September 2014 reviews

Highly recommended this month: Robert Plant

Worth your while: The Wooden Sky, Ventanas, Moonface, Tricky

The following reviews ran in the Waterloo Record in September.

Hiss Golden Messenger – Lateness of Dancers (Merge)

M.C. Taylor of Durham, N.C., is, based on his lyrics, probably the kind of guy who works long hours at his day job, is a family man at night, leaves his mandolin in the rain and lives for the moment every week when he and his buds get together for a few smokes and some epic jams. Taylor has a Dylanesque drawl, not unlike Adam Granduciel of The War on Drugs—but where that band filters their Americana through driving Krautrock beats, Taylor and Hiss Golden Messenger slide easily into the grooves of The Band and Southern rock. The performances are better than any of the actual songs here; the keyboardist and drummer in particular give these sparse songs plenty of subtle soul. (Sept. 4)

Download: “Lucia,” “Saturday’s Song,” “I’m a Raven (Shake Children)”

Vance Joy – Dream Your Life Away (Warner)

It’s frosh season. Our cities are overrun with 19-year-olds entering unfamiliar environs, meeting new friends, missing old ones, and singing songs together at closing time. Once the party spills back into the dorm rooms, there will be someone with a guitar playing, among other things, Vance Joy songs.

It’s most likely to be “Riptide,” a hit earlier this year; it might also be “Mess Is Mine,” the song most likely to be played at weddings five years down the road by couples meeting this week. Joy may be riding on a post-Lumineers zeitgeist moment, with his slightly Celtic melodies and largely acoustic instrumentation, but his songs are less gimmicky. There’s nothing in a Vance Joy song that could possibly ruffle any feather (sample titles: “All I Ever Wanted,” “Best That I Can,” “We All Die Trying to Get It Right”); he’s an everyman making pleasant music that never descends into the treacly. Just because this is the kind of music that surfers might play around campfires in Joy’s native Australia doesn’t make him a new Jack Johnson. It makes him a lot better. For the frosh today, he’s probably going to be the soundtrack of their lives. (Sept. 18)

Download: “Mess is Mine,” “Riptide,” “First Time”

Lowell – We Loved Her Dearly (Arts and Crafts)

A 23-year-old, globetrotting Calgarian who dropped out of the University of Toronto’s music school to write songs for the likes of the Backstreet Boys (yes, in 2013), Lowell comes with an impressive resumé even before this, her debut album. She’s every bit the modern girl: part Tegan and Sara, part Lykke Li, part, um, Bananarama. A sunnier and peppier Cat Power, slave to no genre, writing occasionally candid personal songs to upbeat poppy beats. It’s smarter than (what’s presumed to be) teen pop; it’s too juvenile for anyone over 30 (i.e., the chorus that goes, “Money, hey! Money, woo!”). One of the catchiest songs is “LGBT”: a simple, sing-songy trifle with the chorus: “Hello my name is LGBT / don’t take out your misery on me / I’m happy, I’m happy and free.” It all sounds tailor-made for a spot on the Girls soundtrack. As a bold new artist, Lowell is one to watch. And while half of all frosh students will be learning Vance Joy songs on guitar, the other half is probably dancing to Lowell. (Sept. 18)

Download: “Cloud 69,” “LGBT,” “Words Were the Wars”

Moonface – City Wrecker EP (Paper Bag)

Moonface is the most recent moniker for Spencer Krug, late of Wolf Parade and Sunset Rubdown. It’s supposed to be a catch-all name where every record sounds different from the last—until now, where this EP follows lockstep behind 2013’s Polaris long-listed Julia With Blue Jeans On, in its stripped-down piano-and-voice arrangements. Krug has gone full-on piano lounge, except this lounge is in a run-down hotel in smalltown Finland, where a misplaced Anglophone is pouring his heart out over minor chords. The title track is as personal as Krug has ever been, speaking frankly about why he left Montreal for Helsinki several years back (he recently relocated again, to Vancouver Island). “We all know safety is a blessing and a curse,” he sings. Which is why he is unafraid to sing whatever’s on his mind: even when the lyrics fall flat or he’s uncomfortably frank, his piano playing is beautiful—despite odd, ham-fisted outbreaks that shatter the mood—and he’s singing better than he ever has. Moonface is confounding, deliberately so, it seems. It’s raw. It’s honest. And Spencer Krug is making some of the best music of his storied career. (Sept. 18)

Download: “City Wrecker,” “Running in Place With Everyone,” “Daughter of a Dove”

Karen O – Crush Songs (Sony)

The debut solo album from Yeah Yeah Yeahs singer Karen O is not new. She says she wrote and recorded these songs when she was 27, when she “crushed a lot. I wasn’t sure I’d ever fall in love again.” There’s no official word on whether this has anything to do with a leaked demo CD (stolen from a suitcase misplaced by TV on the Radio’s Dave Sitek) made in 2006—the year Ms. O was 27. Either way, why is she choosing to release this time capsule now?

Crush Songs is a lo-fi affair, seemingly recorded on a four-track tape deck, featuring just O (and her own backing vocals) and a guitar, not unlike “Modern Romance” or “Subway” or any time the Yeah Yeah Yeahs have included a hushed, Lou Barlow-ish bedroom recording amidst their usual rock’n’roll maelstrom. The only difference is that the Yeah Yeah Yeahs are a three-headed songwriting partnership; O on her own can offer only half-baked ideas. Being the charismatic vocalist she is, of course, she doesn’t have to do much more than show up; she’s a compelling presence no matter the circumstance. Sadly, this serves more as a historical curiosity rather than a statement from a major artist. It’s no Nebraska. (Sept. 18)

Download: “Ooo,” “Body King,” “Sing Along”

Robert Plant – Lullaby and… the Ceaseless Roar (Universal)

Never mind Led Zeppelin. Or even Alison Krauss. Remember the Afro-Celt Soundsystem? Robert Plant sang on a 2001 track by that cross-cultural experiment—the template for 1,001 folk festival workshops ever since—and it informs much of this new album, where African blues, Celtic banjos and fiddles (actually a Gambian riti), and electronic beats dominate the sound. It could easily fall flat on its face—and sometimes it does. But Robert Plant is a classy guy these days (see also: his excellent 2010 album Band of Joy), and here he’s assembled an impeccable band—featuring collaborators of Jah Wobble and Portishead—to execute his plan. (Reassembled, actually; many of them were part of his Strange Sensation band in the early 2000s, including guitarist Justin Adams.)

There is more lullaby here than ceaseless roar: Plant is a zen state, even if his recent divorce from Patty Griffin finds him singing about “the breaking of two hearts” on “House of Love (Is Burning Down).” The only time he attempts to pick up the tempo is on “Turn It Up,” a track about as imaginative as its title; it’s the only clunker on this remarkably consistent record, which channels its intensity in much more subtle ways—especially on the stark piano ballad “A Stolen Kiss,” where the 66-year-old singer delivers one of his loveliest vocals, perhaps ever. (Sept. 11)

Download: “Little Maggie,” “A Stolen Kiss,” “Up on the Hollow Hill”

Sloan – Commonwealth (Yep Roc)

Sloan titled their 2008 album Parallel Play, a term for toddlers who have yet to learn how to interact, who play side by side. It was a self-deprecating dig at the fact that Sloan’s four members were increasingly working in isolation, developing their own individual visions independent of each other while still in the same band. On 2011’s The Double Cross, however, Sloan had never sounded so collaborative and coherent; it was a hands-down highlight in their 20-year discography.

Here, they’re back to their old ways. Parallel Play was not a great Sloan album; neither is this one, where each member is given one side of a vinyl record with which they can do whatever they please. Jay Ferguson and Chris Murphy opt for five songs each. Master of concision Patrick Pentland offers four. Oddball drummer Andrew Scott delivers an 18-minute Syd Barrett-ish suite that’s easily the strangest thing in the Sloan catalogue (it involves barking dogs and a children’s choir).

Ferguson is first up to bat, followed by Murphy, Pentland and Scott—was this an alphabetical decision? Or maybe some outside mediator decided to order the album by quality: Ferguson’s songs are all lovely, rich with classic Sloan harmonies, and likely to be the most enduring. Murphy opens his set with one of his best, “Carried Away”; the rest don’t rise to that standard, though in “So Far So Good” he does score the album’s best lyric: “Don’t be surprised when we elect another liar / did you learn nothing from five seasons of The Wire?” Pentland can usually be counted on for surefire rockers; this time, only the amusing “13 (Under a Bad Sign)” is likely to raise any fists. Meanwhile, his clunky rock ballad has the unfortunately accurate chorus: “What’s inside is dead.” Scott’s suite, for all its obtuseness, is not a solo act: it at least sounds like the band is capable of working together and pushing their creative boundaries, even if it doesn’t always work. (Sept. 11)

Download: “You Got a Lot On Your Mind,” “Carried Away,” “13 (Under a Bad Sign)”

Tricky – Adrian Thaws (False Idols/Arts and Crafts)

Trip-hop pioneer Tricky’s golden period was in the mid- to late ’90s, when he put out five albums in six years and helped define the era’s sound—one that’s now back in vogue as mainstream hip-hop and R&B have taken turns into darker, downtempo material (see: Drake, The Weeknd, Frank Ocean). Then came a decade of diminishing returns. Now he’s on his own label, answering to no one, and this is his second album in 18 months. He claimed that 2013’s False Idols was his best work since his 1995 debut: he was right. This album, titled after his birth name, is just as strong. The man is on a roll once again.

As usual, he does so with the help of powerful ladies: newcomers Tirzah and Francesca Belmonte, and MC Bella Gotti, who spits furious verses on “Why Don’t You” (chorus: “Why dontcha come and get f--ked?”) and a cover of an obscure 1990 single by London Posse (“Gangster Chronicle”), which Tricky cites as a life-changing influence. Even more powerful are Tricky’s forays into house music, notably on the single “Nicotine Love,” which counteract the delicate, sensual downtempo tracks, the likes of which he made his name—but, as evidenced by this album’s breadth, no longer define him. (Sept. 11)

Download: “Sundown” (feat. Tirzah), “Nicotine Girl” (feat. Francesca Belmonte), “Right Here” (feat. Oh Land)

Ventanas – s/t (Fedora Upside Down)

Jewish music in North America is often marketed as klezmer. That’s only half the story, as klezmer is the exclusive domain of the Ashkenazi Jews of Europe. For Sephardic Jews of Iberia, North Africa and the Middle East, there’s an entirely different musical tradition, and that’s what Toronto quintet Ventanas tap into. With some players borrowed from raucous East European party band Lemon Bucket Orchestra, Ventanas is led by flamenco student Tamar Ilana, the daughter of an ethnomusicologist: clearly she knows her material well. These are not dabblers. Ilana is a strong vocalist, and the percussion shares equal space with virtuosic performances on violin and clarinet; the production is superb. If anyone can carve out some space for Sephardic music in folk and jazz festivals in this country, it should be Ventanas. (Sept. 18)

Download: “Tha Spaso Kupes,” “Gusta Mi Magla,” “Oy Que Buena”

The Wooden Sky – Let’s Be Ready (Chelsea)

Toronto’s The Wooden Sky is full of piss and vinegar on this, their fifth album. They’ve always juggled rootsy instrumentation and epic stadium rock, but never as effectively as they do here: hushed ballads one minute, Tom Petty rockers the next, Radiohead-esque guitar textures the next. Sometimes the influences are too obvious: “Maybe It’s No Secret” sounds suspiciously like the Constantines’ “Young Lions” as covered by Blue Rodeo. No matter; it works. Singer/songwriter Gavin Gardiner has been moonlighting as a producer for other local acts; he also works as a mastering engineer at one of Canada’s top facilities. Listening to this, it’s clear he saves his best work for his own band: the whole record sounds like a million bucks. His voice is a commanding instrument, one that quivers and quakes at all the right moments; the rest of the band’s backing vocals, especially on the call-and-response closer “Don’t You Worry About a Thing,” provide extra colour. This band has played second banana to many of their more successful peers over the years, but now it’s time to light up The Wooden Sky. (Sept. 4)

Download: Saturday Night, Maybe It’s No Secret, Our Hearts Were Young

Zeus – Classic Zeus (Arts and Crafts)

They don’t make bands like Zeus anymore. Childhood friends who grew up learning how to play and sing together, their chemistry—and harmony—is impeccable. They later cut their teeth as sidemen for Jason Collett; their ear for arrangements is egoless. If their first two albums saw them indulging the classic rock influences of their youth, Classic Zeus finds them tinkering more in the studio, toying more with structure and dynamics. Even though there are fewer riffs and hooks this time out, the attention to detail and craft make this a far more rewarding album than if it had shot for the obvious. They sing about someone who is “old enough to make a difference but young enough not to care,” but it’s clear that they do care—a lot. (Sept. 4)

Download: “Straight Through the Light,” “Miss My Friends,” “Old Enough To Know”

Polaris preview 2010 pt 2

Part one of this Polaris discussion is here.
The Polaris Prize will be awarded on Monday, Sept. 20.
The remaining five nominees are:

Owen Pallett – Heartland (For Great Justice)

The album: I’m tired of anyone with a string section getting comparisons to classical composers. Because frankly, Owen Pallett is one of the only composers making some semblance of pop music who writes the kind of melodies and orchestrations that successfully blend classical forms, pop melodicism and modern arrangements. There are straight-up songs here that need no explanation—“Lewis Takes Off His Shirt” being the obvious one—but it’s tracks like “The Great Elsewhere,” with its seemingly spastic keyboards, skittering and stuttering electronic percussion, stabbing strings and gentle, lilting melody that sum up most of Heartland’s strengths. In terms of compositional ambition in 2010, I don’t see anything in Canada or anywhere else that approaches this album’s scope. For that reason alone I’m ready to write Pallett another Polaris cheque.

The chances: Fair. Like Caribou, Pallett has the previous Polaris winner curse on him; at this young stage in Polaris history, the chances of a repeat winner are slim. And not everyone—including the self-deprecating Pallett himself—thinks he has the vocal chops to pull this off. Arguably the whole project is too egghead-y and not visceral enough. But more than a few critics simply don’t buy into Pallett’s lyrical concept, which has something to do with a meta-narrative involving a 13th-century farmer in a story told by one Owen Pallett, who rises up and kills off his creator, the very same Owen Pallett. I think it’s a fascinating comment on free will, theology, role-playing games, power struggles and the role of fiction in general. Others would use Pallett’s least favourite adjective: pretentious. Which is an entirely inaccurate term, as Heartland is very much true to who Pallett is, and manages to meet his own lofty ambitions.


Radio Radio – Belmundo Regal (Bonsound)

The album: If there’s a dark horse this year, this is it. It’s also a testament to the growing power of the listserv to which Polaris jurors subscribe, where we champion albums we love and spam each others’ inboxes. It’s safe to say that this Acadian hip-hop group had zero profile in the rest of Canada until it began to be championed by a couple of jurors. And while Bonsound is a promotional powerhouse in Quebec, there’s no guarantee of a golden touch. The music, however, is merely okay. It is fun trying to decipher the deeply regional take on franglais, but (I’m only guessing here) there’s nothing terribly deep going on. Not that there has to be: the music is funky enough, a hip-hop-electro-pop hybrid with a bit of Southern bounce to it, and it’s pleasant enough one track at a time. But album of the year? This sounds like Bran Van 3000 b-sides at best.

The chances: Slim. This is definitely the luckiest band on the list—in that sense, they’ve already won.


The Sadies – Darker Circles (Outside)

The album: Like anyone else in southern Ontario, I love the Sadies and have seen them dozens of times, with one or two ecstatic experiences in there somewhere. And yet I never, if ever, put on one of their albums for my own listening pleasure. There’s good reason this album—their, um, umpteenth—is getting more than its usual share of attention. I was frankly worried when I heard they were working with Gary Louris of the Jayhawks—a man who, talented though he is, is not known for his grit or sense of adventure. (Side note: he did excellent work on another Torontonian album last year, Kirsten Jones’s The Mad Mile, though no one would accuse that of being adventurous or gritty.) But as he did with their last album, New Seasons, Louris clears away only a bit of the haze and otherwise helps the band define their textures a bit more clearly; on Darker Circles, they’ve definitely hit their stride in their studio work, both with each other and with Louris. Whether he whipped their songwriting into shape or whether they’re just naturally maturing is beside the point; one finally gets the sense that the Sadies believe in these songs, that they’re not just vehicles to get them on the road and perform.

The chances: Good. Surely when a band that could be eligible for a lifetime achievement award makes an album this strong, it has to count for something.


Shad – TSOL (Black Box)

The album: The best Canadian MC whose name doesn’t begin with K (although his last name does), Shad is hard to dislike: he’s warm, witty, and nerdier than thou. He’s also whip-smart and insightful when he wants to be, like on the haunting “At the Same Time,” but his metaphors can just as easily fall flat on their face (“Trying to listen to Jesus is hard as fake boobs”). Mostly, though, he’s full of good times and positivity, and uses his spotlight to spread the love and laugh at himself. The music rarely matches the dexterity of his lyrics, however; hopefully his continued success will attract stronger collaborators.

The chances: Excellent. Shad surprised a lot of people with his last Polaris shortlisted album, The Old Prince, and many feel that this is his year—not to mention the fact that it might be time a hip-hop album took home the prize. On top of genuine love for TSOL, people also love Shad himself; his chances of riding a wave of goodwill to the top are better than strong. He splits his time between B.C. and Ontario, which would at least be a small dent in Central Canada’s stronghold on the prize so far.


Tegan and Sara – Sainthood (Universal)

The album: I’ll admit to having dismissed this album when it came out; not because I disliked it particularly, but because it was a competent, commercially palatable pop record and the world has plenty of those—why should I care about this one? I listened with open ears, hoping for at least a conversion on the level of Metric’s Fantasies; instead, I cast it away. The single “Hell” crept up on me during many a grocery trip (where I’m always a captive audience); the other singles are just as strong, and there’s a good chance they could be giving Carl Newman a run for his money in another few years. Maybe if my stepkiddo was as enthralled with Tegan and Sara as she is with Billy Talent, I might have succumbed by now, due to sheer overexposure.

The chances: Fair. Like the Sadies, they’ve been around a long time and their recorded output continues to improve; this may well be their best album yet (I have no idea; I haven’t followed them closely), which could tip some votes their way. But the same critics who won’t give Billy Talent the time of day are unlikely to give Tegan and Sara an objective listen.

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The could've beens:

Schomberg Fair – Gospel (Hi Hat)

The album: Last year I dumped on Elliott Brood, and arguably Schomberg Fair are cut from the same cloth. Except that they’re awesome. The breakneck banjo songs are thrilling, but there's much more going on here than a hackneyed hoedown. Bassist Nathan Sidon is the most frog-voiced singer I've heard since Gabe Minnikin in the Guthries, but it totally works for him. I don't hear a lot of people putting soul into roots music these days—and by soul I don't mean R&B (though there is a strong gospel element here, hence the title, as well as the aptly titled oddball track “Motown Break”), but that indescribable "it" that gives certain bands undeniable chemistry and sets them apart from genre-fication. This band absolutely kicks my ass: the blistering shredding, the Christian guilt, the gutsy playing that's probably the most punk rock thing I've heard in Canada this year, the banjos, the rumbling baritone voice, and the ability to breathe life into hoary clichés like "Wayfaring Stranger."

Why it didn’t make the short list: This band barely has a profile in its hometown of Toronto, never mind the rest of the country.


Souljazz Orchestra – Rising Sun (Strut)

The album: What began as a rather imitative second-rate Afrobeat band has grown up quickly, and Rising Sun is an intriguing and varied jazz album that happens to use some African instrumentation and grooves. It’s their first for an international label, and they’re more than ready for the spotlight. Keyboardist Pierre Chretien deserves top marks for tying it all together; tenor saxophonist Steve Patterson has plenty of fine performances here as well, particularly on the dreamy, spacy “Consecration,” which owes a debt to Alice Coltrane.

Why it didn’t make the short list: World music? Jazz? Polaris has a long way to go. And fans of these genres rarely rally around a favourite, no doubt leading to an insane amount of vote-splitting.


South Rakkas Crew – The Stimulus Package (Mad Decent)

The album: Polyglot pop and deconstructionist dancehall that draws from just about every dance music trend of the last 15 years. It’s wicked, wacky and wild party from beginning to end, full of booty bass that’s both abrasive and persuasive, and even the occasional auto-tuned vocal merely adds to the overall madness rather than a nauseating distraction. This came out on Diplo’s Mad Decent label, and it has much more in common with that scene than anything else going on in Canada. Indeed, the Crew themselves have lived in Orlando (?!) for over 10 years now, but coming from Brampton and Mississauga, their sound is definitely the sound of the modern, multicultural suburbs—suburbs barely recognizable to Arcade Fire.

Why it didn’t make the short list: Because it’s a free mix tape, not a “real album,” the old world has a bit of trouble grasping the fact that this was not available in stores and therefore not legit. It also recycles a couple of “riddims,” in Jamaican parlance, which means four tracks here with the “double-up riddim” sound exactly the same except for the vocal—that doesn’t mean each individual one is less thrilling, however. But really, the main reason South Rakkas Crew didn’t make the shortlist is because not nearly enough people listen to David Dacks.


John Southworth – Mama Tevatron (Dead Daisy)

The album: John Southworth must be as sick as anyone by descriptors like “weird and wonderful” or, that classic kiss of death, “quirky.” But on Mama Tevatron this unique character not only shows off his songcraft at its best, but moves away from several of the stranger personas he’s inhabited in the past. Gone is the sweater-clad boyish man, gone is the weird blackface bluegrass phase; in its place is a space-age bachelor pad pop music that’s a strange hybrid of Esquivel, the Ramones and Dirty Mind-era Prince—that has to be heard to be believed. Nine of these 10 songs are pop perfection, both in their immediate appeal and the layers underneath. The final one, “Zulou,” could be Klaus Nomi covering Pink Floyd, as Southworth heads deeper and deeper into space.

Why it didn’t make the short list: Southworth’s heyday—if he had one—was over 10 years ago, when both he and Hawksley Workman were starting out and were cut from the same cloth; their paths have since diverged considerably. Maybe people still have him pegged in that period, who knows. If so, they’re missing out.


Yukon Blonde – s/t (Nevado)
Zeus – Say Us (Arts and Crafts)

The albums: I’m going to cheat and group these together—because I can barely tell them apart, and not just because they’re always neighbours at the bottom of any alphabetical list. They’re both full of bearded boys who love ’60s pop and ’70s guitar rock, and have the kind of chops that will come in handy when Paul McCartney needs a new pool of backing players. They’re both full of rich harmonies and harmonized guitar leads, and goddammit, they both write songs that are mere inches away from the greatness of their biggest influences. If I had to give the nod to one, it would be Zeus; though their lyrics are equally as inconsequential, they do avoid downright dorkiness, which Yukon Blonde is guilty of on occasion.

Why they didn’t make the short list: Because no one else can tell them apart either, and most jurors likely reserved only one spot on their ballot for ’70s retro rock, meaning both of them (and Jason Collett, for that matter) suffered from vote-splitting. Just get together and form a supergroup already!

March '10 reviews

The following reviews ran in the Kitchener-Waterloo Record and Guelph Mercury in March.

Beach House – Teen Dream (Sub Pop)
Besnard Lakes – Are the Roaring Night (Outside)
jj – No. 3 (Jagjaguwar)

Dream states know no borders, and in another plane of consciousness, these three acts could well be neighbours, instead of solitary silos residing in Baltimore, Montreal and Gothenburg, Sweden, respectively. The Besnard Lakes try to aim for transcendence through swirling layers of guitars; jj eschew guitars almost entirely; Beach House use whatever combination gets them to their hazy destination the quickest.

“Quick” is not a word associated with anything Beach House has ever done. But for this, their first album for a larger indie label and consequently their first conscious bid for a larger audience, they’ve stepped out of the somnambulant shadows and into the sunlight. In doing so, they sound suspiciously like their new Sub Pop peers Fleet Foxes, Low and Band of Horses—and yet even though you’ve heard this sound plenty in recent years, Teen Dream captures it beautifully with a Brian Wilson touch that utilizes vocal harmony textures and elevates lo-fi innovation to illusions of high-tech gloss.

It also underscores how apt their band name is: every cymbal here sounds like a crashing wave, and there’s a woozy, almost seasick element in the way the guitars and organs bend in and out of tune on a track like “Norway.” It all adds up to a lovely spring thaw album.

The Besnard Lakes also make dreamy, languid music—though they like to do so with their amps cranked to punishing levels. Soaring harmonies, big guitar riffs and a lurching rhythm section are obviously reaching for a Big Statement—and occasionally they succeed, at least more than they have on earlier albums; Roaring Night is easily their catchiest, most accessible work to date, made with the help of their equally epic Montreal neighbours in Stars and the Dears.

And yet much of it sounds stuck in a similar groove, one where everyone in the band chugs along on plodding eighth-note rhythms that stubbornly refuse to build any tension: everything, no matter how lovely, just sits there, waiting for something to happen. When it breaks out of the lethargy—as on the appropriately titled “And This is What We Call Progress”—the Besnard Lakes finally begin to roar. There are delicate moments as well—like “Chicago Train” with its shades of Sigur Ros, but that’s when Jace Lacek’s falsetto stretches toward the ridiculous rather than the rapturous.

Swedish duo jj are as light as the Besnard Lakes are heavy; there are many moments here where pillowy synths and featherweight vocals veer too close to new age pop, or where the lead female vocalist sounds like she’s taken her own metaphor seriously: “Take me away like I’ve overdosed on heroin.”

The ESL lyrics are by far the biggest distraction on this otherwise perfectly pleasant new wave desert island fantasy; thankfully, that’s not true on the powerful, sombre opening track “My Life,” where the narrator is a survivor—not of her own struggles, but of the death that surrounds her. Maybe it’s drugs, maybe it’s a plague, maybe it’s a natural disaster—whatever it is, she’s still standing, alone, and bewildered by her fortune, if in fact surviving is good fortune at all. No wonder the rest of the album sounds like twee escapism; there’s a serious sadness at the core of every song here, no matter how sweet it may sound. (K-W Record, March 25)

For Beach House, download (iTunes, amazon.com): “Zebra,” “Norway,” “Lover of Mine”

For Besnard Lakes, download (iTunes, eMusic, amazon.com): “Like the Ocean Like the Innocent Pt. 2,” “And This is What We Call Progress,” “Albatross”

For jj, download (iTunes, eMusic): “My Life,” “Let Go,” “Into the Light”

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Jully Black – The Black Book (Universal)

Canada’s ballsy, brash soul diva is back bursting with inspiration—or at least inspirational slogans, which are peppered throughout the CD booklet (i.e. “What you project is what you’ll reflect”). That confidence bursts through every track here, where Black once again proves her mettle: part Tina Turner, part Mary J. Blige, and ready to straddle the worlds of pop, rock and R&B by putting her own stamp on each. When she promises “I’ll Rock It,” she certainly does, with heavy ’80s electric guitar riffs that recall vintage Michael Jackson; on “Recalculate,” she takes aim at the Killers’ anthemic rock territory. There are times when her motivational-speaker tendencies get distracting (“The Time of Your Life,” “Glass Ceiling”), but perhaps we shouldn’t expect anything less from such a larger-than-life personality. (K-W Record, March 4)

Download (iTunes, puretracks.com, amazon.com): “Running,” “Share My World,” “She’s Out There”

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Johnny Cash – American VI: Ain’t No Grave (Universal)

Johnny Cash has been dead for seven years now. What we thought was the final installment of his pivotal American Recordings series came out four years ago. Here, of course, we hear him teamed up once again—at this point, one would hesitate to say for the last time—with producer Rick Rubin and a small cast of sympathetic players. The first words we hear him sing are “there ain’t no grave can hold my body down.”

Even the biggest Johnny Cash fan has to ask themselves: dear God, isn’t this enough already? Haven’t we been put through the emotional ringer over the past 15 years listening to Cash sing songs of mortality with what has sounded like his final breaths, to only now be subjected to him haunting us from the grave?

Yes, of course. And you’ll be forgiven if you abstain from this Cash-in. Yet Ain’t No Grave is actually one of the strongest albums of the series, primarily because of the consistency of its vision. The other albums were too often buoyed by covers of either seemingly incongruous songwriters (Trent Reznor, Depeche Mode) or tired and hokey chestnuts from both the country and pop worlds (“Danny Boy,” “Bridge Over Trouble Water”); comparatively, this one plays it straight.

Ain’t No Grave was recorded in the few months before his own passing and after the death of his beloved wife, June Carter, who pulled him out of addiction and gave him a reason to live for the last 40 years of his life.

And so there’s no room for fooling around or gimmicky stunts: the song choice is impeccable, even if it is ridden with clichés about how “I know it’s over/ but life goes on/ and this whole world will keep on turning.” Though the man was dying and his voice is weary, there isn’t a hit of resignation anywhere in these 10 songs and half-hour of music.

Johnny Cash has been gone long enough that we don’t feel obligated to champion each final album as a summation of his legacy; and God knows (even if Rick Rubin doesn’t) that there was more than a few filler tracks on those final albums. That makes Ain’t No Grave all the more powerful: what could easily (and literally) have been squeezing the last breaths out of a dead man is instead a fitting epitaph that stands alone, independent of its backstory. Johnny Cash died more than a legend; he was still an artist until the end. (K-W Record, March 4)

Download (iTunes, amazon.com, puretracks.com): “Can’t Help But Wonder Where I’m Bound,” “Cool Water,” “I Don’t Hurt Anymore”

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Jason Collett – Rat a Tat Tat (Arts and Crafts)
Zeus – Say Us (Arts and Crafts)

It didn’t take long for the students to overtake the master—if in fact any such role-playing ever existed in the relationship between veteran Toronto songwriter Jason Collett and his young backing band, Zeus. They recorded Collett’s fourth album together, the primary strength of which is the arrangements and performances. And on their debut album, Zeus boldly announce themselves as classic rockers of the highest order, seasoned songwriters and players who exude enthusiasm for their favourite artists of decades past, audaciously managing to scale many of the same heights themselves.

Neither act would ever be accused of doing anything original; both are decidedly comfort food. Yet oddly enough, it’s Collett who reaches for lyrical clichés and musical metaphors that are usually the crutch of wide-eyed rookies; Zeus’s lyrics are inconsequential, but never distracting—their music does all the talking. Such are the band’s strengths that they overshadow Collett on his own record; even though the songs are a step up from his somewhat disappointing 2008 album Here’s to Being Here, he’s still adopting an affected drawl that’s ultimately distracting from his other charms as a performer.

Say Us, on the other hand, oozes charm—as well as almost every classic rock signifier imaginable: harmonized guitar leads, reggae drops, honky-tonk pianos, full-throated four-part harmonies, over-driven organs, sugary sweet pop songs and raging rockers. Three songwriters help ensure there’s no monotony from track to track, or even within each track itself; it’s obvious that their performing and production work outside Zeus itself has made them acute listeners and keen observers of minute detail. Say Us sounds like every one of your favourite records made between 1967 and 1977, without ever sounding like any one in particular—the one exception being the closing guitar solo on “At the Risk of Repeating,” which is far too close to The Band’s “It Makes No Difference.”

Zeus will be performing with and without Jason Collett (along with peers Bahamas) on tour across North America this month. (K-W Record, March 11)

For Jason Collett, download (iTunes, eMusic, zunior.com, puretracks.com, amazon.com): “Lake Superior,” “Love is a Chain,” “Rave On Sad Songs”

For Zeus, download (iTunes, eMusic, zunior.com, puretracks.com, amazon.com): “How Does it Feel,” “The Renegade,” “I Know”

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Four Tet – There is Love in You (Domino)
Pantha du Prince – Black Noise (Rough Trade)

There’s a track on the new Four Tet album called “Circling,” and unfortunately that’s all that Kieran Hebden seems to be doing on every track here: adrift and hesitant to lay anchor.

Admittedly, a degree of repetition is to be expected from an electronic music artist who is clearly moving toward techno forms, no matter how abstract. Except that Four Tet’s discography has always set itself apart from his peers who are content to let the beats do all the work, with any additional textures mere window dressing. Hebden, on the other hand, drew heavily on jazzy beats, found sounds, sampled folk instrumentation and delicate sonic layering that was at once experimental yet entrancing and welcoming. So while there are elements of Four Tet’s finest work here, Hebden mostly manages to sound like he’s stuck in a locked groove, his once eclectic pallet somewhat stifled.

That’s not the case for German electronic artist Pantha du Prince, aka Hendrick Weber, who definitely owes a debt to Four Tet for taking exotic acoustic sounds and rendering them unrecognizable while setting them to a chilled-out beat. Pantha du Prince comes from more of a German minimalist techno bent than Four Tet’s downtempo funk, but either way there is much breadth to be discovered on this, his third album.

Titled Black Noise, there’s nothing particularly dark nor noisy about it; Weber works with vivid colours conjured from electric guitars, subtle synth sounds, gamelans and bells that coalesce in an evocative, cinematic landscape—even on the tracks that are more obviously designed for a dance floor. The one time he stumbles is when Noah Lennox of Animal Collective shows up to sing on “Stick to My Side”; in the middle of an exotic sound world devoid of signposts, Lennox is incongruously conventional and utterly disposable—which can’t be said about any other aspect of Black Noise. (K-W Record, March 11)

For Four Tet, download (iTunes, eMusic, amazon.com): “Sing,” “Plastic People,” “She Just Likes to Fight”

For Pantha du Prince, download (iTunes, eMusic, amazon.com): “Bohemian Forest,” “Im Bann,” “Satellite Snyper”

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Gigi – Maintenant (Tomlab/Sonic Unyon)
Fanshaw – Dark Eyes (Mint)
Abramson Singers – s/t (White Whale)

Gigi, Fanshaw and the Abramson Singers all make Sunday morning hangover music—which couldn’t be timelier, now that the world’s eyes have turned away from their shared hometown of Vancouver after two weeks of non-stop partying. Life goes on with small everyday pleasures—like each of these low-key debut albums, each of which rallies Vancouver artists together to sing in perfect harmony.

Gigi is not a band as much as it is a studio project, one steered by producer Colin Stewart (Black Mountain, Veda Hille) after he acquired some plate reverb units that inspired him to make ’60s-style Phil Spector-ish recordings, featuring group harmonies and large bands playing live in the studio. He enlisted songwriter Nick Krgovich (P:ano, No Kids) to pen the songs, and various guest singers to both take lead turns and join the choir.

As a genre experiment and period piece, the songs are successfully charming, and even at their saddest, there’s still sunshine thanks to the ebullience of the performances. The lead vocals tend toward the fey, but everyone else in the room gives it their all. The arrangements are rich, and there’s a clearly audible difference in hearing the band play live; the room ambience is extremely effective and the reverb plates are put to good use; Stewart ensured he got his money’s worth. Fans of vintage pop revivalists like Jens Lekman and Camera Obscura—or even Amy Winehouse—will be tickled pink; there are also perhaps-not-unintended parallels to the Langley Schools Music Project, the ’70s recording of a Vancouver-area children’s choir singing the pop songs of the day, which became a cult favourite several years back.

Vancouver seems to love choirs; Olivia Fetherstonhaugh is part of an indie collective called the Choir Practice, and records solo under the name Fanshaw, which is a more solitary, insular project. There are times when she sounds dark and gothic like her Vancouver neighbours Lightning Dust; at others she recalls PJ Harvey’s more spooky and sublime moments; sometimes she crafts drowsy, languorous country music; other tracks are dead ringers for U.K. newcomer Bat for Lashes. Fetherstonhaugh has a compelling voice that could work in just about any setting, but it’s her haunting songwriting that make Dark Eyes much more than just a promising debut.

Leah Abramson decided to start a female choir after developing tendonitis and being unable to play guitar, and though her eponymous band does feature sparse and almost ghostly instrumentation, the angelic four-to-eight-part harmonies are front and centre. This is definitely a 3-a.m. album, rich with shadows and suggestion. Its all-too-brief running time, at less than half an hour, is hardly enough to sustain us until daybreak; hopefully this visitation from the Abramson Singers is more than a fleeting dream. (K-W Record, March 4)

For Gigi, download (iTunes, eMusic, amazon.com): “Alone at the Pier,” “Won’t Someone Tell Me,” “Strolling Past the Old Graveyard”

For Fanshaw, download (iTunes): “Nobody,” “Strong Hips,” “Diana”

For Abramson Singers, download (zunior.com, iTunes, eMusic, amazon.com): “Take a Camera,” “Fool’s Gold,” “Trucker’s Prayer”

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Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba – I Speak Fula (Next Ambiance/Sub Pop)

Music from Mali has been one of the biggest African cultural exports of late, led by the hotshot guitarists in Tinariwen and Amadou Bagayoko (of Amadou and Mariam); both owe a large debt to the late Ali Farka Toure, who just released the last album recorded before his death.

Bassekou Kouyate doesn’t play guitar; he plays a hand-held lute called the ngoni, which he attacks with the virtuosity of any great guitar god, not necessarily with the delicacy associated with the ngoni’s closest cousin, the kora. Unlike most ngoni players, Kouyate plays it standing up and even occasionally through effects like a wah-pedal; he’s also designed different models for members of his group, resulting in a new string band set-up that contributes to his original sound.

Kouyate is a relentless noodler, and yet paradoxically the music is never unnecessarily busy or frenetic—even though his tempos are quicker than most of the languorous Mali music we’ve heard. Percussion is minimal but effective; the group’s harmony vocals are lovely. Guests like Vieux Farka Toure (son of Ali) and kora master Toumani Diabate are on board mainly for marquee value; Kouyate is the undisputed star of this show. (K-W Record, March 18)

Download (iTunes, amazon.com): “Musow (For Our Women),” “Torin Torin,” “Ladon”

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Mumford and Sons – Sigh No More (Universal)
Schomberg Fair – Gospel (Hi-Hat)

The U.K. is witnessing something it hasn’t seen in at least 40 years: a group of good-looking young men playing all-acoustic instruments at foot-stomping speed and singing with sunny four-part harmonies, all of which has mysteriously attracted many screaming young women (including on these shores, even before the debut album was released here). This, of course, has led Mumford and Songs to be called “the bluegrass Beatles” by the hyperbole-hungry British press.

Here in Canada, the sounds of Mumford and Sons’ debut album, Sigh No More, are far less impressive. We have Great Big Sea on our pop charts; we have Elliott Brood tearing up nightclub stages across the country. What’s the big deal? Mumford and Sons do, to their credit, write catchy songs—some of which could be very traditional, some of which aspire to rock epics without really having the weight behind them. And when they try to delve into darker material, as on “Dust Bowl Dance,” they simply sound lost.

Much more exciting is young Toronto band Schomberg Fair, who, it’s very safe to say, could kick the asses of Mumford and Sons. The opening track on Gospel, their second album, is a slow ominous build of banjos and tumbling percussion, a small breather before the next four tracks burst forth at breakneck speed.

If you thought the Sadies were shitkickers, Schomberg Fair delivers double the intensity, without getting cartoonish or losing sight of solid songs and performances that would be as powerful even at half their current tempos. Schomberg Fair do for electric Canadian folk music what the Pogues did to Celtic music in the ’80s: write booze-soaked songs plumbing spiritual angst and delivered soulfully with more energy than punk bands who use electric guitars as a cheap crutch.

They’re more than a one-trick pony, too. The album stops cold in the middle for a curiosity called “Motown Break,” which could be a Beastie Boys’ b-side. And from there, both lead vocalist Matt Bahen and the sub-baritone growl of bassist Nathan Sidon deliver emotional performances on slower but equally intense tracks like “Strange Kind of Grace” and “Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down.”

Playing punk arrangements with folk instruments is old hat by now, a schtick that’s far too easy to succumb to cliché. And yet when Schomberg Fair preach their Gospel, you’ll be a believer in no time. (K-W Record, March 18)

For Mumford and Sons, download (iTunes, eMusic): “Little Lion Man,” “The Cave,” “Roll Away Your Stone”

For Schomberg Fair, download (iTunes, zunior.com): “Drunkard’s Prayer,” “Pretty Bird,” “Wayfaring Stranger”

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Shearwater – The Golden Archipelago (Matador)
Dead Letter Chorus – The August Magnificent (Bumstead)

Last month, Peter Gabriel came crawling out of semi-retirement, only to underwhelm his fans with an all-covers album set to mostly solo piano accompaniment. But what if someone had kidnapped the legendary innovator from his comfortable British home, stranded him in the middle of Texas, and told him to write a concept album about threatened civilizations on remote island communities around the world? It still probably wouldn’t sound as glorious as The Golden Archipelago by Shearwater, a band that’s hitting its stride.

This Austin band has always created delicate epics worthy of early Gabriel or rainy-day favourites Talk Talk (or, at times, Elton John’s now-long-forgotten prog rock moments of the ’70s), with the confident, clear voice of Jonathan Meiburg leading a sympathetic backing band that would be as comfortable playing a Steve Reich composition as they would accompanying an adventurous singer/songwriter. Though they’ve always been a formidable live act, this is the first time they’ve fully gelled in the studio, reining in the bombast and spinning a beginning-to-end masterpiece. And to exemplify their economy, they do so in 11 songs and less than 40 minutes, making a journey to The Golden Archipelago much less daunting yet entirely immersive.

Shearwater play Lee’s Palace in Toronto with the equally excellent Wye Oak on April 1.

Dead Letter Chorus also aim for the epic, although with shared male-female lead vocals. If you took British art rock, dragged it through Chicago’s alt-country scene, and eventually wound up half a world away in Australia, you’d have Dead Letter Chorus. Opening track “The Peaceful Sleep of Death” sounds suspiciously like The Tragically Hip’s “Nautical Disaster,” which is surely unintentional. Sadly, the same can’t be said for the ’50s-style waltz “The Long Goodnight,” where the chorus is shamelessly stolen (uncredited) directly from Dolly Parton’s “I Will Always Love You”—the lyrics are “I will hold on to you.” Outside of their obvious influences, Dead Letter Chorus is a promising band in their own right. (K-W Record, March 25)

For Shearwater, download (iTunes, eMusic, amazon.com): “Black Eyes,” “Corridors,” “Landscape at Speed”

For Dead Letter Chorus, download (iTunes, eMusic): “The Peaceful Sleep of Death,” “Fight the Morning,” “11th Dream About Aeroplanes”