're treated to the full concert videotaped in Memphis in late 1982 during the Vengeance tour, which has been out of print for decades. It's an incredible performance, a snapshot of Priest at the peak of their powers, as they tear through "newer" Vengeance songs, as well as classics like "Victim of Changes", "Sinner", and "The Ripper". The picture quality is amazing, and the improved audio mix is in both two channel stereo and five channel surround sound.
There are some nitpicky gripes about the track selection, such as the stunning omission of the great Sad Wings melodrama "The Ripper", as well as weak live performances of "Green Manalishi" and "Love Bites", which pale in comparison with the original versions. Still, those are minor, minor complaints, as the band has done a brilliant job choosing songs (The tepid Priest...Live! is left out, and bless those boys, neither "Locked In", nor "Johnny B. Goode" are on the set!). The set is beautifully designed, a black 7"x7" box, with a very nice full colour book with detailed notes, a good essay, and a nice timeline and discography. The cd's are unfortunately stored in cheesy cardboard sleeves, which is kind of annoying, but with a marvelous box set like this, that's a very minor complaint.
Overall, it's pretty much as good as a "best-of" box set can get, and if you have yet to buy any of the recent remastered albums, or if you're new to the band and have no idea where to start, you must have this set. Save your money, beg your parents or significant other this set for your birthday or Christmas...just make sure you have this glorious collection in your hands before the end of the year. When you finally get it, sit back, crank the stereo, and behold the power of the mighty Priest.
Monday, June 14, 2004
"The incomplete triangle's three sides face a reflective horizon.
Its three sided face disappears into a black mirror.
You can often times only see the rope that ties it together."
So says the enigmatic quote on the front of the promo copy of The Incomplete Triangle, by the equally enigmatic Miami artists' collective, Lansing-Dreiden. Staging multimedia exhibits in galleries instead of playing gigs in clubs, this isn't your usual indie band, as their own mission statement so obtusely declares: "Lansing-Dreiden is a company that sees no distinction between art and commerce -- or anything else. Hence, the output of the organization may manifest itself in various forms, from video to music to product design to the construction of narratives. All Lansing-Dreiden projects are fragmentary, mere stones in a path whose end lies in a space where the very definition of 'path' paths." Yeah, I'm as baffled as you are. This is one extremely pretentious group of people, and normally, such a project would hardly be something that I'd be so ecstatic about, if the music wasn't so darn spectacular.
The Incomplete Triangle, fittingly, is divided into thirds, as each of the three sections are wildly different from the next, but somehow, there's a consistency to it all that makes the album so compelling. The opening section is a flat-out, relentless assault that brilliantly blends metal and electro, something best exemplified on the loud, frantic "The Eternal Lie" (which boasts an extremely catchy, Golden Earring-style vibe), and the ambitious "The Advancing Flags", whose synth melodies sound eerily close to the melodic guitar harmonies of Iron Maiden.
The second section veers into a more ethereal, introspective shoegazer style, anchored by the surprisingly tender love song "A Silent Agreement" and the beautiful "Laid in Stone", which takes that Slowdivee kind of sound, and throws in touches of Sixties psychedelia and smooth, lush, Scott Walker style production. The ambient "An Effect of the Night", with its layers of synths and soft vocal harmonies, serves as the perfect segue into the final section. The jubilant "Glass Corridor" shifts abruptly into new wave territory, as its funky synths, guitars, and bouncy electronic beats mimic the music of New order perfectly, a great little dance track. The jittery synth dance of "I.C.U." and "Disenchanted" veer into Depeche Mode territory, pulling that off just as well, too, while the ultra-smooth "Desert Lights" sounds like a Harold Faltermeyer movie score composition, as the song's Bernard Sumner-style lead vocal melody brings the album to a wonderful, rosy-hued conclusion.
The album isn't quite that straightforward, though. Just listen to those otherworldly Brian Wilson-style vocal harmonies meshing with loud guitar on "Metal on a Gun"...but wait, there's also a funky little guitar riff hidden in the mix, a loping Madchester bassline, a touch of Jesus & Mary Chain style distortion-meets-bubblegum...the depth on this cd is astonishing. The lyrics on the album waver skilfully between the simple and profound ("What we're working for, an 'increase,' is it falsified?/A wage, misunderstood as good despite the truth") and the extremely oblique ("The question was posed in a binary tone/Control the gears that control the relevance of the throne"). At first, you think they're sincere, and then on the next song, they're pulling your leg, making for an unsettling experience.
When you focus strictly on the music of The Incomplete Triangle, ignoring all the extraneous stuff (the corporate satire, the baffling "interviews", the whole art gallery thing), you're hit by just how musically rich this album is, as the three themes of aggression, introspection, and jubilation come to mind over everything else. I don't know if I'll ever fully grasp the whole geometrical theories behind this record, but what is clear is the fact that this is by far the best indie rock album of the year so far.
Saturday, June 12, 2004
I just love it when I get a cd by a band I've never heard of, I pop it in the stereo, and from straight out of left field, it absolutely bowls me over. Before five days ago, I had no freakin' idea who, or what, Atreyu is, but now, I do know that these guys are a surprisingly good band, and their new album The Curse, besides boasting one of the best cover photos in recent memory, is one of the best metal/punk/whatever releases this year. So what are they like? Well, they combine the crunchy hardcore riffs of Hatebreed, the overwrought vocals and energy of screamo standouts Funeral For a Friend, and the melodic riffs and solos of Swedish metal heroes In Flames, and, unbelievably, touches of Husker Du, which almost made me fall off my chair. Guitarists Dan Jacobs and Travis Miguel prove to be the band's most important asset, as they deliver some actual creativity in their playing, with some Iron Maiden-esque solo harmonies, plenty of shredding solos, and hints of Scandinavian metal in their intricate, tightly-executed riffs, punctuated by some surprisingly intricate playing by drummer Brandon Saller and bassist Marc McKnight. But Husker Du, you ask? Yeah that's right...they have a cool little formula going here, as vocalist/lyricist Alex Varkatzas screams his way during the verses, and then from out of nowhere, in comes drummer/singer Brandon Saller, with a smooth, strong voice that totally smacks of Grant Hart, singing punk-infused melodies that sound straight off Zen Arcade or New Day Rising. Although the lyrics to the songs aren't anything to get excited about, The Curse is very solid throughout...standout tracks include "Bleeding Mascara", "The Crimson", "Five Vicodin Chased With a Shot of Clarity" (now there's a classic screamo title), and the stupendous trifecta of "The Remembrance Ballad", "An Interlude", and "Corseting". Most intriguing is the first single, "Right Side of the Bed", which possesses some terrific Teutonic metal riffs that seem swiped straight off Accept's Metal Heart album, as Saller chimes in with the catchiest melody on the album. It's a fantastic song, with a real pop sense, sounding fresh, while still displaying reverence for traditional metal, something rarely heard in young American metal bands. The album comes out on June 29, and if you're looking for good new metal that is both ambitious and catchy, you have to hear this one. Many, many thanks to Heather for thinking I'd like this, and being absolutely right.
Friday, June 11, 2004
I just noticed that a web advertisement for Bob Dylan's Live 1964 album just happens to contain a quote from a review by yours truly. That has never happened before.
I've been so busy, but I have every intention of doing my somewhat-in-depth look at the Lansing-Dreiden album sometime in the next couple of days. The critical shredding the record received at the hands of Pitchfork irked me just a little bit. Stay tuned.
Well, I got in my first several listens to the new Killers album, Hot Fuss, today, but not without some effort, and not to mention some moments of extreme rage. The fine folks at Island have supplied geeks like me with a cheesy CD-R of the album...which is fine, I'll take that any time, but this one has a stupid anti-copying dealy in it as well, so my stereo actually refused to read the dumb thing, something it's never done before. Popped it in the computer, same thing. Went to the living room, slapped it in the stereo down there, and yes, it worked. However, I like to listen to albums while at the computer, especially ones I have to listen to at least a dozen times over a few days, so I thought, "oh well, I'll just make a tape for now." So I started recording, and the confounded tape deck didn't want to record properly. I was at my wit's end, but in the end, I solved my problem by hooking up the console from my old portable stereo to my receiver upstairs by the computer. Weird how old cd players from the pre-CD-R era seem to be more accepting of burned cd's than the newer machines. I hate technology sometimes...
So, after all that fuss and burning rage, how is Hot Fuss? You know what, it's strange. On the first listen, I was loving the album, but by the third time, I was already growing tired of half of it. How to describe it...you know how American television always steals clever British program ideas and takes the formula for the show completely over the top, making it gaudy, bloated, and annoying? (think Trading Spaces vs. Changing Rooms) Well, that's what The Killers have done, they've taken a good musical idea that's been successful in the UK, namely the dance-fueled post punk of Franz Ferdinand, and blown it up, Oasis style, with a huge, booming, music-for-the-masses sound, with roaring riffs that echo both New order, U2, and Oasis and a very propulsive dance beat, and if that weren't enough, a gospel choir, for crying out loud. It's absolutely shameless. But still, at least five songs are so good, they're able to withstand, and sometimes overcome, the overproduction and cheesy effects. At the forefront is the absolutely, erm, killer single "Somebody Told Me" (which was featured in my weekly top five a while back), which is currently gaining momentum on mainstream rock radio, with those great "hoo-hoo-ooh"'s and that great chorus of, "Somebody told me you have a boyfriend who looks like a girlfriend that I had in February of last year." Then there's the 80s Britpop of the endearingly maudlin "Jenny Was a Friend of Mine", the utterly gorgeous (and current UK single) "Mr. Brightside", which would fit on the soundtrack to a John Hughes movie, the smooth synth pop of "Smile Like You Mean It", and best of all, the dance-oriented "On Top", which is really like nothing else on the album, just a very well-executed blast of Duran Duran style pop. After that, though, ugh, the music gets too glossy to bear at times (that choir in "All These Things That I Have Done" is unbearable). Out of all the members if the band, it's bassist Mark Stoermer who emerges as The Killers' secret weapon, as he delivers proficient imitations of the distinctive basslines of Duran Duran's John Taylor. I still haven't completely decided where I am with this album, but I certainly cannot deny the slick, instant pleasures of half of this album, anyway. The album comes out next week...for the time being, download those five tracks, and enjoy them until you get sick of them.
Got another new cd yesterday, Shout Factory's new Bob Dylan tribute compilation, Dylan Country. Dylan's influence on twentieth century music was so immense, it's interesting that in the past year, there has been an album of blues interpretations of Dylan classics, an album of gospel performances, and now, country. The blues album was a bit of a dud, and the gospel album was spectacular...thankfully, the country album is every bit as great as the latter. There are tons and tons of country performances of Dylan songs, but they've done a superb job with this cd, culling material, ranging from 1966 to the late Nineties. You've got Johnny Cash adding his "Ring of Fire" mariachi horns to "It Ain't Me, Babe", a surprisingly beautiful rendition of "Girl From the North Country" by the obscure Country Gentlemen, Buck Owens' tender performance of "Love Minus Zero", and the always great Emmylou Harris doing "When I Paint My Masterpiece". The entire album is great, but the real standouts are the duet by Peter Otroushko and Norman Blake on the plaintive "Restless Farewell", the stunning "Boots of Spanish Leather" by Nanci Griffith, The Byrds' Sweetheart of the Rodeo classic "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere", and Kitty Wells' lovely "Forever Young". This cd is in stores now (I just saw it the other day), and like the gospel record, is an absolute must for Dylan fans.
I don't know what surprised me more, the fact that I thoroughly enjoyed Calendar Girls, or that Anthrax has a cameo in the movie. What a weird, weird, weird combination.
Which reminds me, I haven't talked about the great new Anthrax live cd/dvd yet! Nor the new Otep album! Oh man, I'm falling behind here...
Wednesday, June 9, 2004
New review today: Patterson Hood's dark, dismal Killers and Stars album. It's a good one, but I'd recommend this one to devoted Drive-By Truckers fans more than, say, someone new to the DBT. And you know, it's so bleak and rough, I don't know how many times I'll be taking this cd out and listening to it. I'm enjoying the Andre Ethier album so much more, which is just as lyrically bleak and recorded just as quicky, but has so much more life...
Also, I forgot to mention my review of the fun new Young Heart Attack album, which appeared on Monday. I'm so dumb, I didn't even notice it there until late that day. You know what, I was perusing the used bin over at my town's best record store, and I saw a pristine promo copy of Mouthful of Love sitting in the New Arrivals section, for only 10 bucks. What kind of heartless monster would abandon such a fun, catchy album like that? Whoever you are, sir or madam, you are dead inside. For shame. I hope someone buys it real soon...it's quite a find, and supercheap, to boot.
Well, I had no idea that Ash's brilliant lead guitarist, Charlotte Hatherley, was embarking on a solo career, but whaddy know, her new single is out, and what a shocker it is. It's called "Kim Wilde", and it's a deliriously bouncy blend of Ash's driving guitar pop with tons of eccentric synth and vocal melodies (think Metric). It's such a crazy little song, with a gazillion things going on all at once, like The New Pornographers on crystal meth, and nothing but pure, summery fun. Go to her official site, and download the mp3 for free at once.
So why have I not mentioned the new !!! yet? Well, because it's a disappointment. Not that Louden Up Now is awful, mind you, but that it's so ordinary (kind of like my reaction to the PJ Harvey album last week). Sure, songs like "Dear Can" and "Pardon My Freedom" are great, but what really upset me was how the band totally copped out and made last summer's single "Me & Giuliani Down By the School Yard (A True Story)" the centrepiece of the album. It's all well and good for people discovering !!! for the first time, but for the rest of us, especially those of us who bought the original cd single (myself included), it's a waste of time, especially when you learn that over the past year, the band hasn't even come close to matching the psychotic brilliance of that one song. So if you don't have the single, sure, go buy the album, it's decent enough...but if you do have the cd single, don't bother paying for this one, believe me.
Over the past twelve months, I've been slowly, gradually gravitating towards the music of Scissor Sisters. As I mentioned in my March 1, 2004 entry (see the archive on the right), I first heard their disco version of Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb", and the song just wouldn't go away; by the time I heard other songs like the awesome 70s AM radio style ballad "Mary" and the incredible Elton John-goes-falsetto of "Take Your Mama Out", I was dumbfounded. Here's a band with not only a campy sense of humour, but with some real musical talent as well. Finally, I have their new self-titled album, and what a killer one it is. If you're not familiar with this saucy quintet yet, try to picture a combination of Fischerspooner, The Darkness, and Junior Senior. Or, if that comparison doessn't work, think Elton John meets the Bee Gees meets uh, oh, I don't know, Sweet, perhaps. The album is exuberant ("Take Your Mama Out"), trashy ("Lovers in the Backseat"), tender ("Mary"), tongue in cheek ("Music is the Victim"), and sleazy ("Filthy Gorgeous")...and AMG is right: "Lovers in the Backseat" totally smacks of Wham!'s "Everything She Wants". The band's sound is refreshingly organic (unlike Fischerspooner), not to mention very versatile, and vocalists Jake Shears and Ana Mantronic can really sing, too. It's nothing but pure, uproarious fun, and it looks like I have yet another contender for my year-end list. Go get this album!
Monday, June 7, 2004
Sad to hear that Robert Quine, one of the best rock guitarists from the past thirty years, passed away this past weekend. If you're in your late twenties or early thirties, and are not familiar with with the name, you are likely very familiar with the work he did with Matthew Sweet, namely his early 90s hit "Girlfriend". That said, Quine proved to be a very versatile musician, first as a member of early punks Richard Hell & the Voidoids, as well as working with the likes of Tom Waits, Lou Reed, and many, many others. The mere fact that Quine played on "The Blank Generation" and "Downtown Train" makes the guy extremely cool in my books.
On a more cheery note, yay, Stylus's I Love 1993 begins its five-day run today. Be sure to catch today's installment, it's a good one (shameless plug: there are lots of contributions from yours truly).
So you're probably wondering why I put a W.A.S.P. song on my weekly top five list over there in the left margin. Most of you probably remember W.A.S.P. as the band who were the whipping boys of the PMRC (Parents Music Resource Council), thanks to such attention-grabbing concert stunts as drinking blood from a skull, codpieces that shot fireworks, flinging raw meat into the crowd, pretending to slice up a scantily clad young woman tied to a rack, those famous sawblades, and of course, the most notorious metal single of the early 80s, the great "Animal (F**k Like a Beast)". Well, the novelty of the whole Alice Cooper-meets-Kiss gimmick didn't last long, as we all forgot about the band as the 1990s came along, but to his credit, W.A.S.P. mastermind Blackie Lawless has soldiered on, consistently delivering new material, making him one of the most resilient and prolific of all the rockers who emerged from Los Angeles in the 80s. The Neon God Part 1 is W.A.S.P.'s eleventh studio album, and an ambitious one it is, as Lawless revisits the ultra-heavy, highly theatrical sounds of 1988's The Headless Children and 1990's The Crimson Idol. A concept album chronicling the rise of a young messiah with the ability to manipulate the minds of the masses, the storyline gets a bit garbled and complex, but the album is saved by the music, which is Lawless's strongest work in years. Tunes like "Wishing Well", "Red Room of the Rising Sun" (which cleverly pays homage to The Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows", "XTC Riders", and the passionate "The Raging Storm" are all exceptional, with tremendous vocal work by the gravelly-throated Lawless, but the real keeper here is the epic "Sister Sadie", which thunders along at a relentless pace, sounding like a cross between Iron Maiden and Uriah Heep. Part Two of this story will be released later this year, and I sure hope it sounds as great as Part One.
Also, you might be curious as to why I put an entire EP in my current top five, which usually features songs only. Well, when you listen to the debut EP by San Diego's The Locust, you realise that it's not so much an EP, than a truly psychotic, crazed, nine track, five minute, grindcore suite. When you listen to The Locust today, it's tempting to lazily categorize them among other great experimental hardcore bands like Daughters and Ex Models, but upon closer listen, they're something entirely different. The band's self-titled debut seven inch single, originally released in 1997, has become an underground success story, selling 15,000 vinyl copies to date, and thanks to Gold Standard Laboratories, it's now available on CD for the first time, remastered, and complete with two bonus tracks (which extends the running time to a whopping seven and a half minutes!). The Locust fuse the adventurous synth sounds of Devo and the progressive melodies of Frank Zappa with extreme grindcore, making for a listening experience you will never forget. Keyboards stab you like rusty daggers, guitar, bass, and frenetically beaten drums pummel you relentlessly, and barely understandable lyrics are shrieked; it's a kind of controlled chaos that is masterfully executed, and is absolutely enthralling to listen to. That's the best I can describe this thing, really. Packaged as a snazzy little three inch CD, this is a minor masterpiece that has to be heard to be believed. You need this one in your CD collection, believe me.
Sunday, June 6, 2004
My review of Melissa Auf der Maur's solo debut is up this weekend. Like I said a couple weeks ago, it has its flaws, its lack of originality dangerously close to annoying, but I still can't help but like it. The whole combination of stoner rock, goth, and that nice voice of hers, I'm just a sucker for it all.
So I went and caught Girl Nobody's brief, 40 minute or so set last night, in a shockingly sparsely populated venue, especially for a warm summer Saturday night (where the heck was everybody? Moping about the stupid Flames?). The band had their share of trouble with monitors and amps, not to mention a few theremin hassles, but once they got the problems fixed (somewhat), they really sounded terrific, especially "Sirens", Aliens", and "Paperdoll". The album translates very well live, the band members switching instruments left and right, and there's the singer Marta, who's a very beguiling presence up there (and who doesn't love the sound of a Rhodes piano late at night?). I only wish they played longer (no "Smile and Beware", sadly)...we'll have to wait until the next time they cross the country, I guess. So get out and see this band, why don't you, and go buy their awesome cd! Their currently heading eastward...don't miss them, like the idiots who did in this town (and don't get me started on the cluelessness of the local rag of a newspaper). This band is going places, I tell you.
And on a related note, go here to listen to two excellent remixes of Girl Nobody's "Cages" (real player required). The Lemon8 remix has actually been touted by none other than Paul Oakenfold, apparently...
Friday, June 4, 2004
I've finally heard the new PJ Harvey album, the gutturally titled Uh Huh Her, and I'm saddened to say it's turned out to be quite the disappointment. It's not that I hate her return to the more laid-back, rawer style on this record, it's just that the songs are at times, very, very dull, the melodies too morose to care about. There are some good ones..."The Letter" is one of her steamiest songs ever, and her lyric writing has never been better ("It turns me on to imagine your blue eyes on my words"), and the album picks up some steam further on ("The Slow Drug", "Cat on the Wall", "You Come Through"), but the overall effect is still underwhelming, and slightly annoying, especially when Harvey teases you with a painfully brief interlude like "No Child of Mine", which has a great hook, but sounds like an abandoned work-in-progress, a waste of a very pretty melody.
I listened to Uh Huh Her, and immediately put in her masterful 2000 album Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea, which I loved (and continue to), and there's no comparison, none at all. Every single track on Stories... destroys most of Harvey's new material; she sounds so inspired, so passionate on that cd, and the production is terrific. Sometimes there's nothing wrong with slick production, as Stories... proves. I agree with the Guardian's lukewarm review, that Uh Huh Her is like Radiohead's snoozefest Hail to the Thief. It'll be an album that will sit on your shelf, and rarely be played. I was so looking forward to buying this album next Tuesday, but now, there's no way I'll buy it. What a let-down.
Thursday, June 3, 2004
Hey, I'm briefly mentioned in this week's edition of John Sakamoto's Anti-Hit List, which I've been reading every week for nine years. Check the #4 entry...
Way back this past January, while driving in the dead of winter, running some errand too mundane to go into great detail, cruising past snowdrifts and flat, undeveloped city land here on the outskirts of the frigid city, underneath the kind of silvery grey sky that's all too typical of the Canadian prairies, I heard on the local community radio station a very cool song by a new Canadian band. A new canadian "supergroup", if you will, featuring Rick White (Elevator, Eric's Trip), Dallas and Travis Good (The Sadies), and Greg Keelor (Blue Rodeo). The song I heard on the radio was hypnotic, a smooth combination of country, Sonic Youth-style noise/art rock, and the kind of neo-psychedelia that Keelor and The Sadies did on the Stories Often Told album in 2002. It sounded cool, fitting well with the cold, monochrome environment I found myself in. I pulled the car into the grocery store parking lot as the song ended, and heard the dj talk about the band. Always eager to learn more about new bands, I got out of the car, walked into the supermarket, grabbed a basket, and walked in past the deli and the bakery, all the while muttering to myself the name of the band over and over again, trying not to let the name excape my notoriously unreliable short-term memory: "The Unintended, The Unintended, The Unintended..."
Well, I finally have the new, self-titled album by The Unintended, and I sit here early this warm June morning, the cd playing in the stereo for the umpteenth time in the past 244 hours, feeling completely, and surprisingly, underwhelmed. What's going on with this cd? That one song I heard on the radio five months ago, "The Collapse", still sounds terrific, a chilling portrait of of someone sinking deep into an abyss of self-loathing on the heels of a nasty break-up, but yikes, is this album ever a one-trick pony. Never before has a 35 minute album sounded so monotonous, so quickly. It's not all that bad, so much as it just all sounds the same, songs blending into one another. It's one of those albums where you hear one song, think, "Wow, I have to hear this!" (like I did back in January), but once you hear the entire cd, you're left thinking, "Is that all there is?" And it's clear that these guys were smoking way too much pot while writing and recording; you have the same organ drone, the same acoustic guitar, the same spaced-out singing. You can picture the band listening to the playback, pungent smoke filling the air, amazed at how cool the music sounds, with no clear-headed person there to tell them that it's nothing but redundant crap. The lyrics are terrible, sounding like bad stoner poetry: "Blue full moon high over June, stay calm in the cool"..."Sit and feel the gentle breeze that blows your hair like rolling seas"..."Did we remember to forget to remember?"..."I'd fly but my wings are so sore"..."Let's run to the wide open plains, where all is so clear clean, and sane"..."Look out! Do you see the endless fields of grass? Let's run away forever on the grass"...oh, for crying out loud, do shut up, will you?
What should have been a really cool side project has turned out to be nothing more than a one-dimensional, empty attempt at psychedelic country rock. All you need to hear off this album is "The Collapse", it's a fantastic song, but unfortunately, I can't send you to any websites or mp3 links...if you can find that song on a filesharing network, get it at once. The rest, well, it might impress you a little more than it did me, who knows, but be forewarned. Listen to this cd before buying. Agh, the more I write about it, the more annoyed I feel. I'm taking this dumb piece of pretentious, hippy-dippy, faux-art out of the stereo this instant, and slapping in some Young Heart Attack to clear my head.
Wednesday, June 2, 2004
My review of the new Pixies best-of compilation is now up. A very good collection, but fans will still be complaining about what wasn't included.
It's a bizzy, bizzy time for yours truly right now. Lots of irons in the fire, as it were. It's easily the biggest load of writing I've ever had to do over the course of a month, as I'm juggling big essays, special features assignments, and the ubiquitous cd reviews for all of June. Couple that with the Stanley Cup playoffs, Euro 2004, the beginning of an insane month of family birthdays, and a bunch of fascinating club shows (Girl Nobody, Manitoba, 3 Inches of Blood, Calexico), and I have myself thirty (okay, make that 29 now) crazy days ahead of me.
So, first things first, as I'm trying to get through the dregs in my pile of cd's. Next up is the new one by Story of the Year's favourite band, Boston's Godsmack. As much as my brother wants to deny it, Godsmack has made a living out of ripping off Alice in Chains (dude, just listen to Facelift for once in your life!!!), but as hopelessly unoriginal as that idea is, they've done a decent job over three albums, nimbly straddling the line between maudlin post-grunge and antisocial nu-metal, delivering some terrific metal riffs with some passable melodies. Granted, their music isn't perfect, but I've always said, if they ever put out a best-of album, I'll buy it. There's nothing wrong with liking a Godsmack song or two...I can certainly think of worse stuff to listen to. And the band went up a notch or two in my books when I saw them open for Metallica a few weeks ago, as they have a terrific stage presence, not to mention a very tight live sound.
Anyway, back to this cd, aptly named The Other Side. It seems that Godsmack is continuing in the familiar AIC pattern, this time putting out their own version of the 1994 acoustic EP Jar of Flies. On this thirty-minute cd, the band unveils a couple of new songs, as well as giving some more well-known fan favourites a more subtle, acoustic treatment. Tunes like "Re-Align", "Keep Away", "Spiral", and "Awake" (facetiously re-dubbed "Asleep") are good, albeit by-the-numbers performances (kind of like Pearl Jam's surprisingly ordinary turn on MTV's Unplugged twelve years ago), while the new songs alternately shine ("Running Blind") and sputter ("Touche", which shamelessly featured two members of Dropbox, singer Sully Erna's latest signings to his new label). Overall, it's okay, a mildly pleasant diversion for Godsmack fans, but really, we've heard all this before, and Godsmack sounds much, much better when they're cranking up the volume and being a Big Dumb Rock Band. This one's for completists only. Which begs the question, are there Godsmack completists out there?
I have to mention a young Vancouver metal band called 3 Inches of Blood, who have recently signed with Roadrunner Records and are coming to my town in a few weeks. I was stunned to hear what they actually sounded like. You see the picture of them, and you think, oh, they're probably some obnoxious, tuneless, Canadian version of Ill Nino, or even worse, yet another sorry screamo knock-off, but no, that's not the case at all. If you download their new demo of "Deadly Sinners", you'll hear a band heavily, heavily influenced by Judas Priest, Accept, and King Diamond. Riffs are tight and mellifluous, the lyrics are extremely corny, and the singer (his real name is Cam Pipes...how great is that?) sounds like a cross between Painkiller-era Rob Halford and the legendary little camouflaged dwarf, Udo Dierkschneider. Like the band Wolf, whom I mentioned last week, they're totally retro, which immediately appeals to old metalheads like myself. I have to check this band out...recently they've been touring with The Darkness and recording their new album. Something tells me I'll be anxious to hear it soon enough. Anyway, try out the song, it's fantastic.
Tuesday, June 1, 2004
So what springs to your mind when you hear the name The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir? And no, they're not a British police glee club. Chances are, you were probably reminded of all those twee/chamber/orch pop bands from Scotland, like Belle & Sebastian and Camera Obscura, centering on acoustic-based music with hints of trumpet and cello, not to mention the obligatory, overly precious lyrics. And you know what, if you did guess that, you're right. Only they're not Scottish at all...they're from Chicago. Frontman Elia Einhorn doesn't mince words; this band's sound is heavily influenced by Belle & Sebastian, something that becomes immediately apparent when you listen to their new album, I Bet You Say That to All the Boys. Granted, they do the B & S imitation very well, especially on songs like "Jennie That Cries", "All the Heart You Wear on Your Sleeve", "I Say the Stupidest Things Sometimes", and the typically ironic "Would You Still Love Me if I Was in a Knife Fight?", as Einhorn and singer/cellist Ellen O'Hayer trade lead vocals, nicely executing that male/female dynamic that seems to be common in this style of music. It's all nice enough, but the album becomes considerably edgier when you hear singer/guitarist Matthew "Boston" Kerstein enter the fray. His songs contrast greatly from Einhorn's compositions, as his robust tunes possess a more rough-edged, almost punk-like quality, as he howls his charming lyrics with a voice not entirely unlike Joe Strummer on songs like "Along the Way", 'She Just Wants to Move", and the raucous "Tear Down the Opera House". Kerstein and O'Hayer actually do a very, very nice duet on the sweet ballad "Bet You Never Thought it Would Be Like This", the two aounding like vocal polar opposites, much like Shane MacGowan's duet with Sinead O'Connor on the song "Haunted" way back when. Einhorn's "Mother's Son" is a very nice folk tune, while the poppy "I Know a Girl" is surprisingly sprightly. One of the very best tracks on the album is "Fan Club", as Einhorn sings unapologetically about his favourite band (you know who). "I'm joinging a fan club and I'm not ashamed," he croons softly, "I wish I could sound the same." Well, they certainly do sound the same, but The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir show they're willing to try to be more than just another B & S clone. Yeah, they thank Stuart Murdoch in their liner notes, which, coupled with another Murdoch name-drop in "Fan Club", borders on overkill, but the entire album posesses plenty of musical depth, so much so, that you expect this shameless worshipping to be nothing more than a phase, a stepping stone towards something even better.
Oh, and if I may repeat myself here, seriously, the Lansing-Dreiden album is a mighty fine one. I'm going to talk about this cd in great detail, likely after the weekend (who knows, maybe sooner), but for now, just go here, and try out some of the mp3's they have to offer...
Monday, May 31, 2004
Over the weekend, I happened to hear a song on the radio by a new British band called Delays. That song, called "Wanderlust", sounded straight out of 1992-1993, with its shimmering sound, its poppy samples of what sounded like steel drums, and the singer's ultra-high, wispy-voiced Cocteau Twins imitation. I was more than a bit surprised to learn immediately following the song that that angelic-voiced singer was actually a guy...his name's Greg Gilbert (no, not the former hockey player), and as John Sakamoto said on CBC, he makes Thom Yorke sound like Tom Waits, as he hits the high notes with such ease, it's actually quite stunning. So, curiosity bubbling over, I went to find the rest of Delays' new album, called Faded Seaside Glamour, and after hearing it a few times, I can confidently say that this is one nice little disc. Were you a huge fan of Britpop ten years ago? Do you secretly with that The La's had released a proper follow-up to their legendary, only album? Well, you must hear this one. Shamelessly basing their tyle on the chiming, ultra-slick album sound of producer Stephen Street, Delays make no bones about it, they're totally ripping off early Nineties Britpop. It's a bit bumpy from time to time, but when they get it right, oh my, it's glorious. Songs like the aforementioned "Wanderlust", the sweet "Nearer Than Heaven", the lilting "Hey Girl", and the utterly spectacular "Long Time Coming" (egads, do I love this song) are all perfect examples of how good this band can be. The rest of the album, while not bad at all (well, on second thought, "Stay Where You Are" is kind of dumb), kind of coasts along at a comfortable, Lowgold-style pace, before redeeming itself somewhat on the final two tracks, the terrific Byrds rip-off "One Night Away" and the awesome Stone Roses style thrum of "On". Faded Seaside Glamour ranks somewhere between being a buyer and a burner, but if you miss the halcyon days of Britpop, and if you're moved by the cd's five best songs as much as I was, then yeah, the album might be worth picking up if you can find it for a good price.
From flitty British girlyboy janglepop to classic progressive metal: Dave Mustaine has put up a remixed and remastered version of Megadeth's classic 1990 song, "Holy Wars...The Punishment Due" for everyone to download. Some noticeable changes, as Mike Clink's tight, claustrophobic original mix is expanded somewhat, given a bit more reverb, and some extra vocals are added during the verses (whether they're old vocals turned up, or newly-recorded vocals is unknown...to yours truly, at least). Anyway, it's a nice little teaser for the upcoming Megadeth remasters this summer, which I eagerly await. Download the track here.
One of these days, I'm going offer a detailed look at the great new album by Lansing-Dreiden, but not right now. But take my word for it, this album is spectacular. You might as well start searching for mp3's now...
Saturday, May 29, 2004
My review of the new Scorpions box set has surfaced. Gotta say buyer beware with this one, because there's an unhealthy emphasis on the band's 90s albums (ugh, that orchestral version of "Rock You Like a Hurricane" is going to haunt me for the rest of my life), but the sheer power of the first two discs makes up for it, as both the Uli Roth period and the massive 80s material are all well-represented. It's the best Scorps anthology out there, but I still stronly advise that if you're going to buy it, make sure it's on sale for a good price.
This past week, I finally got my cd copy of the May 7th Metallica show here in Saskatoon (scroll down to May 8 for my review), which was downloaded by brudder drc from LiveMetallica. The sound is good (downloaded as a FLAC file), and the mix is good, but it's interesting just how spotty the band's performance really was...you just don't notice it as much in a big, cavernous arena. Ulrich's drumming is incredibly sloppy at times (man, how his drumming has gone in the toilet over the past 12 years), as are many of Hammett's solos...still, the band does pull things together for about two thirds of the set, especially on tunes like "Master of Puppets", "Leper Messiah", "The Wait", and "Sad But True". Hetfield & Trujillo are both very solid...but what Met really misses these days is a good backing vocalist, something Jason Newsted always brought to the table. Trujilo tries his best, but his voice just lacks the power you need, and Hammett, well, let's just say he shouldn't be allowed near a microphone anymore. As you may or may not know, the dude has a bit of a high speaking voice, but when performing, he tries to make up for it by trying to yell in a much lower register. The result sounds like he's trying to do the voice of a Muppet, a weird, guttural croak, like an asthmatic frog. "YeLIVIT uhLY-IT! YeLIVIT uhLY-IT!" Urp, urp, ribbit ribbit. Yeah, thank you, Kirk. Kindly step away from the mic. Go play your guitar, and stop messing up the freakin' solos.
It's nearly a year since St. Anger came out. If you may recall, I gave it a bit of a lukewarm review, saying that despite its flaws, it was nice to see the band passionate again (kind of damning by faint praise, I suppose)...so what do I think of it now? I gave the album another listen recently, and yeah, I still stand by my review. It goes on way too long, but it has enough decent songs to warrant a very slight recommendation.
About a month or so ago, I forget, I got the new (well, new to us North Americans) album by German jazz quartet Bohren & der Club of Gore...I said I'd give it a closer look, but other stuff just happened to come up, so I never really got around to it. Not that I haven't been playing the album; in fact, Black Earth has become one of my latenight staples, a cd I constantly reach for while pecking away at the computer keyboard in the middle of the night. No, the primary reason why I haven't written more about it sooner is, it's a really, really, really hard album to write about, and I'm a lazy sod. Now I have to write about it, and I tell you, I don't know where to begin.
Simply put, this is jazz like you've never heard before. You remember Angelo Badalamenti's music for Twin Peaks? That slow, slinky, playful, minimalist blend of Fifties rock & roll and lounge piano, how hearing a single movement in the soundtrack instantly hit you with the mental image of Audrey Horne coquettishly walking across a room? Well, the music on Black Earth is just as simple, but instead of reminding you of cherry-lipped brunettes, this music sounds like a corpse clawing its way out of a grave, lumbering in the moonlit night, with creaky joints and a half-decayed face, in search of human flesh to feast on. The band bases each song around Robin Rodenberg's double bass, which slowly, slowly, s l o w l y holds down the rhythm with single thrums on the strings, which are tuned so low, you can hear the vibrations in your gut. Morten Gass and Christoph Closer provide accompaniment on mellotron, piano, Fender Rhodes, and saxophone, while drummer Thorsten Benning accentuates the basslines with subtle beats, sounding more atmospheric than rhythmic, like a somnambulistic Elvin Jones. The overall effect sounds like a demonic hybrid The Bad Plus and Candlemass. These guys could be Satan's own jazz combo.
It's dark, it's gloomy, but it's so incredibly beautiful, and the production on the album is immaculate, the bass resonating and full. And just look at those song titles: "Maximum Black", "Constant Fear", "Skeletal Remains", "The Art of Coffins"...this stuff isn't as campy as the titles would seem to indicate. The album has a dignified air to it, something best exemplified on the sensual "Maximum Black", and can easily appeal to jazz fans as it would entice metal fans with its gorgeous, embossed, black-on-black digipak cover art. The whole noir feel of the record really has me convinced that the music would work quite well in a film adaptation of a James Ellroy novel like The Black Dahlia, the perfect soundtrack to a warm, rainy night (like it is right now as I write this, rain plummeting outside my open window as the music plays). Black Earth is simply too beautiful for words, yet another great 2004 release by the good folks at Ipecac Records, and it's a virtual lock for my year-end list this December. Don't hesitate, buy the thing here, and make your nights even darker.
Thursday, May 27, 2004
Hey, a new review for y'all to take a looksee at: Junior Fiction, by those fun Aussies in Sekiden. Nothing more than a fun, goofy, indiepop rekkid (think Weezer with synths), but sometimes that's all you'll ever need. It's definitely the most shamelessly cute album I've heard this year.
Okay, I've procrastinated long enough, I have to talk about the new Andre Ethier album. It bears the marblemouthed title of Andre Ethier With Christopher Sandes Featuring Pickles and Price, and it ranks as one of the most pleasant surprises of 2004 so far. Like the Patterson Hood album I mentioned a couple weeks ago, this one was thrown together over two days, and like Hood, Ethier fronts a loud, boisterous rock band (The Deadly Snakes), and does an abrupt about-face, going all acoustic and introspective, but instead of using the album as a means of cathatic therapy like Hood did, Ethier appears to be having a total blast with the project. Yeah, there are a bunch of booze-laced, self-deprecating, dare I say, Westerbergian songs like "Let Me Put My Suitcase Down" and "Sweep Up After Me" but any negativity is instantly disguised (often totally negated) by a playful, roadhouse feel. If you like Bob Dylan's Basement Tapes, then you're going to like this album. Actually, if you're familiar with Dylan's legendary 1967 collaboration with The Band, you will be stunned by the uncanny similarity on this new cd. You get touches of acoustic blues, folk, country, ragtime (Sandes' piano echoes Richard Manuel at times), and plenty of ragged, drunken, staggering-but-never falling rock & roll. Other highlights include the bouncy "Little Saddy", "Last Line", "Dear John" (dig that great Dylan-circa-'65 phrasing imitation!), and the smooth "Honey Drips, Butter Runs". The word "Dylanesque" is one that has been used far, far too many times over the past thirty-odd years, but man, sometimes you've got to just suck it up, throw your thesaurus out the window, and type the darn word. This album is not original, and few reviews of this album will ahve any originality in them, either, but like that aforementioned Sekiden cd, when you're having this much fun, who cares, right? A big, boisterous, beer-drenched thumbs-up. (A much more extensive PopMatters review will be done soon)
Wednesday, May 26, 2004
Evil Star, the new album by Sweden's Wolf is one of the best metal releases this year so far, and if you're an erstwhile metal fan who hates the cookie monster vocals and yearns for a return to old fashioned riffs, melodic vocals, and bombastic lyrics, you're going to love this one. These guys are total throwbacks, as their sound derives heavily from NWOBHM bands like Angel Witch and Di'Anno-era Iron Maiden. The bass player does the Steve Harris gallop, the two guitarists sound a lot like early Helloween (you can even hear some Mercyful Fate style, Denner/Shermann potential with these guys), and the singer has a soaring voice that sounds like a cross between Helloween's Michael Kiske and Metal Church's second singer Mike Howe...actually, this album reminds me a lot of Metal Church's Blessing in Disguise in its no-frills approach. Standout tracks include the title track, "Black Wing Rider", "The Dark", "Wolf's Blood", and "The Avenger". The cd has bonus covers of "Don't Fear the Reaper" (very good), Slayer's "Die By the Sword", and the Ramones' "I'm Not Afraid of Life", but the latter two are very hard to find on the net, so if you come across them, get them at once. With this band, though, the original material is all you really need, anyway. It's excellent, solid, traditional metal, something I really wish there was more of these days.
Friday, May 21, 2004
Two more new reviews have appeared. There's my piece about The M's, who have a good album out right now...it's not perfect, but you get the feeling that bigger things are in store with these guys.
Also, there's my huge review of Pulp's classic Different Class. Back in March, or whenever that was, I posted my rough copy on this page, but the version at PopMatters is a bit more polished, not quite as sloppy. If you don't own this album, go get it now. Definitely an all-time top five disc for me.
Well, whaddya know, I really like "Duality", the new Slipknot single. The other stuff I've heard from their new album hasn't impressed me that much, but this particular song is a very good one. One thing that really bugged me about 2001's Iowa album was that the band abandoned the melodic touches that their self-titled album possessed. "Duality", thankfully, returns to that "Wait and Bleed" feel...musically, the band is as limited as they've ever been, with their limp Meshuggah rip-off in the main riff, but it's Corey Taylor's soaring chorus that saves the song. Rick Rubin's production is excellent...the one thing I like most about Rubin when he produces metal records is that he makes sure you understand every single word the singer is saying. Just listen to Reign in Blood or Toxicity, and you'll hear what I'm talking about.
Thursday, May 20, 2004
Okay, finally have some things to talk about here. First, my big review of the reissue of Disco Inferno's D.I. Go Pop has finally appeared. I'm just so blown away by this band right now, and that album is an undeniable classic.
So the great Elvin Jones passed away the other day, which was disappointing to hear. Whenever I think of Elvin Jones I think not of his classic work (Coltrane's A Love Supreme, for instance), but of a little, one-off 1982 recording he did with Allen Ginsberg called "Little Fish Devours the Big Fish". You can just envision the guy hulking over his drums, delivering a killer, primal beat, a powerful, very controlled performance, his fills crashing like bombs. Coupled with Ginsberg's chanted reading and Rudolph Grey's slicing guitar, it's a chilling piece of work.
Got the new Pixies compilation yesterday. The band's reunion was a good time to reassess their career, not to mention rake in some extra cash. The 1997 best-of disc Death to the Pixies was decent, but flawed...it was painfully short, and lacked several essential Pixies tracks. The new one, Wave of Mutilation: Best of Pixies, does a much, much better job, offering 23 tracks, as opposed to the other cd's 17. Aside from the band's 1990 cover of "Cecilia Ann" (a very, very odd selection for a best-of), all of the songs from Death to the Pixies are on here. The key with the new cd are the seven other tracks: you have the early fave "Broken Face", the Surfer Rosa standout "Vamos", Doolittle's "Hey", the great B-side "Into the White", Bossanova's "Allison", the straightforward cover of Neil Young's "Winterlong", and best of all, "Alec Eiffel", one of my favourite all-time Pixies songs. Granted, fans will still gripe about other songs that were not included, like "I Bleed", "Levitate Me", "Cactus", "All Over the World", "Is She Weird", etc. (somthing tells me a certain brother in law of mine would have loved to see "Motorway to Roswell" on it), and there would have still been room for a few more inclusions, but as far a best-of compilations go, this one's a near-great one.
And get this...allmusic.com has a review of DiscLive's recording of the Minneapolis show! Very cool..although people are saying that the Vancouver and Saskatoon shows are the best ones so far. I can certainly vouch for Saskatoon...
Also, I finally, finally, finally got my hands on a copy of Broken Social Scene's new odds & sods collection, Bee Hives. People have been somewhat lukewarm towards this cd, but for what it's worth, it's a very enjoyable one. It's basically composed of atmospheric tracks recorded between 2001 and 2003, but there are a couple of real gems, that being the gorgeous "Backyards" (with Metric's Emily Haines on vocals), and an absolutely beautiful performance of "Lover's Spit", sung by the lovely Leslie Feist, during a recorded performance for XFM in the UK. As for the rest of the album, you know how the band spends half of their shows hunched over their effects pedals and whatnot, twiddling away with noise and feedback for extended periods? This is basically what it sounds like, but it's far from dull. As someone said before, it's a perfect late night record.
Young Heart Attack's Mouthful of Love is still getting regular play on my stereo. It's stupid, but gloriously so. This has mainstream hit written all over it. It's just waiting to be usurped by the rowdy beer gardens crowd.
Oh, and you must see what some twisted Brazilian Iron Maiden fan has done. He's in the midst of creating a massive Flash cartoon series based on all Iron Maiden albums, using the original music as the soundtrack. The way he combines the tunes, the cover art of Derek Riggs, and a great sense of humour is just too fabulous for words. He's finished the first three albums...I implore you to go see for yourself.
Friday, May 14, 2004
My extensive review of the new Streets album is up today.
I'm really enjoying the new Leslie Feist album. Let it Die has a real smooth, folky, European quality that is just so darn disarming. Feist's smooth, effortless vocals actually remind me a bit of Nellie McKay, sans the "look at me, aren't I clever?" pretentiousness. The lilting, acoustic "Mushaboom" is so cute, while the utterly gorgeous "One Evening" totally smacks of Fleetwood Mac, with its laid-back groove. Oh, and her covers of Ron Sexsmith's "Secret Heart" and the Bee Gees' "Inside and Out", dare I say, top the originals.
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
Back in January, I briefly mentioned the new solo debut by one Melissa Auf der Maur, but didn't go into much detail. Well, the album is finally, finally coming out in three weeks, so now's as good a time as any to take a closer look at it. First of all, the record is totally generic. Lots of tuned down guitars, slowly-paced tempos, a goth-like feel in the vocals that's a lot like, say, Lacuna Coil. That said, I'm a total sucker for all that stuff, especially when it's sung by a woman with as intoxicating a voice as Auf der Maur's. We all knew she could sing (her backing vocals on Hole's Celebrity Skin more than prove that), and she certainly sounds terrific on this cd. The overall sound is kind of a cross between stoner rock and the dour art rock of A Perfect Circle, something her guest musicians had a large part in creating. Auf der Maur has an awesome lineup playing behind her, including Josh Homme, James Iha, Eric Erlandson, and Brant Bjork, one of the best stoner rock drummers ever. For the most part, the songs work quite well, especially the brilliant "Followed the Waves", "Real a Lie", "My Foggy Notion", "Would if I Could", and the spacy "I Need I Want I Will". The songs "Overpower Thee" and "I'll Be Anything You Want" have a strange, cabaret, Kurt Weill style that is an odd fit, and her lyrics rarely possess more depth than a teenaged girl's journal ("Plug it in, so I can digest you/I will taste you"...ugh), but it's the presence of Melissa, the thunderous sound of her band, and those seductive, dark melodies that make this album worth recommending.
A Grand Don't Come For Free is now out in Canada, and if you look hard enough (hint hint), you can find it for a really good price. One of the year's best. Don't be swayed by Chart's utterly laughable review.
Tuesday, May 11, 2004
Got the new Tangiers album yesterday. Last year’s Hot New Spirits was an anjoyable rock record, nothing really original about it, but it had enough energy to keep things fun for half an hour or so. They didn’t waste any time recording a follow-up, which is kind of strange considering the sudden overhaul the band went through, as the guitarist and drummer left, while the band’s old keyboardist came back into the fold. As a result, Never Bring You Pleasure is a bit of a departure, and might I add, it’s for the better.The keyboards play a major role on the album, adding much more depth (you hear touches of reggae and new wave) than just the double-guitar attack that sounded a bit one-dimensional. “Ro Ro Roland” has been online for the past month or so, and that track is the best example of the change in sound, a great little Strokes-ish tune that features an irresistible organ line as catchy as “12:51”. Other songs that immediately grabbed me were the slinky, post punk of “Love Rackets”, the pounding “Spine to Necklace” (dig that shift from a tight, angular beat to a full-on garage rock swing), the stop-start fun of “Your Colour”, and the buoyant “We’re So Breathless”. The album has a much better cover, too…the last one was a bit lame, and I’m always a sucker for a really nice digipak like this one. The band still seems strangely obsessed with colorforms when it comes to artwork, however. Overall, a really good cd, a big step forward. It’s out in Canada on the 25th, and in the US on June 22. Look for this one to be a smash on the Canadian campus radio charts.
Also received the much-anticipated solo debut by Patterson Hood. At least, it's been highly anticipated by fans of the Drive-By Truckers. Killers and Stars has been on the shelf for three years, in fact...recorded in a fit of catharsis, anger, and soul-searching, as Hood went through a divorce and a strained relationship with his bandmates, it's a simple, raw album that features only Hood and his acoustic guitar. People have been comparing this record to Springsteen's Nebraska, but I feel it bears a stronger resemblance to Steve Earle's acoustic songs over the past eight years, with the music's rugged, yet tender feel, as Hood croons in that scratchy voice of his. Not everything works ("Belinda Carlisle Diet" is an empty exercise in self-indulgence), but the stuff that does is as good as any Drive-By Truckers song, such as the chilling "Rising Son", the dark "Fire", "Miss Me Gone", and "Old Timer's Disease". "Cat Power" is another that really got my attention, mainly because of Hood's remarks to Chan Marshall (she of Cat Power notoriety), who the dude seems to be a bit obsessed with. "I don't mean to sound unsympathetic to your plight," he says, "but if you're so shy, why are you standing out in the light?" I've often wondered the same thing about Ms. Marshall myself. This is a fine cd, one that will please any DBT fan, proof that Hood's one of the best American songwriters out there right now.
I was expecting the new In Flames album to be better than it actually is, but the feeling I get from The Soundtrack to Your Escape is that of being fairly underwhelmed. It's not bad, but the tracks just aren't as good as the lead-off single "The Quiet Place". Maybe it needs a few more listens.
Okay, time to talk about Madvillain. I'd been listening to mp3's of the new Madvillainy album for about a month and a half, and finally went out and bought the actual cd last week. I know I rarely talk about hip hop...the fact is, I've always been very finicky when it comes to hip hop albums. I don't hate the music, I'm just rarely blown away by it, and I'm so wrapped up listening to other genres, that it's always tough for me to find time for it. I want wild creativity, smart lyrics...anything less than that is nothing but a huge bore. So Madvillain fits the bill perfectly. I was never hugely familiar with the prolific, schizophrenic Madlib, but I've quickly become an admirer, as his production on Madvillainy is stunning. He throws everything into the mix, from accordions, to organ, to ukuleles, to old movie scores, but it's done with great restraint, it's not an overwhelming melange of samples. Then there's the guy with the silly iron Dr. Doom mask, MF Doom. His vocal delivery is strangely relaxed, and his lyrics possess touches of surreal genius. There are moments on the album where I hear echoes of Kerouac's spontaneous poetry experiments...take this line, fo instance: "The flow make her fatty shake, patty cake, patty cake/For fake, if he was Anita Baker's man/He'd take her for her masters, hit it once an' shake her hand." Those rhythmic hits of rhymes, the whimsical wordplay, there's a real connection between the two here. Not only that, but Doom's pop culture references are hilarious, as he name-drops Kurt Angle, Worf, Lawry's seasoning (!), Gary Gnu, Juicy Fruit, not to mention the very goofy line, "More cheese than Doritos, Cheetos, or Fritos." The entire album works best when you listen to it all at once, but single tracks that stand ot the most for me are the great single "All Caps" (the video is incredible), "Accordion", "Meat Grinder", "America's Most Blunted", "Rhinestone Cowboy", and "Shadows of Tomorrow". I'm not the biggest hip hop expert (here's a much better review than I could ever manage), but you don't have to be to know that Madvillainy is easily one of the best albums of 2004 so far.
Sunday, May 9, 2004
After weeks of lingering around the 8.5, 9 out of 10 range, I've come to the conclusion that the new Streets album is pretty much, well, perfect. It's fabulous...even "Dry Your Eyes" (what can I say...my initial reaction was wrong!). A huge, comprehensive review is on its way.
Saturday, May 8, 2004
Well, the boys in Metallica delivered again. What a fantastic show. Definitely the most overwhelming array of pyrotechnics I've ever seen in an arena show...it was actually close to being too much for my old thirtysomething self with all the bangs and the BOOMS and the pows and the BLAMS and the heat so hot's gonna SINGE me...
Seriously, it was a memorable night. Yeah, they did the standards, but they were all excellent, especially "Blackened", "Seek & Destroy", "Creeping Death", "Battery", "One", and the full eight minutes of "Master of Puppets". However, the real fun was the number of surprises the band pulled out in the setlist, including "No Leaf Clover", "Fade to Black" (my favourite Metallica song as a young teen), "Damage, Inc.", "Leper Messiah" (wow!), and "The Wait" (wow!!!). I have to say I was not crazy about hearing "I Disappear" (one of the worst songs in the Metallica catalogue), "Nothing Else Matters" (boring), and "Enter Sandman" (too ubiquitous), but overall, it was so incredibly brilliant. Had too much fun. Especially funny was the group of 15-16 year old's in front of me who smoked way too much pot way too soon, and spent over an hour nodding off, their heads between their knees. It looked like nap time at kindergarten. Real smart, kiddies, spend 50 bucks on a ticket and wind up missing half the set!
Godsmack were solid, making good use of the huge stage, and were very, very well received from the crowd, who was so obviously starved for some good hard rock. Singer Sully Erna can really command a crowd, too, a surprisingly charismatic frontman, and the band overall were very good, playing songs like "Awake", "Straight Out of Line", "Faceless", "Voodoo" (which was very cool), "Re-Align", "Keep Away", and "I Stand Alone". The double drum solo was surprisingly well done, as they did cheeky little tributes to Aerosmith ("Walk This Way"...okay, that was a bit too obvious), Led Zeppelin ("Moby Dick"...again, too obvious), and Rush ("Tom Sawyer", "YYZ"...now we're talking!).
So here you go, the full Met setlist:
Blackened
Fuel
Seek And Destroy
Fade To Black
Frantic
Leper Messiah
No Leaf Clover
St. Anger
Sad But True
Creeping Death
Battery
First Encore:
I Disappear
Nothing Else Matters
Master Of Puppets
One
Enter Sandman
Second encore:
The Wait
Damage Inc.
Many thanks to Metallica for yet another memorable night, and a timely reminder of why I've loved their music for the past eighteen years!
Friday, May 7, 2004
Well, well, my big Girl Nobody review has appeared. So, if my ecstatic raving over the past month or so has not yet convinced you to give this excellent album a listen, maybe my more comprehensive review will. They're touring Canada in June, so I hope to catch them when they come to my city.
Also, my review of Bad Religion's albums Suffer and No Control is up today. These records were fun to write about...it was nice to listen to them again for the first time in years.
Whaddya know, the big day has arrived. Metallica show Number Four for yours truly (1986, 1989, 1997 the other occasions)...despite the tepid reaction to St. Anger, the band seems rejuvenated on this tour, playing around with the setlists every night, unleashing rare album tracks, covers, etc., really looking like they're having fun for the first time in years, so this night could be special. Expect a setlist and full review sometime early Saturday morning!
I'm looking forward also to seeing Godsmack. Yeah, I know they're reviled by musical hipsters, and they're a total one-note band, but I've always liked a handful of their songs ("Awake" and "Voodoo" have long been guilty pleasures), as their best tracks show they can walk the line between old school metal and nu-metal better than most young bands. I don't think I can ever give a full thumbs-up to any of their albums, but if they ever put out a best-of cd, I'll probably like it.
I was going to talk about how much I love that Bohren & Der Club of Gore album (and do I ever love it), but something arrived yesterday that has provided me plenty of goofy fun over the past 24 hours. That's right, I have the new Scorpions anthology, Box of Scorpions, and it's a pretty nifty little three disc set, the track selections neatly organized. Disc One focuses on their more prog-oriented 70s output with guitarist Uli Jon Roth, Disc Two is all about their huge successes in the 80s, and the third, well, it centres on mediocre 90s stuff like "Winds of Change" and more recent releases. Of course, when you're doing an anthology, you have to include the lean years, but despite the amount of weak material on Disc Three ("Rock You Like a Hurricane" with the Berlin Philharmonic? Why?), this is one fun compilation.
The first cd is very good, despite the glaring absence of the Taken by Force standout "Sails of Charon", but it's Disc Two that you'll keep reaching for. Yeah, the 80s were when the Scorpions went all pop metal, but what songs! Such great, simple riffs by Rudy Schenker, the great tenor voice of Klaus Meine, and hooks, hooks, hooks aplenty, as albums like
