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| Kaytranada's 99.9% |
Highly recommended earlier this month: Veda Hille, Operators,
Anohni
Well worth your while: The Burning Hell, Tanika Charles
As always, these reviews ran in the Waterloo Record.
Streaming is great for sample purposes, but please support your
favourite artists financially.
The Burning Hell’s Mathias Kom is not as a singer/songwriter as
much as he is a comedic storyteller who happens to front a band—an electric
rock band led by ukulele and clarinet that owes debts to Jonathan Richman,
Pavement and Men Without Hats (hence the song here titled, um, “Men Without
Hats”). Kom largely abandoned melody a while back to become an absurdist
raconteur, and a highly entertaining one at that. Based on St. John’s, N.L.,
but spending most of their time on the road in Europe, The Burning Hell are a
polished live band that underscores Kom’s rap cadence, filled as it is with
dorky punchlines and meandering observations (just listen to him try to cram a
reference to the International House of Pancakes into the meter of a rhyme).
Kom is not just a joker; he has a fine sense of detail that bestows deeper
meaning to mundane details (“The band was as blue as the melted Joni Mitchell
cassette on the dash of the van they had named ‘Regret.’ ”)
The Burning Hell don’t make it to these parts often these days;
be sure to catch them June 14 at the E-Bar in Guelph, with Partner; June 15 at
the Monarch in Toronto, with Dave Bidini. (May 26)
Stream: “The Road,” “Men Without Hats,” “F--k the Government, I
Love You”
This Toronto-via-Edmonton
moonlights in a Motown cover band featuring some of the city’s best session
players, and she used to be a backing vocalist with sci-fi soul singer Zaki Ibrahim.
It’s fitting, then, that her debut is a blend of vintage grooves and
songwriting with modern pop production, brought to life by some of the city’s
best R&B, rock and hip-hop producers, and musicians with jazz skills.
Charles is the star of the show, of course, and a classy lady, a trait that’s
evident in every vocal phrase here. The Weeknd notwithstanding, this country
has a terrible history of recognizing its R&B scene, but Charles has the
kind of starpower—and now a debut album that fully captures her talents—to
overcome any obstacles. (May 5)
Stream: “Soul Run,” “Two Steps,”
“Money”
Drake – Views
(Universal)
It’s become impossible to separate
Drake the icon— Drake the civic booster, the Raptors ambassador, the brand
master who announced that the city will now be known as “the Six” and thus it
was instantly so—and Drake the musician. To be critical of Drake’s music seems
downright traitorous, his every commercial and critical triumph negating all
the haters.
This is an album he announced two
years ago, teasing out details slowly, releasing red-herring singles—and two
wildly successful so-called “mixtapes,” one solo, one with Future—in the
interim. Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar might rack up the acclaim and the
awards, but Drake is hands-down the most successful rapper in his prime on the
planet right now. Expectations could not have been higher.
Yet even diehards seem mystified by
Views. One writer on a panel from MTV News—who defined himself as a die-hard
Drake fan—lamented that “there’s no possible
way I could be this bored by a Drake album.” Or, as Drake himself says about a
woman on opening track “Keep the Family Close,” on a lyric that sums up his
awkward flow and limp analogies: “Like when
Chrysler made that one car that looked just like a Bentley, I always saw you
for what you could have been.” Is everyone realizing the emperor has no clothes?
Sure, “Hotline Bling”—a song even
Drake haters (i.e. me) can love, despite its ridiculously entitled and
condescending tone toward yet another ex—is tacked on to the end, almost as an
afterthought. “Too Good,” featuring Rihanna, is the only other track here that
remotely resembles a pop song, but it’s “Childs Play,” in part about a
hilariously mundane breakup at the Cheesecake Factory, that is the only real
delight here. “One Dance,” a collaboration with Nigeria’s WizKid, features
perhaps the strongest production on the album, but Drake is the weakest link in
the whole track—can we get an instrumental?
Most telling is that much of the
album sounds like Drake and producer Noah “40” Shebib on autopilot: they broke
through by taking Kanye’s 808 and Heartbreak and expanding that nocturnal
melancholy into pop hits, but now that sound has proven so influential that
dozens of imitators are now doing it better. As a writer, Drake was at his most
fascinating and/or infuriating when he was documenting his every trial and
triviality; now he doesn’t seem to have much to say about anything. Over the
course of an album that’s 20 songs long, it’s more than clear that “Hotline
Bling” wasn’t the promise of more greatness to come; it was just the moment in
time we reached peak Drake.
Views? More like snooze. (May 5)
Stream: “Childs Play,” “One Dance,”
“Too Good”
Six years between albums is not that unusual compared to the
name you chose for your band. Trends come and go, but this Toronto rock band
based on twisted and tampered electronics was never any marketing team’s ideal
client anyway. They’re still running every sound through distortion and tape
delay, the grooves are heavy and solid, and they sound more and more like a
collab between a Canadian punk band and Congolese DIY electronic ecstatists
Konono No. 1. Vocals are more prominent this time out, though more as tortured
ghosts caught in a machine rather than pop hooks with identifiable lyrics.
“Shivering” and “Neon Dad” are the closest to balladry this band will ever get.
(May 26)
Holy Fuck play the Track and Field festival in Toronto on
Saturday, June 4, with The National, July Talk and Santigold.
Stream: “Tom Tom,” "House of Glass," “Neon Dad”
Kaytranada – 99.9% (HW&W)
Daft Punk spent millions of dollars on vintage synths and disco
legends to make Random Access Memories.
Kaytranada—23-year-old Montreal DJ Louis Kevin Celestin—made this tour-de-force
debut record in his parents’ basement, where he still lives, and it’s every bit
as all-encompassing and forward-thinking as the French duo’s Grammy-winning
classic.
Until now, Kaytranada has been known for remixes posted on
Soundcloud, of Janet Jackson, Missy Elliott and others, which launched his
international DJ career. He doesn’t pull that kind of starpower on the guest
list here—even though he’s gone on tour with Madonna and been summoned to Rick
Rubin’s ranch. But he certainly doesn’t need name-dropping when he’s made an
album like this.
At a time when EDM and hip-hop both opt for maximalist excess,
Kaytranada is refreshingly raw and sparse, his speaker-rattling bass lines
falling behind the beat—which is fine, because the bass throughout is mixed far
louder than any of the drum tracks. One can hear J Dilla’s work with Erykah
Badu in here, as well as Stevie Wonder’s ’70s prime, and the
Brazilian-influenced broken beat scene out of West London at the turn of the
century. Detroit jazz drummer and hip-hop producer (and Dilla associate)
Karriem Riggins—whose day job is behind the kit for Diana Krall—lays down some
live tracks. Toronto group BadBadNotGood are natural collaborators, as is
Phonte, an MC from 2000s hip-hop cult heroes Little Brother.
Along with Poirier’s Migrations,
99.9% marks a massive moment in
Montreal’s beat-making scene. Don’t be surprised if the Haitian-born Kaytranada
becomes his hometown’s biggest international calling card since Arcade
Fire. (May 26)
Related: read this fantastic profile of the man in Fader.
Related: read this fantastic profile of the man in Fader.
Stream: “Together” (feat. AlunaGeorge and GoldLink), “Weight
Off” (feat. BadBadNotGood), “Breakdance Lesson N.1”
This Hamilton artist seemingly came out of nowhere in 2013 to be
signed to a prestigious British electronic label, and her debut, Pull My Hair Back, was shortlisted for
the 2014 Polaris Music Prize (alongside Drake, Arcade Fire, Tagaq, Shad and
others). It showcased Lanza’s electronic production skills, her playful,
confident vocals and her love of ’90s R&B and ’80s synth pop and ’00s Daft
Punk disciples. But if the debut was merely promising, Oh No delivers on every level. With co-producer Jeremy Greenspan of
Junior Boys back on board, Oh No
buries any sexist assumption that he was a principal architect of Lanza’s
sound, seeing how this album betters his band’s entire output. There’s nothing
cold or distant or arch about Lanza’s music; Oh No is joyous and even euphoric, something that too much of
modern retro-tinged synth pop seems to forget. Oh No is a sunnier side of Grimes, and easily the best electronic
pop record out of this country since that artist’s Visions. Oh look, and summer is right around the corner. (May 12)
Stream: “VV Violence,” “It Means I Love You,” “Oh No”
The new album by this alt-country star opens with 30 seconds of
droning, ominous synths before collapsing into a sparse piano-and-strings
ballad—only to switch gears into a full-on Stax-style soul song halfway through
its five-minute running time. Not your typical country song; not a typical
country record.
Sturgill Simpson was vaulted from obscurity with 2014’s Metamodern Sounds in Country Music, on
which he covered a new wave obscurity and got downright psychedelic at times,
on an otherwise traditional country album that sounded like it was recorded in
the ’70s (it, and this new one, are helmed by producer du jour Dave Cobb, who’s
also behind Chris Stapleton and the latest from Corb Lund and Lindi Ortega).
Here, he is delightfully even more confounding, as that opening
track suggests. Pedal steel guitar solos ping-pong between speakers. The
horn section sounds like it could have been arranged by New Orleans legend
Allen Toussaint. There’s an Otis Redding-style rave-up about American foreign
policy. There’s a mournful, string-drenched cover of Nirvana’s “In Bloom”—the
only moment here that sounds remotely gimmicky. In between are straight-up country
songs (“Breakers Roar,” “Oh Sarah”) that are no less worthy than Simpson’s soul
excursions.
Most important, Simpson’s songwriting has stepped up, his lyrics
and melodies matching the ambition of his sonic vision. It’s hard to imagine a
better Americana album will emerge in the rest of this calendar year. (May 26)
Stream: “Breakers Roar,” “Keep It Between the Lines,” “Welcome
to Earth (Pollywog)”
Who was Gene Clark? He was one of
the original Byrds, writing fan favourites like “Eight Miles High” and “Feel a
Whole Lot Better.” But his bandmates were apparently jealous that he landed the
most songs on the group’s debut album, so they started to muscle him out. He
released a series of lesser-known but beloved albums that made him a cult hero;
his personal habits—including alcohol, heroin, and eventually crack—stymied any
chance of success. He died at age 41 of throat cancer and heart failure.
Over the years, Clark’s songs have
been covered by Tom Petty, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, This Mortal Coil and
Teenage Fanclub. Now Toronto’s Skydiggers—on this album reduced to the core duo
of Andy Maize and Josh Finlayson, with Guelph’s Jessy Bell Smith—and producer
Michael Timmins (Cowboy Junkies) have assembled this intimate tribute, eight
songs from throughout Clark’s discography that illustrate the lasting appeal of
the troubled songwriter. Sometimes it’s predictable; stripped-down versions of
songs beloved by other songwriters. Then there’s “So You Say You Lost Your
Baby,” where psychedelic guitar and haunting piano transform the song into
something more sinister. (May 5)
Stream: “Eight Miles High,” “One in
a Hundred,” “So You Say You Lost Your Baby”
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