July 2016 reviews

Highly recommended this month: Badbadnotgood, Michael Kiwanuka

Well worth your while: Aaron Neville, Billy Talent

As always, these reviews ran in the Waterloo Record.

Streaming is great for sample purposes, but please find a way to support your favourite artists financially.

Thanks to everyone I ran into at last weekend's Hillside Festival who told me they read this blog faithfully. It's always nice to know I'm not writing into a total void.

Badbadnotgood – IV (Arts and Crafts)

From Led Zeppelin IV to Black Mountain IV—hell, even Foreigner 4—and now the fourth album from Toronto hip-hop/jazz band Badbadnotgood, putting the number four in a title suggests you’re saving your best ideas for the music, not the marketing, and the fourth album is the ideal time to crystallize the myriad directions the band had taken up until now.

For Badbadnotgood—who, after starting out with jazz covers of hip-hop tracks, came into their own on a full-length collaboration with Ghostface Killah (Sour Soul) and their 2014 album III—this finds them stepping up their game once again, moving away from hip-hop slightly (collaborations with Kaytranada and Mick Jenkins notwithstanding) and toward the funk of Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters and the cinematic esoterica of space-age bachelor pad music a la Esquivel or Broadcast. They also dip into sultry soul music, with pop songs sung by Charlotte Day Wilson and a particularly surprising turn by Future Islands’ Sam Herring, on which he channels the late Bobby Womack.

Part of IV’s success is the natural evolution of these young players, but also the permanent addition of saxophonist Leland Whitty, whose guest spots on III were a highlight. Nonetheless, they enlist avant jazz star Colin Stetson to lend a beefy, baritone bottom end to “Confessions Pt. II,” where he trades leads with Whitty while the band vamps on what could be a ’70s action film soundtrack underneath.

Exciting as it is, even better is anticipating where this band will venture next. Just please, whatever you do, don't judge this album by the album cover. (July 7)

Stream: “Time Moves Slow” (feat. Sam Herring), “Lavender” (feat. Kaytranada), “And That, Too”

Billy Talent – Afraid of Heights (Warner)

Against most odds, Billy Talent is still standing. The Mississauga band who first broke through in 2003 are now on the other side of 40; you’d think it’d be getting hard to tap into the energy of their bestselling debut—surely it’s time for the synth experiments or the pseudo-country ballads, no? Well, there are apparently some synths hiding here somewhere (underneath the wall of guitars on “Horses and Chariots”), but after the more “mature” Dead Silence in 2012, the band revisited their debut album for live dates celebrating its 10^th anniversary, and releasing a hits compilation that served as a reminder of just how hook-filled and durable all those shout-y singles have proven to be. A comeback record could well be a bunch of old men trying to recapture old glories; the lyrics of “Louder Than the DJ” (“Those glory days aren’t over yet”) suggest a bunch of leather-clad grandpas squeezing into skinny jeans and yelling at rave kids; thankfully the song is much better than that.

Afraid of Heights is very much a sonic throwback of sorts, with only a few clunky spots (“The Clutch”) and one poor attempt at power ballad (“Rabbit Down the Hole”), which is helped only slightly by Ian D’Sa’s lyrical lead guitar. Otherwise, the fact that D’Sa has always had more complex pop songwriting skills than most of his peers continues to set the band apart; once the title track runs its course at rock radio, look for the anthemic “Leave Them All Behind” to dominate the rest of the year.

The sad news for fans is that drummer Aaron Solowoniuk’s MS has finally forced him to resign; he’s been replaced by Jordan Hastings of Alexisonfire, though Solowoniuk helped the band arrange in the studio and appears beside Hastings in the press photos. It’s not age that’s taken a toll on this band, it’s the disease they’ve been fighting since the beginning. (July 28)

Stream: "Afraid of Heights," "Louder Than the DJ," "Leave Them All Behind"

Blood Orange – Freetown Sound (Domino)

Blood Orange’s Dev Hynes plays well with others: in addition to his prolific and eclectic career as an artist (recording under several different monikers), he’s written and produced records by Carly Rae Jepsen, Solange Knowles, and Florence and the Machine. Here, on his highly anticipated third album, he enlists the likes of Jepsen, Blondie’s Debbie Harry, Nelly Furtado—even bestselling social critic Ta-Nehisi Coates and Bob Marley’s granddaughter, because, why not?

Blood Orange’s sound leans heavily on ’80s iconoclasts like Michael Jackson, Prince and Terence Trent D’Arby—though only the more outré moments from any of those artists, filtered through shades of ’90s trip-hop like Tricky. Though Hynes obviously loves pop music, he doesn’t write particularly catchy melodies himself. Instead, he offers languid, lush, sometimes experimental R&B, where the tiny details—a bass squibble here, a subtle jazz piano turn there—usually trump anything in the foreground. The parade of guest vocalists lend a diversity to a record that could easily fade into the background, but they’re not necessarily enough to stave off overall ennui. (July 7)

Stream: “E.V.P.” (feat. Debbie Harry), “Desirée,” “Better Than Me”

Michael Kiwanuka – Love and Hate (Universal)

The U.S. hasn’t felt this politically divided and tumultuous since the late ’60s and early ’70s. And while Kendrick Lamar and Beyoncé provide fiery anthems and reflection as a soundtrack of the times, British folk-soul singer Michael Kiwanuka has delivered a comedown tonic for the end of each anguished day. His second album—four long years after his acclaimed 2012 debut, Home Again— is a rich and languid masterpiece, steeped in psychedelic blues, string-drenched soul, gospel vocals and more than a few nods to Marvin Gaye’s 1971 classic What’s Going On, as if it were reimagined by Portishead.

Co-produced by Danger Mouse (Gnarls Barkley, Black Keys, Broken Bells), Love and Hate strikes a perfectly consistent mood and tone: unhurried, gentle, yet feeling the weight of the world in every note. Kiwanuka himself is neither a showy singer nor one who retreats into whispers: his calm confidence is what glues this record together. So much of Love and Hate sounds like the flip side of Alabama Shakes’ 2015 summer soundtrack, Sound and Color: can someone put Kiwanuka and Brittany Howard in a room together, please? (July 21)

Stream: “Cold Little Heart,” “Rule the World,” “I’ll Never Love”

Aaron Neville – Apache (Sony)

Aaron Neville is best known as the singer who NPR describes as “an angel who swallowed a wah-wah pedal,” a man best known for a series of hit duets with Linda Ronstadt in 1989-90. Despite his vocal gifts, his solo work is almost uniformly cheesy and lightweight—unlike, by comparison, his incredible work with his siblings in the Neville Brother in the ’80s (start with the Daniel Lanois-produced Yellow Moon).

Apache, on the other hand, might well be the funkiest record of Neville’s solo career. Recorded in New York City, his adopted home, with local musicians—including the Daptone horns—you’d never know he wasn’t still in New Orleans. But maybe absence makes the 75-year-old’s heart grow fonder: he’s clearly in a nostalgic mood, as “Stompin’ Ground” and other tracks illustrate.

No surprise here, but he’s also in a romantic mood. He remarried in 2010 after losing his wife of 47 years to cancer in 2008, and several tracks here—his first album to feature original material in 13 years—mine his mushy side, while avoiding the adult-contemporary trap of his ’90s hits.

Of course, there’s that voice, which hasn’t changed a bit since his first hit single 50 years ago. Rather than showing a scrap of age, it sounds better than it ever did—hard as that may be to believe. (July 21)

Stream: "Be Your Man," "Orchid in the Storm," “Stompin’ Ground”

Pup – The Dream is Over (Royal Mountain)

This Toronto punk band themselves describe their second album as a “rowdy, noisy clusterf--k.” Yes, it’s rowdy and noisy, but it’s a lot more coherent (monotonous?) than that comment would imply. It’s an all-guns-blazing response to the end of one’s twenties, wondering if playing 200 shows a year is taking a toll on your domestic life, having to hear your doctor look at your vocal cords and tell you, “The dream is over.” A song called “Doubts” features the chorus, “What am I supposed to do now?” On “DVP,” friends chime in: “She says I drink too much / she says I need to grow up.” These are common rock’n’roll themes, and there’s no doubt that time logged on the road has made Pup a lean, mean rock’n’roll machine. But the best thing I can say about this record is that it makes me want to listen to Japandroids’ 2013 classic Celebration Rock: same theme, same punch, same raw power, much better songs. (July 21)

Stream: “DVP,” “My Life is Over and I Couldn’t Be Happier,” “Familiar Patterns”

Wake Up You! The Rise and Fall of Nigerian Rock, Vols. 1 & 2: 1972-1977 – Various Artists (Now Again)

Every retro reissue trend dries up eventually, right? Surely there are no more hidden gems from the golden age of American soul music in the ’60s and ’70s left to uncover? Hasn’t every punk band who had five minutes of fame in the ’80s been unearthed? Even the 30-volume Ethiopiques collections of East African jazz and soul have finally trickled to a crawl. And so while the Fela Kuti revival in the early 2000s sparked an interest in Nigerian and West African music, which opened the floodgates to seemingly hundreds of quality reissues—of which at least a dozen could be considered essential to anyone remotely interested in the scene—even that treasure trove appears to be running dry. I mean, after the elusive William Onyeabor was discovered, what great mysteries were left?

So here comes a two-volume set, 10 years in the making, accompanying two 100+ page books written by Onyeabor biographer Uchenna Ikonne, chronicling the Nigerian psychedelic rock scene in the wake of the country’s civil war and the rise of Fela Kuti. Some of these names will be familiar to followers—namely the Funkees, who had their own anthology on Soundway Records in 2012—but the pleasure here is finding even more new names that haven’t been featured on comps like Nigeria 70 (Strut, 2001) or The World Ends (Soundway, 2010). Like that latter comp, the guitars here are raunchy and louder and more psychedelic than heard on the straight-up funk comps.

It’s a lot to wade through, but it’s a testament to just how musically fertile Funky Lagos was during this pivotal time. Rest assured it won’t be the final word on the subject, either. (July 7)

Stream: “Everybody Likes Something Good” by Ify Jerry Krusade, “Graceful Bird” by War-Head Constriction, “Never Too Late” by the Apostles

Polaris preview 2010 pt 1

It's Polaris Prize season again, which means that music critics across the nation are reaching fever pitch trying to hide the fact that they actually care quite a bit about who ends up with a $20,000 cheque at the end of Monday night. As they should--ultimately, they're collectively responsible for the shortlist, from which the winner will be chosen by 10 selected jurors.

Polaris season inevitably means many incoherent rants about what the prize is and what it isn't and whatever Writer X thinks it should be and whether or not anyone even listens to albums anymore. Some people like to complain about the shortlist and then admit that they like at least half of the artists on it. Some people think the prize only awards safe, predictable choices--and then almost everyone is surprised at the final result, every single goddam year. Which really means that most of the snipers are just upset that they weren't able to predict anything at all.

With the exception of the first year, I've been wrong every single year. I don't see why this year will be any different.

That said, today and tomorrow I'll post my annual charge to the jury, along with 10 other albums I would have loved to have seen on the shortlist--many of which made the long list of 40, so I can't really complain.

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And the first five nominees are:

The Besnard Lakes – The Besnard Lakes Are the Roaring Night (Outside)

The album: I feel like I was one of three rock critics in all of Canada who was bored to tears by the Besnard Lakes; the universal praise for their last album, the Polaris-shortlisted The Besnard Lakes Are the Dark Horse, left me completely mystified. Then again, I’ve never been a part of the cult of either My Bloody Valentine or the Beach Boys, and this band is a wet dream for people in love with both. Yes, the singing is lovely, and yes, Jace Lacek is a great producer with an ear for big guitar tones—you should hire him today. And thank god that bassist Olga Goreas is taking more control of the lead vocals, as Lacek’s falsetto can be a bit strained. But I clearly don’t take enough drugs to be entranced by the plodding rhythms here, which seem scared of any semblance of syncopation, and I spend most of my time while listening to this record simply nodding my head and counting out the beats: one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and one and two and three and four and one and two and zzzzzzz …. Zzzzz … zzzz

The chances: Fair. The people who love this band love them to bits. And Roaring Night is a definite improvement over Dark Horse—which in turn was leaps and bounds above their debut, so on the other hand this is a band that continues to improve. Their masterpiece is most likely ahead of them. Considering the competition, this is probably not their year.

Broken Social Scene – Forgiveness Rock Record
(Arts and Crafts)

The album: Broken Social Scene and I are fair-weather friends. That is to say, I love 2002’s You Forgot It In People as much as anyone, and I can take or leave pretty much everything else they’ve ever done. Having said that, I love this album: it’s full of pop hooks, sonic experimentation, a surprising Krautrock influence, a star turn by new singer Lisa Lobsinger, stellar production, and Justin Peroff delivers the best performance by a drummer I’ve heard this year. String sections, horn sections and multiple guitar lines bob and weave around each other yet never distract from the unity of purpose. I don’t know nor do I care what “Texico Bitches” are (though I can guarantee it’s not the prescient political statement some lugheads thought it was when the BP oil spill hit), but the lyrics on “World Sick” give me chills, as does the melody on “Sweetest Kill.” Forgiveness Rock Record is diverse, daring, and deserves all absolution for past sins, perceived or real.

The chances: Good. The last time they were on a Polaris shortlist, it was for their divisive self-titled album, which—according to Stuart Berman’s book This Book is Broken—even the band itself was divided on. Forgiveness Rock Record has brought old fans back into the fold, but it’s unclear whether the unconvinced are on board. Jury members might be either sick of this band or never cared in the first place; with the kind of baggage this band carries around, hopefully objective ears will prevail. “It’s the year 2010,” goes a line in the triumphant “Water in Hell”—a year that could well belong to Broken Social Scene.

Caribou – Swim (Merge)

The album: Caribou picked up a Polaris two years ago for Andorra, an album that saw him shifting away from his electronic and psych-rock beginnings toward a ’60s-tinged pop sound. Swim sees Dan Snaith moving forward yet again, retaining the melodic sense of Andorra with an intriguing mix of acoustic and electronic sounds that sounds worlds away from anything else he’s ever done. “Odessa” was a perfect summer dance single; “Found Out” does his peers the Junior Boys better than they do themselves; likewise, “Bowls” betters Caribou’s one-time mentor Four Tet. But mostly, Swim sounds like no one other than Snaith himself, an eclectician and sound scientist giddy with endless possibilities. Surely that’s him we hear cackling like a monkey on “Odessa,” delirious with joy about the wonder he’s created.

The chances: Merely fair. Because no matter how good Swim may be—and it’s Snaith’s best work in an already impressive discography—the fact that he’s a previous winner in the short history of this prize may work against his chances in the jurors’ minds, subliminally or otherwise.

Karkwa – Les Chemins de Verre (Audiogram)

The album: This Quebecois band has been around for 12 years, this is their fourth album, and yet it’s safe to say precious few in TROC have ever heard of them, despite their popularity in their native province. Listening to Les Chemins de Verre, it’s easy to understand the cultural gap: there is an entirely different vernacular at work here. Never mind the language difference; this music sounds entirely foreign, in ways that bands like Sigur Ros or Dungen or, I don’t know, even Tinariwen doesn’t. The previous Polaris franco contender, Malajube, came from prog and punk reference points that translated universally. All of this is a long-winded way of saying that I simply don’t get it. Thankfully, Ben Rayner does.

The chances: Fair. Its difference could work in its favour, especially since most jurors probably feel like they’ve heard enough of the other nominees, and their respective genres, already.

Dan Mangan – Nice Nice Very Nice (File Under: Music)

The album: There’s nothing I can say about this album that the title doesn’t. I will say, however, that I met Dan Mangan at last year’s Polaris. He is, in fact, very nice.

The chances: Depends on how many CBC Radio programmers are on the jury. Or twentysomething university students. Or both. Either way, it will answer the eternal question: do nice guys finish last?

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The could've beens:

Bahamas – Pink Strat (Nevado)

The album: A lovely, low-key debut from Feist’s guitarist, sung in a morning-after voice—although judging by the longing in the lyrics, there was no loving to be had: “In the morning I woke up, and the whole thing was in my head.” Afie Jurvanen makes tasty guitar licks sound effortless, which combined with the fact that he sounds like he’s singing in a reclining chair, makes listening to Pink Strat as easy as relaxing on a beach in, uh, the Bahamas. Though it’s a promising debut, its one downfall is that every time it comes up on my shuffle, I think it’s M. Ward.

Why it didn’t make the short list: Despite his famous friends, not many people heard this album in time for it to make an impression; it likely scraped onto the long list on the strength of two or three extremely enthusiastic supporters in the jury. Expect his forthcoming album, recorded with the Weakerthans’ Jason Tait, to make big waves.

Billy Talent – III (Warner)

The album: I’ll admit I fell in love with this via Stockholm syndrome, because my teenage stepkiddo plays it relentlessly and mastered every bass line on it. As a result, I probably heard this more than any other Canadian album released in the qualifying period. Thankfully, it’s really good: though they started out as a slightly screamo, Buzzcocks-influenced melodic mall punk band, Billy Talent have come a long way, and producer Brendan O’Brien (Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam) brings out subtle nods to R.E.M. and The Police inside the huge riff rock that they’ve now mastered. Ben Kowalewicz is not only less cartoonish now that he’s on the other side of 30, but he’s an increasingly impressive singer. “Saint Veronika” not only gave the stepkiddo an excuse to read Paulo Coehlo, but it was one of my favourite melodies of 2009; “Turn Your Back” is the rare song that makes me feel 16 again. Billy Talent are a teenage rock fantasy that this adult doesn’t feel guilty about at all.

(P.S.: Ben, Ian, Aaron and Jon: if I could get your autograph, I’d score major points at home and would be eternally grateful.)

Why it didn’t make the short list: Billy Talent do it for the kids, not the critics. And sadly, headlining the Air Canada Centre doesn’t mean they’re taken seriously. No matter—surely they’re laughing all the way to the bank.

Frog Eyes – Paul’s Tomb: A Triumph
(Dead Oceans)

The album: I’ve had many musician I admire tell me for years that Carey Mercer is a genius. I never bought it. Until now. While I found early Frog Eyes albums somewhat intriguing, they seemed stuck in a rut and Mercer’s Beefheart strut got wearisome quickly. Here, however, there are far more dynamics at play, and his usual maelstrom of madness is tempered with majesty and melody. The guitars sound fantastic, and drummer Melanie Campbell steers the ship that’s always in danger of capsizing completely. Paul’s Tomb is certainly an exhausting listening experience—as is everything Mercer is involved with—but it’s also utterly fascinating.

Why it didn’t make the short list: Frankly, because most people hate this band— if they’ve heard of it at all. The fact they made the long list was a minor miracle. Carey Mercer frightens most, and infuriates others. It’s too bad that some who wrote him off ages ago might not give this album a chance.

Lee Harvey Osmond – A Quiet Evil (Latent)

The album: A bunch of CanRock survivors—Tom Wilson (Junkhouse, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings), Michael Timmins (Cowboy Junkies), Josh Finlayson (Skydiggers, Country of Miracles), Colin Cripps (Crash Vegas, Kathleen Edwards) and elder statesman Brent Titcomb (Three’s a Crowd)—unite to play some spooky blues and Velvet Underground jams in the wee hours of the night. It’s not unlike the magical mystery of the first two Cowboy Junkies albums, even if it’s more muscular and in clearer focus. Indeed, it seems to have sparked something in Timmins, who also just released the finest Cowboy Junkies album in 15 years, Remnin Park. And it’s hands down the best album Tom Wilson has ever been at the centre of—whether or not you consider that faint praise.

Why it didn’t make the short list: Too old and taken for granted. Polaris is a young man’s game, though they did squeak on to the long list. Also, it’s too weird for folkies and too folkie for weirdos, plus some critics thought the whole thing was too slapdash—though I’d argue that’s why it worked.

New Pornographers – Together (Last Gang)

The album: Together indeed, as every member of this uncommonly talented band brings their A-game to their fifth album. Kathryn Calder has fully grown into her role, and she and Neko Case play off each other perfectly. Carl Newman coughs up his best set of songs since at least 2005’s Twin Cinema, perhaps even since the New Pornographers’ 2000 debut Mass Romantic. Everyone else provides the muscle and ornamentation that make this band the dense delight it is. At this point, their biggest problem is that people take them for granted.

Why it didn’t make the short list: Fucked if I know.

June-July 09 reviews

Reviews from the last six weeks in the mainstream daily newspapers the Kitchener-Waterloo Record and Guelph Mercury.

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A Hawk and a Hacksaw – Delivrance (Leaf)

When drummer Jeremy Barnes first started playing accordion and writing songs that borrowed heavily from traditional eastern European music, he was very much an interloper trying on a new set of clothes and creating something that didn’t aim to be authentic, but something new entirely. Several albums later, Barnes has been fully immersed in this culture to the point that there are many points on Delivrance where the flying dulcimers, Romanian violins and haunting melodies appear interchangeable with anything by legendary Roma band Tarif de Haidouks. The only time Barnes stumbles is when he sings—in English—in a voice even more nasal than Colin Meloy of the Decemberists, which ruins the illusion; thankfully, he only does this on two of the ten tracks here. (July 9, K-W Record)

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Apostle of Hustle – Eats Darkness (Arts and Crafts)

Apostle of Hustle’s Andrew Whiteman has always been an insatiably curious musical soul, and the best and worst thing about him is that he’s tried to do everything. But the older he gets—he’s now 42—the more successful he is at distilling the breadth of his influences into three-minute songs that focus on deceptively simple riffs and rhythms that are packed with attention to minor detail. He’s also getting wonderfully weirder with age: woven through the songs are sound collages that recall the radio art of Negativland, that convey as much thematically as Whiteman’s lyrics do. Musically, dub rhythms, Latin guitars, pop hooks and rock guitars are all rearranged into a unique hybrid driven by the versatility of Whiteman’s powerhouse backing duo of Julian Brown and Dean Stone; each of them is invaluable to the whole, making Apostle of Hustle much more than a solo project outside of Whiteman’s work with Broken Social Scene. Apostle of Hustle pack more into the 30 minutes of this album than most groups do in their entire careers—and still leave the listener space to breathe. (June 11, K-W Record)

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Bat for Lashes – Two Suns (EMI)

Ignore the horrible moniker, about which the only positive thing you can say is that it’s purposely vague and lowers expectations considerably. What a pleasant surprise then, to hear Natasha Khan’s musical vision unfold over the course of this, her stunning and singular second album.
Kate Bush comparisons are inevitable, for reasons that start with her operatic, British art school approach to singing and songwriting, as well as the ’80s textures that weave their way through Two Suns. Kate Bush’s influence may be on the rise overall—witness acts like Fever Ray, St. Vincent, My Brightest Diamond, Katie Stelmani—but only Bat For Lashes is fully worthy of ascending to the role of High Priestness of Pop Weirdness.

Listening to Two Suns is like the last 25 years never happened; Khan has emerged with the kind of album that Peter Gabriel should have continued making after his third album. Khan is as delightfully unconventional as Bjork without teetering near the edges of cliffs; she writes songs that fall somewhere between the classical ambition of Rufus Wainwright and the shoegaze-y new wave textures of Robert Smith of The Cure. There’s nothing resembling rock arrangements, but nor does she fall into any other set patterns; each song is a world unto itself, and Khan’s layers of vocals light the path through mysterious forests of sound. (June 11, K-W Record)

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Billy Talent – III (Warner)

Billy Talent have platinum albums. They sell out the Air Canada Centre. They’re a #1 act in Germany. They could easily rest on their laurels. Instead, they’re getting better.

Producer Brendan O’Brien (Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam) has clearly pushed every member of this band to be better songwriters and players. Every one of the 11 tracks here boasts the kind of killer hooks that their best singles have always had; don’t be surprised if they spin a half-dozen radio hits out of this record. But even more importantly, they’ve matured to the point where they can maintain their trademark intensity at half their normal tempo—lead single "Rusted by the Rain" being the best example.

Elsewhere, they leave much more open space and use dynamics to help build tension in ways that all the best rock records do—or should, anyway. Other influences have started creeping in: "Tears Into Wine" and "Pocketful of Dreams" have vaguely Celtic guitar melodies. Not that they’ve mellowed: Saint Veronika boasts some furiously arpeggiated metal riffing, and "Turn Your Back" and "Tears Into Wine" are the kind of barnburners that Billy Talent built their reputation on.

Some things don’t change: Ian D’Sa’s one-note backing vocals are still inflected with a hilariously overwrought sense of frustration, like he stubbed his toe immediately before stepping up to the mic. Lead singer Ben Kowalewicz, on the other hand, has moved far beyond his signature screams—which he still lets out of the bag on a couple of tracks here—to become a much more engaging vocalist; he’s no longer a one-trick pony.

This is not just the album that will elevate Billy Talent above their mall punk fan base and present a convincing case for their longevity—this is the rock record for the summer of 2009. (July 16, K-W Record)

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Dinosaur Jr. – Farm (Jagjaguwar)

Reunion albums aren’t supposed to sound this good. When a beloved band gets back together, fans usually grant them one grace album for old times sake, but would really prefer it if they sticked to the hits in the live set. Nothing could be further from the truth for ’90s proto-grunge band Dinosaur Jr., who are writing and playing better than they ever did.

J Mascis is one of the only guitarists of that era who ever took guitar solos seriously, not afraid to flex his virtuosity while focusing primarily on feel—like some perverse cross between Neil Young and Eddie Van Halen. Mascis was out of step then as he is now: well over half of the eight-minute track "I Don’t Wanna Go There" is full-on noodling. As always, his slacker snarl is incongruous with his raging rhythm section, and the strength of his songwriting elevates this band from hundreds of others who merely hide between distortion and destruction.

There are no bells and whistles here: this is a straight-up guitar rock record, the kind you need for long summer drives, the kind that reminds you that maybe the ’90s weren’t the musical wasteland that they might seem like now. (July 2, K-W Record)

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Dirty Projectors – Bitte Orca (Domino)
Grizzly Bear – Veckatimest (Warp)

Dirty Projectors’ singer, guitarist and songwriter Dave Longstreth acts like he’s making up all of his own rules as he goes along, which he may well be; he is undeniably idiosyncratic and unique in ways similar to Bjork or David Byrne (both of whom have sought him out to collaborate), and may well be crazier than both of them put together.

He has an astoundingly versatile and slippery voice, which means that he could easily pull off an R&B ballad if he really wanted to—if he wasn’t trying to simultaneously juggle his interests in British folk, electronic composition, Asian string music and Led Zeppelin III. All these influences are there if you probe deeply enough; yet on the surface, Dirty Projectors don’t sound like anyone else at all.

The track "Remade Horizon" sounds like several disparate African recordings being pulled apart in ProTools: the Soweto-style female vocals, the hi-life guitar lead, the stuttering funk of Afrobeat rhythm guitars. And yet at the same time, there’s nothing remotely African about the end result; it’s a piece of music that could only have come from Longstreth’s oddball vision and reimagining of existing forms.

There’s no question that Longstreth is immensely talented and capable of creating wondrous magic, which makes Bitte Orca is an easy album to respect, but a hard one to love—immediately, anyway. This could easily be either a future classic that will influence generations, or a passing fad for people who like difficult music for its own sake.

Grizzly Bear will likely suffers the latter fate, with the disadvantage of being more overly mannered than the Dirty Projectors, who at least sound like they’re being playful. Grizzly Bear is the epitome of an art school band—deadly serious and downright stuffy, they sound like the taxidermist has already got to them. There’s nothing particularly linear nor repetitious about any of this material; sadly, it lacks any other charms or mystery to make up for that. Lovely though his voice may be, singer Edward Droste is more distracting than anything, if only because his presence gives the listener some expectation of normalcy, instead of the atonal art-folk that is Grizzly Bear’s specialty. (June 18, K-W Record)

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Elephant Stone – The Seven Seas (independent)

This Montreal band is named after a Stone Roses song, which explains much of their musical template: early ’90s British guitar textures with nods to dance rhythms and ’60s psychedelia. Bandleader Rishi Dhir knows a lot about the latter, which was the focus of his former band the High Dials. His own studies of Indian classical music also come into play here, and it’s his sitar playing that sets Elephant Stone apart from other Britpop bands, especially on the raga rock of "The Straight Line." But even the tracks that play down that influence have plenty going for them, drawing on early Blur and Spiritualized influences with the help of fellow Montrealers in The Dears and The Besnard Lakes.
(June 18, K-W Record)

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Grand Analog – Metropolis is Burning (Urbnet)

Perhaps you’ve been to those workshops at any folk festival where hip-hop artists are paired with local folkies and a funk band and magic is expected to happen—and it rarely does. Grand Analog sound like the product of just such an experiment, but they actually gel their genres together in a seamless summer blend of reggae, pop, funk, and hip-hop, with frontman Odario Williams proving to be a commanding microphone presence whether he’s crooning or rapping. The kazoo solo in the first song—titled, uh, "I Play My Kazoo"—hints that they’re willing to try anything, no matter how ridiculous. Fortunately, it never gets more ridiculous than that; many of these tracks deserve a spot on Top 40 stations, especially the breezy reggae of "Take it Slow" and the electro-’80s R&B track "Stir Crazy," featuring the smooth female vocals of Maiko Watson. (July 2, K-W Record)

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Hypnotic Brass Ensemble – s/t (Honest Jon’s)

In a live setting, this Chicago ten-piece will grant you a quick, informal schooling in the possibilities of brass music, from New Orleans to klezmer to funk to hip-hop to jazz. And while all those come into play on this, their first official full-length album, much of this sounds like a sweeping ’70s urban drama with a soundtrack co-written by Curtis Mayfield and Bill Conti (Rocky, An Unmarried Woman). There are more than enough party tunes here to bolster the live show, but this self-titled album is also rich with dynamics, recognizing that the home listeners might not want to be constantly be subjected to the full-blown intensity that is the Hypnotic live show. (July 9, K-W Record)

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Iron and Wine – Around the Well (Sub Pop)

The well in question appears to be dry. This is a two-CD compilation of cast-offs from a consistently strong artist; over seven years, Iron and Wine’s Sam Beam has released three full-length albums and three equally worthy EPs. Considering that volume of output, it’s not a sign of weakness that his leftovers are so uninspiring; it is worth wondering, however, whether even Iron and Wine completists need any of the material found here—most of which didn’t cut the mustard the first time around to even appear on CD singles.

Iron and Wine began as a bedroom project, featuring just acoustic guitar and Beam’s hushed vocals, recorded while his baby daughters were asleep. Since then, he’s managed to avoid many singer/songwriter clichés and evolve successfully into a multi-dimensional artist drawing from eclectic textures and rhythms while maintaining a singular sound and identity. Too many of these tracks, however, are still in the solo-man-with-guitar mode, and, by the measure of Beam’s own quality standards on his official releases, the material simply isn’t as strong.

The handful of covers are also uninspiring and predictable—not in their source material (Stereolab, Flaming Lips, New Order) but in the way they sound like every song Sam Beam ever recorded before he evolved into a bandleader.

Material from recent years is slightly more rewarding, if only because one can hear Beam breaking his own formula and arriving at the subtle dub reggae and psychedelic textures that coloured 2007’s The Shepherd’s Dog. (June 11, K-W Record)

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Jennifer LFO – Songs from the Alien Beacon (Kanda Kid)

“How close can you get without f---ing up the friendship?” So asks Jennifer LFO on one of the catchiest songs on her debut album (under this name, anyway; she used to record under her given name, Jennifer Foster). But the question may well be metaphorical, as throughout this album she takes her pop songs and stretches them into ’70s prog territory, with tasteful heaps of sonic decoration courtesy of her producer Michael Philip Wojewoda, and a cast of Toronto all-stars. Together, they push this material to extremes and then pull it back to a more straightforward piano ballad or three-chord rocker. Foster’s lyrics stray from conventional fare as well, which makes her all the more believable when she sings: “I know the girl you look for/ you won’t find her too soon/ She’s teaching string theory on Saturn/ she’s playing her synth on the moon.” (July 16, K-W Record)

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La Patere Rose – s/t (Grosse Boite)

La Patere Rose could hail from no other place in Canada except Quebec: an eccentric and girlish vocalist/keyboardist (nom du rock: Fanny Bloom) who is well-studied in chanson, absurdist pop and cabaret, backed by two gents (noms du rock: Roboto et Kilojoules) who ensure that no two songs sound alike. If acclaimed acts like Fiona Apple or Regina Spektor were actually as unpredictable and unusual as they’re made out to be, they still wouldn’t sound as inventive as La Patere Rose, especially when Bloom starts shrieking like a theremin on La Marelle. This isn’t dark and mysterious like Bat For Lashes; it’s too goofy for that. It’s not abrasive or aiming for any kind of shock factor, and it’s too off-kilter to be safe and radio-friendly. And once you’re through figuring out everything that it’s not, it’s just to best revel in their unusual pleasures. (July 2, K-W Record)

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Lee Harvey Osmond – A Quiet Evil (Latent)

It’s one thing when a veteran artist returns under a new guise and puts out the best record of his career. It’s another thing entirely when he ropes in a group of all-stars who rally for the cause and sound creatively re-energized in ways that their main projects haven’t in quite a while.

Tom Wilson has been the bandleader of Junkhouse, one third of Blackie and the Rodeo Kings, and put out solo albums; here, he enlists Cowboy Junkies’ Michael Timmins as producer and engineer, the Skydiggers’ Josh Finlayson on bass, and various people drawn from each of those three men’s extended musical families. Together, the music they make as Lee Harvey Osmond is a dark and spooky Canadian gothic roots gumbo: sombre folk meets swampy blues meets late-night ambient country music all made for midnight drives, with covers of Lou Reed and David Wiffen thrown in for good measure.

Though Wilson may be front and centre, Lee Harvey Osmond is very much a collective effort, and it succeeds just as much on atmosphere and Timmins’ arrangements as it does on the songs co-written by Wilson with many others. The decades of experience shared between these players works magic when it sounds like they crashed in the studio after a long night of whiskey and decided to let their imagination run wild. This isn’t so much “dad rock” as it is “creepy, weird old uncle music”—and it suits Tom Wilson perfectly. (July 9, K-W Record)

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Micachu – Jewellery (Rough Trade)

Micachu is as wonderfully weird as the Dirty Projectors’ Dave Longstreth, but makes music for a much more raucous dance party. Bandleader Mica Levi sticks to 4/4 rhythms and conventional harmony, but her unusual approach to sound sculpture finds her constructing pop, punk and dance music from clipped samples, toy instruments, and any household item that can be transformed into percussion. She gets help from producer Matthew Herbert, who uses a similar approach in his own politically charged electronic jazz and performance art; here, however, he applies his attention to unusual detail toward much more visceral thrills. Micachu doesn’t have any agenda except playful tomfoolery—which makes Jewellery one of the most delightful debuts of the year. (June 18, K-W Record)

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Moby – Wait For Me (EMI)

Moby’s landmark album Play turns 10 years old this year. And though its sound quickly became a cliché, it’s worth noting that when it was released, Moby had given up hopes of pop stardom, and made the album as a personal project. And as he admits now, he’s spent much of the last decade trying to second-guess the marketplace and somehow replicate its success. He hasn’t failed per se, but nothing he’s done in the past decade is remotely remarkable—or memorable.

Until this. Wait For Me was recorded at home, and his only motivation was to make an personal album that wasn’t tailored to any pop radio standard. And lo and behold, it’s a lovely, warm, engaging album, which in part revives the template of lush strings and gospel vocals heard on Play, but with nary an uptempo beat to be found; the liveliest number is the only one sung by Moby himself, and it’s about as cheery as Joy Division. Wait For Me is a luxurious mind massage that sounds like Brian Eno producing Pink Floyd. For the most part it’s too sumptuous and sedate to be co-opted by lifestyle advertising, like much of Play was; it is much more intimate and interior—and ironically, by pleasing no one else but himself, Moby may have made his most universal album in a decade. (July 9, K-W Record)

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Stuart Murdoch – God Help the Girl (Beggars Banquet)

Belle and Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch woke up one morning and heard his songs being sung by an all-female chorus, which prompted this, his first solo album, on which he writes the songs and hires various ladies to sing them. The material here sounds like it’s from a ’50s stage play; there’s nary a sign of rock nor R&B influence, instead relying on featherweight piano melodies with saccharine strings and mannered, polite vocals. Belle and Sebastian don’t exactly boast a muscular reputation either—much of their discography is on the lighter side of twee—but this material might be too well-scrubbed for even that band’s biggest fans. It doesn’t help that a couple songs from the last B&S album, their punchy pop masterpiece The Life Pursuit, are recast here in considerably weaker versions; other songs are feeble rewrites of earlier B&S classics ("Lazy Line Painter Jane," "I’m Waking Up to Us") set to new lyrics. That the songs aren’t up to Murdoch’s recent standards is one thing; the fact that none of these arrangements and vocalists are particularly compelling is another. (July 9, K-W Record)

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Nomo – Invisible Cities (Ubiquity)

Nomo are a Chicago band who started out playing relatively straightforward Afrobeat, but are all over the map on their latest album. And that’s a good thing. Their horn section is unleashed to allow for jazzier excursions, the rhythm section has become more muscular—even if many of the tempos are slower this time out—and the synths and treated kalimbas that colour around the edges help define the 21st century funk that Nomo is creating.

This album was spawned from the same sessions as their 2008 release Ghost Rock; that album is a better entry point for beginners. Invisible Cities is less of a party record and more of an esoteric head trip for fans of late ’60s and early ’70s jazz, where dissonance and tension are more prevalent in both the solos and the riffs. And while African influences are still paramount, traces of Balkan brass and Asian scales also creep into the mix. (June 11, K-W Record)

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Peaches – I Feel Cream (XL)

In 2009, Peaches should be mouldy by now. And yet on her third album, the Berlin-via-Toronto transplant can be heard crooning: “Seems you got a little bit more than you asked for.” After years of maximum personality and minimal musical promise, that statement finally holds true.
What started as an electro-punk performance art construct, based on dirty beats and dirtier lyrics, turned into an underground pop and fashion sensation. Peaches is many things: proudly pansexual, smart, sassy, “so sexual and so conceptual.” She’s also an unconventionally attractive older woman who invites you to “lick her crow’s feet”—the polar opposite of the parade of Lolitas peddled in the mainstream.

And yet until now, her message of inclusive sexual liberation was articulated mainly through lugheaded repetition of phrases meant to poke and provoke. No matter how addictive her primitive beats and punk rock guitar may have been, Peaches the songwriter was nowhere near as powerful as Peaches the performer.

I Feel Cream isn’t exactly the sound of Peaches cleaning up her act, but it does drop the sillier side of her shock value and ups the musical ante considerably. She’s moved well beyond simple riffs into fully developed pop songs worthy of early Prince ("Mud," "Talk To Me," "Trick or Treat"), and her buzzing synths and dirty techno puts similar acts to shame—including upstart Torontonians like Thunderheist and MSTRKRFT. Lyrically she’s just as brazen and intentionally ridiculous, but she’s digging deeper by cramming each track with hilarious one-liners—instead of milking each one for three minutes at a time.

The early ’00s electroclash trend that she arrived in the middle of may be on the wane, but seeing how she was one of the only bonafide personalities of that era—coupled with the strength of this album—I Feel Cream should rise to the top. (June 4, K-W Record) (June 4, K-W Record)

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Royal City – 1999-2004 (Asthmatic Kitty)

Royal City were always bridesmaids back around the turn of the decade. Feist was in their band. Sufjan Stevens, Broken Social Scene and Hidden Cameras opened for them. They were the impetus to launch Three Gut Records, a Guelph label that helped make Toronto cool again and inspired many of that city’s current success stories. Royal City broke up just as the world’s eyes were turning toward Toronto.

But much more important was the legacy of unforgettable shows that live on in memory: sometimes a total trainwreck, often completely brilliant, always indifferent to whatever people might expect. Arriving as the Canadian music industry was collapsing, they offered a complete alternative to everything around them, including many of their squeaky clean alt-country peers. Dissonant and delicate, fragile and ferocious, Royal City conveyed naked emotion, and demanded that you either love or hate them. There was no middle ground.

The three studio albums they left behind all have their charms; 2001’s Alone at the Microphone is a masterpiece. But this collection of odds and sods captures the overall spirit of the band in their raw glory. Some of their best songs never made it onto albums ("O You With Your Skirt," "Postcards"); they appear here along with revelatory alternate takes and covers of Iggy Pop and the Strokes—the latter’s song is turned into a lilting waltz.

The album closes in the most perfect way possible: a long, slow fade of the band singing their eponymous song (inexplicably titled "In the Autumn" here), chanting “c-i-t-y Royal City” as they march on into eternity, oblivious to the fact that the tape is running out, that the audience has gone home, that soon all we’ll have left is cherished memories and a few records. But now we have one more. (June 18, K-W Record)

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Sonic Youth – The Eternal (Matador)

Here’s a little secret about the avant-garde: no matter how groundbreaking you were at an early stage in your career, the older you get, the more boring you are. There’s no better example than Sonic Youth, a band who did nothing less than rewrite the rules of rock’n’roll in the late ’80s, by combining the nihilism of the no-wave movement with Rolling Stones riffs, free jazz and hardcore punk rock. At that point in time, nobody sounded like Sonic Youth.

By the mid-’90s, however, everyone was trying to. Their descendents are plentiful, as is Sonic Youth’s discography: both their “official” releases and their myriad side projects and art projects. So plentiful, in fact, that what was once thrilling and mysterious is now almost as innocuous as, well, as a new Rolling Stones album. And the alternative press prove themselves just as gullible as mainstream media when an old warhorse trots on the stage talking about getting back to their roots and referencing earlier, beloved works—a routine Sonic Youth has been milking for at least 10 years now.

There’s something to be said for sticking to your vision, and tracks like "What We Know" and "Anti-Orgasm" will resonate with anyone who’s ever loved the band. But with the group of cultural sponges that compose Sonic Youth, you’d think their palette would be wider at this point. While there’s some comfort in hearing new songs that are interchangeable with anything they’ve done in the past quarter century, it’s neither weird nor accessible enough to excite or polarize fans. It’s just there.

Which, for former revolutionaries, is faint praise that proves most damning. (June 18, K-W Record)

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Regina Spektor – Far (Warner)

Regina Spektor must have heard the word “quirky” used often enough to describe her, that she’s decided to tone down her vocal tics on this, her third album. She still specializes in piano songs best suited for the closing credits of movies set in New York City autumns, with a decidedly more reggae lilt to them this time out, however subtle. Musically, Far is impeccable, aided by an ace list of producers: Mike Elizondo (Fiona Apple, Eminem), Jeff Lynne (Tom Petty, Traveling Wilburys), Jacknife Lee (U2, R.E.M.), and returning collaborator David Kahne (VP of Warner Records, incidentally).

It’s Spektor’s lyrics that distract. She’s fine with opening a song with the sentiment: “no one laughs at God in a hospital/ no one laughs at God in a war.” But she starts to get lazy and loopy when she follows it up with the mouthful: “no one laughs at God when it’s getting late and your kid’s not back from that party yet.” Alanis, your ghostwriter is calling. (July 2, K-W Record)

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Street Sweeper Social Club – s/t (Warner)

Tom Morello was considered one of the most innovative guitarists of the ’90s for his work in Rage Against the Machine. Since then, however, his career has largely consisted of wasted opportunities: the non-starter supergroup that was Audioslave, an agitprop solo acoustic act called The Nightwatchman, and now a collaboration with MC Boots Riley of political hip-hop crew The Coup. The idea of returning to Rage-style riff-rock with anthemic choruses and fiery rhymes sounds good on paper, yet Street Sweeper Social Club serves as a reminder at how good Rage Against the Machine was at what it did. There are no guitar pyrotechnics from Morello, and Riley’s politics are plodding and punctuated with far too many “motherfuckers” to be taken seriously. Red Hot Chili Peppers b-sides sound better than this, and at least that band's songs are supposed to be about nothing, rather than ankle-deep agitation and leftist suggestions that add up to something neither instructive nor constructive—nor particularly destructive. Just dull. (June 4, K-W Record)

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Sunset Rubdown – Dragonslayer (Jagjaguwar)

What instrument would you use to slay a dragon: a piano or a guitar? Why, a guitar of course, which is why Sunset Rubdown’s bandleader and keyboardist Spencer Krug straps one on for the bulk of this, the fourth album for his main musical outlet.

Piano-based songwriters who migrate to the guitar usually do so with mixed results: either they get deliberately reductionist after discovering the power of three-chord simplicity, or they become overly obtuse. Krug uses the guitar every way he can: as harmonic and rhythmic texture, as an adrenaline shot and power boost, and to continue to write the unique songs that set him apart from almost all of his peers.

If parts of Dragonslayer sound slightly more conventional and accessible than previous Sunset Rubdown recordings, all the trademarks are still there: the epic songwriting with plenty of twists and turns, the impenetrably surreal lyrics, Krug’s hiccup-y vocals, the rich harmonies of keyboardist Camille Wynn Ingr, the melodic guitar lines and unconventional drumming. New bassist Mark Nicol brings added depth on his recorded debut with the band.

Krug has a long and dense discography—including two albums with Wolf Parade and two with Swan Lake on top of the Sunset Rubdown output—but Dragonslayer is the album most likely to convert new ones and satisfy old ones. (July 16, K-W Record)

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Think About Life – Family (Alien 8)

There are more than enough indie rock bands shouting and screaming about disco infernos, but Think About Life are one of the few who can boast “I’ll set your world on fire” and actually pull it off. This band had extremely shaky beginnings; I’d go so far as to say that they’re one of the worst opening acts I’ve ever seen, back when Wolf Parade took them on tour in 2005. In the time since, Martin Cesar has become not only a wildly engaging frontman, but a serious R&B singer with a killer falsetto. The pop smarts that guitarist Graham Van Pelt put to use in his other project, Miracle Fortress, come to the forefront here and give Cesar some actual hooks to sing. Tracks like "Havin’ My Baby," "Set You on Fire" and "Young Hearts" are all polished enough to be Top 40 hits, or at the very least fodder for a N.E.R.D. remix.
And while much of Family is fodder for an all-night dance party, Think About Life show themselves capable of much more, both texturally and dynamically. They may love their four-on-the-floor beats, but they also love pulling everything apart and tweaking every minor sonic detail, which they do to great effect during the long-decaying closing track, "Life of Crime." (July 2, K-W Record)

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Allen Toussaint – The Bright Mississippi (Nonesuch)

There are a lot of musicians vying for the title of Mr. New Orleans, but Allen Toussaint is certainly one of them. The pianist and arranger has been in the employ of all the greats, and though he may not be as recognizable outside musicians’ circles, he’s revered among his peers—and with good reason.

Which is why Toussaint gets help here from the top notch team of producer Joe Henry (who also pens insightful liner notes), clarinetist Don Byron, guitarist Marc Ribot, bassist David Piltch, trumpeter Nicholas Payton and drummer Jay Bellerose, who help him romp through songs that would be tired standards in anyone else’s hands: "Just a Closer Walk With Thee," "St. James Infirmary," and songs by Duke Ellington, Jelly Roll Morton, and Django Reinhardt.
Toussaint, however, renders all the material here virtually unrecognizable and completely enchanting. The 71-year-old is rhythmically inventive and melodically playful, especially with Thelonious Monk’s title track. And he’s a generous bandleader, though when he grants solos, it’s often his rhythm part that is still stealing the show. (June 4, K-W Record)

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John Vanderslice – Romanian Names (Dead Oceans)

John Vanderslice grew up in Florida and lives in California. Little wonder, then, that his music sounds so sunny—on the surface, anyway. Sunny not necessarily in the way of surf rock and saccharine ’70s singer/songwriters—although there are some obvious vocal debts to the Beach Boys here—but in the way that spending too long in the sun can create a squinty, skewed take on reality where the simplest things appear complex and vice versa. There are certainly nods to normalcy in Vanderslice’s delightfully unconventional approach to pop music. But he is a producer first and foremost (Spoon, Death Cab for Cutie), using the studio to play with sound in the subtlest of ways: these are still pianos, guitars and drums, but there’s always something slightly off about them. His songs used to be busier than they had to be; over the course of seven albums, he’s learned to lay back and let the textures set up the action, leaving the melodies plenty of room to drape themselves or two or three chords. His lyrics are imaginative and suggestive, if not downright cryptic; not many songwriters would try and string a chorus out of the phrase: “fetal horses gallop in the womb.” Fewer still would pull it off. At the age of 42, Vanderslice still likes to mess with his formulas—not out of desperation, but because he continues to improve with age. (June 4, K-W Record)

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White Rabbits – It’s Frightening (TBD)

White Rabbits are a six-piece rock band with two drummers—yet ultimately, it’s the entire band that thinks like a drummer, approaching their parts rhythmically rather than filling every dozens of tracks with layers of harmonies. Less is always more with this album, which could just as easily been made on an analog eight-track machine, leaving plenty of space for catchy pop hooks, melodic guitar leads, and piano breaks. That this minimalist approach works so well is due in part to producer Britt Daniel, who employs many of the same tactics in his band Spoon; while both bands share an aesthetic and attention to minute detail, White Rabbits sound like Spoon’s slightly weirder cousins—and yet original enough not to be overpowered by Daniel’s shadow. (June 11, K-W Record)

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Wilco – Wilco (The Album) (Warner)

Wilco’s dramatic days are over. After years of line-up upheavals, label battles, drug abuse and controversial artistic shifts, this eponymous album marks the first time in ten years that two Wilco albums have been made with the same line-up, which now includes colourful guitar virtuoso Nels Cline. The Wilco heard here is in full-on dad rock mode—even Feist drops by for a duet on the lovely "You and I"—with the more artsy, soundscape-y side of the band fully integrated into ’70s soft rock that serves as perfect comfort food on a summer’s day. Nothing here raises the temperature, but nothing disappoints, either; where 2007’s Sky Blue Sky shared a similar sound, it was too noodly at times and some of the rockers fell flat. Wilco (The Album) sets modest goals and exceeds them. This is their strongest work since the game-changing Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, and finds them settling into a new stride that shows how mellowing out doesn’t mean giving up. (June 18, K-W Record)