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!!!
Myth Takes
We have the limited edition 2CD versions available. Supplies are limited, so don’t sleep.
Building on their reputation as one of the best live acts in the world, pan-American eight piece group !!! have made the album that they always promised to.
Recorded mostly in a rented communal house in Nashville – and the first album to be produced by band member Justin Van Der Volgen - ‘Myth Takes’ is a real coming-of-age release. Aside from an extended sojourn touring with the Red Hot Chili Peppers on their Stadium Arcadium album tour last year, the band have devoted their entire focus to producing music that’s even more powerful than their previous work and channeling this extra energy into exploring the function of Myth. They’ve even thrown in some intriguing lyrics to boot!
As is Reflected in the amazingly intricate, fantastical sleeve art, ‘Myth Takes’ is a dense web of allusion that sees !!! sinking their world view into brilliantly inventive grooves that bubble with elements of Meters-style funk, Jamaican dub, cosmic Krautrock, house bleeps and the stark power of NYC disco. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Warp
Genre/Style: Dance / Punk
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Air
Pocket Symphony
Like a resplendent star re-appearing in the night sky, internationally acclaimed French duo Air return with their most accomplished album to date.
Produced by Nigel Goodrich and features appearances by Jarvis Cocker (Pulp) and Neil Hannon (Divine Comedy). Double LP also available. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Astralwerks
Genre/Style: Electronic / Pop
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Amnesty
Free Your Mind: The 700 West Sessions
Researched & compiled by Eothen 'Egon' Alapatt.
Original recordings produced by Amnesty.
To tell the truth, Damon Malone has already written about the formation of Amnesty. He pretty much hit the nail on the head, so I’m going to start with what he wrote:
“The Embers singing group was formed in 1966 by Joseph Trotter and Damon Malone, two young men who had previously been in a group called the Dynetones. They would listen to The Temptations’ records every day, admiring their harmonies and interpretations of different styles. They joined with a friend from Trotter’s school band, Gary Burke, who introduced them to A. Louis (“Bubbles”) Cobb. Before long the four had established a reputation as the best vocal quartet in town. In 1968 they decided they needed their own personal band, so they set up auditions for local rhythm sections. After auditioning several bands, they came across three young men – Calvin Williams on guitar, James “Red” Massie on bass and Phillip “Kirk” Alexander on drums – known as The Crimson Tide. The Embers and The Crimson Tide fell in love with each other immediately, and became a winning combination. However, in 1970, independent of each other, the two groups broke up. Red, Calvin and Kirk kept rehearsing in Kirk’s basement, and in 1972, they convinced the others to rejoin their group with the addition of extra personnel – Herman “Squalls” Walker, who replaced Burke, James “Gino” Johnson on saxophone, and Raphael Barnes on congas. This time their musical sound was more in the direction of Chicago, Blood, Sweat and Tears and Earth Wind and Fire.”
In other words, we, after a few more personnel changes, became a total funk group. “Amnesty,” to us, meant “a second chance,” and we made the most of ours. We knew the bands that had recorded funk on LAMP Records – it was through them that we got turned onto Herb Miller and through them that Herb got turned onto us. But if you could have seen us live! Funk was big in Indianapolis. When “Everybody Who Wants To Be Free” came out, we were so hot that we were booked to do a show with the Jackson Five. In the middle of our set, Joe Jackson walked on stage and told our management, and the booking agents at the club, “Get them off stage, or the Jackson Five won’t come on!” We were turning that place out, boy!
I loved our band. I was the last one standing, in about 1976, with all of the equipment, and memorabilia. I’ve kept it all. We broke up for a lot of reasons. Things were going good for the group, but people were starting to get lazy. People were missing rehearsals. People were thinking they were this, or they were that. The big head thing. Drugs were a large part of it. As were women. You could say the fast pace of life dispersed us. But I never got sick of that band. Thirty years later, and I’m still excited. Our “second chance” still has legs, and I’m happy for it.
James “Red” Massie
Co-Founder/Leader/Bass guitar -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Now Again
Genre/Style: Funk
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Amon Tobin
Foley Room
The sometimes idolized, and sometimes taken for granted Amon Tobin’s new album, “The Foley Room,” creates the odd impression of reminding me to have missed him. Tobin, who hasn’t released a proper album in 4 years or so, is the kind of electronic artist who, despite the obsessive terminology developed, it was always difficult to put a finger on. Even if you bothered to calculate what polysyllabic idiosyncratic variation of a subgenre he was working in, it would be more or less irrelevant in actually evoking the feel of his music. Tobin legitimately has the open mind and discipline to create a sonic universe capable of accomodating a nearly infinite range of sounds, structures and feels, and somehow synthesizing and twisting them according to his own muse.
Tobin did not spend his years away from conventional album craft doing nothing. Among other things, he did the original music for “Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell.” I understand the tendancy to scoff, but my friend argues that video games are the next pre-immenent artistic format on the scale of literature, music, and film and I am afraid he is correct and great video games require a lot of money to develop and so sometimes require a tie in such as Tom Clancy putting his name on it. I have no beef with commisions, as I believe they subsidize the freedom and space for artists to go out and turn their dreams into sound and vision. Anyway, the idea of scoring a video game is an interesting challenge that I think might, gasp, flex new artistic muscles that can help a musician to grow.
In “Foley Room,” Tobin attacks the challenge of making cinematic music. Here again we encounter the problem of a description not giving a sense of scope. This is not just cinematic electronic in the usual sense of “evoking the texture and moodiness of a film score, leaving a space for the mind to create its own technicolor images.” It satisfies that impulse on the surface while constantly engaging and metamorphising, keeping a number of mesmerizing elements steady while dropping others out and constantly bringing in new information, shuffling them until the places you can go become fluid. This is an electronic album that manages to entrance and charm so much that the drop of a beat becomes a delightful surprise rather than an anticipated inevitablity.
The conceit that gives the album its title is that Tobin constructed this album mostly from real physical sounds recorded in a Foley room, one of those studios where they create the sound effects for movies using actual objects and highly sensitive microphones. Comparisons could be drawn, appropriately, to artists like Matmos, Fourtet or Herbert, who also incorporate the organic into the electronic, but at the moment I truly believe that nobody has truly made a record that sounds exactly like this. It has the pitch perfect mood snazziness of a downtempo master like Bonobo, but is more active. At the same time, it has the hyperactivity and idea disposal of Squarepusher, but is more subtle in presenting it. The sounds are so delicate and perfectly meshed it can make you forget how much he is doing with them.
“Always” recalls the innate thrills of both Orbital and surf-rock/spy soundtracks of the 60s. “Straight Psyche” actually goes above and beyond the title, switching gears and twisting mental space with only a few elements at a time, taking you constantly to new places you don’t quite remember the path to. “Esther’s” combines a cocky beat with the constant hum of both guitar tones and motorcycle revs, alternating with lovingly touched and echoed keyboard and piano notes, mixing and tossing them until they are all part of the same liquid loveliness. “Vanilla’s the Killer” builds to a devestating breakbeat steamtrain powered by several frequencies of sinister and funky organs. The title cut slowly demonstrates its tools before blowing up into a psychotic math demonstration evoking the Rocksteady Crew playing the Blue Man Group.
“Foley Room” is an end to end burner of music and ideas. An audio concept flitters through the mix like an image on the silver screen, sounds shifting as frequently and smoothly as in the pictures. Like a movie of Hollywood’s golden age, it is designed sometimes to make the listener unaware of the craft and sometimes to blow them away with it. The invisible craft lures you into a trance, and then the visable art busts you out of it into an orgasm. Or maybe that’s just me. I really like this album -GB
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Ninja Tune
Genre/Style: Electronic
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Antibalas
Security
What do you get when you pair up one of the most critically acclaimed and hardest-working bands on the planet, Antibalas, with one of indie rock’s most intricate and innovative producers, John McEntire (Tortoise, Stereolab, Tom Ze)...and let them play sonic tug-of-war in a studio for a month? The answer is Security, the fourth and newest full-length gem from this twelve-strong Brooklyn collective, who over the last decade have become known worldwide as much for their riveting afrobeat-laden concerts and social consciousness as for their previous albums and unique collaborations. Enticed by McEntire to explore and unleash sides not previously mined on earlier recordings, the seven new original compositions presented here illustrate perhaps a darker, more dynamic approach that’s guaranteed to shock and dazzle new and old fans alike. This is music that was made to linger long after the party’s over. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: ANTI
Genre/Style: Afro Beat / African Pop
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Apostle of Hustle
National Anthem of Nowhere
'National Anthem of Nowhere’ is for everyone who feels that they have no voice or can’t be heard. They hear this title and something stirs inside them. Then they hear this song and they feel that they “know” it. They meet strangers in nowhere places and will never forget those meetings. They wander out into the suburban, in-between zones and there they are welcomed. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Arts & Crafts
Genre/Style: Rock
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Arcade Fire
Neon Bible
Today has been an incredibly conflicted day for me. Major confessions have been made and then retracted; I've fallen in love with my city and hours later discovered its bitter edge; I froze in the winds of early morning and then basked in the warmth of the afternoon. The minutes have waxed and waned and fought with themselves. And now, nearing this day's end, I sit and listen for the fifth or sixth time to an album to which I have still not sorted out my reaction.
The Arcade Fire have taken on a greater challenge with Neon Bible: in writing, in orchestration, and in subject matter. Their songs are no longer just the ambiguously poetic yellings of an emotional young adult. The youthful and poetic spirit remains, but now it surges from men and women sorting out their specific emotional struggles in a large global context. Yes, this does mean it is a political album, but to me there is a political basis because coming of age today means having to surface in an ocean of political confusion. It is a bit bleak for my taste, with a dense apocalyptic tone permeating the songwriting ("World War III, when are you come for me?" etc.). Yet in all the darkness and fear, The Arcade Fire work on a foundation of pop aesthetic, and as a result the songs can seem incongruous. The songwriting exudes trembling and loss and a shaking of the head over string, drum, and piano parts that demand dance and heart-felt sing-along. The contradictions can be confusing and even irksome, which is most likely why I hadn't been able to form a solid opinion.
Neon Bible is the work of a band that knowingly exists and creates in a vast context. Their hundreds of instruments weave and swing in and out of each other; the style swims through historic eras of pop yet breathes a pure air of innovation; the songs are complex and explore a confusing world stage but still hold fast to simple structures and the heart of an individual. Each minute stands in stark contrast with the next and with itself. Yet without one minute the disparate next would have no frame and thus lose its jarring significance. In the silence following an album of and about conflict and all the fear and uncertainty inherent in it, its ultimate resonance is a deep, tired hope.
And it is in this context that I can realize this album and this day to be one of my fullest and best.-JM
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Merge
Genre/Style: Rock / Pop
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Big Business
Here Come the Waterworks
Big Business is bigger and better than ever, with better hair, bigger hits, and the kind of overwhelming Norman Schwarzkopf-style force that rolls like thunder, stings like a missile, and--above all--takes no shit. On Here Come the Waterworks, their second full-length, bassist/vocalist Jared Warren and drummer Coady Willis (both of whom also happen to be the newest members of underground super-legends the Melvins) unfurl all the mammoth riffs, furious vocals and blazing drum work you've come to expect--nay, DEMAND--from LA's answer to Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday. No, wait... make that Sonny Crockett and Rico Tubbs. Either way, there's a new sheriff in town--two of 'em, actually.-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Hydra Head
Genre/Style: Metal / Stoner Rock
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Mary Chapin Carpenter
Calling
As a songwriter and performer, Mary Chapin Carpenter has long since transcended the traditional notions of genre and style, finding widespread acclaim for her poetic, elegantly - observed compositions. The Calling, her first release for Zoe / Rounder, is the most topical album she's made in her twenty-year career. While it unequivocally addresses issues both public and political - from the after-effects of Hurricane Katrina to religious zealotry to the trial-by-radio of the Dixie Chicks -- there is also something deeply personal about this extraordinary collection of songs. The album is a powerful, provocative meditation on the mysteries of fate and circumstance, which mingles timeless questions with contemporary issues. Introspective, defiant and deeply resonant, The Calling is a profound set from one of modern songwriting's most distinctive voices.-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Zoe / Rounder
Genre/Style: Country
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Cheeseburger
Self-titled
In the grand tradition of party records such as License To Ill by Beastie Boys and Another Wasted Night by Gang Green comes the Self-Titled debut full length by Cheeseburger. Essentially, the record is an ode to New York City and the love and drinking that comes with it. Singer Joe says it best, "For better or worse- we are a drinking band and this is a record "about" boozing it up and all the jive that goes down with it (good times, bad times, falling in love, making an ass of yourself, getting dumped, the happy drunk, the melancholy drunk, the morning after, the morning after that, the morning after that, etc etc..." The final product is a raw and catchy record with songs like "Hot Streets", "Money for the Heart" and the quintessential New York anthem "Do You Remember" that captures the "having the time of my life while trying to keep my head above water" feel of the city. So crack open a brew (or ten) and "Let the Good Times Roll!"
Cheeseburger has it down to a science. Each song is crafted to perfection, finding the right combo of AC/DC power chords, Cheap Trick pop-rock refrains and the right mix of Iggy Pop/Glen Danzig melodic crooning (and roaring) to create the most concisely awesome rock gems. Some say it couldn't be done, some think their palates are too refined, and some people just haven't heard a really good one in years. Cheeseburger. People, it's time. You don't have to understand how it works or why it works so well. It is pure, immediate, savage, and oh my god, see them live! No one else has got it. Cheeseburger.-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Kemado
Genre/Style: Rock
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Ry Cooder
My Name Is Buddy
On My Name Is Buddy, Ry Cooder revisits, in a new set of original material, the sound and feeling of the "dust bowl songs" he first explored more than three decades ago on such groundbreaking albums as his self-titled 1970 debut and 1971's In The Purple Valley. In fact, he's joined by old friends like pianist Van Dyke Parks and drummer Jim Keltner who were with him at the start of his extraordinary, ultimately globe-spanning musical odyssey, which has yielded him six Grammy Awards to date, several more nominations, and perennial acclaim. My Name Is Buddy is also a journey, a phantasmagorical rendering in music, words and pictures of the travels of three unlikely cohorts - Buddy Red Cat, Lefty Mouse and Reverend Tom Toad - as they meander through the west "in the days of labor, big bosses, farm failures, strikes, company cops, sundown towns, hobos and trains...the America of yesteryear." For this allegorical tale, Cooder marshals all his remarkable skills as a producer, arranger, songwriter, soundtrack composer and musicologist. (The Christian Science Monitor recently dubbed him "a modern-day Alan Lomax.") My Name Is Buddy recalls Woody Guthrie's Bound for Glory - that is, if it had been enacted by the articulate animal characters of Walt Kelly's classic comic Pogo. Cooder conjures up the dark shadows of an earlier time to wryly comment on the political and social issues of the present. As back-story to his songs, Cooder has written short stories for each one and they're accompanied by evocative illustrations from noted San Antonio-based painter and muralist Vincent Valdez, all of which are included in a specially designed package. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Nonesuch
Genre/Style: Cuban Jazz
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Gov't Mule / Warren Hayes
Benefit Concert Volume 2
This is from the 12th annual X-Mas Jam, from 2000, in Asheville, NC. It features two CD's of tunes and collaborations from Col. Bruce Hampton And The Aquarium Rescue Unit, John Popper, Allman Bros, some guys named Tramp and ton's more. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Evil Teen
Genre/Style: Rock / Jam
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Lustmord
Juggernaut
With sound design & production by Lustmord and guitar & vocals by King Buzzo of the Melvins, Juggernaut unleashes four track's worth of menacing ambient tremors, boomeranged drones and ominous sonic moonscapes in swell after unsettling swell of creeping electronic deviance. Initially recorded for an art opening by hot-rod enthusiast / notorious tit man Chris "Coop" Cooper in August 2004, this version of the Juggernaut collaboration is a limited release and an updated version of the original recording.
-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Hydra Head
Genre/Style: Experimental / Noise / Industrial
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My Brightest Diamond
Tear It Down
PLAYING THE NORVA W/ THE DECEMBERISTS ON APRIL 1ST!!
My Brightest Diamond’s Shara Worden has decided to set loose her bobby pins and let her hair fly on the ambient dance floor. Her latest semi-collaboration with 13 different remixers, entitled “Tear It Down”, reworks songs from the highly acclaimed album, “Bring Me The Workhorse” featuring tracks by Alias, Lusine, Murcof, Stakka and Gold Chains. Oh, it’s international too! With diplomatic representatives from Belgium, France, Mexico, The UK and America (East and West Coasts baby!), the remixes range from drum-n-bass, to glitchy ambient, minimalism, and get-your-booty-on-the-dance-floor club music.
The wonders of the internet abound and as evidence of the modern times, where being in the same room with someone is no longer necessary for collaboration, the relationships to the remixers vary from being friends, to fans, to MySpace finds. Via the internet, tracks floated through the sky like Willy Wonka’s tv converter and landed in bedrooms and studios with wonderful result. Having crafted songs for five years, meticulously deliberated over string arrangements for two years, flying coast to coast for mixing and recording sessions, and generally laboring over every aspect of “Bring Me The Workhorse”, Shara was ready to hand over the reins and see what the songs could do without any of her guidance.
“Tear It Down” stands on it’s own horsie legs. In comparison to Shara’s control in the songs of “Bring Me The Workhorse”, these electronic horsetrainers loosen up the forms and smooth over some of the rougher emotional outbursts. Many of the remixers adhere to the original song forms, snazzing them up or stripping them down, and there are also examples of djs excerpting the tracks to create something entirely new and not song form related, focusing on one element and elaborating, rather than being bound to the storytelling. Shara says, “The variety of their approaches made this project exhilaratingly unpredictable!”
The album opens with indie beloved Anticon artist, Alias, rocking his version of “Golden Star”. While the song form is the same, we hardly recognize it. Gone are the angry guitar rumblings and welcomed in are beautiful electronic twinkles and killer kick drums. While on tour in Seattle, Ghostly artist Lusine came to shake Shara’s hand from the stage. Now she knows what he looks like. His rolling, moody, sexy version of “Workhorse” employs vibraphone, major chords and soaring strings, finding its home at track two on the album. Gold Chains’ remix nabbed the title track trophy with his club reconstruction of “Freak Out”. “It’s time to tear it down” and she did and he did and you will. Having featured English DJ/producer Stakka’s remix on the single for “Disappear”, we are still enjoying its dramatic trapeze act drum beat. Like a secret mission, Shara went to Stakka’s Brooklyn apartment, slipping the split tracks through his mail slot. A week later, the amazing 16-bit version landed on her proverbial email doorstep. Still they have never met. Will they ever? Eyebrows raised.
That mysterious and haunting male voice from “Magic Rabbit” appears again, but this time in the Scott Walker-esque remix of “Gone Away”. Who is that masked, multi-talented man? Also known for his subconsious drawings on “Bring Me The Workhorse”, David Stith emerges subtley. The clamor and noise seem to hush in the quiet suspension of his gorgeous and icey remix. The backstory begins in the summer of 2004 which found Shara recording demos in a Brooklyn basement converted into museum, The Museum of Disembodied Folk Art. In the next room lived David Stith who would creep out during cookie and milk breaks and he and Shara would discuss music, art, life and the Starbucks coffee uniform. David moved away momentarily but Shara kept snooping around his diggs, borrowing microphones, triangle beaters and getting him to sing, draw and remix on projects for her! Cheers to more collabs between friends! Speaking of friends, Mr. Stith made a mix cd of some electronic favs to help Shara research remixers and a mix by Mr. Stith’s pal, Alfred Brown was nestled there. Shara heard his music and loved and then wrote to Mr. Brown for his minimalistic touch.
MySpace can be a beautiful way of finding people, when it’s working and not slow as Christmas. That’s how Shara found the Belgian electronic beauty of Haruki. With what looked like a bird on wallpaper, Shara was drawn in by the id photo and began listening. With a delicate hand, Haruki preserves the song “Sparkling” while opening it up to shiny glitchy electronic worlds reaching beyond the organic.
If you recognized the sounds of DJ Kenny M and David Keith a.k.a. NC47, it might be because you heard the Awry Remix EP! Before there was My Brightest Diamond, there was the band Awry, a collaboration between Shara and guitarist Shane Yarbrough. Awry made two full length records and released a short remix EP, so it seemed only natural to have some of the old school djs represented on the MBD remix album. Local Brookynite, DJ Kenny M makes us move to the dance floor with his drum-n-bass version of “Freak Out” that might just possibly maybe, but we aren’t sure, reference “Le Freak, C’est Chic”. The vibey groove of David Keith’s “Something of an End”, highlights those original buried string tracks, and gives chilling isolation to the line “beautiful and terrible”, but this interpretation makes you feel less like the world is coming to end and more like you know everything is going to be okay. Sounds Are Active artist, Siamese Sisters bring their own magic production, scrambling the text of “The Good and The Bad Guy”. What is she saying? She wants to be the bad guy now? My how things change!
When Shara contacted the French group Strings of Consciousness about doing a remix, what intrigued her was that the four piece band composes together and performs their music live. However with deadlines quickly approaching, Strings of Consciousness decided that their group methods would be too slow if they were to do a traditional remix, so they emailed an already finished track for Shara to sing a new vocal over. The instrumental seemed perfect for the song “Gone Away” so Shara tapped into her trip-hop vein and delivered a new smoky version of those meloncholy lines “Far away you’ve gone and left me here” as if at once in a trance, then wailing despairingly the last “Goodbye”. After all that, there’s a celebration of deconstruction with Wheat and Cedar AV’s ripped apart version of “Disappear”. Delicate yet explosive it pronounces once again how “we aren’t meant to stay here very long”. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Asthmatic Kitty
Genre/Style: Remix / Electronic / Experimental
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Okkervil River
Black Sheep Boy Definitive Edition
This is the definitive double-disc set which brings together Okkervil River's ground-breaking Black Sheep Boy project in its entirety - including the original album, the 7-song Black Sheep Boy Appendix EP, the song "The Next Four Months" (originally released on the "For Real" CD single), the "For Real" video as well as a new video of a magical alternate slower take of "No Key, No Plan". Enjoy this panoramic perspective of a modern masterpiece and one of the most critically acclaimed albums of the new millennium.
Black Sheep Boy is Okkervil River's most ambitious and cinematic record to date, a love story and adult fable carved in lacerating rock and roll, desolate late-night country weepers, and a few shining moments of sheer, shameless pop. Along the way, the compositions of Will Sheff evoke the mature songcraft of Leonard Cohen's New Skin for the Old Ceremony, the sophistication of Scott Walker's Scott 4, the shambling slow-motion bravado of Neil Young's On the Beach, and the raw nerves and trick effects of Big Star's Third/Sister Lovers.
The Appendix is not just a companion piece to Black Sheep Boy; it's also a condensed, alternate vision of that record's imagery and themes, with the ultimate intent to exhaust and destroy both. This ambitious mini-album rounds up and reworks the band's favorite unfinished songs (tracked for the full-length) and then punctuates and bookends them in brand-new compositions.
-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Jagjaguwar
Genre/Style: Pop / Rock
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RJD2
The Third Hand
Catapulted to notoriety, fame, and serious hip-hop credibility with 2002's Dead Ringer LP, Philadelphia based DJ and multi-instrumentalist RJD2 has enjoyed a thoroughly prolific career; following that debut album with 2004's critically acclaimed Since We Last Spoke. For The Third Hand, RJD2 seemingly abandons all the notions and titles that have been placed upon him over the past five years. Underground hip-hop super-producer to some, virtuoso sample-based instrumental wizard to others, RJD2 embodies all of these things on The Third Hand but placates none who seek more of the same. Recorded, performed, arranged, and produced entirely by himself in his basement studio, RJD2 commands his trusty MPC 2000XL sampler/sequencer alongside analog synths, electric pianos and guitars, not to mention his own voice. The result is a cohesive pop album in the most classic sense, a sound more akin to Phoenix than Prefuse 73. In essence, this is RJD2's entrance into the continuum of enigmatic songwriter/producers (see Jon Brion, Brian Wilson, Stevie Wonder) capable of creating a record full of rich songwriting, complex arrangements, and clever production that transcends genre.-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: XL Recordings
Genre/Style: Pop / Rock
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Son Volt
Search
When Jay Farrar resurrected the sound and approach (if not the personnel) of Son Volt for the 2005 album Okemah and the Melody of Riot, it was a welcome return to what Farrar does best after the poorly focused meanderings of much of his solo work. But while embracing the Son Volt handle energized his muse on Okemah, the second album from Son Volt 2.0, The Search, suggests it has also given him a clearer vision in his search for new sonic territory. The melodic textures of The Search are very much in the mode of Son Volt's early work, but Farrar has offered a few noticeable change-ups in how he approaches the material, most noticeably the addition of Derry Deborja on keyboards, whose washes of organ and piano add new colors to the band's palate. Farrar also takes a few other chances here that pay off, particularly with the punchy soul horns on "The Picture," and though it remains clear that Farrar is in charge of this band, The Search finds this lineup of Son Volt growing into a sound of their own, with the rhythm section of Andrew DuPlantis and Dave Bryson sounding more comfortable but also lending a stronger backbone on the more rocking material (especially the title track) and Brad Rice given more room to blend his guitar work with Farrar's Neil Young influenced leads. And while Farrar isn't likely to get ever over his shyness about direct declarative statements in his lyrics, like Okemah The Search is clearly informed by the political and social malaise of America under George W. Bush, and Farrar's compassionate anger on "Satellite," "Adrenaline and Heresy" and the title tune is bracing and powerful. In their original incarnation, Son Volt made a brilliant debut and followed it up with a genuine disappointment, but the second time around, Farrar has followed strength with strength, and The Search is a potent reminder of why Farrar was and is one of the watershed artists of the alt-country movement. - Mark Deming (allmusic.com)-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Legacy
Genre/Style: Yaw'ternative
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The Stooges
The Weirdness
The Weirdness is the fourth studio album - and first formal non-live release since 1973's Raw Power - by influental protopunk band The Stooges, featuring founding members Iggy Pop, Ron Asheton, and Scott Asheton along with new bassist Mike Watt (Minutemen/fIREHOSE) and Fun House saxophonist Steve Mackay.-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Virgin
Genre/Style: Garage / Rock
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Sunn0))) | Boris
Altar
We are now ready to present to you the vinyl edition of the "Altar" album. This very special triple-vinyl version features completely over the top packaging that alot of time, care, effort, love and $ went into! The heavy cardboard gatefold jacket has a 14 page color booklet within as well as a special third pocket (on the right hand pocket of the jacket) that contains the bonus 3rd Lp. The booklet features exclusive imagery photos, and liner notes from Kim Thayil (Soundgarden)! Each of the three records come in specifically designed black (even on the inside) innersleeves. The 3rd LP "bonus track": “Her Lips Were Wet With Venom / (Satanoscillatemymetallicsonatas) is a 28+ min. epic journey that is a result of both sunn 0))) and boris with Dylan Carslon (EARTH) engaged in a completely improvised, no holds-barred,mind - "altering" drone nirvana. Dark, powerful and ultimately up-lifting! -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Southern Lord
Genre/Style: Drone / Shoegaze / Experimental
MP3 Myspace
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CD:$13.98
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Maria Taylor
Lynn Teeter Flower
The first time Maria Taylor's graceful voice was heard through our speakers, we knew it was love at first listen. On Azure Ray's 2001 debut, she sang with a knowledge and a weariness that made us trust and believe her words, fragile tones fragmented through soft acoustic strumming and velvety textures. Skip forward four short years later to when Maria set off on her own for a while, resulting in the stunning solo album called 11:11. A critical smash that wrapped her now-familiar voice in everything from acoustic folk to electronic dream pop, the album established Maria as a master storyteller with a flare for perfect, harmony-soaked melodies. To follow up a stunning debut, Maria has put together another glimmering collection of songs in the shape of her second solo record, Lynn Teeter Flower.-CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Saddle Creek
Genre/Style: Garage / Rock
MP3 A Good Start
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CD:$16.98
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Various Artists
Jonny Greenwood Is The Controller
The British label that has made its name over the years as the best distributor of classic Jamaican music, Trojan, has released a new single disc compilation. It is called “Jonny Greenwood Is The Controller.” Jonny Greenwood is a guitarist in Radiohead, and may seem an odd choice to arrange a reggae mix. Greenwood, however, does such a fine job as selector that it does not feel forced or unnatural at all. One of the mightiest Jamaican anthems of the last year or two, Turbulence’s “Notorious,” seems to have broken out within indieish communities from its inclusion in the mix played at Radiohead shows. There is a nervous, paranoid undercurrent of dread within this sampler that suggests that Radiohead and dub may share more than it initially sounds like.
The collection is full of perfect examples of the transcendent power of dub. The songs are solidly based, exhibiting the irresistible solid songwriting of the earlier rocksteady era. Beneath the structure, however, lies the methodical lurch of reggae tempo, and the more pronounced clatter of the percussion, leaving a somewhat frightful and dark pall that braces the affable material. Each drum hit has its own texture puncturing the mix. When the songs give way to toasting and dub sections, the beats clatter and echo with a wash of treated and isolated elements sweeping in, cutting out, and dispersing, like an organic orchestra of robots. From sound and subject that evokes the earth (roots) there is a transformation to a timeless reverie set in deep space, mental and outer (dub). The effect is no less than authentically psychedelic, as sound separates and takes its own distinct pathways in and out of perception.
Lee Perry hovers over the heart of the collection. On his “Black Panta,” a post ska lockstep supports a sinister instrumental in which the instruments strut, the drums strike and scratch, and the effects build up to embody the predatory growl of a wild animal. On “Bionic Rats” and “Dreader Locks,” Perry collaborates with his band the Upsetters (originally Max Romeo’s Hippy Boys) and Junior Byles, respectively. All of these tracks show the bold intuition, brave spareness, superhuman inspiration, and reckless eccentricity that makes Perry such a legendary figure, the possessed and deranged wizard to King Tubby’s mad scientist. “Flash Gordon Meets Luke Skywalker” is a fine nod to the legacy of these two dub pioneers, offering a taste of what acolytes Scientist, Jammy and the Roots Radics were developing by the dawn of the 80s.
Linval Thompson’s “Dread Are The Controller” is both the opening track and a declaration of intention. The nucleus of the album is the dread friendly dub and roots of the 70s. Marcia Aitkens delivers a worthy version of the standard “I’m Still In Love” that launches into deep space when the toasting and reverb kick in midway. Another sensational Marcia, Griffiths, vamps her way seductively through a version of “Gypsy Man” that makes me feel dirty when I realize that this is the woman who taught us the Electric Slide. Gregory Isaacs proves his dexterity with mesmerizing and sublime to the point of creepy love crooning on the pleading “Never Be Ungrateful.” Delroy Wilson’s “This Life Makes Me Wonder” has the fullness and emotional complexity mixed with catchiness of Motown classics like “Bernadette.” “Cool Rasta” is a good indicator of the point where the Heptones had evolved from a young trio into the greatest band reggae yielded. Junior Byles delivers a heated version of “Fever” that goes beyond Peggy Lee’s disaffected cool into mischievous horniness. Johnny Clarke & the Aggrovators manage to realize dub as the sound of a warzone on “A Ruffer Version.” Scotty’s “Clean Race,” with its abrupt lapses into pure conversation and command mixed with metronome toasting, ends the album on a fine note: complete hypnosis and destruction to your rational mind in the name of dance and life. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Trojan
Genre/Style: Reggae / Dub / Rocksteady
MP3 Lee “Scratch” Perry - Black Panta
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CD:$17.98
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Winterpills
Light Divides
Novelist and music writer Jonathan Lethem says: The Light Divides ups the ante on Winterpills shimering, resonant, heartbroken pop glory. These songs, as musically sophisticated and delicate as any of sogwriter Philip Prices career, and given otherworldly treatment by band members Flora Reed, Dave Hower, Dennis Crommett, Jose Ayerve and Brian Akey, nevertheless feel essential, even familiar, like old friends. The hooks and harmonies have been burnished so that they glow from within - its as if Winterpills has brought to light the songs you were already humming to yourself, but didnt know it. -CP
Release Date: 03/06/07
Label: Signature Sounds
Genre/Style: Pop / Rock
MP3 Hide Me
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