Friday, December 9, 2022
Albums of the Year # 17 Gwenno - Tresor
Weird. I like weird. When it comes to the end of the year, records by Cate Le Bon and Aldous Harding will feature high on my list of favourite personal records of 2022. Practitioners of the new female weird thing.
Also this. Tresor The latest album from Cornish Welsh Folk marvel Gwenno which had me spinning back in time this morning as if I'd inadvisably been deep in the forest, ingested some mushrooms that I really shouldn't have, and been sent back to ancient days to hang out with Arthur's knights and Morgan Le Fey. Trust me, I'm not being fanciful. It does actually sound like that.
Gwenno sings, speaks and chants in Welsh and Cornish while around her, musicians weave a musical backdrop that is both mired deep in pre-history and wonderfully modern at one and the same time. She's been doing this for a while now, so Tresor shouldn't really come as a surprise to devotees, merely confirmation of what a pure and wonderful talent she is..
I'm not sure where I'd rank this in comparison with Aldous's Warm Chris or Cate's Pompeii. I find it increasingly difficult to do such things these days. I'm just glad they're all here. Gwenno should really have called this Treasure. Because that's what it and she clearly are..
Song(s) of the Day # 3,236 Guidon Bear
Olympia band with vocalist that sounds uncannily like Edie Brickell.
Thursday, December 8, 2022
Albums of the Year # 18 Wilco - Cruel Country
Listening to the new Wilco album ptobably isn't high on the 'to do' list of young hipsters at this point of 2022. They're a band who have cerrtainly been hip at certain points in their history, but those points are rather a long time ago now. So while hipsters, young ot otherwise, are probably best directed to the latest Kendrick record, or else Black Country, New Road, I'll give Wilco's latest Cruel Country a listen instead and share my thoughts here.
I'm very pleased to have seen Wilco live over ten years ago. They're probably one of my favourite bands. I say probably because despite all they've achieved down the years, and those achievements are considerable, they've always been the most unassuming of bands.
Because Wilco, (and when you're talking Wilco you're talking Jeff Tweedy first and foremost despite the other great musicians and personalities within the band), really know their stuff and always did. They know their Hank Williams, they know their Gram Parsons, their Big Star, their Mavis Staples, their Replacements. They know their place in the scheme of things. And that alone makes them worthy of respect.
I like the new record the more I listen to it. Wilco are like that too. You have to give them time. Cruel Country is mostly a trimmed back set of songs. Largely acoustic and reflective ones that don't share their secrets easily Fans of Nel Clines extraordinary guitar heroics may not find much in this one to revel in in that particular respect.
But there's plenty else to cherish. It's a rather sad record, as it seems to be reflecting most of all on America, and America's a rather sad place right now. But it's not overly sad. There are plenty of good lyrics. Plenty of good songs. Plenty of reasons to listen to it again and get to know it better. Wilco are not dead just yet even though they're no longer the coolest kids on the block and never will be again.. And that's great news.
Wednesday, December 7, 2022
Albums of the Year # 19 Lady Wray - Piece of Me
Another great album to bring down the curtain of what's been a wonderful January for new music. Piece of Me the second album, from American Soul / Hip Hop artist Lady Wray.
The record is soulful and funky in spades. Boom-Bap drums and chunky basslines The whole thing deeply embedded in the great Black American music traditions of the last sixty years.
Lady Wray and the backing female vocals are at the heart of the mix which is beautifully velvet rich, and wonderfully reminiscent of Marvin, Al, Aretha, Gladys and Missy. Also Amy Winehouse came to my mind on a regular basis.
Thick with romance and heartbreak,; plenty of reminders of the past while still sounding utterly contemporary, Piece of Me is a proper treat from start to finish.
Song(s) of the Day # 3,234 The Staffers
Darren Jones comes good again. Darren, consistent supporter and advisor on content on this blog has similar taste to mine and tracks down loads of stuff I would otherwise be unaware of. I'm very grateful for his input. His latest tip is this one.
It's Asleep at the Wheel, the latest from Ryan McKeever's solo project The Staffers. Classic indie stylings of the sort immediately familiar to the likes of Pavement or Neutral Milk Hotel. This has become a musical sub genre all of its own over the last thirty years. McKeever is fluently versed in its charms. Every song here is a mini-classic of its form.
A decisive factor of whether you go for this or not is McKeever's voice. It tends to be rather willfully flat. I confess I wasn't hugely enamored. Bur otherwise I was enormously taken by Asleep at the Wheel in every respect. Many thanks to Darren. Please keep them coming.
Tuesday, December 6, 2022
Albums of the Year # 20 The Stroppies - Levity
My favourite new Antipodean band, part blah, blah, blah. Levity, the latest album from Australian quartet The Stroppies is a record that will immediately appeal to lovers of Australian and New Zealand bands from way back when like Go Betweens, The Bats, The Chills, The Clean, The Verlaines and, oh well, you know. That lot.
The Stroppies have plenty of the specific wonky charm that make those bands so enduringly treasurable. The Stroppies seem to owe a particular debt to early Television before Richard Hell was asked to pack his bags and leave the bamd by an exasparated Tom Verlaine because he yearned to be taken seriously and Hell insisted on being a goofy junkie instead.
It's precisely the ragged, angular approach that made and still makes the early incarnation of that band so appealing, that fuels The Stroppies tank. Levity jangles and chimes and doesn't make complete cohesive sense which only makes the likes of me want to go back and listen again until it does. It's clearly a truly wonderful record, tailor made for those who love this noble rehearsal room musical heritage.
Monday, December 5, 2022
Albums of the Year # 21 Jake Xerxes Fussell - Good & Green Again
Jake Xerxes Fussell's records are always worth a listen. He's back early in 2022 with another very good one, entitled Good & Green Again.
No real surprises. He's not that kind of artist. He mines the seam he's mined for many years now. That folk seam between the moments of Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan and The Band. The place where good songwriting and telling tales are what's mostly highly prized.
Fussell is a definite contender if prizes are being handed out in this respect. Good & Green Again plays its hand sraight. There's not the slightest hint of pastiche or irony of any sort. The playing with form that you get wth the likes of Will Oldham, Bill Callahan or Nick Cave.
No this is honest endeavour. Archealogical enquiry of the most loving and diligent kind. A very fine record to add to the modest pile this year has already produced.
Song of the Day # 3,232 The Rattles
A wonderful weekend away in Nottingham seeing good friends for the first time for too long. This was purchased. Not that I thought it would be a good record. In fact I suspected it wouldn't. Just because I liked the essentially ridiculous nature of the record cover. The record's OK though occasionally slightly ridiculous. The Rattles were a German Beat Combo and sound pretty much as you'd imagine they would.
Sunday, December 4, 2022
Albums of the Year # 22 Beach House - Once Twice Melody
Baltimore's Beach House's long awaited and much anticpated new album Once Twice Melody, sets off with its opening and title track as if it's on a mission. The mission seems to be to find the missing link between Serge Gainsbourg at his dreamy peak, Suicide's electro pulse, Nancy and Lee's Some Velvet Morning, Broadcast, The Whicker Man and Goldfrapp's marvellous Felt Mountain.
That's a pretty good place to start from and the record shifts on from there, twisting and turning in interesting ways for the course of its run. Like a smooth, high speed train, travelling fast while appearing to travel slowly at one and the same.
I'd like to say immediately that I think it's a very good record. I won't go into how it ranks among their back catalogue, as I'm not familiar with all of that. 'There was never enough time, Michael. There was never enough time,' as Marlon Brando, (speaking from within the skin of Vito Corleone), said to Al Pacino, (listening from within the skin of Michael).
Beach House have been doing this, or things that are rather like this, for quite some time now. I first became aware of them about Veckatimest, the superlative 2009 Grizzly Bear album. I went to see them shortly afterwards play a great set at The Sage, in Gateshead.
Beach House were supporting them that night and though I was aware of and interested in them at the time, I arrived too late to see them. A mistake I cannot amend, though I'd like to. On Once Twice Melody they alternate vocals between the duo's core members Victoria Legrand Alex Scally, and it's quite a disarming process sometimes.
Nancy does the Nancy Sinatra / Broadcast thing while Alex can actually come across sounding rather like Neil Tennant. Not that I've got anything at all against Tennant and The Pet Shop Boys at all. Far from it. But it does come across as a strange, contrasting ride sometimes. But it still works remarkably and incredibly soothing. There are also hints of Flaming Lips occasionally and certainly Kraftwerk which all adds to the mix.
Anyway it's a fascinating and rewarding listen. A record to fall asleep to, and I mean that in the best sense of the term and experience. It will give you sweet dreams. One to listen to and tease out the nuances from over the coming months.
Saturday, December 3, 2022
Albums of the Year # 23 Green / Blue - Offering
Instant, instant love for this one and I suspect already that it might be my leftfield, underground American guitar record on here. There are generally a couple of those on It Starts. Previously Lawn, (on a couple of occasions), Wild Firth and Warehouse, among others, have done this for me.
The record Offering the second album from Minneapolis band Green / Blue kicks off
with first track Talking to Myself in an uncannily similar fashion to the start of my favourite ever album and my favourite ever discovery of this type.
An odd electronic sound, like some kind of electronic static and then the band kick in with wild rickety abandon and you know almost immediately that you're in very safe hands and that you're going to listen to a record you'll enjoy very much indeed.
Yes Talking to Myself reminded me in the way it set off off the way Radio Free Europe kicked off Murmur in 1983 and Offering continued to offer that same mysterious, tangled, youthful thrill for the course of its run.
It's not as good as Murmur was. Very few thing are, but it has a very similar drive and determination. It sounds like a record that people were waiting for somewhere. I'm happy with that
Friday, December 2, 2022
Albums of the Year # 24 Michael Head & The Red Elastic Band - Dear Scott
Much has been written down the years about Liverpudian Michael Head's status as the great neglected British songwriting visionary of the last forty years. To the point of cliche really. Despite the any number of quite classic songs he's written down the years, the man's never actually had a Top Forty single. This beggars belief frankly.
One more classic record to add to the case for the man. Head and his current band The Red Elastic Band have just put out another album, , Dear Scott and it's probably among the very best he's ever released down the years. Twelve classically crafted and beautifully wrought and produced songs, all immediately recognisably Michael Head.
I saw Head and the Red Elastic Band play last Thursday at The Cluny in Ouseburn the day before Dear Scott came out. There was something vaguely triumphant about the performance. Head has struggled with heroin and alcohol addiction down the years and is really doing well just to still be with us, never mind putting out such great records and playing such magnificent gigs.
Because last Thursday was magnificent and Dear Scott is a great album. Full of Scouse melancholy, ennui and regret but pride and dogged endurance too. A story of survival against the odds. It has all the defining features of Head's work. Another essentially nautical record, water is almost ever present in his songs, with his underlying and abiding inspiration points running through it like Liverpool Rock if such a thing exists; Love, Baccarach, The Byrds and Simon & Garfunkel.
It was great finally seeing the man perform, having enjoyed so many of his records from Pale Fountains, Shack and probably his masterpiece, The Magical World of the Strands. It was also nice to see that he's not entirely a prophet without honour in his own land. There were any number of people in the audience in clear rapture at points when career favourites were played. It was a special evening.
Any number of the songs on Dear Scott stand shoulder to shoulder with anything he's ever done. It's a tale of Liverpool more than anythng else, Head namechecks its streets at one point in The Ten, and you feel like you're walking down them with him. It's an evocative and, yes, magical record.
Best heard as a piece at single sittings. It was perfectly clear on Thursday how deeply proud of the record Head is and he has every right to be so. It won't top any charts apart from personal ones. Head never will sadly, but those who appreciate the man's special gifts will cherish it.
Thursday, December 1, 2022
Albums of the Year # 25 Hurray For The Riff Raff - LIFE ON EARTH
Women seem to be pretty much in charge of things in the music world these days. That's a huge generalisation of course, and blokes and bands obviously have plenty to contribute but I'll just chuck a few names that seem to apply at you, entirely at random.
Weather Station, Courtney Barnett, Cate Le Bon, U.S.Girls, Sharon Van Etten, Goat Girl, Adrienne Lenker, Snail Mail, Cassandra Jenkins, Mega Bog, Jane Weaver, Little Simz, Greentea Peng. That's a pretty formidable list off the top of my head. My Top 3 albums of last year were by female solo artists and I could have tweaked the final Top Ten fairly easily to make the whole thing female without betraying my essential musical tastes and preferences.
Add to that list Alynda Segarra or Hurray For The Riff Raff if you prefer. If she's not high on your list already. She may well be. She put out a fine album in The Navigator in 2017, and has a back catalogue that is worthy of exploration.
Her latest Life on Earth though seems like a point of genuine arrival. A realisation of where she's been heading to for the best part of ten years. Segarra does a fairly similar thing to Sharon Van Etten. That thing that Springsteen did on his albums up to Darkness at the Edge of Town. Walking the mean streets in your leather jacket. Not stepping aside for anyone and not showing any fear.
Segarra's own personal twist on this is a slight New Orleans one. She moved there from The Bronx in 2007. She's also taking an 'it's the end of the world as we know it,' eco-line on this one, like so many others right now. Inevitable frankly, given the state of the planet we live on.
This leads to a slightly unfortunate record sleeve for with a picture of Segarra up to her knees in what looks like a Bayou river, wearing the oddest and not the most fetching battle garb. It's a dreadful choice of image to be honest but you shouldn't let it put you off because the record itself is just excellent and finds Hurray For The Riff Raff shifting into an altogether higher gear than she's ever operated at before.
In a year that's already provided some completely excellent and inspiring records; Big Thief, Cate le Bon, John Xerxes Russell, Beach House, Green/ Blue, Costello and any number of others, Segarra finds herself in the leading pack as we head towards the end of February. But it's far too early yet to make predictions for end of the year podium places just yet. Nevertheless, this ones a definite candidate and I suspect it has staying power. It's already getting a play for me every few days.
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