Category Archives: albums

2011, albums, groovemine, music, reviews

Album review: Yuck – "Yuck"

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Finally, after all the hype of indie culture coming to the mainstream, with Arcade Fire winning the Album of the Year Grammy and every band everywhere looking for a unique sound, we get an album that gives us exactly what we need. Yuck has delivered an album that has garnered a lot of attention for its fresh sound that, ironically, is captured by going back to sounding like the music of the 1990’s.

It is funny to think that we can actually refer to this music accurately by saying that it sounds reminiscent to the songs of late last century. A time when MTV actually played music. When shows like “120 Minutes” would showcase music that was up and coming, college radio fare that was not getting much, if any, mainstream attention. I’m sure I am not the only one that remembers staying up late as a kid to catch a glimpse of all the cool, obscure music that was coming out so that I could slyly reference it later in school when talking to my friends. Man, they would think I was so cool. Not that Yuck’s music embraces obscure acts of a bygone era. On the contrary, it captures the essence of the indie rock scene of the 90s that we all know and love but may have passed by those who were not paying attention. This music is a celebration of a time gone by, though its return is more than welcome.

I read a description online of Yuck as a “rock revival” act. Though I know the point that this particular review was getting at I still find it frustrating that the very people that listen to and love rock music are constantly claiming that it is a dead artform. Take for example every time that The Strokes, or any member of The Strokes, releases an album. The magazine covers seem to always ask, “Can The Strokes save rock?” as if it is a genre that is gone, or at least deteriorated and in need of rescuing. I don’t know if Yuck has the power, or even the willingness to “rescue” rock music but they have crafted a beautiful album that is large in scope and certainly charming in its reminiscence of music that music fans of my generation grew up listening to.
Yuck
Yuck - "Yuck"
Strands of early Sloan, early Smashing Pumpkins, Thrush Hermit, Hum, Sebadoh, The Burdocks and Dinosaur Jr. (in the album’s noisier moments) shine through track after track. The album doesn’t come off sounding like some unearthed relic, nor does it feel or sound old or stale in the slightest. Ideas and sound taken from the 90s are developed a bit with tighter rhythm section behind the initial wall of shoegazey noise.

I’m sure that there will be plenty of people tossing around the term “post-modern” in reference to Yuck. Sure, if the shoe fits, but those that dismiss this album as a simple throwback are missing the point. This album and this band seem to be reminding a tired, fractured and disenfranchised indie-rock fan base, that is constantly pulled from one direction to the next, of where we have come from. Perhaps this album can serve as a reset point where we can ponder the roots of all that is coming out today. Or, perhaps this album can serve as a direct line connecteing the music of today to the music of twenty years ago as an alternate reality where an overabundance of easily reproducable, easily attainable music never came to be and therefore never forced fans to choose one of a mulitude of made up genres to which they pledge their unflagging allegiance. Imagine good music stripped of hipster culture. This, I believe, is the world in which Yuck longs to exist.

The album is an “album”. By that I mean that it is a complete journey from beginning to end. Noisy rockers such as album opener “Get Away”, “The Wall” and “Holing Out” are broken up by quieter, more contemplative material such as “Stutter”, “Suicide Policeman” and “Rose Gives a Lilly”. All the songs feature prominently catchy hooks and layered guitar work. “Shook Down”, with its duetting boy/girl vocal, is especially effective as is the up-tempo distored folkiness of “Georgia”.

It seemed to come at us out of nowhere but now we are 20 years past the Seattle “grunge” explosion and just as far are we from the surge of great music that came out of the Halifax scene around the same time. It seems that this is just about the perfect time for a band like Yuck to bring us right back to the comfort of our indie-rock roots.

Soundgarden has reformed, Sebadoh and Dinosaur Jr. have been playing shows, and Beavis and Butthead is returning to television. It seems that a full on 90s reboot is taking shape. It’s a good thing that a band like Yuck can make something new amidst all this looking back.
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/01-Get-Away.mp3|titles=Get Away]
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/08-Stutter.mp3|titles=Stutter]
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/04-Holing-Out.mp3|titles=Holing Out]
2011, albums, groovemine, music, reviews

EP review: of Montreal – "The Controllersphere"

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This EP picks up exactly where “False Priest” left off. I mean that in the most literal way possible. This release can be viewed as an addendum to their last full length offering that was released not 7 months ago. “The Controllersphere” is 5 full tracks worth of Kevin Barnes trying out some of his more daring ideas, heading off in directions that aren’t explored in previous albums and possibly giving us a look at what is to come. This seems to be the way that of Montreal likes to do things now, releasing an album and not too long after its release more tracks that might appeal to their more ardent fans are presented. It was the case with “Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?” of 2006 where “Icons, Abstract Thee” followed. Also “Sunlandic Twins” featured a bonus EP as did “Skeletal Lamping”.

This release is the third that takes its name from one line of “Faberge Falls for Shuggie”, which appears on their breakthrough release “Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?” In a way one can draw a line through these three releases, “Skeletal Lamping”, “False Priest” and “The Controllersphere”. This trilogy can really represent a new direction for of Montreal that saw Kevin Barnes becoming significantly more influenced by psychedelic rock and funk and allowing those influences to really take shape in his songwriting.

The opening track, “Black Lion Massacre” takes the ideas of “False Priest”’s “You Do Mutilate?” and creates another freakishly frightening sonic landscape with the spoken word coming down to us through a backdrop of apocalyptically overdriven noise and feedback. A sort of live energy side of of Montreal that is rarely captured on disc is evident here, drenched in the noise of caterwauling guitars and drums that are wild and  more present than usual. As is usual with of Montreal releases some of the tracks have rather eccentric titles, such as “Flunkt Sass vs. The Root Plume”. The track starts off innocently enough with a gently strummed acoustic guitar appearing for all of ten seconds before exploding into a tripped out, layered nightmare that is perfectly depicted by the cover art, which is done again by Kevin’s brother David. The song continues to build as Barnes screams out in his best Ziggy Stardust, sounding like he is re-entering the atmosphere after space travel without the aid or protection of a shuttle. The screaming, loud, live sound is present in this track as well, like the first.

of Montreal - "The Controllersphere"

Lyrically the themes that of Montreal has been exploring for some time now like loneliness, unrequited love, feelings of insanity and obsession, are explored throughout this EP. The line “Even this ghetto world that has nothing, doesn’t want me” appears in “Flunkt Sass vs. The Root Plume” explores themes previously broached, but the added volume and noise adds a new dimension and desperation to the sadness. The insanity is dialed up to a breaking point, it’s like Kevin Barnes’ primal scream captured on record.

“Holiday Call” is a soulful, spiritual track that is based on folk elements, though those elements are somewhat buried beneath quite a bit of the usual panoply of psychedelia. At over 8 minutes long it is the lengthiest track, allowing for a very interesting turn of events at about the halfway mark that conurs up the sounds of middle eastern folk music with a repeated fiddle gesture, placing the usually busy, up-front bass in a more secondary role. Barnes mentioned via his twitter stream (@xxofmontrealxx) upon release of this EP that it was heavily folk influenced, and that was the direction in which he was going to be heading. He is certainly a man of his word, as odd and unbelievable as that word may often be, he manages to make it happen.

The changes in mood on this EP are more sudden, like the entire “Skeletal Lamping” album, which comprised songs that were seemingly comprised of several short songs melded together. Unlike “Skeletal Lamping” the songs here are still cohesive, and more or less similar in sound to those that appear on “False Priest”. “L’Age D’Or” and “Slave Translator” are definitely spawns of the funk of that album.  Each track is rather wordy. Barnes rushes to fit them all in, even more so than usual. He screams like his body is being torn apart from the inside out one minute and the next is harmonizing sweetly with himself. “The Controllersphere” ends where it began, in a wall of noise. This is a powerful 5 track EP that delivers exactly what was promised not too long after “False Priest was released. of Montreal is great at creating a world of their own both on record and live where their shows are theatrical spectacles concocted from the mind of Kevin and David Barnes. It seems fitting that Polyvinyl is releasing this EP concurrently with a book of David Barnes’ artwork entitled “What’s Weird?”, which I’m sure would be a perfect companion to this release.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/02-of-Montreal-Flunkt-Sass-vs-the-Root-Plume.mp3|titles=Flunkt Sass vs the Root Plume]
2011, albums, contemporary classical, groovemine, jazz, music, reviews

Album review: Colin Stetson – "New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges"

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Colin Stetson is a saxophonist that is clearly out of his mind.

Sax players, in my experience, are a divided lot. They usually either stay on the side of jazz or classical and never the twain shall meet. More accurately, they will stick with party lines and immediately show their loyalty to their chosen side by hating the other group with every ounce of expendable energy that they have. This means that any energy that is left over after obsessive study of all things saxophone is dedicated to speaking down to the other side. I feel as though Colin Stetson may be an exception to that rule, or maybe he just didn’t get the memo. He clearly doesn’t think that there is a need to take a side. Perhaps he is creating a new side, because his music sounds like nothing I have ever heard before. If all contemporary composition for the sax sounded like this I would actually pay attention to contemporary compositions for the sax.

His music is a non-stop barrage of sound that searches for, and finds, ways to make a unilinear instrument such as his sound polyphonic. It’s not that it just sounds that way, it is. Stetson employs not only a complex melodic line that pops out over a sea of supporting, textural, notes; he uses everything that his instrument and he himself physically has to offer. Percussive key clicks serve as not only drums of sorts, but mimic the pitch and timbre characteristics of the pizzicato plucking of a double bass. Multiphonics, or complex clusters of pitches sounded simultaneously as a result of overblowing certain key combinations, help to not only thicken the sound, but provide unique colors to certain parts of a song.

The circular breathing technique, which is essentially breathing out while breathing in concurrently, means that there doesn’t have to be a single break in his melodic line. Ever. For minutes at a time the notes just flow. It’s remarkable.

Colin Stetson - "New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges"

While all of these things are great, they don’t make a song in and of themselves. All of these things would mean so much less if they weren’t coming from a virtuosic performer of such a high caliber.

“A Dream of Water” takes off like a rocket and doesn’t let up. Melodies are hidden inside other melodies, weaving in and out of each other. There is a constant flurry of septuplets rolling through the air while a plain-spoken voice enters, noting observations and asking some questions: “There were those who knew only the sound of their own voices, there were those who knew the rules, there were those who freed their bodies…what was it? What was it?” The voice doesn’t simply make the track more accessible to a certain extent but also serves to haunt the listener, making the pervasive rapid notes carry more weight.

With “Home” the percussive techniques are amped up while the general mood is considerably more sedate. Colin sings through his instrument, humming in a way that transforms the saxophone partially into a theremin in its thin and straight tone. He also sings on the track “Judges”, but there it is a bit more like a growl or a choked scream. His ability to circular breathe isn’t just used to crank out a million notes without stopping, but also to lay down a single foundational pitch like the flat bass pedal tone that remains throughout “Lord I just can’t keep from crying” while a soulful spiritual is sung over top. His inhaling can be heard while the bass note continues to grow louder and more intense while this time the sax seems to take on the sound of a didjeridoo.

An entire ensemble of percussive tongue slaps, key clicks, and growls are summoned in “Red Horses” while “The righteous wrath of an honorable man” is pure blazing virtuosity, fingers flying all over across (this time) silent keys. The notes pop and squeal, leaping out of the furiously fast line. The work on this piece is truly awe inspiring. Starting from nowhere and then soaring for two and a half minutes at breakneck speed before abruptly stopping. The end comes suddenly as a car slamming into a brick wall at 80 miles an hour with nary a note out of place.

The album closes with a track that layers multiphonics atop an endless pedal tone, just as in “Lord I just can’t keep from crying”. Here, however, multiphonics slowly turn to a growl as the volume grows, sounding like something between an overdriven guitar and a siren, until eventually the track slowly fades away.

One of the many great things about this album is that Stetson’s bag of tricks doesn’t grow tired by albums end. His technique is flawless and his songs are multifaceted. There is just so much to listen to and so much to listen for. On the one hand it’s great to just sit back and listen to all of the notes fly by in some of the tracks. Another listen and one can begin to hear the different melodies weaving through each other; another ten listens can easily be spent marveling at how he put this all together without recording over himself a million times.

This album has me spellbound in amazement at his superhuman abilities. “New History Warfare Vol. 2: Judges” is quite an astoundingly daring, creative and virtuosic masterpiece of an album.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/05-From-no-part-of-me-could-I-summon-a-voice.mp3|titles=From no part of me could I summon a voice] [audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/07-Home.mp3|titles=Home] [audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/12-The-righteous-wrath-of-an-honorable-man.mp3|titles=The righteous wrath of an honorable man]
2011, albums, music, reviews

Album review: Chikita Violenta – "Tre3s"

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Chikita Violenta is a Mexican indie rock band that is trying to make waves in a very crowded scene right now. They have the sound and the songs and, mostly, the production backing them up. Unfortunately they are about 6 years behind the times in their efforts making this album sound nearly exactly like what Broken Social Scene was doing back in 2005 with their self-titled release.

It’s not just the sound itself that reminds me of the Broken Social Scene album, or that the same sort of spirit is captured on this album; it is that they pretty directly steal from that album. For example there are spots in “All I Need’s A Little More” that sounds as if it was lifted directly from “It’s All Gonna Break”. Parts of “Tired” are pretty damn close to “Handjobs for the Holidays”. I was wondering what the hell was going on with this album so I started doing a very cursory look around the internet. Normally I don’t look up anything about the band online when I am writing a review, other than to find out member’s names and exact dates of albums for accuracy’s sake. I don’t ever read other people’s reviews of albums and I usually don’t care about how an album was produced unless something really interesting strikes my ear, for example with Women’s albums. I like my reviews to be completely 100% based upon what I hear, but this time I couldn’t let it go. Curiosity got the best of me.

Well….guess what? Chikita Violenta is on Arts & Crafts, the label founded by the main men behind Broken Social Scene. If that wasn’t enough, this album was produced by the very same guy, David Newfeld, that produced Broken Social Scene’s 2005 self titled album. After I patted myself on the back for having such good ears to pick that out (not that it was too difficult being that it was made completely obvious) my appreciation for this album quickly waned. If I would have written a review upon my first few listens, it would have been fairly positive, but then those little things started becoming more noticeable and before long they were spreading like a pox and I couldn’t keep myself from paying attention to them.

Chikita Violenta - "Tre3s"

The sound is molded perfectly to fit that “anthemic” sort of “new wave of arena rock” that none other than Broken Social Scene, and I suppose to some extent those “other” (well, they were the “other” and now are the ones that are more relevant) Canadian arena rockers Arcade Fire, popularized in the early 2000’s. Who could blame them? It’s a great sound. Memorable, emotional, loud and busy. It’s great at filling up all the spaces where music should go with all sorts of wonderment and awe. It’s the sound that could describe that feeling one gets when confronted with something completely amazing, and profound; some grand sight that makes a person feel a oneness with humanity for a fleeting moment. It is the sound of that experience that they are attempting to bottle and make last forever.

Don’t get me wrong, or do get me wrong if you’d like. I don’t like to rip on bands. I don’t really do it that much, or ever. Chikita Violenta is not a bad band. They have written some really catchy tunes, but it seems as though we are prevented from hearing them after all this mimicry is piled on top of it. This places them squarely in the very long shadow cast by some trailblazing indie rock bands. “The Monster (Was Last Seen Approaching the Power Plant)” begins promisingly enough with some Spanish guitar that momentarily breathes new life into the album before everything is once again covered up by a mass of loops, samples and effects in a great whoosh of sound that envelops everything in its warm, stale cocoon.

There are some shining moments on the album, beginning with “Siren” which is a truly affecting song with some emotional power behind it. The latter third of the album seems to strip away at least some of the overdone production and gives us at least some clue as to the group’s abilities as a band. “My Connection”, the album closer, is about as stripped down as it gets here and, unsurprisingly, it is one of the highlights of the album.

Being influenced is one thing, but coming off as almost completely derivitive is another. It is my opinion that this is a band that truly wants to get their music out there, and to be honest, what band doesn’t? The way that Chikita Violenta has chosen to do this though was to attach themselves to the successes of another group and totally relinquish control to the producer in order to capture that certain “sound”, a sound that has already been captured by others.

They need more confidence in their songs. If their songs can stand on their own without the studio wizardry then they will stand out in the crowd. Today’s music scene demands a certain amount of originality. I think that the songs contained within this album may have that desired level of originality, but again, it is hard to tell with all the production piled on top of it. Music shouldn’t be produced like in a factory.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/08-Siren.mp3|titles=Siren]
2011, albums, groovemine, music, reviews

Album review: Deerhoof – "Deerhoof vs. Evil"

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Deerhoof, the ultra-quirky indie math rock/pop/irony heavy band is back with an album cheekily titled “Deerhoof Vs. Evil”.

To me Deerhoof is a band that I am constantly curious about. They seem to be combining things that one wouldn’t necessarily think go together. To me they are a study in opposites. Their singer – a tiny Japanese woman with a super-cute (almost too cute) high pitched vocal style – is backed by an at times very heavy hitting team of guitars and drums that explore disjunct math rock meter shifts. The lyrics are often quite simple and repeated over and over again, take for example their infamous song “Panda Panda Panda” where the lyrics are mostly just the song’s title. “Deerhoof Vs. Evil” has Deerhoof sticking to these principles and adding some depth to their music.

The usual noisy and angular guitars are playing a noticeably smaller role, traded instead for acoustics, there is a reliance on quieter aspects of songwriting notably in “No One Asked to Dance” and “I Did Crimes for You”. “No One Asked to Dance” displays a Spanish influenced guitar style that we haven’t heard from Deerhoof before, and is followed, funnily enough, by a song called “Let’s Dance the Jet” which sounds more like something that might be heard on their “Milk Man” album, which to me, is an album that showcases their typical sound. Usually math rock isn’t this sweet and at times this album can be really beautiful. Some songs open up into some really gorgeous, dreamy melodies. There are still a lot of places that pack quite a powerful punch.

Take for example the track “Behold A Marvel in the Darkness” where the lyric that is repeated is “What is this thing called love?”. That line is underpinned by a gentle guitar line, a few bass guitar plucks and sparse drums. It is soon followed by an explosion into a joyous and celebratory sound with a full wall of guitars, drums and cymbals shattering the silence like an atomic bomb. This band can go back and forth from contemplative and sparse to exuberant and loud instantly. They can turn on a dime. The fact that the music is commenting on the lyric is also something that shows a growth in their songwriting.
Sticking with the theme of opposites there is the fact that Deerhoof is adept at creating pop songs that are extremely dense and quite complicated but still fit inside a pop song idiom. The layered, polyrhythmic arrangements that are part of their sound point to drummer/founder Greg Saunier as a major part of the writing process. The complexity is pulled off in such a way that it never seems to belt one over the head. I hardly even noticed the first few times that I listened to the album until I really started to try to pull apart the songs as I listened. That is saying something, considering that it is one of the first things that I will usually listen for when I hear an album, especially coming from a band like this where I have come to expect it.

Deerhoof - "Deerhoof Vs. Evil"

Pop sensibilities are on display in the standout track “Super Duper Rescue Heads!”. First though, that title. The title of the song alone can give someone who has never heard the band before a pretty good idea of what they are all about. It’s that outward quirkiness that helps to make Deerhoof so accessible. Despite the sense of humor, the music is written and played with a confidence and seriousness, though it’s never too much. They don’t take themselves all that seriously, but there is nothing goofy about them. It’s a fine balance and they manage to keep it always in check.

“Secret Mobilization” starts off sounding like a Stereolab track before drifting into artier territory with the guitar wandering across neighboring harmonies while the drums and bass remain rock steady. The lyrics are repetitive, as usual for this album, which makes me think of another interesting contradictory juxtaposition within the music: it is like complex minimalism with shifting layers that repeat cyclically. The ending of this song explodes as the lead guitar shreds and squeals out a brief lick. The song “Hey I Can” opens percussion heavy with mallet instruments densely layered before schizophrenically jumping into somewhat more clear territory for the verse, and again to the chorus with a drastic shift in tempo that is pulled off so smoothly that it almost passes undetected.

Even the title of the album, “Deerhoof Vs. Evil” is a contradiction. Deerhoof is not the first thing that springs to mind when one thinks about fighting anything, especially something as looming and dangerous as, well, evil itself. They may write songs about superheroes and fighting crime but they are usually remembered for songs about, as mentioned before, pandas or seeing a dog on the sidewalk. Whatever it is that they are doing, all of the elements seem to work well together. Each time that I listen to this album I am only disappointed by the fact that it is over so quickly. The music is so well constructed that the apparent incongruities and maze of contradictions don’t hinder but instead become a part of Deerhoof’s charm and style. It’s why nobody can help but love Deerhoof.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/06-Deerhoof-Super-Duper-Rescue-Heads.mp3|titles=Super Duper Rescue Heads!]
2011, albums, music, reviews

Album review: Sonic Youth – "SYR 9: Simon Werner a Disparu"

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I should start this post with a full disclosure: I am just about the biggest fan of Sonic Youth that there can be. This is not to say that I instantly love everything that they do. Even I can admit that NYC Ghosts and Flowers is a god awful album. They have been around long enough that they are allowed to have a few missteps, phases of greatness followed by brief periods of mediocrity. You definitely can’t blame them for it though, they are always willing to try something new and they are always busy creating.

Ever since buying their early DGC releases “Goo” and “Dirty” off of a friend in middle school I have been in love. Soon after my purchase “Experimental, Jet Set, Trash and No Star was released and I was hooked. They have always been able to get away, in my mind anyway, with anything. They are unabashedly experimental with one foot planted firmly in the “rock” world and the other in the world of “serious” contemporary composition. With Sonic Youth though “serious music” isn’t too different from their rock music. They are responsible for successfully merging the two.

Saying that they have “merged the two” is a bit unfair though, to be honest. There really is no such separation, nor should their be. Music is music. Sonic Youth is one of the most prolific acts in existence today. While they are creating music for Matador they are also creating music to be put out on their own, the SYR series, not to mention the myriad side projects, collaborations, and extra-musical activities that each of the members partake. The point is: they are busy. Busy creating.

The numbered SYR releases usually showcase the more experimental side of the band such as “Goodbye 20th Century” that featured works by John Cage, Yoko Ono and Pauline Oliveros among others performed by the band with help from several musician friends. Kim Gordon, DJ Olive and Ikue Mori collaborated on an SYR release with an experimental album of improvisatory compositions as well. This album, the ninth in the SYR series, is no exception to the experimental rule. It is completely instrumental. At times delicate (“Les Agnes Au Piano”), at other slightly more abrasive (“Chez Yves (Alice et Clara)”) but never crossing into very distant territory.

The tracks err on the side of caution in their brevity with few exceptions (notably the 13 minute closing track). Not that as a rule they aren’t able to make longer compositions sound amazingly beautiful, take for example the extended version of The Diamond Sea off of their “Washing Machine” album. That is 20+ minutes of astounding beauty. It seems that with this album they remain focused on one or two clear ideas per track and they know exactly when enough is enough. The brevity of the songs seems to blur the line of what is improvised and what is laid down as a foundation. Sometimes it appears things are hanging on by a thread, only to be pulled back together again. The improvisations have a great deal of substance and direction. All of this is no doubt the result of them playing together for over thirty years.

Sonic Youth - "SYR 9: Simon Werner a Disparu"

To those familiar with Sonic Youths oeuvre the most apt comparison to their earlier work would be found on the soundtrack that they scored to the movie “Made In USA” (apropos of nothing, that soundtrack features my favorite song title ever, “Mackin’ for Doober”) and far from their live improvisations for some Stan Brakhage films that were released as “SYR 6: Koncertas Stan Brakhage Prisiminimui”. That these songs are used as a film soundtrack seems perfectly fitting.

“Escapades” has some really great changes, and generally creates a dark mood. Persistent guitar rhythm doesn’t allow for too much room to move and explore, whereas “Théme de Laetitia” is probably the most spacious song on the album with a buzz that grows to a throbbing hum of guitars. Disjointed echoes emerge from the distance in the left channel while a feedback drone builds in the right among atmospheric cymbal swells. As far as tight vs. loose compositions on the album, where tight would be characterized by little improvisatory noodling and loose being more aleatoric in nature I would place these two tracks at opposite ends of the spectrum. There are tracks such as “Théme de Laetitia” that seem to be concerned more with creating a mood whereas “Escapades” and tracks like it have more of a standard melodic and harmonic nature.

The final track, also the lengthiest cut, “Théme d’ Alice”, has the most clear delineation of the songs structure. The band works so well together throughout the album, but to me it is especially noticeable here. The final 4 minutes is a loosening of that structure, as the song slowly caves in on itself accompanied by a slow fade out.

Through the entire album Steve Shelly’s steady backbeat serves to hold everything together, preventing the work from becoming too much of an all out spacey jam. While the guitars are reaching out into the unknown it is Shelley’s constant that keeps things from going too far. There is a very slight bit of echo on his snare drum. The recording sounds as though it is taking place in a small room, helping to make the album a bit more of the intimate affair. Thurston and Lee’s guitars are pretty sparsely effected with only a touch of delay here and there and light reverb, but nothing that gets in the way of the music and mic’d pretty close; their sound is pushed up front.

It’s not surprising that it is Sonic Youth that finally creates an album that goes its own path, and does so exceptionally well. There is no “wall of sound” production”, no super crazy amounts of reverb on everything, drenching the music beyond the point of recognition. Not that being trendy is high on their agenda. Sonic Youth have been the vanguard of new popular music for a long time now. They have always been the leader and never the follower.

When I was an undergraduate music composition major my professor used to tell the class repeatedly that composition was merely “edited improv”, and I read in an interview once a long time ago where Thurston Moore said that improv was simply “instant composition”. I suppose these things go hand in hand. Sonic Youth does “instant composition” perfectly. It is improvisation with purpose and shape, forethought and direction, all of this that my composition professor referred to as “causality”. This is exactly what is created with this album.

Listening to SYR releases is like getting a peek into Sonic Youth’s notebooks and it is always interesting to hear what they are working on.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/05.-Jean-Baptiste-+á-la-fen+¬tre.mp3|titles=Jean-Baptiste à la fenêtre]
2011, albums, groovemine, music, reviews

Album review: The Insane Warrior – "We Are the Doorways"

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Music has the ability to take on a character of its own and often the musicians that are creating it feel that they are a different person while in the studio. This much is quite true for hip-hop producer RJD2 whose instrumental album “We Are the Doorways” was released under the moniker The Insane Warrior.

According to an entry on his blog he wants us to think of The Insane Warrior as “a completely different dude”. He even goes as far as imagining that he wanted, at one point, to create different names for the artists that are responsible for creating all of the material that he himself is releasing. This makes sense; if an album is written, performed and produced all by the same guy, but the music changes wildly from one album to the next why not change the name of the artist accordingly? The binding element is that they will all be released, as “We Are the Doorways” is, as an RJD2 production. Similar to how Kevin Drew and Co. have released solo albums in association with Broken Social Scene. This could be a great gambit for getting consumers to become fans of a certain “brand” of music while allowing performers and producers to indulge their every whim of creativity. But I digress.

“We Are the Doorways” is a keyboard driven instrumental album with improvisatory, jazz inflicted breaks contained within a usually steady dance  groove that serves as the foundation. The lead synth sounds are thick and fat with a crunch that is reminiscent of something from 1980’s television like Knight Rider, especially on the track “Within the Maze”. The character of much of the music holds equal footing in kitschy 80’s vintage and ultra-modern jazz/prog-rock fusion with a lot of energy. There are spots that border on the chugging motorik rhythm of krautrock as well, but there is more of a looseness in the compositions than krautrock would normally allow.

There is a lot of sonic ground covered in the course of the album. This only seems appropriate considering his desire to create enough differing music to substantiate a name change for each release. It is exciting to hear from an artist that is a prolific musician with a need for incessant creation. The album just sounds good. There is space in the mix, and nothing is ever crowded or overbearing. The drum sound is clean and dry with no reverb that I can detect on anything. This flies in the face of most records coming out today. I think that it is this dry sound that keeps the synth sounds from being cheesy or over-saturated with some sort of sentimental emotion. The dry sound has the extra added effect of tightening up the sound, giving it a more mechanical feel but still maintaining a looseness in the music, much like a jazz ensemble. The Insane Warrior is both tight and loose in all the right places.

The Insane Warrior - "We Are the Doorways"

Despite the change in sounds from track to track RJD2…errr The Insane Warrior does not usually mess with the structure of the songs. They are usually in a sort of Verse/Chorus/Verse setting. Stagnation can be more noticeable without lyrics to fall back on, and rather than have a constant solo he chooses to vary the “Verses” slightly and places some interesting diversional sections in between familiar material and never goes on too long. It seems as though he is aware of the limitations of instrumental music in that regard.
Tracks like “Black Nectar” and the aforementioned “Within the Maze” are studies in contrast in and of themselves. “Black Nectar” begins with a recurring ostinato over which a jazz flute solo appears. The flute only makes a brief showing in this one track, thankfully. Following the forgivingly brief flute solo is a spacey, amorphous section whose dark tone contrasts sharply with the majority of the album; it sounds like something that could have appeared on the Blade Runner soundtrack. Meanwhile “Saint Ignatius Belsse” features calimba, glockenspiel and vibraphone in a thin texture that makes the music seemingly float on air. As soon as the drums kick in the piece begins to swing like Milt Jackson’s Modern Jazz Quartet.

There is no better way to describe “The Mountain” than to say that it sports a raunchy 70’s porn groove before zooming into a slick guitar lead. The guitar here, used sparingly on the album, adds another interesting timbre to the increasingly complex sonic landscape being created across the album. The guitar tone and style sounds like “Three Friends” era Gentle Giant with a combination of the crunchy synth. The album, at first listen, reminds me to a certain extent of the work of Squarepusher with the fast paced virtuosic bass playing replaced with the soundworld of the late 70’s and early 80’s krautrock and prog of Triumvirat and Gentle Giant combined with the improvisatory nature of more recent act The New Deal.

The Insane Warrior’s “We Are the Doorways” is an ever changing, synth heavy, instrumental surge of energy with a virtuosic zeal that seems to hop gleefully from one genre to the next while maintaining a truly unique sound all its own.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/02-The-Water-Wheel.mp3|titles=The Water Wheel]
2011, albums, groovemine, music, reviews

Album review: White Fence – "Is Growing Faith"

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For the past few years the retro-60’s sound has been featured very prominently in several albums that have made a lot of music fans stand up and take notice. Take for example Best Coast, Caribou, Deerhunter, MGMT and the list goes on. Well, all of that can stop now because White Fence has given us the peak of perfection when it comes to that retro sound.

Specifically stated White Fence’s album, “Is Growing Faith” is, at first glance, freak folk. The freakiest of freak folk. I would even dare to say that at some points this album borders upon sounding like outsider music a la Jandek, or Daniel Johnston in its strange, almost uninviting sound. The fact that their sound is reminiscent of Buffalo Springfield, early Dylan and The Left Banke while at the same time sounding as if it was all recorded on the shoddiest of equipment in a bedroom somewhere truly places this album in a category of its own. To say that it didn’t initially kind of frighten me would be a lie. There are, however, really catchy tracks on this album and its like no other album I have heard, or at least it doesn’t sound like anything I’ve heard done recently.

The lo-fi to the extreme approach in some of the songs is, admittedly, something that needs to be listened-through at first. There is a bit of a learning curve, or “accessibility curve” to this album. Like I said, it’s not outwardly inviting, but if you stick with it and really surrender to the world in which the music exists then there really are some hidden gems to be found. “A Pearl is not a Diamond” has an early psychedelic folk-rock feel to it with ethereal vocals and overdriven guitar that pans wildly from one side to the other while “Tumble, Lies and Honesty” strips everything back to just acoustic guitar, an early sounding vintage synth with its monotone buzz vibrating in the background throughout and tongue clucks used for percussion. Some of the songs sound as if at any minute they are going to fall apart completely, for example “Lillian (Won’t You Play Drums?)” with its off kilter drum machine and synth from the song it follows sounding off an atonal line that is buried beneath everything.

Imagine The Beatles discovering LSD while they were working on their first albums. What would “Love Me Do” sound like if John was taking acid? I suppose one could say that is what early Pink Floyd sort of sounded like with Syd Barrett at the helm. There is a taste of the west-coast surf rock vibe added to the mix via a good amount of the requisite reverb on everything, adding yet another dimension to the music. The guitars are rarely distorted, instead a clean and twangy tone is used throughout. The singing style of Tim Presley, the mastermind behind White Fence, even sounds like something from British Invasion era rock and roll.

Tim Presley of White Fence

The DIY element seems evident at the beginning and ending of nearly every song where snippets of other songs appear and are abruptly cut off. The tape stretches and warbles throughout, throwing the tempo askew and generally having a disorienting effect. The tempo shifts from the varying tape speed are not the only disorienting part of the album. It is quite an interesting experience listening to this work because my mind is telling me the whole time that there is now way that this was not created in the 60’s. I start to make up reasons as to why it is only being released now: Perhaps this is some lost or forgotten tape. But then a song like “Body Cold”, that is a little harder driving, begins and I’m torn by its farfeesa organ sound combined with a sinewy hard rock guitar. Then there are other moments like in the song “When There is No Crowd” when the lyrics speak of “[the] Summer of 2000, six years past the date and I wondered if I would come back…” which takes me completely out of focus for a few seconds each time I hear it. Up until that point in the album I find that I am completely immersed to the point where I have actually convinced myself that I am listening to an album from the 60’s. There is also “The Mexican Twins” which sounds to me to be directly influenced by The Mothers of Invention’s 1968 album “We’re Only in it for the Money”.

“Your Last Friend Alive” runs directly into “Enthusiasm”, the latter song actually starting before the prior song finishes. The tape then fades out and back in again as if it was a  last minute decision to leave the song in, or as if it is Presley improvising on the chord progression and later coming up with a use for it. Things like this give the album the feeling of it being produced as a home tape, distributed to friends. The track “Enthusiasm” really captures that surf-rock sound, though with a lot of background noise added to the mix and wild, erratic drumming while the country swagger of “Stranger Things Have Happened (To You)” is one of the most immediately inviting songs, complete with a catchy hook and bridge.

White Fence has outdone everyone with their retro stylings. Though, like Zappa, there may be “no commercial potential” for this album it is most certainly a statement being made about returning to core songwriting elements. The songs fit together like a run on sentence, or more like a stream of consciousness. The lo-fi, DIY sound, though initially offputting, actually grows to make the album to feel more like an intimate, homemade and tape-traded affair. If you spend some time with this album you will be rewarded.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/16-You-Cant-Put-Your-Arms-Around-a-Memory.mp3|titles=You Can’t Put Your Arms Around a Memory] [audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/06-A-Pearl-Is-Not-a-Diamond.mp3|titles=A Pearl Is Not a Diamond]
2010, albums, groovemine, music

Album review: X-Ray Press "Uvb – 76"

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Prog-rock has been around for quite a long time now. Though its roots can be traced back to jazz fusion many bands eschew those undertones in search of a new sound that still retains the complexities in the music but not so much the jazzer attitude that can come off as overly pretentious. Nobody wants to end up sounding like Yes, or (it pains me to type this…) Emerson, Lake & Palmer after all. X-Ray Press has created one of the more complex albums that holds a firm footing in the prog world, but is still so much more.

From the opening of the first track, “Everybody, This Is Everyone (And Nobody Cares)”, the guitar tone reminds me of Shellac. The aggressiveness of the music also matches Shellac’s own ethos in some ways, and though they can both be considered to be creating “math-rock” (a genre that side-steps the aforementioned jazz influences found in progressive rock but still holds to the same “complexity for complexity’s sake” constantly shifting time signatures) Shellac would never consider creating an album with songs that are linked thematically forming a deeply woven story about living in the modern age. X-Ray Press’s angle is more similar to that of The Dillinger Escape Plan, with more than just a nod to their metal leanings, but with not as much of the dialed up anger as Dillinger, and cleaned up a bit. Though there is not an overt jazz sound there are glimpses of its interesting harmonies and song structure that can sound reminiscent of “Starless and Bible Black” era King Crimson as in tracks like “Chord and Mumble” and “Holy Ghost, USA“. But then again, doesn’t every prog band have some element or other that points back to King Crimson in some way? There are also strains that sound like Pink Mountain’s avant–garde improvisations in “Bad Beard (God Under Oath).

Hopefully this will give you an idea of the truly rich palette these guys are working from. Of course, it’s little bits here and there, nothing overtly derivative or “ripped-off” from anyone. Strongly influenced yes, but X-Ray Press really does seem to be doing something different. With “Uvb-76” they have taken a rather complex structured album and, where most bands would leave the tracks at 20+ minutes in length, X-Ray Press is carving out little gems that are much more easily grasped because of their forgiving song length of 2 to 5 minutes. This makes for a prog album that is in your face and quite possibly “radio-friendly”. A significant amount of punch is packed into the 2 minutes of “Cubicle Racist” and “Thin Mint, FSA“.

X-Ray Press - "Uvb -76"

The concept of the album is primarily one of anger and frustration directed toward the world at large which eventually arrives at acceptance through discovering some way in which one can transcend, on ones own, the problems that are continually faced through creative action of some sort. In short: making lemonade from the lemons that life seems to perpetually dish out. From being just another automaton to making something out of ones life and moving on. The album is divided into 2 acts of sorts: I. Thought and II. Action. The first of these is divided up into 2 “scenes” while the 2nd is divided into 3. These “acts” are broken up by haunting, short piano interludes that appear between scenes. It sounds to me like a prepared piano (a concept first invented and developed by the American 20th Century avant-garde composer John Cage) where the strings are somehow stopped or otherwise prevented from resonating.

I told you it was a heady concept…

As mentioned before, their math/prog leanings means that the time signatures do not sit still for a second, switching all over the place before one can even begin to sort out where the downbeat is. As for the substance of the songs though, and there is a lot of substance that goes far beyond complex time signature changes and polymeter, the band has a way of working elements into each song that find them interlocking into a groove for a short time before pulling themselves apart again to go their own separate ways. The inclusion of a Rhodes piano to the ensemble adds to the hint of jazz influence as well as melding well with the guitar tone. It has the ability to sound like the guitar feeding back, but also adds to the bright high end of the guitar, often doubling it though you wouldn’t know until they choose to go their separate ways.

There is a lot to this album, but knowing the kind of fanaticism and dedication to detail that fans of this type of music are I’m sure that very little of it will be lost. If this is a sign of music to come in 2011 then we’d all better hold on because it is going to be an intense ride.

And check it out! You can stream the entire album at the band’s own bandcamp site!

Or, if you are in a hurry, I have uploaded two tracks below.

[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/XRayPress-07_Cubicle_Racist.mp3|titles=XRayPress-Cubicle Racist] [audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/XRayPress-12_Holy_Ghost_USA.mp3|titles=XRayPress-Holy Ghost USA]
2010, albums, groovemine, music, reviews

Album Review: Stereolab – "Not Music"

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Stereolab is one of those bands where it almost seems pointless to write a review. Their fans are fiercely dedicated and almost unanimously unflagging in their enthusiasm for “The Groop”. Certainly Stereolab is in a class of its own. There is no other group, or Groop even, that sounds like they do. With their latest release, “Not Music”, they give us a heaping helping of electropop goodness.

Stereolab
Stereolab

The fact that Stereolab is in a class by itself can be seen as both a good and a bad thing. They are instantly recognizable, which allows them a certain amount of freedom because it seems that no matter what they do they can never not sound like Stereolab. I suppose this speaks to their reliance on the sounds of retro synths as well as to their melding of jazz, rock, electronic and lounge influences. It also speaks to their songwriting style and the way that they have branded themselves over the years as standing apart from most musical trends. It seems as though this group has their own language when it comes to naming albums and songs. The titles that Stereolab chooses for their releases seem to suggest inside jokes that only the band is in on in which they wryly comment on some abstract metaphysical idea, flat out absurudist humor, or references to food. Stereolab is an extraordinarily prolific band. In their time together they have released so many full lengths, EPs and collections that all but the most dedicated followers of The Groop can keep up, or even keep track.

“Not Music” was not originally conceived of as an album, rather these tracks were culled from the sessions of the band’s last full-length “Chemical Chords”. The fact that “Chemical Chords” as an album was strangely so-so and not quite up to the usual Stereolab standard makes this latest effort (not-effort?) very welcomed. This album is as solid as Stereolab albums come. An instantly recognizable  jazz inflicted version of vintage synth driven lounge krautrock. The vintage synth sounds are mixed seamlessly with jazz ensemble stalwarts like a brass section and vibraphone. Imagine if Kraftwerk had traveled back in time to the 1950s and then hopped into their Delorean again (well they are European so I suppose that they would travel via Police Box) and went 10 or 20 years into our future, that is the sound of Stereolab. So well defined and distinguishable is their sound that it is to the point where they should actually go by the name Stereolab™. If anyone else even came close to imitating them it would be so obvious that they were completely ripping off Stereolab that the imitator would be instantly scorned and run out of town.

Stereolab - Not Music
Stereolab - "Not Music"

That being said, this album specifically is no different from any other album you have already heard from Stereolab and, unfortunately, this may be the last album that we  ever hear from them. I say “unfortunately” not because this is a disappointing album, quite the opposite is true, but because they have been producing a steady stream of regularly fantastic work since the early 1990s. The band announced an indefinite hiatus in April of 2009 and singer Lætitia Sadier has begun touring as a solo artist. Her voice being so linked to the sound of Stereolab that I imagine she is going to have an extraordinarily difficult time separating her solo work from the work of this group.

Songs on this album like “Silver Sands” with its incessantly chugging rhythm bring the Kraftwerk influence front and center. That song sounding a lot like “Trans Europe Express” in, I feel, a very obvious way. The fact that Stereolab drags it out for over 10 minutes shows how unashamed they are in displaying the importance of their influences. The motorik backbone of “Silver Sands”, “So Is Cardboard Clouds” and “Pop Molecules” and the minimalistic opening of “Aelita” seem to be coming from a completely synthetic place but Stereolab never allows their music to come off as cold, unemotional or unhuman. Much to the contrary Stereolab, with their jazz influence, sometimes politically charged lyrics, and absurd/dada sense of humor show a very human side even if sometimes one can’t quite picture what instruments are being played, or if humans are even responsible for producing the recorded sounds. Sadier’s voice has very much to do with softening the sometimes machine-like sound of the group.

Hopefully this will not be the last that we hear from Stereolab. If we don’t hear from them for a while it’s good that they left us on a high note. Despite this album not really being an “album” in the traditional sense, but more a collection of songs from previous sessions, it still holds up with lots of great Stereolab™ songs worth hearing.