The following reviews appeared in the Waterloo Record and the
Guelph Mercury.
Highly recommended this month: Pusha T, the Strumbellas
Recommended: M.I.A., Deep Dark Woods, Red Hot + Fela, Omar
Souleyman
Cowboy Junkies and Various Artists - The Kennedy Suite (Latent)
Michael Timmins of the Cowboy Junkies took the 50th
anniversary of John Kennedy’s assassination as reason to complete a
long-gestating project he’d been producing, featuring original songs by an
unknown Ontario schoolteacher, Scott Garbe, obsessed with the ripples the event
sent through North American culture.
Timmins had no trouble collecting an impressive circle of friends
to give voices to the various characters in the song cycle. That includes
generations of incredible Ontario artists, from veterans of the ’70s Toronto
punk scene (who now perform as The Screwed) to country icons the Good Family to
the Skydiggers to the Rheostatics to Hawkley Workman to Sarah Harmer to Jason
Collett to Doug Paisley to newcomers like Jessy Bell Smith and Harlan Pepper.
The backing band on most tracks is the Cowboy Junkies, minus singer Margo
Timmins (who of course sings one track).
So how did it all go horribly wrong? The songs obviously
captivated the Skydiggers’ Andy Maize, who gave a tape of Garbe’s demos to
Timmins over a decade ago, and unless there was some serious extortion going
on, clearly all the artists involved signed on willingly. When so few of them
are able to breathe any life into the material, despite the calibre of talent
involved, the problem has to be at the source.
Which is a shame, because there are a few gems, including the
previously released “The Truth About Us” (found on the Skydiggers’ 1997 album
Desmond’s Hip City) and “Parkland” (found on Lee Harvey Osmond’s 2009 album A
Quiet Evil). It’s a joy to hear the Rheostatics’ Martin Tielli and Dave Clark
reunite and play off each other on “Slipstream.” Outside of that, only Sarah
Harmer and Reid Jamieson manage to make a song sound better than it is.
The Kennedy Suite could have been a fascinating project; indeed,
the elaborate CD packaging alone shows how much care went into the project.
Let’s hope the same cast finds something else to rally around. (Nov. 21)
Download: Sarah Harmer – “White Man in Decline,” Martin Tielli
and Dave Clark – “Slipstream,” Reid Jamieson – “Take Heart”
Deep Dark Woods – Jubilee (Six Shooter)
With the notable exception of the Sadies and Lee Harvey Osmond,
most Canadian roots music is too safe and squeaky clean. Thank God for the
weirdoes, like Saskatoon’s Deep Dark Woods, who specialize in organ-drenched,
spooky and psychedelic minor-key country songs—the kind Neil Young and Greg
Keelor are so good at yet rarely indulge in anymore. This, the band’s sixth
album, was recorded in a Rocky Mountain cabin in Alberta. It’s helmed by L.A.
producer Jonathan Wilson (Father John Misty, Bonnie Prince Billy, Roy Harper),
who recorded the powerful live band direct to tape—though the group’s superstar
keyboardist Geoff Hilhorst surely layered his organs, pianos and oddball synths
with a few different takes.
Much of the album is morose and set to the same lurching tempo,
but that all works in Deep Dark Woods’s favour. This is not a band of
showboating singers or instrumentalists. Every member digs deep into the
grooves, adding layers of haunting textures and backing vocals to support lead
singer Ryan Boldt’s fragile lead.
I’d heard some of this band’s previous records, which never left
much of an impression. Jubilee, on the other hand, is immediately striking and
sounds like an instant late-night classic. This band’s years of hard work are
finally paying off; you can hear it in every note. (Nov. 28)
Download: “Miles and Miles,” “18th of December,” “East St. Louis”
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire – Original Soundtrack
(Universal)
We’re not in District 12 anymore, Toto. The soundtrack to the
first Hunger Games film was a largely acoustic affair, reflecting the rural
roots of protagonist Katniss Everdeen; the sequel is considerably slicker.
T-Bone Burnett is not involved. Neither, for that matter, is Arcade Fire, who
nailed the first film’s tone of fascist dread with their two contributions.
Instead, we get a lot of already mopey rockers and R&B stars
shoehorning themselves into a Panem state of mind. Few survive. Coldplay
display a remarkable sense of subtlety, which in this case means they’re
indistinguishable from The National, who also appear; neither band phones it
in, though both sound like they’re doing a better than average U2 ballad.
Likewise, the Lumineers and Ellie Goulding fare better than expected.
But the meeting of hitmaker Sia with Toronto’s The Weeknd and
superstar Diplo is shockingly flat; The Weeknd’s own track is even worse.
Likewise, Santigold forsakes her usual firecracker personality and wades
through the too-obviously-titled “Shooting Arrows at the Sky.” The album never
gets worse, however, than Christina Aguilera singing, “Burn me with fire /
drown me in rain”—a lyric the 16-year-old protagonist of the film would never
dare write herself.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the only real standout here is
17-year-old Lorde, who covers Tears For Fears’ ’80s staple “Everybody Wants to
Rule the World,” reducing it to a death-row dirge and creating something more
ominous than ever suggested in the original. It’s note perfect—and, at 2.5
minutes long, never wears out its novelty.
Who wins this round of Hunger Games? The actual teenager, of
course.
(Nov. 28)
Download: “Lean” – The National, “Everybody Wants to Rule the
World” – Lorde, “Mirror” – Ellie Goulding
Lady Gaga - Artpop (Universal)
M.I.A. - Matangi (Universal)
“Pop culture was an art / now art’s in pop culture, in me.” It’s
a line from Lady Gaga’s new single, “Applause,” but it could just as well apply
to M.I.A. Both ladies revel in visuals, incongruous imagery, provocation and
performance art: what they do in the public sphere is as important as their
music. But without the music, the rest is empty.
Gaga has sold millions of records; M.I.A. has inspired millions
of words from critics trying to make sense of her truly cross-cultural mashups
and the political significance—if any—of her wordplay. Until now, Gaga had plenty
of ace pop songs to back up the avalanche of media-baiting stunts she delighted
in. Meanwhile, M.I.A. was all style and little substance; her visual aesthetic
and personality far outshone her lyrics and beats.
That’s all changed.
Gaga has always excelled in maximalist pop anthems, but at least
she had the melodies to back it up. Here, she sounds cloying and bored. Even
for a performer who always embraced the glitz and absurdity of celebrity
culture, tracks like “Jewels and Drugs,” “Swine” and “Fashion” are beyond
vacant—Paris Hilton could do better. Meanwhile, her production team steamrolls
over everything, making the Black-Eyed Peas sound like sultans of subtlety. The
nods to post-Skrillex EDM take her out of respectable discos into low-rent meth
parties with tweakers’ anthems (“Jewels and Drugs”). This record sounds too
loud even at the lowest volume; it’s compressed to the point where it sounds no
better from the worst computer speaker than it does from the best headphones.
“Do you want to see me naked, lover?” she asks, “Do you want to
see the girl who lives behind the aura?” Well: tough. Ain’t gonna happen. The
most personal Gaga gets is an attempt at a stirring piano ballad, with the
unfortunate chorus: “I need you more than dope.” Other than that, she stoops as
low as rhyming the planet Uranus with, “Don’t you know my ass is famous?” One
can’t help but respond: yes, but for how long?
Meanwhile, reading about M.I.A. was always more fascinating than
actually listening to her records. It’s not that she’s matured or mellowed: far
from it. She still spits po-mo flow over unconventional beats, and she’s still
more likely to turn to Angolan dance music than any trend in American hip-hop,
throwing in pan-Asian elements, Caribbean rhythms and Britpop along the way.
Her beats take samples of traditional drumming—from which
tradition exactly it’s hard to tell—and sets them to pitched-up synths and
clipped vocals, while tempos accelerate and drag and generally lurch in ways
unheard of in dance culture. “Come Walk With Me” starts out as a power ballad
for the rave generation, before the video-game-Arabic-dancehall-whatever beats
kick in and turn the pop melody into a frenetic ADD anthem.
It works. As does everything else here, the first time M.I.A.’s
world of sound coalesces into a truly great album that matches her outsized
personality.
(Nov. 14)
Download Lady Gaga: “Aura,” “Manicure,” “Gypsy”
Download M.I.A.: “Matangi,” “Come Walk With Me,” “Bring the
Noize”
Machinedrum - Vapor City (Ninja Tune)
It’s 2013: does anyone listen to ’90s drum’n’bass anymore, never
mind make it? Roni Size and Goldie were spotted on (some kind of) comeback
trail this summer, so who knows. Yet here is Machinedrum, aka Trevor Stewart, a
Brooklynite now living in Berlin who got his big break when hot new hip-hop MC Azealia Banks rapped
over a couple of his tracks. On his debut album for venerable beat purveyors
Ninja Tune, Vapor City could have rivalled Plug’s Drum N Bass For Papa for the
best electronic album of 1997. Coming out in 2013, however, Stewart
incorporates elements of the noir-ish corners of dubstep, ala James Blake, and
latter-day Ninja Tune heavyweights like Bonobo. There’s no mistaking the retro
vibe, and it’s a reminder that not all of the ’90s was terrible. (Nov. 14)
Download: “Gunshotta,” “Don’t 1 2 Lose U,” “U Still Lie”
Sam Phillips – Push Any Button (Littlebox)
Though Phillips has a stellar reputation among those lucky
enough to know her music, she’s paid many of her bills in the last decade doing
incidental music for two TV series by Amy Sherman-Palladino: Gilmore Girls and
the recently cancelled Bunheads. Because I loved both those shows, I felt
inundated with Phillips and that that therefore gave me an excuse to ignore her
more recent records. Foolish, foolish.
Composing 20-second snippets appears to have honed Phillips’s
talent for concision even more: The 10 songs on this, her second self-released
record, clock in at under half an hour. Phillips knows how to encapsulate joy,
loneliness, disappointment and determination in tiny, perfect songs rich with
melody and driven by a rockabilly backbeat with modern production. Phillips is
now free of a record contract, free of a TV show, and free to make lovely
little records like this whenever she feels like it. Our gain. (Nov. 28)
Download: “When I’m Alone,” “Pretty Time Bomb,” “You Know I
Won’t”
Pusha T - My Name is My
Name (Universal)
You spent the last month
reading about Rob Ford. You might not be in the mood to immerse yourself in an
album about the cocaine trade that includes tracks called “No Regrets” and “Nosetalgia.”
Or conversely, that might just put you in exactly the right mood to try and
make sense of the seamier side of urban life.
Pusha T has pulled this
off before, as one half of The Clipse, whose 2006 album Hell Hath No Fury spun
harrowing narratives atop incredible beats courtesy of Pharrell Williams’s
Neptunes. Now he has a second lease on life courtesy of Kanye West, who brought
Pusha T into his G.O.O.D. Music imprint, and provided production on more than
half the album. Williams, The-Dream and Swizz Beatz are also on board, as are
vocalists Kelly Rowland, Rick Ross, Kendrick Lamar, Future and 2 Chainz.
Despite the wealth of talent, My Name is remarkably sparse and lean—the polar
opposite of West’s bloated output of late. Pusha T proves to be a better
vehicle for Kanye’s beats than West himself.
The big-name backup
certainly helps, but Pusha T is the rare MC who can deliver street stories,
smarts and charisma in equal doses. You don’t like the guy, but you can’t help
but hang on every inflection in his voice: “36 years of doing dirt like it’s
Earth Day?” he posits, before exhaling with either self-loathing or mockery of
your own disdain: “Gawwwwwwwd.”
One can engage the endless debate about whether
or not Pusha T is glorifying the drug game—or if he’s doing so any more than
countless crime shows. Pusha T tackles the subject with menace, neither
celebratory nor cautionary and far removed from the undisputed crossover king,
Jay-Z. Unlike Jay, Pusha T still sounds hungry, unsatisfied, and restless—and
far superior to any other MC who put out an album in 2013. (Nov. 7)
Download: “Numbers on the
Boards,” “Let Me Love You,” “Pain”
Red, Hot + Fela – Various
Artists (Knitting Factory)
There’s never a shortage
of hastily assembled, wishy-washy compilation albums for charitable causes. The
Red Hot series, raising money and awareness for HIV/AIDS, has always been the
exception to the rule. After releasing at least an album a year for 12 years,
the series took a seven-year hiatus after 2002’s incredible tribute to Afrobeat
superstar Fela Kuti—perhaps because it was hard to beat. Now a new Red Hot
record only surfaces every couple of years, and this Fela-centred follow-up is
more than worth the wait.
Only a few African artists
participated last time. This time, it’s the Western artists who are in the
minority, leaving room for Spoek Mathambo, Canadian expat Zaki Ibrahim, and,
well, a lot of artists of whom you and I have never heard. Most of the major
starpower, if you will, is consolidated on one track: ?uestlove, TuneYards and
Angelique Kido, on an absolutely sizzling version of “Lady.” And My Morning
Jacket, joined by TuneYards’ Merrill Garbus and Alabama Shakes’ Brittany
Howard, get the longest track, with 11 minutes of “Trouble Sleep Yanga Wake Am.”
The largely unknown cast
that fleshes out the lineup draws from Africans living in Germany, Belgium and
the U.S., as well as discoveries like the Kenyan group Just a Band and Sierra
Leonean hip-hop crew Bajah.
They all excel at the
near-impossible task of interpreting Fela, the man who invented Afrobeat, which
seems as daunting as covering James Brown. Granted, many versions are far
removed from the originals, but the spirit is intact, and what is a tribute
project except an excuse to reinvent? (Nov. 7)
Download: “Lady” –
TuneYards, ?uestlove, Angelique Kido and Akua Naru; “Sorrow, Tears and Blood” –
Kronos Quartet, Kyp Malone, Tunde Adebimpe and Stuart Bogie; “Afrodisco Beat
2013” – Tony Allen, M1 and Baloji
Omar Souleyman – Wenu Wenu
(Ribbon)
When Hosni Mubarak was
deposed as president of Egypt during the Arab Spring, his immediate successor
was Omar Souleyman—not, sadly, the Syrian musician of the same name. One can
dream.
Souleyman makes dabke, the
kind of pulsing Arabic electro-folk that one imagines blasting from street
carts on a dusty market alleyway—which is where the American who first brought
his recordings to the West first heard them. Either a dumbek or an electronic
facsimile rattles away insistently, creating an ecstatic trance that Bjork
(whom Souleyman has remixed) calls “Syrian techno.” Synths set to approximate
reedy wind instruments play furious, frenetic melodies that would send Ashley
MacIssac spinning, while Souleyman plays the energetic frontman with the
command and charisma of a Jamaican dancehall singer.
Before the civil war, this
was Syrian wedding music. Now Souleyman lives in exile in Turkey, admitting
that he has trouble making joyous music while his country is falling apart.
He made this, his first
official Western release, with Kieran Hebden of FourTet, whose dreamy,
psychedelic strains of electronica Hebden keeps to himself; he knows better
than to mess with Souleyman’s working formula. The only significant change is
perhaps more definition of the bass tones, creating greater contrasts with the
tinny synths. Souleyman’s vocals also benefit from better microphones;
everything no longer sounds overdriven, which may lose some of the appeal for
his early adopters, but the improvements are incredibly subtle, and absolutely
nothing has been watered down or Westernized. Hebden merely loaned Souleyman’s
keyboardist some new synths.
Souleyman may be a man
without a country, but the whole world is about to embrace him. (Nov. 7)
Download: “Ya Yumma,” “Nahy,”
“Mawal Jamar”
The Strumbellas - We Still Move on Dance Floors (Six Shooter)
The zeitgeist could not be better for the Strumbellas—who, on
the surface, are another group of beirdos with acoustic instruments that sound
like Elliott Brood mixed with Funeral-era Arcade Fire, tailor-made for the
millions of fans that have transformed Mumford and Sons, Edward Sharpe and the
Magnetic Zeros, and the Lumineers into platinum acts in the past two years. Indeed,
We Still Move on Dance Floors was produced by Ryan Hadlock, the architect of
the Lumineers’ massive breakthrough.
Name-dropping might provide context, but the Strumbellas, who
hail from Lindsay, Ont., would be a fantastic band regardless of current trends.
Singer Simon Ward writes soaring melodies for both campfires and stadiums; his
backing band, including violinist Isabel Ritchie, sound like they road-tested
this material for a full year before capturing the energy in the studio. Unlike
their folkier contemporaries, the Strumbellas are at heart an electric rock
band, having more in common with modern classic rockers like Yukon Blonde or
Zeus, and the songs would be as powerful no matter what the instrumentation.
Right now the Strumbellas are the kind of band with a weekly
residency at Toronto’s tiny Cameron House, with their tour schedule including Irish
pubs in Sarnia. Based on this sure-to-be breakthrough album, that’s all about
to change very quickly. (Nov. 21)
Download: “Sailing,” “Did I Die?,” “End of an Era”
12 Years a Slave – Various Artists (Sony)
You’ve spent over two hours in a darkened theatre enduring the
gripping, powerful and emotionally draining cinematic experience of being
trapped in one man’s hell as a slave.
Now: relive the magic with this companion soundtrack album!
(Did Schindler’s List come with an album “inspired by” the film
featuring contemporary pop stars?)
John Legend was put in charge of this project, and he’s done a
largely tasteful job, maintaining the sombre tone of the film while curating
something that, unlike the film, you can handle experiencing more than once.
The heavy-handed score by Hans Zimmer is thankfully relegated to a bare
minimum, and the solo fiddle tunes are impossible to hear without picturing the
tortured expression of Chiwetel Ejiofor being forced to play for his masters.
Legend himself shines on two tracks: one an a cappella, one accompanied by just
guitar—both rare settings for the normally slick R&B singer. Bluesman Gary
Clark Jr., Alabama Shakes and African-American opera singer David Hughey
provide solid era-appropriate material, while Alicia Keys panders with a limp
modern track, and Chris Cornell—wait a minute, what the hell is Chris Cornell
doing here?
The film is a stunning, unforgettable work of art; the fact that
the largely unrelated “soundtrack,” which on the surface seems like a quick
cash-in, manages to make an impact of its own is a minor triumph. (Nov. 21)
Download: John Legend feat. Fink – “Move,” Alabama Shakes – “Driva
Man,” David Hughey and Roosevelt Credit – “My Lord Sunshine (Sunrise)”
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