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An art pop album that
balances the beautiful with the ugly
Best track: Bring Me your Loves Worst track: Every Tear Disappears A pleasant reminder
of effective mainstream rock music
Album opener Shit Shots Count is a bright, mid-tempo rocker filled with witticisms. "Put your cigarette out and put your hat back on / Don’t mix up which is which" begins the song, and is quickly followed by "Boss ain’t as smart as he’d like to be / But he ain’t nearly as dumb as you think." Cooley’s deeper vocals bring the party while Hood’s reedier voice paints vivid character pictures on When He’s Gone. Case in point is the Pauline Hawkins, an atmospheric song inspired by an oppressed character in a novel by author Willy Vlautin, which paints an evocative picture of a small-town struggle. Primer Coat is mid-tempo melancholy, a song about endurance and struggling through incomplete lives. Highlight of this album is Made up English Oceans which changes the dynamics of the record with a different flow. The album closes on an emotional note, with Grand Canyon, written for the band’s close friend and longtime tourmate Craig Lieske. A dirge in the classic sense, the song touches on God and fate and the wondrous and mysterious beauty of life. Best track: Made up English Oceans Worst track: When Walter Went Crazy Rating*** Gorgeous music,
nostalgia and longing
Best track: Talking Backwards Worst track: Horizon Rating ** A musical empathy
over 24 years of togetherness
Best track: This Blue World Worst track: Colour Fields Rating*** Top 10 Singles Happy..........................................Pharrell Williams (NM) All Of Me..............................................John Legend (CU) Dark Horse ........................Katy Perry feat. Juicy J (FD) Let It Go.............................................Idina Menzel (NM) Team..............................................................Lorde (FD) The Man..................................................Aloe Blacc (CU) Pompeii.......................................................Bastille (FD) Loyal.............................Chris Brown feat. Lil Wayne (CU) Hey Brother....................................................Avicii (CU) Timber........................................Pitbull feat. Ke$ha (FD) Legend: CU): Climbing Up
(FD): Falling own (NM): Non-mover (NE): New Entry
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St. Vincent’s
new self-titled album is her most advanced experiment to date. The
album follows Annie Clark’s celebrated musical partnership with
Talking Heads founder and veteran collaborator David Byrne. St.
Vincent showcases Annie Clark as a fiercely accomplished musician,
a relentlessly original artist, and an innovator of pop. Opening track
Rattlesnake sets the album’s tone. Under a deceptively simple
pattern of synthesiser tones, Clark narrates her lived experience of
going for a walk on a Texas ranch and encountering a rattlesnake. The
aura of her recent collaboration with David Byrne on Love This
Giant lingers throughout the brassy Digital Witness, the lavish
art-punk anthem Psychopath, and the robotic menace of Bring
Me Your Loves. Birth in Reverse feels like a cry from Clark to
people everywhere to not be afraid to venture out into the unknown and
try new things. Huey Newton sees Clark trade her high-hitting vocal
range for a lower-pitched grimace, which she uses to make her
impossible stories sound real. Severed Crossed Fingers, the album’s
crescendo and most affecting number, contains the line "The truth
is ugly, and I feel ugly, too," sung in a clarity that is rare
for a St. Vincent album. With each album tangibly improving on the
last, it’s intriguing to imagine how St. Vincent is going to refine
her unconventional sound in the future.
English Oceans is
a welcome addition to the Drive-By Truckers discography as well as
their best since 2008’s Brighter Than Creation’s Dark. The
band’s 12th LP is the first to present Hood and Cooley as equal
vocal and songwriting partners, and the results are muscular and more
experimental than you might expect. The album is a return to their
roots; a leaner, more focused, take on their country infused rock’n’roll.
After a fantastic
self-titled debut Days, Atlas further establish their talent
for building tight and near-perfect tunes out of delicate guitar
melodies, swaying vocals, and agile bass lines. The record starts with
the promising Had to Hear, an aching track featuring
interweaving guitars by Martin Courtney and Matt Mondanile. Talking
Backwards is a song lamenting the perils of long-distance
relationships, while Past Lives expresses how out of place it
feels in old hometown. Real Estate’s soaring ambitions are perhaps
more obviously apparent on mid-album anchor The Bend. The track
immediately recalls their earliest work, from the ambient rhythm to
the metaphor of the lyrics. Primitive is among the best songs the band
has written, relying on a unique blend of sturdy, country-rock
melodies and delicate guitar arrangements. Horizon breaks free
of the established groove of the record, but while this change of pace
shows a commendable effort to diversify, the song never quite takes
off. Positive, with its rattling chord progression and
expressive lyrics, is a potent combination of disarming and
straightforward instrumentation. Though their influences may be
numerous and obvious, Real Estate still sound like themselves
and everything is done at their own pace.
The Take Off and Landing
of Everything sees the band
re-embrace the intimate production values they displayed with such
poise on their remarkably mature debut, Asleep in the Back.
Garvey’s resonant baritone remains as refreshingly distinctive as
when it first appeared on the scene fourteen years ago. Opening track This
Blue World is a slow-burning beautiful introduction to the album
with staggeringly poetic lines like "While three chambers of
my heart beat true and strong with love for another, the fourth is
yours forever," confirming Garvey’s top lyrical form. Fly
Boy Blue has a sense of melancholy and re-visits the layered,
minor-key openings of Asleep in the Back’s striking opener Any
Day Now. The centerpiece of the album remains Sad Captains,
yet the wonderfully ornery Charge and the dreamy, subtle resignation
of Honey Sun are equally as notable. On the lengthened Real
Life/Angel, Garvey advises you to "Go straight back to the
place where you first lost your balance and find your feet with the
people that you love." The most immediately accessible track,
New York Morning starts off simply with just vocals and piano
before gradually building in intensity. Garvey and the band members of
Elbow have always been craftsmen, focused more on finer details than
instant fulfillment.