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Check
out this week’s
online CD reviews by our
music staff |
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Black
Rebel Motorcycle Club
Take Them On, On Your Own
(Virgin)
B+
Website:
BlackRebelMotorcycleClub.com
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While the lads in
BRMC are justifiably enjoying their quarter-hour of fame at
the hands of the British musical press it’s anybody’s
guess whether their brand of rumbling, fuzzy guitar-rock will
turn as many heads on this side of the pond. The tough-sounding
trio definitely burns brightly on the roaring Take Them On…,
bringing to mind some of your favourite hook-filled grinders
of the past. Every song either opens with a neat, repetitive
six-string riff or offers one somewhere in the song. That
kind of songwriting style pays dividends in the short-term
memory department but at the same time it’s doubtful
any of these shimmering tunes will last in your mind after
the disc is taken off the player. This month’s saviours
of rock.
Jeff Monk |
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Various
Artists
Dubstep Allstars Vol. 1 – Mixed By
DJ Hatcha
(Tempa)
A-
Website:
www.tempa.co.uk |
With disillusionment
of electronic music running high in the U.K., it was only
a matter of time before something as interesting as dubstep
emerged. Mixed by scene leader DJ Hatcha and featuring a small
group of London producers who have been the vanguard of the
genre, Dubstep Allstars Vol. 1 is packed with mutated digital
drum beats, rubbery bass lines and rugged two-step percussion,
and littered with flutes, sitar and other world beat influences.
Anchored by speaker-wrecking bass lines and twitchy, infectious
rhythms, DJ Hatcha and his crew’s vision of late-night
culture in London is a place where smoking bylaws aren’t
yet the norm, the beer is free-flowing and the lounge is packed
with fans of dub, reggae, drum ’n’ bass, two-step
and bhangra. Watch for Dubstep Allstars Vol. 1 on a bunch
of year-end Top 10 lists, mine included.
Anthony Augustine
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Various
Artists
Martin Scorsese Presents: The Blues Sampler
(Legacy/Columbia/ Sony)
A
Website: www.legacyrecordings.com |
Now that the televised
portion of producer Martin Scorsese’s wonderful The
Blues series has passed, it’s time to evaluate some
of the attendant bounty of merchandise available. Besides
the book, radio series and DVD set (and The Blues swizzle
sticks and satin bomber jackets) there’s a complete
set of artist- and theme-related CDs that offer some classic
and hard-to-find blues music. This particular sampler really
only brushes the surface of what’s in store for those
with enough cash to purchase the entire collection of albums.
The 14 tracks collected here are mostly quintessential blues
nuggets, including W.C Handy’s St. Louis Blues, Muddy
Waters’ ageless Hoochie Coochie Man and the venerable
mover Spoonful as performed by Howlin’ Wolf. Recommended
for completists and those looking for an easy-to-assimilate
series “best-of.”
Jeff Monk |
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Chip
Taylor & Carrie Rodriguez
The Trouble with Humans
(Texas Music Group)
B+
Website: www.txmusicgroup.com |
If you forget that
Chip Taylor wrote the bar-band staple Wild Thing, it may be
easier to deal with the pleasantly mellow country-gentleman
persona exhibited on his latest album with fiddling partner
Carrie Rodriguez. On their second collaboration Taylor has
crafted some of the most elegant, warm and engaging Americana
available. Most of the tracks are set around Taylor’s
dusty acoustic guitar and Rodriguez’s easy yet eloquent
fiddle adornments and sensual vocals. For the most part the
lyrics hunch around the campfire of real human emotion most
comfortably. The title track travels a supremely laidback
path, allowing the near-whispered voices and deft, hushed
steel guitar full sway. Rodriguez and Taylor sound as if they
were born to do this together, and their songs are but a small
glimpse into their private world.
Jeff Monk |
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Poison
The Well
You Come
Before You
(Atlantic/Warner)
B
Website: www.poisonthewell.com
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As strange as the
Atlantic imprint looks on the spine of this CD, You Come Before
You is, thankfully, not far from what made Poison The Well
such an exciting band to listen to on its formative releases.
Trademark shifts between capital-H heavy and small-m melody
rule this disc from start to finish, making the record a qualified
slap in the face to those who give merit to hour-long debates
about a band’s right to a MAJOR LABEL CONTRACT. Longtime
observers of great bands swallowed whole by promises from
music industry eggheads should hope that this Florida five-piece
can survive the well-travelled path of bands that traded the
praise of over-engaged music fans for the stability of the
deep pockets majors can provide. Poison the Well opens for
AFI at the Convention Centre on Saturday, Oct. 11.
Sam Smith |
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The
Gay
You Know the Rules
(Mint)
B-
Website: www.mintrecs.com
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With a indie-supergroup
lineup (including members of Maow, Superconductor and Vancouver
Nights) and production by New Pornographer Kurt Dahle, you
know The Gay’s full-length debut will at least be decent.
In places, the Vancouver band is sort of New Pornographers
lite: a little lighter on melodies, a little lighter on personality
– and none of the band’s four female vocalists
quite have the appeal of Neko Case. But the group lives up
to the “fun” in its “funpop” self-description:
There are heavy doses of whimsy – such as the back-and-forth
falsetto chanting of “Robert” on Robert Smith
– and the chipper five-part harmonies on tunes like
Bed of Tines are like a wry sugar-shock to the heart. Despite
the adroit songwriting, however, The Gay never really rises
above its coy and sparkly sound. Ah well, at least it’s
a tasty ride.
Melissa Martin |
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The
Parkas
Now This is Fighting
(Endearing)
B+
Website: www.endearing.com
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The debut CD from
London, Ont.’s Parkas opens with a rather respectable
pop-rock bang – and then upholds that precedent for
much of the rest of the album. On the surface, they’re
yet another indie-rock outfit playing on watered-down ’70s
sensibilities mixed with jangly, stripped-down rock rhythms,
but the Parkas deliver an album that is entirely more than
the sum of its parts. Opening with the delightful Bus Station
Blues and Giants in My Field, the band delves into dirty country
vibes on My Life of Crime. If the album has a few calling
cards, they would be the delightfully frisky melodies and
crunchy rhythms. Big, fat organ on The Art of Complication
and a delicate piano opening on the gospel-inspired Every
Light is Red add greater texture, offsetting the down-South
guitar noodling of the other tracks.
Melissa Martin |
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Steve
Earle
Just An American Boy: The Audio
Documentary
(E Squared/Artemis)
A
Website: www.steveearle.com |
If you haven’t
got tickets for next Tuesday’s show at the Cummings
Theatre then buy this live album and get the next best thing
– 94 minutes of the outspoken politics and compelling
poetry that have characterized Earle’s gritty, post-rehab
career. Since weaning himself from the needle and the damage
done in the mid-’90s, this hardcore troubadour has become
the most politically charged American musician of his generation,
using his stage as a pulpit to vigorously rail against injustice,
American imperialism and moral hypocrisy. He takes on the
big topics in songs such as Amerika v. 6.0 (The Best We Can
Do), Billy Austin, John Walker’s Blues and Jerusalem,
and he delivers them with a rough-hewn, rootsy sensibility
that incorporates elements of bluegrass, country, blues, folk
and, of course, amp-buzzin’ rock ’n’ roll.
A bonus is his son Justin’s first recorded tune, a half-decent
ballad called Time You Waste.
John Kendle |
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Lederhosen
Lucil
Tales from the Pantry
(Hypo Recordings)
B
Website: www.lederhosenlucil.com
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It sounds like the
definition of a novelty act: woman dresses up in blond braids
and lederhosen and sings songs about ganglions and chocolate,
accompanied by the cheesiest of Yamaha keyboards and canned
drum beats. Oh, and some of those songs are in French. Or
German. Indeed, Tales from the Pantry would be doomed to Weird
Al-ville if it weren’t for the fact that Lucil, aka
Krista Muir, is such a whiz with the new wave kitschy-cool
melodies. Like a Black Forest Vav Jungle, the Montreal performer
blends robot-rock, cocktail swankiness, irreverent lyrics
and more than a smidgen of self-mockery into something that’s
novel, but not a mere novelty. Lederhosen Lucil opens for
Kid Koala at the Pyramid Cabaret on Tuesday, Oct. 14.
Jill Wilson |
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