White Denim: Fits
Thursday, November 19th, 2009
White Denim’s Fits wields a dizzying, ADD aesthetic that brims with rhythmic dexterity. By design, nothing stays in one place for too long. “Radio Milk How Can You Stand It” opens with a wash of noise that bursts into rhythms snaking through funk, psychedelia and art-rock terrain. The music careens wildly, crashing against the noise-damaged, Tex-Mex spaz of “El Hard Attack Dcwyw” and the spaced-out dub of “Sex Prayer.” At the half-way point, the group’s meds seem to kick in as “Mirrored and Reverse” settles into a groove that continues its wild directional changes but tames the atmosphere. The group’s execution of such lurching musical bouts is impressive, but the rapid-fire nature of it makes Fits an exercise in difficult listening. (Downtown Music) 3 out of 5 stars.
Though his production work on albums for Aesop Rock and other elite indie rappers gets a lot more attention, Manhattan beatmaker Blockhead has quietly been releasing consistently strong solo albums in the last half-decade. His tracks for other artists tend to be more in the hard-hitting, slicing-and-dicing, traditional hip-hop vein, but albums such as his latest, The Music Scene, give him an opportunity to be more atmospheric and experimental, and at times, to simply space out. The disc is at its best on such creeping, smothering instrumentals as “Attack the Doctor” and “Hell Camp,” which are as compelling as the work of turntablists DJ Shadow and RJD2. One wishes, however, that Blockhead would ditch the canned, vintage-sounding voiceovers he often employs to make things a bit more ironic. On The Music Scene’s title track, it’s a ’50s-style educator chanting, “We call that a joint” – which is pretty silly. (Ninja Tune) 4 out of 5 stars.
Duet for Theremin and Lap Steel’s latest offering captures two sprawling masses of improvised drones too harmonious to be called avant-garde and too experimental for stuffy modern classical terms. These sounds are the product of two minds sharing a single headspace and letting the music drive – which is typical of the Atlanta duo. From the onset of the 23:56 minute opener “Live at Eyedrum,” the lines are blurred as each instrument’s respective whines and whirs waver in a dream state. The longer 33:18 minute piece, “Live at Kavarna,” embodies everything the subconscious mind finds appealing when deciphering the beauty in whale songs, haunted house sounds and dog whistles. Here, they collide with the cerebellum in a graceful, slow-motion crash. Put it on and drift away. (Self released) 4 out of 5 stars.
Fans of the veteran Argentinean rockers Los Fabulosos Cadillacs ought to be used to a release like El Arte de la Elegancia de LFC. A compilation of rerecorded and reinterpreted B-side tracks, it follows the same pattern that has propelled the band to revered status among the Rock en Español faithful: Every few years, they’re able to rerelease old material that suddenly catches fire. For El Arte, the goal was to get the band together to capture its current sound, as it has evolved from ’80s rude-boy ska to a polished, strum rock infused with congas and a horn section. It works. These B-sides – including a heartfelt cover of Curtis Mayfield’s “Move On Up” (”Vamos Ya”) – enjoy a breath of fresh air and demonstrate that, for a band midway through its third decade, there’s no letting up. (Sony Music) 4 out of 5 stars.
On his 2004 track “Chains,” R.A. the Rugged Man raps that he is “mad famous for being unknown.” This is true. Despite having recorded with everyone from Notorious B.I.G. to Kool G Rap and having once been signed to Jive and Priority, R.A. has only one studio album in a career spanning nearly two decades. Which is why his new greatest hits CD, Legendary Classics, Volume 1, seems strange — until you realize the Long Island-born MC has enough beloved unreleased cuts and guest appearances to justify it. The work features Havoc from Mobb Deep, Biggie, and Sadat X, but it is R.A. who stands out with his uber-dense, chiseled-in-granite flow, which is as elegant as his lyrics are profane. If you’re not interested in explicit songs about dirty sex this might not be your bag, but for hip-hop fans unfamiliar with R.A.’s work, it’s a perfect starting point. (Nature Sounds) 5 stars out of 5
With their self-titled debut, Londoners, The xx drift through a mire of boy-girl, twentysomething sexual and emotional ruminations via sparse atmospheres and occasionally evolved pop melodies that hide mostly in the shadows. But when it comes to the surface in “VCR,” “Crystalised” and “Basic Space,” their simple, economical songwriting soars far beyond their years. Vocalist Jamie Smith coos her regrets, apologies and desires with spaciousness and allure, leaving plenty of room to roam in every song. Romy Croft delivers deep, ethereal guitar lines that fit perfectly, but he has the voice of a breathy gorilla with a mouthful of marbles and he ruins the moment every time he emotes. It’s not enough to kill the record, but in an otherwise perfectly sensual balance he’s hard on the ears. (Young Turks) 4 stars out of 5
Echo & the Bunnymen’s best songs have always swelled with hopeless romance weighed against distress and an almost creepy sense of longing. The sweeping mood of their groundbreaking early ’80s records has steadily evaporated since their mid-’90s reformation, but concise pop tendencies have grown in its wake. The Fountain isn’t poorly executed, it’s just a bit samey. Ian McCulloch’s dark croon in “Shroud of Turin” and the title track evoke everything that ever made the group so fantastic. And Will Sergeant’s flourishing melodies are equally evocative in “Life of a Thousand Crimes,” the album’s strongest number. But 25 years ago these would have been killer B-sides. As such, The Fountain always take a backseat to such ’80s staples as Crocodiles, Porcupine, and Ocean Rain. (Great American) 3 stars out of 5
A DJ crew composed of four Tel Aviv beatmakers, Soulico blends U.S. hip-hop with traditional Jewish melodies and Israeli folk in a way that feels exotic to American ears while remaining accessible. It helps that the debut CD, Exotic on the Speaker, features many MCs rap heads will be familiar with, including Ghostface Killah, Lyrics Born, Pigeon John and Del the Funky Homosapien. Mainly, however, the disc succeeds because the tracks bounce, and the Middle Eastern-crossover, party flavor will remind listeners of the group’s JDub labelmate Matisyahu. Though Exotic on the Speaker slows down near the end when the mix switches from uptempo rap and dance to slower reggae and dancehall, early tracks like “El Nur” and “Put ‘Em Up” make for an album well worth copping. One is left wondering why no one thought of having Ghostface rap over a pulsing snake-charmer beat before. (JDub Records) 4 stars out of 5
Best considered as a warm-up for U2’s next album, the classic The Joshua Tree, 1984’s The Unforgettable Fire finds the quartet retreating from the overt commerciality of War and, with the help of Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, gradually shifting to a more ambient sound. The Eno-Lanois production team would later be the key that pushed U2 toward experimental waters. Although that approach is apparent on a bonus disc of B-sides, non-album rarities, live tracks and extended remixes, songs such as “Pride (In the Name of Love)” and “Bad” still aim for the stadium back rows. An accompanying DVD includes all the album’s videos as well as the band’s performance at Live Aid. A half-hour documentary shows the group and its producers laboriously recording “Pride” with all the repetition, second-guessing and sheer boredom of piecing together the song, practically guaranteeing you’ll never want to hear it again. (Mercury/UME) 4 out of 5 stars
Before there was grunge, there was Bleach, Nirvana’s harsh, ‘89 debut that dragged punk’s contemptuous sneer through the mud to churn out one damn fine album. Bleach isn’t the voice of a generation that came two years later with Nevermind, but it’s an infinitely better record. “Blew,” “School,” “Love Buzz,” “Negative Creep” — they’re all raw classics that were too visceral for the masses. Cobain’s half-baked yowls still sound like they’re going to fall apart every time he opens his mouth, and the remastered job makes the album’s highs higher and lows lower. It’s a dirty album, and the production needed to be touched-up. A booklet of photos and a live show from the era are nice add-ons, but it ain’t the bells and whistles that matter here. The songs themselves make Bleach a ramshackle work of perfection. (Sub Pop) 5 stars out of 5
The second full-length from U.K. duo Fuck Buttons is an impressive shift toward accessible melodies without sacrificing the experimental grit of their ‘08 debut, Street Horrrsing. As such, it’s inappropriate to call Fuck Buttons a noise group, per se. Sure, they shun the verses, choruses and whatever else goes into what most people call songs. But the drifting rhythms and crystalline sounds in “Surf Solar” and “Space Mountain” lay out a blueprint for the group’s restrained ears. There’s nothing harsh about the album’s modernist industrial and math rock structures. Even as the buzz and mutant cut-ups on “Rough Steez” morph into obtuse beats, there’s a soothing quality to the clutter that reaches in through your brain, grabs ahold of your guts and tugs you along ever so subtly. (ATP Records) 4 stars out of 5
The most popular male duo in music history (easily besting Simon & Garfunkel and the Everly Brothers, at least in terms of sales) Daryl Hall and John Oates get the belated yet extremely comprehensive box set tribute they deserve. There have been plenty of other blue-eyed soul men, but none have tapped into the zeitgeist with as much pure pop savvy as H&O. They effortlessly captured the smooth soul of their Philly hometown and even though over the years (this set starts with material recorded back in 1966) the twosome dabbled in folk, harder-edged rock, and schlocky ’80s synth-heavy rock, they kept the R&B current bubbling underneath the other trappings. Four discs, packed with 74 tracks — including 16 previously unreleased rarities, about half of them live — and a glossy 60-page book with track-specific information, details Hall & Oates’ crossover appeal, longevity and somewhat unexpected resurgence in recent years. (RCA/Sony Legacy) 5 stars out of 5
The final Isle of Wight festival produced some of rock’s greatest moments, but exposed the dark side of the peace and love generation. At 2 a.m., folk singer Leonard Cohen walked on stage and faced a riot, as the beleaguered audience ripped and roared following one of Jimi Hendrix’s last, incendiary performances of his career. Somehow, Cohen’s monotone storytelling brought a vast chunk of the raging 600,000 back to earth, and he proceeded to deliver one of the most mesmerizing concerts of the decade. Backed by what was basically a country western band including banjo player Elkin Fowler and fiddler Charlie Daniels (yes, that Charlie Daniels), Cohen’s dark poetry intertwined with the vastness of the night and hypnotized the masses. The event, filmed by Murray Lerner, is almost 40 years old. In a stark visual comparison to the recently released Live in London 2008 DVD, 1970’s Cohen is scraggly, unkempt, but just as enigmatic and committed to his words. Ageless, indeed. (Sony Legacy) 4 stars out of 5
When Lester Bangs, Lenny Kaye and every other half-cocked rock critic on the planet has weighed in on the Velvet Underground, what’s left to discuss? Not much. That’s why Chicago Sun-Times pop critic Jim DeRogatis lets the pictures do the talking in this friggin’ gorgeous collection of photos, fliers and album art that captures the Velvets in all of their glorious vanity. A brusque 1975 interview with Sterling Morrison is the most revealing component. Otherwise, the coffeetable book has to be the greatest visual history ever produced on the band. What’s more, it isn’t overwrought with pointless hero worship like the kind that guides so many other books that broach the Velvet Underground. DeRogatis’ Walk on the Wildside shows Reed, Cale, Morrison, Tucker, Nico, Warhol and the rest of the hangers-on in the good, raw and ugly. (Voyageur Press) 4 stars out of 5
The members of Music Go Music must want you to believe they’re Scandinavian fairies living in the mountains, with only synthesizers and pixie sticks to sustain them. Why else would they give themselves pseudonyms like Gala Bell, Kamer Maza and TORG, and play the airiest, most sugary-sweet dance pop imaginable on their debut, Expressions? The group is actually composed of members of Los Angeles indie-rock outfit Bodies of Water, and this project sees them indulging their love of ’80s electro, cheesy love stories and “whoa whoa whoa” sing-alongs. It’s all as much fun as it sounds, and track highlights like “Love, Violent Love,” “Explorers of the Heart” and “Light of Love” offer enough low-commitment escapist melodies to power a Matthew McConaughey movie. The only difference is that, while you can probably wait for Ghosts of Girlfriends Past to get to cable, you’d be wise to give Expressions a spin post-haste. (Secretly Canadian) 4 stars out of 5
Much like ’07’s North Star Deserter, Vic Chesnutt’s At the Cut finds Athens’ grim folkie still soaring beyond the devices of a traditional singer/songwriter. Many of the players who made North Star Deserter so bold and beautiful, including members of Godspeed You! Black Emperor and former Fugazi vocalist/guitarist Guy Picciotto, have returned. But whereas North Star crystallized Chesnutt’s stark visions into swirls of strings, rhythms and dissonance, here the expansive sound feels natural. “Coward” opens with epic drama, and Picciotto’s guitar adds terse immediacy to “Phillip Guston,” while “Granny” wilts with somber remembrance. Riding these peaks and valleys is emotionally exhausting, but if you’re a fan you already know the kind of pain you’re in for. At the Cut doesn’t hold North Star’s surprises, but it’s a stunning companion album. (Constellation Records) 4 stars out of 5
Tealights’ six-song debut is a sweeping marriage of laptop textures and bold strings sculpting dramatic moods that are very pretty but brittle. Take Us By Sea is the backbone of a musical vernacular driven by dark romanticism set adrift in modern classical and experimental arrangements. Like Claude Debussy on a date with Björk, surrealism and impressionism mingle in the dramatic male/female wailing in “Wait.” The lingering string melodies heard over front lady Nancy Shim’s cool voice provide the weeping heart of the CD. The grand finale “No Sound to Hear” layers a procession of live and electronic instruments alongside a reluctant new age croon in a short, delicate burst of chaos. With so much swelling emotion, these songs err on being too precious for rock ‘n’ roll ears. But the accomplished musicianship and elegant bent of Take Us By Sea will melt the hardest of hearts. (self-released) 4 stars out of 5
Bradford Cox has declared that Logos is an “extroverted” album that isn’t about him, but I couldn’t disagree more. The second solo full-length from Deerhunter’s leader is the inward journey of a world-weary voice dealing with the natural order of the universe — all awash in soft-focus, pop tones. Noah Lennox (aka Panda Bear) of Animal Collective lends his voice and sampling blueprints to “Walkabout,” and Stereolab’s angelic voice Laetitia Sadier drives “Quick Canal.” These couplings feel like vacations from the Id, Ego, Superego clash commencing beneath the happy exteriors of “Sheila” and “Logos.” Each is bound by fairytale bliss and distress under gorgeous façades. With repeated listens, Logos reveals greater staying power than its predecessor, and though it’s not the catchiest or the most unpredictable album Cox has made, it’s the strongest one so far under the Atlas Sound moniker. (Kranky) 4 stars out of 5