Even with the tempo slowed down to below 100 bpm’s, the Ruby Suns‘ version of El Guincho’s “Palomitos Park” is immediately identifiable with its ancestry. Its a beautiful offspring from the parent recording, but this child is a little softer around the edges, about 40 percent fatter in time, and the most sensitive a cover song could ever be. Maybe its just because I can actually understand the language this time.
Campfire Songs is for the active and possibly obsessed Animal Collective fan. If you haven’t had the good fortune of listening to their music then I beg you to enter door number 1 and begin your journey. For those of you that are left, I give you what I believe to be the earliest artifact of what we now know as Animal Collective. Although there are two LPs before this release, Campfire Songs marks the first time all four members of AC played together.
True to its name, the recording of the album was done in the open air (a screen porch in Maryland to be exact), and the songs played back to back in one take. Untrue to its name, these songs are definitely not your average “camp songs” - and thank God for that. The album is somewhere between ambient sound and the foundations of Sung Tongs. There is something undefinable about Avey Tare’s acoustic guitar playing. He takes an instrument that is so weighed down in traditional song writing, and transforms it into an enigmatic tool. Any admirer of Sung Tongs (and if you don’t know what that is you really should have taken door number 1 above) will find a satisfying point of origin in Campfire Songs.
Most of us never get our fifteen minutes let alone the five years that Bowie warned us about. I think I jumped on the Killers bandwagon too early in their musical arc because I am eagerly awaiting their five years to come to a close. This new song of theirs, “Human”, another rehash of 80s synth pop clusterfudge that will inevitably soundtrack a myriad of junior high make-out sessions and soft, sitcom outros doesn’t resolve any of my ill will towards the band. It just does the usual job at making one’s love life sound like a credit card commercial. Its a little embarrassing to listen to but it is, after all, musical crack: you know the stuff is bad for ya but it sure does feel good when no one is watching. What these dudes need is some cheaper mics, some broken equipment, and a handful of dust in the tape machine to help me connect with them because there is no way I can recommend this with my usual notarized signature. This recommendation comes from under the table where it can never be traced back to me. Now I’ll play it again for the umpteenth time.
The first thirty seconds of Lunglight places me square in the middle of a Fugazi record. It’s got everything from the choppy, muted guitar chords, to the warbled vocal delivery. These are great qualities for a couple reasons - 1. I haven’t heard Fugazi for a long time now and it makes me want to get out End Hits and/or Red Medicine immediately 2. It’s clear once you’re in the song that The Shaky Hands have their own North West spin on these post-punk traits. The most obvious being that while DC is made up of concrete and shady politicians, Portland is surrounded by lots of trees and good pot.
It doesn’t take long for the band to shake of any semblance of Fugazi, and embark on their own musical journey. Along that road they meet a couple of bands like The Velvet Underground, Wilco and R.E.M., hang with them for a couple of songs and move on. However, no matter the band, The Shaky Hands are held together by a Pacific North West sound that roots Lunglight perfectly and uniquely.
Will Sheff has one of the most distinctive voices in indie music. It blends tones of desperation and storytelling that fit somewhere around a camp fire. While on their first breakout release, Black Sheep Boy, Okkervil River set out to tell elaborate fictional tale of a downtrodden boy, The Stand Ins, the band’s fifth LP, is a bit vaguer thematically but is held up by the tightness of the songwriting and performance.
The endless resource that is Wikipedia just informed me that if you line up the cover art for The Stage Names (4th LP) with The Stand In’s you’ll have a complete picture. Also placing this release as a companion piece to last year’s stand out album. Both of these albums flirt with celebrity and pop culture, but judging from the title and tone it’s an non-romanticized approach.
Brian Wilson is easily one of my favorite artists of all time. There was a period of about six months in college where all I listened to was the Beach Boys and all I read were books on the making of Pet Sounds and the techniques of 60s pop producers. It became a bit obsessive. It made sense to my friends that were spread out across the States. I was the California kid, the surfer. I even rocked that flock of seagulls/abomination haircut in high school with the sun bleached tips (actual sun used) and often had a wetsuit rash wrapping around my neck (which always got pawned off as some casual hickie). My obsession just seemed an obvious a way for me to strengthen the knot that binds me to my California heritage.
Knowing that Brian Wilson’s London-commissioned opus, That Lucky Old Sun, was a nostalgia tripping, 60s pop hat-tipping, celebration of the Southern California lifestyle made me wonder if this new record could go head to head with the religious inducing worship that I had experienced under the influence of Smile. In short, even on its tiptoes, That Lucky Old Sun is a heaven’s leap from measuring up eye to eye with Smile. But that doesn’t exclude That Lucky Old Sun from being an eager attempt, which often succeeds, at trying to respark that musical wonder and merriment that was omnipresent throughout Wilson’s greater work. Some of the songs (”Forever My Surfer Girl”, “Live Let Live”) have the ability to almost sample some of Wilson’s early masterpieces, the most noticeable being the focal point of “Surfer Girl” and the prechorus swell of “Let Him Run Wild”. Fortunately, this isn’t an annoyance as Wilson has always seemed able to rehash old chord arrangments and melodies into something fresh enough to listen to anew. Just make a medley of “Surfer Girl”, “In My Room”, and “Warmth of the Sun” and try to imagine them being remnants of the same song. Fairly easy, huh?
Its also easy for any Beach Boys fan to find something to fall in love with on this new record. Where Smile seemed to alienate the inpatient listener or those not well versed in early Beach Boys’ mythology, That Lucky Old Sun is a more easily accessible entrance into the brilliance of Wilson’s twilight years.
The cycles of music continually spin and repeat, and Black Kids have landed square in The Cure territory. The band manages to avoid straight parody by modernizing their sound and keeping it light and airy. Reggie Youngblood croons his lovesick vocals over anthem induced keys and guitars. Like The Cure before them, this split between melancholy vocals and upbeat melodies creates a more layered song compared to the wafer thin dance beats of Black Kids’ peers.
While last year’s Wizard Ahhhs EP was a great introduction to the indie scene, Partie Traumatic seems meant for a broader audience.
I don’t speak Spanish but that definitely is not a prerequisite to enjoy El Guincho’s mastercrafted, debut album, Alegranza. Its not even necessary to have a background in Tropicalia or 60s sunshine pop for it will be nearly impossible to identify any of the myriad of sounds amongst the scattered jungle thumping and organized harmonies that form this pop masterpiece. Alegranza is sure to be a permanent fixture into any credible playlist featuring Panda Bear or post-Strawberry JamsAnimal Collective.
del.icio.us
digg it
facebook
stumble upon
