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Mon, 22 May 2006

Golden Age of Radio / Josh Ritter
Golden Age of Radio One good folky singer/songwriter with a guitar deserves another, I always say. Okay, I don't always say that. In fact, I've never said that. Well, not until now. Because clearly I've said it now. See? Right up there I said it.

Sorry; I'm better now. Anyway, to Josh Ritter. I don't know why, but I picked You've Got the Moon as the first track to sample on this album. And I was blown away; it's such a simple and sweet performance. Sadly, that higher register doesn't show up on any of the other tracks. Or maybe that's a good thing; better to be more than a one trick pony. Or a more than one trick pony. Or not a pony at all. Or something.

[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Mon, 15 May 2006

We Shall Overcome - The Seeger Sessions / Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Springsteen was always at least a little bit political. I remember his anger when Born in the U.S.A. was coopted by the Reagan campaign, demonstrating that neither the Republicans nor those "Reagan Democrats" had the slightest idea what he was singing about. Or maybe they just didn't care, more's the pity.

So it isn't that big a leap for Bruce to go back and bring life to the work of Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie and other practitioners of folk and protest songs. And that he certainly does, giving a song of man vs. the machine like John Henry the energy and the defiance the story demands. Not all folk songs are meant to lull you to sleep, after all. Just most of 'em.

Update 06/20: Suffering from a shortage of irony in your diet? I guess we have the answer to the question in Christine's comment. According to Boing Boing, Springsteen's record label put such extreme DRM on the CD release of this album that it can't be played on a computer or ripped to MP3s. Which would have inspired some great protest songs from the ultraliberal Mr. Seeger, I'm sure. As for us, I guess it's a choice of either buying from the iTMS or stealing the music from one of the P2P sites.

We Shall Overcome - The Seeger Sessions
[ Category: Rock | 1 comment | Link ]


Fri, 12 May 2006

All the Roadrunning / Mark Knopfler & Emmylou Harris
All the Roadrunning All the Roadrunning took seven years of stolen moments to put together, and it shows. Not in any dramatic way; in fact, this is about as undramatic an album as I've heard. But it shows in how easily their two voices intertwine, how natural and calm and sweet their performances together. Don't expect to be bowled over. But you may just find yourself being seduced.
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Mon, 08 May 2006

Burning Snow / Downliners Sect
Burning Snow I almost made a horrible mistake. Not my first, surely not my last, and not even my worst. But still...

I got an email from a band called Downliners Sekt, asking me to plug their album which is available for free download on their website. And when I went to check them out, I mistyped their name as Downliners Sect and found this album on the iTMS. It didn't take more than a few seconds of listening to realize my error; Sect has a definite rockabilly thing going on, while Sekt is pure electronica.

Depending on your taste, you may find one or the other to your liking. And you certainly can't argue with the price of Sekt's offering.

[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Fri, 14 Apr 2006

At the Fiftieth Gate / Attrition
At the Fiftieth Gate From the little reading I've done on Attrition, its fans seem divided on how to qualify their music. Goth gets mentioned, as does Industrial. And a quick listen to clips from their The Attrition of Reason album tends to confirm those views. But what's interesting about At the Fiftieth Gate is how controlled and melodic it is. Completely accessible, even for an old fart like me. If it's Goth, it's Goth that works for the terminally non-Goth. Which suits me just fine.
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Wed, 15 Mar 2006

All Wood And Stones / John Batdorf & James Lee Stanley
I received an email recently from James Lee Stanley regarding the review I gave an album by the late Hamilton Camp. Mr. Stanley, who produced Mr. Camp's last album, the newly released and not at this writing available on iTunes Sweet Joy, was one of his good friends, and wanted to thank me for mentioning him.

Which was nice, but what was nicer was his inclusion of a link to his own latest CD, which is on the iTMS. All Wood And Stones is a collection of Rolling Stones songs, performed on acoustic guitar. Which might sound like a really bad idea, and in fact is a really bad idea when you choose the wrong material (like Black Sabbath, for example). But here I think it works very well; there's often a sweetness to the Stones' lyrics and melodies that can get lost in their energetic performances. And of course there are precedents for mellowing out the Stones, like the Corrs' version of Ruby Tuesday. Or any version at all of As Tears Go By. So as a fan of folksy covers that avoid the descent into hell that is elevator music, I like All Wood And Stones. A lot.

Or is it that I just can't resist a good album title pun? There's that too, of course.

All Wood And Stones
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Mon, 27 Feb 2006

Rocinate / Ester Drang
Rocinate I heard an excellent lecture in which author Malcolm Gladwell explained why Pepsi wins the Pepsi Challenge and how Coca Cola screwed up so completely with New Coke. Turns out our behavior is different when we sample; what tastes good for a sip doesn't appeal over a larger serving.

I mention this because I'm not at all sure that 30 second samples do justice to Rocinate, either as a collection of individual tracks or as a cohesive work. I like what I've heard so far; I just don't know how to describe quite what it is I like about it. Maybe after a few more listens.

[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Mon, 13 Feb 2006

The Acoustic Verses / Green Carnation
The Acoustic Verses I feel like I've come into a movie in the middle. Listening to Acoustic Verses, I thought I'd found a gentle, folk-y kind of rock band. So imagine my surprise to discover what a departure this latest album is from the metal sound of Journey to the End of Night and A Blessing in Disguise. And what luck! Not being much of a headbanger these days, if I'd encountered those earlier albums first I might never have learned of their softer, more melodic side. Truly a blessing in disguise, I'd say.
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Mon, 09 Jan 2006

Faithful / Todd Rundgren
Faithful is a kind of mirror on my life and my taste in music. I played the hell out of my copy of the 1976 LP, or to be more accurate I played the hell out of side A. That was the side that had covers of a whole bunch of pop hits, most memorably a version of The Beach Boys' Good Vibrations that was as perfect a copy as Rundgren's studio wizardry could produce. Side B was original music, which to that other me wasn't nearly as compelling. Now I'm more impressed by the creative artistry on the flip side (do they still call it that?) than the mere technical skill that first caught my attention. There's probably a really good metaphor for life and aging and maturity and wisdom in there. Another thirty years and I might figure out what it is. Faithful
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Mon, 19 Dec 2005

B of A Pavilion, Boston, MA 8/21/05 (Live "Bootleg") / Tori Amos
B of A Pavilion, Boston, MA 8/21/05 (Live "Bootleg") I was never much of a concertgoer. And I never collected bootleg recordings, not out of any sense of morality, but because I didn't know people who trafficked in such goods. But I can understand the appeal of hearing a live event, captured with a minimum of technical enhancement. Which should be in quotes, since one person's enhancement is another's unnecessary manipulation that destroys the integrity of the performance.

I don't remember reading anything about these non-bootleg bootlegs when they started appearing on the iTMS many months ago. Which is kind of a surprise, given how much attention is paid to every move Apple makes. But I think it's a big deal, something you can do when you stop thinking of online music as a way of delivering CD content and start treating it as its own form of distribution. With CDs, there are good reasons not to have a dozen performances of the same material available. In the online world, why not record and release every single concert? The additional cost is low, customers can choose exactly the performances they want, perhaps the ones they attended, and collectors can go crazy! I mean, who wouldn't want to hear every note Tori's ever sung? I certainly do. Although I guess that'll have to wait until the next increase in iPod capacity.

[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Fri, 16 Dec 2005

NYC Subway - Songs from the Underground / Various Artists
As a New York City native and a veteran of the city's subway system (although I admit it's been a while since I last passed through a turnstile), I'm intrigued and amused by the idea of a compilation album of songs by subway buskers. (Do New Yorkers call them that? I thought that was a London Underground thing.) But I'm also impressed, by both the variety and the quality of the performances on display. To say nothing of the ability to work under adverse conditions. After all, Carnegie Hall acts don't have to dodge transit cops. They don't, do they? NYC Subway - Songs from the Underground
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Fri, 18 Nov 2005

12 Songs / Neil Diamond
God, I used to listen to Neil Diamond all the time. It's embarassing to admit that even his most cringworthy lyrics didn't penetrate. C'mon; this was the guy who brought us classics like
    I am, I swear
    To no one there.
    And no one heard at all
    Not even the chair.
and
    Songs she sang to me,
    Songs she brang to me,
    Words that rang in me,
    Rhymes that sprang from me.
Sprang? Brang? And I, who claimed to care about the English language, didn't cry out in anguish even once. What can I say; there's just something about the guy.

It's nice that the new Neil Diamond has dialed down some of the excess of the old. His performances are lower key. Mellow even. I haven't listened closely to the lyrics yet, so I can't say whether there are any howlers like the above. But, like Waldo, I'm sure they're waiting to be found.

Warning: Rant ahead: 12 Songs is more than a comeback album. It's also part of a secret plot by Sony BMG to kill the sale of music on CD. You've probably heard about the anti-piracy software Sony's put on some recent releases. Try to play a CD on your computer and it'll install some nasty software that'll watch your every move, keep you from doing anything they don't like, poison your dog, ruin your score in third person shooters and keep neocons in power. And suddenly the DRM Apple uses in the iTMS doesn't seem nearly so bad. You could almost believe Sony wants CDs to fail. I mean, they couldn't be so stupid as to believe they could get away with breaking people's computers without suffering at least a little bad publicity, right? Then again, the really nasty spyware only does its damage to Windows boxes. Their Mac "solution" is both less effective and less destructive.

12 Songs
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Wed, 09 Nov 2005

So Many Roads (1965 - 1995) / Grateful Dead
Mention Grateful Dead and I think of working at Silicon Graphics back in the middle to late 90s. SGI's offices were right next to Shoreline Amphitheatre, the local concert venue. And we could always tell when the Dead were scheduled to play, as the Deadheads began arriving hours before concert time in their distinctive garb. It was probably hours before; my feeling that they started showing up days in advance is probably just my memory getting fanciful.

I could never figure out if being a Dead fan was more about the music or about the shared experience, a sort of "if you're not one of us, you couldn't possibly understand" attitude. And when an acquaintance told me about being a Deadhead and about the number of times she'd gone to hear them play, I couldn't imagine why that sounded like pride in her voice. Sounded pretty nuts to me. Of course, that was before I became a Scaper and demonstrated that I too was capable of (boldly) going where no (sane) man has gone before.

I still don't quite get the Dead. But I can understand the obsession, even if I don't share it. Not yet, anyway.

So Many Roads (1965 - 1995)
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Wed, 26 Oct 2005

Hitstory / Elvis Presley
How's this for an embarrassing confession: hundreds of CDs, gigabytes more on my hard drive. And not a single Elvis track in all that music. Granted, that's not the only hole in my collection; I didn't get my first Sinatra CD until I needed it for a Farscape video. But not having Sinatra was a conscious decision; I never could relate to the man or his music. With Elvis I have no such excuse. Every time I hear him sing, every time I get caught up in one or another of his mostly dreadful movies, I remember just how good he is. And I make a mental note to plug that hole. So, based on the belief that anything worth doing is worth overdoing, why not eighty of his best? Hitstory
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Wed, 21 Sep 2005

Phantom Power / Super Furry Animals
Phantom Power Strange album, this. The mood is down, but in a positive way. It's gloomy, but kind of bright. Challenging, but somehow keeping to this side of edgy. Some of it's simple, just vocals and acoustic backing as on Hello Sunshine. Other times it's more raucous. Each track's a bit of a surprise, and yet they all seem to hang together. Disconcerting. But in a comforting way. Strange, like I said.
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Mon, 19 Sep 2005

Brandi Carlile / Brandi Carlile
They say that clichés become clichés because they tell a basic truth. Okay, nobody says that; I just made it up. But stay with me.

The cliché I have in mind is the one about judging a book by its cover. Because one look at the cover of Brandi Carlile's album and you're bound to think packaged cutesy pop. And that's an impression that won't survive more than a few seconds of Follow, her first track. Carlile's voice and her country tinged delivery puts her a million miles from the Disneyfied pop princesses. And it only gets better from there. Although it does make my job harder. Instead of scanning album covers, I actually have to listen...

Brandi Carlile
[ Category: Rock | 2 comments | Link ]


Fri, 02 Sep 2005

Fan Dance / Sam Phillips
Fan Dance Like a lot of folks, I first heard Sam Phillips perform on Gilmore Girls; she provides those little interstitial bits of music that are as much a trademark of the show as the snappy dialogue and the cultural references. And that might have been that, if not for that same sampler CD that introduced me to the Dresden Dolls. Track number one on the CD was All Night, from Ms. Phillips' A Boot and a Shoe. That got me wanting to listen to more of her work, which led me to Fan Dance, her latest album.

And now I have a whole new appreciation for Sam Phillips, her songs and her voice. They say that sometimes less is more. But compared to the little bits we get on Gilmore Girls, I have to say that there are times when more can be more. And better. And more.

[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Fri, 26 Aug 2005

When Pigs Fly - Songs You Never Thought You'd Hear / Various Artists
The horror! The horror! As if a movie version of The Dukes of Hazzard wasn't terrifying enough, the world has to endure gets the pleasure of Jessica Simpson's remarkable rendition of These Boots Are Made for Walkin', proof as if we needed it that Ms. Simpson's singing is every bit as special as her other performing skills. It's enough to make me swear off covers for good.

Okay, not really. Because, with certain exceptions, even bad covers have their moments. Like The Box Tops' version of Blondie's classic Call Me, which I first heard a few weeks ago on Coverville, Brian Ibbott's twice-weekly cover music podcast. You may remember The Box Tops from their 60s hit, The Letter. And you'll be as surprised as I at their cover effort. Or at Roy Clark's take on What a Wonderful World. There's even a cover of These Boots Are Made For Walkin', mercifully done by someone who isn't named Simpson.

Yeah, there are misses as well as hits here. (Don Ho? Ani Difranco and Jackie Chan? Oy.) But they're fun too. In their fashion.

When Pigs Fly - Songs You Never Thought You'd Hear
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Wed, 03 Aug 2005

Greetings From Michigan - The Great Lakes State / Sufjan Stevens
I'm gonna guess that Sufjan Stevens hasn't had a lot of happy experiences in Michigan.

It's always risky to ascribe beliefs and attitudes to an artist based on their work; as a writer friend and I discussed recently, views expressed by a character belong to the character, not necessarily to his or her creator. But in listening to Greetings From Michigan, it's hard not to conclude that Stevens has strong feelings about the place, that he's mining a vein of sadness and pain and longing. Which shouldn't frighten us away; in that sadness comes great beauty.

Stevens loves Michigan. And he makes me want to go back and try to see some of what he sees.

Greetings From Michigan - The Great Lakes State
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


Fri, 29 Jul 2005

Acadie / Daniel Lanois
Sometimes my memory goes horribly wrong. And occasionally that's a good thing.

Acadie is such a moment. When I first saw the name of the album, I confused its artist with Daniel Lavoie, who performed as Frollo in both the French and English cast albums for Notre-Dame de Paris (a.k.a. the story with the hunchback). A little research revealed my mistake, and also told me that Mr. Lanois was producer for some major records by people like Peter Gabriel, Bob Dylan and U2. His own music is nicely underproduced, more folk than rock, and shows signs of his once-removed French heritage, both Canadian and Cajun. I'd call it easy listening, if that weren't a pejorative.

Acadie
[ Category: Rock | Add a comment | Link ]


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