Switched to Tumblr

I've moved. Come follow me.

Flaming Lips and Yo La Tengo Year End Reviews

I was asked to write year end reviews for two of favorite records of last year, The Flaming Lips Embryonic and Yo La Tengo's Popular Songs. You can find them here, as well as below.

Flaming Lips- Embryonic

Embryonic resets the clock for the Flaming Lips. After a decade of functioning as a studio three-piece and turning out highly orchestrated albums with Wayne’s voice and lyrics firmly in the foreground, the band has gone back to being a band again. It would be easy to imagine that a back-to-basics approach would result in an album that sounded like it could be the follow-up to 1993’sTransmissions From The Satellite Heart, but this is the Flaming Lips. They’re anything but predictable, although they probably needed to remind themselves of that after the relatively tame At War With The Mystics.

Constructing songs primarily upon a tapestry of drum and bass patterns, Embryonic is also their first so-called double album, even though it fits on a single disc and doesn’t run much longer than some of their previous records. Like the Rolling Stones’ Exile On Main Street, the record goes for a sustained mood over individual songs. Which is not to say there aren’t some gems on here. Embryonic takes you on an organic journey through a range of styles including free jazz and psychedelia, and because the vocals are pushed to the back, the themes of power and astrology only emerge over time. But on a sprawling record like this, uncovering the rewards is what it’s all about. –Todd Norem

Yo La Tengo- Popular Songs

There’s something to the title of Yo La Tengo’s 2009 album that really rings true. Popular Songs – it sounds like another joke from the same band that brought us 2005’s I’m Not Afraid Of You And I Will Beat Your Ass. Sure, we’ve never seen Yo La Tengo in the top 10 and probably never will. But Popular Songs is Yo La Tengo’s most accessible album in years. Longtime fans enjoyed their Condo Fucks detour into garage rock covers from earlier this year, but by genre-hopping from R&B to psychedelia to guitar-drenched epics, they’re created a better record here. “Periodically Double Or Triple,” “If It’s True,” and “Avalon Or Something Similar” may not have the catchiest titles, but the music is some of the most infectious the band has created. And just when you think they really have created a batch of single-ready material, they reward you with three epic songs to close the disc. But what really matters is that Yo La Tengo have recorded another record which lives up to the promise of I Can Hear The Heart Beating As One and And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out. By referencing their past while creating an adventurous new musical landscape, the record rewards longtime fans while providing a great entry point for wannabe converts as well. –Todd Norem

February Album Writing Month 2010

Happy New Year everyone. I haven't posted much here lately, but I hope to get back into it. Please leave comments when you can. It helps big time.

February Album Writing Month is just around the corner. For those of you scratching your head, here's a little background. Since 2004 there's been a community of people who each try to write an albums worth of material (defined as 14 songs on the site) during the shortest month of the year. It started out with just a handful of people and has grown to a couple thousand worldwide.

So if you've written a song, or always thought about it, visit fawm.org. It doesn't start until February 1st, so there's still time to sign up.

This will be my 5th year doing it. I finished the challenge and wrote all 14 songs in 2005, 2008 and 2009.

Tom Waits- Glitter And Doom Live

Check out my review of the new Tom Waits live album at onethirtybpm.com.

Sensitive singer songwriter. Jazzy nightclub hipster. Found instrument auteur. Growly bluesman. Circus sideshow act. You never know what you’re going to get with Tom Waits. For four decades now Tom Waits has been defying easy categorization and doing what he does best – producing music that is as big of a hodgepodge of styles as America once was. You’d think live albums would be a safe way for those new to his music to dive in. Usually second only to greatest hits albums in predictability, the live album often features little more than a disc or two of an artist’s biggest hits framed by crowd noise. But this is Tom Waits we’re talking about, and there’s nothing business-as-usual about Glitter and Doom.

A document of the 2008 tour of the same name, the Glitter and Doom Tour played only scattered U.S. and European dates and came two years after his last release. Orphans was a three-volume compilation of songs that didn’t find their place on previous records, along with a handful of new material, and his last studio album of all new material, Real Gone, was back in 2004. With nothing new to promote, the Glitter and Doom Tour promised nothing but the opportunity to see Tom Waits live, and although he performed songs from both releases, the resulting live album has more in common with his pair of theatrical releases from 2002, Alice andBlood Money.

Glitter and Doom isn’t about a live show as much as it is about a live performance. There’s nothing natural about the brute voice that Tom projects so well during the opening “Lucinda/Down To The Well,” a brilliant combination of two Orphans tracks that far surpasses what the two originals had. The album is worth checking out for this song alone, but it’s unsettling the first time you hear it. Tom Waits has used the grittier aspects of his voice quite effectively for the past 25 years, but this pushes things to the extreme and into the realm of theater. “Goin’ Out West” is a nice romp, sounding like a stripped down blues song done to the tune of T. Rex’s “Bang A Gong.” There’s a foreboding that’s absent from the Orphans version on “Fannin’ Street,” and his excellent band gets a chance to stretch out as Waits barks lyrics on “Get Behind The Mule.”

Waits sticks mostly to songs from the last decade or so, but even then his choice of material sometimes seems random and plays more like an alternative detour through the past 20 years than any sort of greatest hits live collection. “Falling Down” is a nice nod to his previous live album, 1988’s Big Time, as the song was featured on that record as the album’s lone studio song. And “Singapore” reaches back a little further to the time when he made a major break from largely acoustic guitar and piano-driven songs to a potpourri of sounds you couldn’t easily slap a label on.

The theatrical nature of the performance starts to wear a little thin by end of the first disc on songs like Real Gone’s “Circus.” And there’s plenty of this on the second disc, such as “Tom Tails,” which consists of nothing but between-song banter and jokes. It’s entertaining when you’re in the right mood, but sometimes you wish a guy with these immense talents and songs this good would play things just a little bit more straight. Of course, part of being a Waits fan is learning to enjoy the ride. Glitter and Doom rewards, even if, much like the randomness of the cities the tour played in, it comes across more like a backwoods road trip than a full-blown drive.

R.E.M. Live At The Olympia

R.E.M. embrace their early albums, test out new songs, and capture it all on a new live album. Read my review at 130bpm.com.

R.E.M. released five full-length records, an EP and a b-sides collection for IRS records in the 1980’s. And even though they built their reputation as a touring band, playing small towns and major markets and just about any venue they could get a gig in, they never released an official live record for the label. Peter Buck often spoke out against it, saying that a live record should be more than just greatest hits with crowd noise and referenced The Who’s Live At Leeds as a live album that was done right. After commercial success and a major label contract, they would eventually cave somewhat and release live videos after successful tours, but it wasn’t until 2007 that they released a proper live album, 25 years into their career. But R.E.M. Live was exactly the kind of live record the band had always been against. In retrospect, it seems like an attempt to save the material from 2004’s sterile Around the Sun and prove to the world that they still mattered, at least in a live setting. But the proof wouldn’t come until the following studio album and a back-to-basics approach that began with five shows in Dublin.

In 2007, R.E.M. were at a crossroads. They had released three albums since Bill Berry left, and while some, like 1998’s Up were artistic highs, they were increasingly spending more time in the studio and getting weaker results. With the follow up to Around the Sun looming they wanted to break the mold so they booked 5 nights at the Olympia Theater in Dublin to test material in front of a live audience as recognition to the way they used to work up new songs by trying them out on tours. In order to prepare for the shows they went back to their earliest albums and looked for material that might fit in with their new direction. Most of the new material played at these concerts ended up on 2008’s Accelerate, and the double-disc Live at The Olympia contains all 39 songs played during the 5 nights, including two new songs that didn’t make the cut for Accelerate. But unlike R.E.M. Live, the only thing bloated here is the length.

Live at The Olympia is over two and a half hours long and avoids the big hits of the 90’s, as well as most of their minor hits of the 80’s and almost all of their recent work, in favor of truly a back-to-basics approach. R.E.M. mine their IRS years, playing almost the entirety of their 1982 debut EP Chronic Town along with half ofReckoning and several lesser-known songs from Fables of the Reconstruction, Lifes Rich Pageant andDocument, and a few scattered songs from the Warner Brothers years. Besides the emphasis on more rock-oriented material, the most surprising thing about Live at The Olympia is just how well this older material works with the new. It’s testament to how far they had come with the pre-Accelerate material that the one dud out of all the 39 songs is a song from Around the Sun, the very album that they were fighting against making.

Live at The Olympia might just be that rare live album that Peter Buck had always talked about. It captures a legendary band that never found a reason to quit, even after they finally succumbed to recording a truly bad album, and finds them reinventing themselves by returning to what they do best. For those only familiar with the band’s 90’s material, the plethora of great early songs like “Kohoutek,” “Feeling Gravity’s Pull” and “Letter Never Sent” will provide a killer introduction to their past while also bringing you up to date with the where they are now. And for those of us that got on board early on, it’s the closest we’re likely to get to going back. But for the band, it marks a new start and a rewinding of the clock. To borrow one of their lyrics, they have begun again. And it’s great the tape was rolling this time.

The Other Side Of The Street

I woke up on the right side of the bed, yet I find myself on the opposite side of the street. It's a Monday morning in November and it's absolutely beautiful out. Just a month ago there was a bitter chill in the air. But that's long gone.

I couldn't find a spot at my regular coffee shop. I don't know if that's because of the weather or if people are just feeling especially productive on this Monday morning. Maybe there was another round of layoffs somewhere and people are looking to add a little structure to their day. I don't know. I just couldn't get a table and it was sort of baffling.

I like the people over at this place, my second choice. They really appreciate your business. So I don't feel guilty coming over here. Quite the opposite, I feel bad for staying away.

The guy gives me a detailed story about my coffee. I like that. He says that it's harvested in Ethiopia and roasted in SE Minneapolis. He warns me that it isn't a true dark roast, but instead a full city, and that they should have the dark roast available soon. In fact, they have it on the shelf. Smell this, he says as he holds out the bag of beans.

It smells strong. The kind of coffee I like. But the full city is just fine. As is the altered perspective. I'm across the street. The weather is beautiful. And it's a Monday morning in November.

Built To Spill- There Is No Enemy

Review is up at onethirtybpm.com for Built To Spill's new one.

The best artists are often haunted by their past. Stick around long enough to see bands that grew up on your sound start to imitate it, or meet fans that treat your albums as gospel, able to recite every lyric and conjure up every note, and it can leave you in an impossible position. Some bands drastically change their sound, looking to grow artistically while separating themselves from an identity forged by their early material. But an even larger number of them simply break up. After 2001’s disappointing Ancient Melodies of the Future, Built to Spill took a long break.

“Make up your mind, make up your own mythology,” Doug Marsh sings on There Is No Enemy’s “Planting Seeds.” He could easily be talking about the singular vision that shaped the two albums that largely defined the band and helped shape the sound of indie rock in the previous decade, 1997’s Perfect From Now On and 1999’s Keep it Like a Secret. While 2006’s You in Reverse sounded tentative, only occasionally hinting at the brilliance that so many fans of guitar-based rock fell in love with, There Is No Enemy sounds confident. They’ve created an album that sounds less like a patchwork and works as a whole, and more importantly, they sound like a real band again.

“Hindsight” could easily fit on Keep it Like a Secret, with textbook indie-rock hooks and a concise structure, and “Pat” is Built to Spill at their most economical and aggressive, but many of the highlights of the album are the mellower moments. “Life’s A Dream” features some unexpected harmonies that provide a welcome relief from the serious nature of the lyrics, and “Things Fall Apart” could easily sit alongside the very best of the band’s songs.

There is No Enemy is far from perfect. There are some prodding moments, most noticeably during the middle section of the record, especially on “Oh Yeah,” but as a whole this is the strongest record they’ve put out in a decade and a welcome return to form. Like Dinosaur Jr, Built to Spill seem to be able to reconcile the mythology of their past with their artistic pursuits of the future. It can’t be an easy task, but it’s awfully nice to be able to go along for the ride.

CarrotMob Hardware Store Action

I had an interesting moment last week when my parents were in town. I wanted to put a new thermostat in my place and asked for my Dad's help. I mentioned that there was a hardware store just a few blocks away from where I lived, but he was dismissive, saying that Home Depot would have much better prices and we should just go there. I felt pretty guilty driving by that hardware store and vowed not to do that again. You really do have to support the little guys once in a while or they won't be around anymore.

Anyway, I plan on making it up on October 24 at Guse Hardware. They're participating in a CarrotMob event and donating 100% of their revenues to making energy improvements in the store. It'll be pretty hard to drive by that.

Mason Jennings- Blood Of Man

Review is up at onethirtybpm.com for the new Mason Jennings album.

For much of his career, Mason Jennings’s body of work has been the type that would often feature a handful of great songs alongside a lot of filler. His albums invariably contained one absolutely killer song, a role “The Field” fills on Blood of Man, but too often Jennings fell short in fulfilling the promise of his early work. From the opening notes of Blood of Man, it’s apparent that this is not business as usual. There’s a new sense of primal urgency and yes, electric guitars, most noticeably on “Ain’t No Friend of Mine,” which recalls the Black Keys’ Hendrix-indebted blues rock. The album’s production is more lo-fi than any of his recent releases, but more than anything there’s a sense of rebirth in the subject matter as well as the delivery. Mason’s been releasing records for well over a decade now, and if there was ever a record that served to remind us why we started listening in the first place, Blood of Man is it.

Jennings’ lyrics speak of “blood on the door” and “blood on the wall” and from the sound of this record, there’s blood on the line as well. The singer-songwriter takes full control on Blood of Man, playing all of the instruments and recording everything himself much like he did on his 1997 debut EP, but the music here is much darker, recalling Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska both in approach and in subject matter. But where that record featured acoustic guitars and stories of closed factories and dead end small town America, Blood Of Man is plugged in and addresses war, suicide, murder and drugs. Like Springsteen, Jennings knows that with a heavy dose of doom and gloom you have to sprinkle in a little optimism, and it’s here in songs like “Tourist” and the first-childhood-kiss recollection of “Sunlight,” where “Minutes freeze like popsicles and drip their seconds down our shirts.”

This return to his roots shouldn’t be surprising to longtime fans. Jennings has always put his art first, not releasing his first EP until he was truly satisfied with it, painstakingly recording each part by himself in a run down apartment, and reportedly turning down major label recording contracts early on in favor of doing things his way without compromise. Blood of Man signifies a new direction for Jennings, whether he’ll continue down this path remains to be seen, but it’s clearly a career reset from a guy who could have been perfectly content making records like his last couple. Then again, great artists are never really content are they?