Davenport Cabinet - Damned Renegades (2014)

Equal Vision Records ■ EVR295

Released September 30, 2014

Produced by Davenport Cabinet

 

Mixed by Mike Major

 

 

 

Side One:	Side Two:
41°15'22.0" N Everyone Surrounding Aneris Bulldozer In Orbit Sorry for Me	74°21'31.7" W Students of Disaster Damned Renegades Glass Balloon Missing Pieces Graves of the Great War

Thanks to the questionable choices of WordPress¹, I lost about two hours solid of writing on the initial draft of this, which left me irritated enough to just sit—writing irritated on something like this is a recipe for disaster.

Now, then.

It’s not for nothing that I restart a previously dormant project.  I’ve been mostly running things (in an entirely different style) at Meandering Milieu, covering more in the range of comics and movies than anything else. Music never really stops being an important part of my world, but this particular blog (as I noted in my review of the previous album by Davenport Cabinet) is not really suited to writing during full-fledged employment, as it takes a pretty hefty time investment to do it the justice I intend.

Why, then, is it being revived?

Well, a few weeks ago I was at a show and met Travis Stever of Davenport Cabinet. After some jokes passed around the circle², I mentioned that I’d written the “vinyl” review of Our Machine and Mr. Stever very amicably told me he’d liked it and asked me to let him know what I thought of the new album. In my head, there was a twinge: I’d recently fallen out of favour with the employment gods, and had not pre-ordered the album as I’d hoped, but figured I’d just drop a line when I got around to it. I thought it was kind to respond with memory, but figured the chances that my one rambling writing had struck enough of a chord to stick were pretty low and let it be (and enjoyed the show).

Turns out, I may’ve been mistaken, as I was prodded out of the blue with a very polite question about actually writing something on the new album—after a moment of stunned confusion and pancake-levels of flattery, I agreed and snagged a promotional copy. Turns out that, taking pity on my financial state, this particular album (in the ultra-fancy, all-the-bells-and-whistles bundle form) had been pre-ordered for me by my own mother (thanks, ma!), of which I was notified after I mentioned the shocking request. That, then, is how a not-vinyl promotional copy was reviewed on vinyl and photographed poorly above, should you be curious.

Now, I realize that with a context like this, it might seem as if I’ve either been buttered, or am aiming to do so myself. I can very, very strongly testify to the contrary: that two hours I lost was crushing. It takes a lot to put this particular approach together, and that informs, further, why it’s not at all fun to do for anything mediocre (or less!). Witha predecessor like Our Machine, though, it's not a huge gamble--it was in my Top 5 for the year last year—vacillating between two and three because I’m indecisive. These things together meant I was confident that doing this would be worthwhile to myself, anyone reading, and the band in question, with no questions about ethics (barring those who just can't resist)

It’s a set of coordinates on which we open the album: “41°15'22.0" N”. Deep, warm tones are interrupted and subsumed by sharp, distinct, clean guitar and the long-drawn bows of E’lissa Jones’s violin and viola. It's quiet and a bit sad, the guitars acting to counter the other strings, but only slightly--it's something truly weighty through which they press.

Snake-like muscular guitar starts “Everyone Surrounding”, with Michael Robert Hickey’s drums and Tom Farkas’s bass thudding beneath it, while additional guitar draws a web of suspension around that weight. Thanks to a comment from that same Hickey on a video for this very song, I know that the voices are Tyler Klose’s, multi-tracked. If the guitars’ undulations are snake-like, his voice is just riding the waves, until that chorus: “Don’t break down, don’t give it up, you got it/They were wrong about everything you wanted”, where his voice reaches high and chops to a rapid tempo, highlighting the space and lengthy syllables of the line that follows, which emphasizes the song’s title. Indeed, it is that line which finally closes the song, lowering as if defeated to ring for only a moment.

“Aneris” contrasts with the muscle of “Everyone Surrounding” by focusing its introduction on a distinctly picked melodic line. Hickey and Farkas then push the track out of this lazy swing with a thumping beat. The voices in verse are more in line with the feel of the guitars, even when set against that same thumping beat. But when they are kicked into the chorus by a perfect alternation of tom and kick thumps with cymbal and hat work, it hits the kind of chorus that is a lot of what I love about Davenport’s songs: “Talented with bringing the end/Maiden of structure music of minute hand/Broken circles will spin around again”. It’s complemented perfectly by Hickey’s percussive choices and skips along, zigging and zagging up and down in a delightful way. The bridge that follows its second run abandons that for bright, ringing guitar and shorter repetition: “She won’t leave She won’t let you fall/She won’t speak She is above it all”, which takes the instruments back through their first two progressions neatly and catchily, to their end.

Despite the title, “Bulldozer” spends much of its time rather restrained. The opening lacks restraint, in the best possible way: it has a tone that immediately makes me think of Davenport Cabinet as a sound, and, when I first heard it, brought a smile to my face as it confirmed that this was the same band, not a leap entirely away from what had already come. It’s warm and round, akin to a Jeff Lynne sound, though a bit more muted, which is such a wonderful touch that it’s difficult to express how good it just feels. The instruments seem to lead the voices around by their noses, until the words take control: “And never speak my name again to anyone”—the relaxed feel of the song is gone with Hickey pounding away (with a nice touch to the beat that stops it from being simple on-beats) under absolutely electric electric leads. The brakes are put on shortly, though: “And nothing can take you away from me”, returning the song to that tone. When the bridge begins and says, “Will we find a common ground?” I can only respond “Yes,” as the song itself finds a balance between the subdued introduction and the ever-increasing wave that leads to and through the chorus. A brief isolation of muted guitar introduces Scott Styles’s guest solo, which flies off into the stratosphere and perfectly meshes with the return to the tight curls of the chorus’s crescendo which gets one more run through, leaving us with a twinned set of guitar lines.

“In Orbit” lets Hickery veritably paradiddle his way through it, scaling things back and down with that snare focus underpinning a remote slide guitar lead that dips in and out around clean picking that is relatively low in the mix, letting Farkas’s most melodic bass-line drive the song more comfortably. The drums and vocals give the feeling of a sort of impromptu performance of musicians at a porch, or something of that ilk—which is only enhanced by the chorus, which is an excellent example of the harmonized vocals the band favours. It’s a bit of an odd mix: the slide is like something from space, but the rest of the track is utterly earthen. Though the former is not present, the bridge still manages to bring the sounds most completely together, culminating in a sharply toned and soulful lead line that marries the two elements for good.

As if still floating in orbit, slightly reverbed guitar sprinkles out notes in the darkness in "Sorry for Me", until a lead-in fill from Michael’s drums lights the fuse and the song charges out of the gate. Smooth and slickened slide runs up and down the track’s steady momentum, and then spreads open to a ringing chime—that guitar that was out in space just a few moments earlier. The chorus is falsetto call of the song's title for normal range answer—“Whenever the captors let me go”—and it actually lets the tempo breathe just a bit. It’s a good thing, as when it comes around again, it’s leading to a winding solo and lead from the guitars that Farkas anchors the hell out of and Hickey creatively backs. A kind of knowing repetition follows the final line, which is indeed heard over and over: “And I’m sorry again”, almost like a broken record, skipping and slowly diminishing to tremolo’d guitar lines that waver out, left to hang as most repeated apologies are. As I played the vinyl version for the first time, I sat hoping, avoiding confirmation, that this would end Side one—not because I wanted it to be over, but because it was the exact right way to end a side. And so I was right—whether by coincidence or agreed plans, I know not.

More coordinates open the second side of the album—“ 74°21'31.7" W”—and Michael Robert Hickey is left to really shine in his second job: that of string arranger. This time, there is no accompaniment from any rock instruments at all, just a woosh of space and quavering orchestral strings from Jones again, though this intro is yet more brief than the last.

If there was any concern about a relative hesitation to flat out rock on this album, “Students of Disaster” throws it out the window after giving it a good swift kick. Drums crash in and guitars thunder after them, harmonized through melodic leads held to a jolting stop by Farkas’s bass. This time, they don’t really relent for vocals, with even noodling guitar fills sneaking in here or there. While I associate Travis’s voice most strongly with the first time I recall hearing it in isolation—a cover of the Band’s version of “I Shall Be Released”, lending itself more toward folk-rock applications, then—this is where it shines out in its perfect place (recalling somewhat Fire Deuce!). Soaring up to carry the chorus through tinges of the nostalgia that has lingered in all recordings (including the first album, which references it explicitly), it’s almost forgotten when the solo kicks in, book-ended perfectly by runs of that almost operatic chorus. Those big ol’ down-strokes on the chunky riffing just frame the whole thing in great big drapes of rock, which is exactly what it goes out on.

Perhaps to balance out the in-your-face-ness of “Students of Disaster”,  the title track that follows is shimmering guitars and even bells, answered by an early Thin Lizzy-esque (we’re talking Vagabonds of the Western World at the latest, and moreso the eponymous debut or Shades of a Blue Orphanage) lead. With phrases like “bag of bones”, “bourbon on my breath” and a title like “Damned Renegades”, there’s a feeling of morose, cowboy campfire tones—enhanced by the Mariachi-like touch of Gabriel Jasmin’s trumpet. The most emphatically instrumental passage of the album is sandwiched in here, with a knotted guitar solo, increasingly plaintive calls from that horn, and stampeding drums—the only voices that follow are non-verbal.

When “Glass Balloon” first started, I thought all the impressions “Renegades” gave me might have been right: a collision of Thin Lizzy’s early sound with a later choice—the sudden up-turn of their “Cowboy Song” to barnstormer. But no, “Glass Balloon” is expertly placed, but independent. Perhaps my favourite of the straight riffs with a nice little hammer-on/off kick to it runs the tune, even when there’s a lead laid over it. Interesting vocal choices mark the brief moments before that riff returns: “But screaming…to fill the void/Speaking to carelessly until I was so ready to go”—that pregnant pause before “to fill the void” is one of those choices that looks weird in words, but sounds strangely right when sung. Hickey’s rampaging snare brings in a new movement: deep, sawing riffs and a trill of distant lead thud and thump up to a four-on-the-floor pounding, which only harmonized guitars can rescue us from the punishment of. A lightly phased refrain of “So ready to go” repeats over that awesome riff, with bending, screeching solo—and suddenly halts.

With that built-in sound of “penultimate track” we come to “Missing Pieces”. Acoustic chords and pointy—I think that’s a 12-string?—electric licks are the fanciest of decorations on the track. It’s more song than showcase, in the least denigrating sense possible.  Somber like the title track, but somewhat more hopeful, “Pieces” is a vent for what came just before, not lost for energy, but redirecting it to vocal performance and emoting the core. A quiet passage of bass and guitar marriage helps to enhance the relaxing feel of the song, which shifts the vocals to a distant place in the mix, slowly fading them out with the rest of the track.

“Graves of the Great War” is unquestionably a closer. Timpani rolls in with piano (courtesy of Hickey) and guitar on a slow, steady beat, a kind of dirge, almost. The insistence and power of Klose and Stever is abandoned in vocal, “Aaaahs” chant-like in the background. “We floated your way/There’s not a soul to save/Our journey/Your place” they call out, momentarily re-ignited as if to make the depths of this more clear. And then holy dear lord that guitar. It brings to mind Eddie Hazel, just a bit, to touch on some truly hallowed ground, and it doesn’t overstay its welcome or take it too far. It just spirals out there, emotional fireworks, and then lets the song roll out on its own, strings sweeping in over the beat to find another solo that is just as perfectly controlled and restrained (excellent work, gentlemen!).

---

The most important takeaway I had from this album was its progression from the previous: Nostalgia in Stereo was Travis working out on his own, Our Machine saw the addition of Tyler to give the nascent band an even clearer identity, and now, with the addition of a selected rhythm section (instead of take-what-comes, get-what-you-can as before) really makes itself known. This is the sound of a qualified band this time around. In a year that’s seen the return of Aphex Twin after a decade away, and Braid after even longer, the still-lit spark of a band growing and finding itself, while still retaining enough of its own seeds to be recognizable as progression rather than overhaul shows its worth. Balanced and weighted properly, with care in production, construction, movement, and placement—that’s something not always seen in general, and even less so in this day and age.

I’ve sat here after solid, straight-through listening and then careful dissection (twice, in an even mix of misfortune and fortune—the latter coming from listening again) to find only more to appreciate. This is going to end up somewhere near the top this year, which is no small feat at this point. I would not be surprised if it finally settles into place before all the rest. The way that every instrument, from drum to bass to guitar to vocal serves its purpose and never becomes rote or mechanical, beyond the respects in which a section demands it acquiesce for the “greater good”—an invigorating and heartening thing to hear.

Give the thing a spin, then another, then buy it (I know how you modern audiences work!) and play it some more. I suspect it’s only going to get better—whether “it” is this album, or this band.

¹Apparently, knowing that one “New Post” link fails to trigger auto-saving for a year and a half doesn’t encourage anyone to do anything. Even just remove the bloody link. That will teach me to be used to Blogger’s fully-functional auto-saving…

²”Circle” meaning “Coheed and Cambria”, which is who I was there to see, on a fancy-pants ticket I pre-ordered before becoming unexpectedly unemployed. It turns out I coincidentally share initials with his son! Craziness.

Number Eight: Jason Isbell - Southeastern (2013)

Southeastern Records ■ SER 9984

Released June 11, 2013

Produced by Dave Cobb

Side One:	Side Two:
Cover Me Up Stockholm Traveling Alone Elephant Flying Over Water Different Days	Live Oak Songs that She Sang in the Shower New South Wales Super 8 Yvette Relatively Easy

I suppose it's a given that I know Isbell from the Drive-By Truckers, but the truth is I got into them via 2008's Brighter Than Creation's Dark, which postdates both his final album with the band (2006's A Blessing and a Curse) and his debut solo record (2007's Sirens of the Ditch). This put me in the strange and seemingly unenviable position of liking a band in what was considered a reduced state; many felt they'd declined severely after his exit, even with the natural caveats for the remaining members. It made me--as such things do--wary of his solo work, as it doesn't give the greatest impression of anyone's fans to often couch that fandom in dismissal of something else.

Still, during a random bit of shopping in 2010, I ran into his second post-DBT album, the one which eponymously named his band the 400 Unit, and fell madly in love (after all, wariness is not cause for dismissal, either!) with it. Since then, of course, he has released, inbetween that and this, 2011's Here We Rest, still with the 400 Unit, and in post-or-mid-I'm-not-quite-sure start to sobriety. A lot of people prefer that record and this one, as I even found zero songs from that favourite four years ago in the last set I saw him play.

A lot of people called this one out around release as a pretty solid candidate for album of the year (the first I recall being someone I used to work with) and in principle I most definitely cannot disagree. Here We Rest felt a little more scattered to me than Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit--not weaker, mind you, just less focused. While Southeastern abandons a lot of the rock that drives that self-titled record (not all, though), it stays the course it chooses to perfectly to find any criticism in this.

Number Nine: Toro y Moi - Anything in Return (2013, of course)

Carpark Records ■ CAK77

Released January 16, 2013

Produced by Chaz Bundick

Engineered by Patrick Brown, Second Engineer Jorge Hernandez

Mixed by Patrick Brown and Chaz Bundick

Mastered by Joe Lambert

Side One:	Side Two:
Harm in Change Say That So Many Details	Rose Quartz Touch Cola

Side Three:	Side Four:
Studies High Living Grown Up Calls	Cake Day One Never Matter How's It Wrong

Toro y Moi came to me via the broadcast that is staff overhead selection at one of the music stores I frequent on longer trips--Lunchbox Records in Charlotte, NC. The album had been out for all of two months when I heard "Cake" playing there and decided to go with an instinct I'd previously experienced during my endless trips to CD Alley in Chapel Hill in years prior. I'd never heard of Toro y Moi, nothing new for me and my complete obliviousness to modern independent music, except as it filters in by chance or through the few friends who track it.

As it was the one I heard (a reasoning that also inspired the purchase of records like Tobacco's Maniac Meat and Youth Lagoon's The Year of Hibernation), it was the first one I purchased. Causers of This followed in April, and then it was the synchronicity of a work trip to Atlanta that led me to see Toro y Moi in concert in October last year. I picked up the rest of his albums, as well as a few odd singles and the 3x7" box set of bedroom recordings that was released as well. Still, Anything in Return is the one I return to most often.

At that show, Chaz was the closest thing I've seen to a superstar. Classixx opened for him (new to me, and worth checking out, as their Hanging Gardens could easily slip into an expanded top list for last year), but when he came out, it was unlike anything I'm used to in small venues or even large ones. There's a roar for bands, and everyone is often focused on vocalists, but the fact that Chaz does his albums "Prince-style" (in the impossible-to-read-in-the-LP notes, it mentions he performed the entire album alone) seemed to shift the tone, somehow. The crowd was larger, it was a different kind of music, a different kind of venue, but there was still something to it.

It's a bit strange, to be honest--not undeserved, but almost out of keeping with his music. He was first identified with the aptly-named "chillwave", one of those terms that seemed a flash-in-the-pan, but defiantly remains in use as many such things do, thanks to sheer bull-headedness. Unlike his earlier work, though, Anything is a lot more energetic. That said, the energy is of a subdued and extremely cool variety, in most slang senses of the world, and often even a bit of the metaphorical incarnation of the most "literal" use of the word.

So This Is the New Year...

Well, it's 2014.

Every year I seem to flutter into a new approach to how to write about music, as one of my driving instincts is to share music, but an audience that is attuned to such a thing is not something I've yet grasped how to acquire (indeed, most of my traffic--what isn't spam--is folks looking at something they already like). Of course, I understand--even my wide splatter of taste is informed more at random than it is by seeking out explicit and continual sources of new material, barring those cases where it comes as a by-product of what I'm doing otherwise, as is most readily seen in my affection for Nevermind the Buzzcocks and much of the music it exposed me to.

So, all I can do is type out words into the ether, maybe here and there actually clicking with someone, and maybe not. This format still seems logical to me, as it has that "hook" of the familiar, surrounded by things that aren't.

I may relax the alphabet, or otherwise change up the progression (as facing Album X, Y, or Z would often leave me faced with forced listening), but I think I'll stick with the overall theme of my own collection, unless I can again wrangle in some of my good friends to include their own thoughts.

What I think should start the year is a countdown of the top 10 albums--for me personally, of course, not necessarily as definitive answers--of 2013, as I own most of them on vinyl as well as CD. There's at least one exception, and that would be number ten, hence this very entry.

It skirts the line for me on a multi-medium purchase, but it's Neko Case's record from last year--I haven't got anything against it, obviously, but also no overriding instinct to double up on it, for whatever reason. I suppose, then, that's why it comes in at ten. I do, however, own all 9 of the others on vinyl, so if I can manage around work, you can look forward to them (or down on them, if you so choose!) over the next nine days.

Cheers to anyone still here to see this!

The Faint - Danse Macabre (2001)

Saddle Creek Records ■ LBJ 180

(Originally LBJ-37 on same label)

Released August 21, 2001

(This compilation released November 1, 2012)

Engineered and Produced by Mike Mogis and The Faint

Side One:	Side Two:
Agenda Suicide Glass Danse Total Job Let the Poison Spill from Your Throat Violent	Your Retro Career Melted Posed to Death The Conductor Ballad of a Paralyzed Citizen

Though it ended up one of the most brief hiatuses I've taken, early June's was instigated by a work-related trip to Council Bluffs, Iowa, which happens to be right next door to Omaha, Nebraska. I currently live in an area where there are barely handfuls of record stores for a good 60+ miles, so hitting a larger college town (like I myself used to live in) was a blessing and a curse: I flew back with a shoulder bag filled with vinyl, and a suitcase veritably lined with CDs. While there, I took occasion to visit the store that the Saddle Creek label operates there in their hometown, inspired more than anything by the associations it has with Cursive, a fellow fan of whom I discovered I was working with (who also shared a love for The Format and a handful of others--and ended up passing me a copy of Cursive's The Ugly Organ on green vinyl!). While I was in there, I did walk out with a copy of Cursive's I Am Gemini, having failed to pick it up already, and (rather amusingly) did finally get a copy of Whiskeytown's Strangers Almanac, an album by a band from the area I last lived in, but thought I should really pick up a record the label itself put out (I Am Gemini being on CD). The Ugly Organ wasn't there (and, as mentioned, I serendipitously acquired it later in the same trip anyway!), so I wandered about until I ran into this.

I remember around the time this album came out, the band was pretty darn hot around the internet, though I was still in my formative musical explorations. I did glance at them, but moved on before anything took hold, eventually picking a copy of the album up on CD many years later. When this edition was released, I first stumbled into the CD/DVD version last year, and suddenly realized I'd really missed something. That was what pushed me to add to it this vinyl version--it's actually the "deluxe edition" which contains not only a second 12" of bonus tracks (remixes and b-sides) but also that self-same 2xCD+DVD set I already have, albeit in far more inconvenient format for a portable medium.

When it originally came out, the record used a different cover, but the rights to use it were thoroughly rejected--even more than a decade later, which is why it continues to use the cover above. Though this new cover was used for the later pressings, for this deluxe reissue it was re-tinted in neon pink instead of its original blood red. It's a weird colour, very eye-catching, and actually feels more appropriate in a strange sort of way--though the red, black, and white colour scheme of the original issue fit nicely with the cynical overtones of the record and its goth-y vibe, the pink hits on the fact that those are not the whole, and it's a ridiculously danceable record (or so I would guess, being as I lack the skill at such activities, personally).

Donald Fagen - The Nightfly (1982)

Warner Bros. Records ■ 23696-1

Released October 29, 1982

Engineered by Roger Nichols (Chief), Daniel Lazerus (Overdubs)

Assistant Engineering by Wayne Yurgelun, Mike Morongell, Cheryl Smith, Robin Lane

Mastered by Bob Ludwig

"Note: The songs on this album represent certain fantasies that might have been entertained by a young man growing up in the remote suburbs of a northeastern city during the late fifties and early sixties, i.e., one of my general height, weight and build.

D.F."

Side One: Side Two: I.G.Y. Green Flower Street Ruby Baby Maxine New Frontier The Nightfly The Goodbye Look Walk Between Raindrops

While I definitively eschew any such categorizations as best I possibly can, I remain fascinated with the lines that are drawn around any work or artist to render it "untouchable" by certain groups. A work or an artist may be unmentionable to fit comfortably under the umbrella of "serious music fan" or "metalhead" or any of the other myriad communities associated with music--some very carefully defined, and others so loose as to be questionably meaningful. I like a lot of artists that cross those lines quite heavily--the first albums I ever owned mystify people to this day, and the first mix-tape I ever had made for me (by my father, partly from my requests, and partly from his own insertions) was a slew of Dr. Demento tracks from various decades and styles ("The Martian Hop", "The Cockroach That ate Cincinnatti", etc) mixed with Paul Revere and the Raiders ("Cherokee Nation"), the Coasters ("Poison Ivy", "Mother in Law", "Yakety Yak"), Tommy James and the Shondells ("Crimson & Clover", "Crystal Blue Persuasion"), and a few odd other tracks I'll occasionally recall out of the blue.

For a time in and around middle school, my taste remained confined by the distance I kept from my father's turntable and thus the questionable volume of music available to someone who didn't look to spend limited allowance-type funds on it. The local library had its share of odds and ends, and I checked some out from them here and there, but two in particular ended up sticking with me for quite a while, as my non-existent owned music meant whatever I had checked out was what I was listening to, short of hitting the radio. Those two albums were--bear with me now, and feel free to look back at other albums I reviewed (and thus own) and drop jaws or shake heads as needed--Billy Joel's Storm Front and Donald Fagen's Kamakiriad. These (and the few albums I would gradually purchase) were strangely important: listening to the same songs from each over and over would have been tiresome with the limited (and tedious) programming capabilities of my cheap (discman-style!) CD player at the time, so I ended up listening to both albums straight through many times.

Intermission V [End of "E" Part 1, Or: Intermission MCMXXVIII]

Ah, "E". If it isn't a big enough giveaway to see how uniform the image above is, it ought to be. Considering 5 of those are the same artist, 3 are another artist, 2 are one more artist...well, it's not really a shock how little there is. How many artists do you like that start with "E"?

Now, I did almost buy the new Electric Six album on vinyl when I saw them a week ago, and that would've made a difference to be sure. A Dave Edmunds album wouldn't be out of the question, either--heck, I've got plenty of Nick Lowe's Edmunds-infused albums, and Rockpile's Seconds of Pleasure, so it wouldn't be too surprising, either. Edsel's records were never released on vinyl, to be fair--though I sure as heck would not turn down their split with Jawbox. Some Brian Eno? Heck yeah. Eyedea & Abilities' By the Throat? Actually, may do that. I look at Bill Evans records pretty regularly, as I do at The Extra Lens (John Darnielle's non-Mountain Goats side project). I almost picked up a copy of Explosions in the Sky's Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Die, Those Who Tell the Truth Shall Live Forever.

But, all that aside, it's pretty well destined to be a pretty shortlisted letter all the same.

Man, to be honest, if I could get my hands on The Elephant Kashimashi's stuff on vinyl--those first two albums, or one of those singles...but, well, those are ridiculously difficult for an American with limited funds to get a hold of. Alas!

Alejandro Escovedo - Real Animal (2008)

Back Porch/Manhattan Records ■ 50999 5 824111 1 9

Released June 10, 2008

Produced and Mixed by Tony Visconti

Engineered by Mario McNulty

Assistant Engineering by Tim Price

Mastered by George Marino

Side One: Side Two: Always a Friend Chelsea Hotel '78 Sister Lost Soul Smoke Sensitive Boys People (We're Only Gonna Live So Long) Golden Bear Nuns Song Side Three: Side Four: Real as an Animal Hollywood Hills Swallows of San Juan Chip n' Tony Slow Down Falling in Love Again I Got a Right

I could completely obscure how I know the name Alejandro Escovedo, but that would really just be disingenuous, wouldn't it? Truth be told, he does a duet with one Ryan Adams on Whiskeytown's Strangers Almanac--one of my favourite records in the world--on a track called "Excuse Me While I Break My Own Heart Tonight". A snide reviewer once noted that Adams's music was inferior and a listener might be better off with Escovedo's, seemingly unaware of this connection or, I later found out, a bit of a friendship between the two. That interview was what really pushed me to check Escovedo out for himself: in it, Adams said Escovedo shared an "outsider's" perspective on love, being less defined by it than most and thus able to record it that much more acutely, in a strange way. He mentioned a song ("She Doesn't Live Here Anymore"), referencing it as astonishingly sad and evocative emotionally--which was something that appealed to me a lot in Adams's stuff, particularly that which he did with Whiskeytown.¹

I was out on a business trip in Iowa and Nebraska, which meant a lot of trips to the record stores in Omaha, where I found quite a few things of interest (to the point that I started to stress the space I'd quite deliberately left in my luggage for music to come back with me). One of those "things" was Real Animal: Escovedo's third-to-last album at the time (back in June this year), on sale and predating the CD I'd picked up just previously but not much listened to (2010's Street Songs of Love).

On Failures:

Well, I've successfully failed to maintain an entry a day, a week, and shortly a month, it seems. It's not for lack of interest--it's now for serious lack of time. I've usually got chunks of one filtering slowly into a draft stage, but I've got a lot on my plate at the moment. Now, you're most likely not reading regularly anyway--I don't think anyone does--and indeed have no reason for this to affect your reading one way or the other, be you familiar, unfamiliar, or accidentally present. It is, however, the state of things. I intend to write as much as I am able, that simply seems to be, unfortunately, not an awful lot. That my collection's growth outpaces my writing isn't helping, of course. Still, Alejandro Escovedo's Real Animal has been spinning off and on for a few weeks as I attempt to get that entry together.

Keep checking in, I haven't abandoned ship!

Emperor - Prometheus: The Discipline of Fire & Demise (2001)

Candlelight Records ■ Candle064LP

 

Released October 23, 2001

Produced by Ihsahn

Mixed by Thorbjorn Akkerhaugen and The Emperors
Mastered by Tom Kvalsvoll and The Emperors

Side One:	Side Two:
Eruption Depraved Empty The Prophet	The Tongue of Fire In the Wordless Chamber Grey He Who Sought Fire Thorns on My Grave

I've only touched on black metal here once before, and that was a rather curious and unique example of the genre. Diabolical Masquerade are not at the forefront of most minds when naming bands that fit the bill for the genre--more likely, you will hear Immortal, Mayhem, Burzum, Darkthrone--and Emperor.

I picked this album up from the sadly defunct store Musik Hut in Fayetteville, source of not only much of my metal from years past (on vinyl or otherwise) but also of my "black X" collection, and even a few other oddities indicative of how odd that store actually was. It was intended as a metal/punk/industrial store, but did carry plenty of other and "normal" stuff.

As with much of metal (other than Morbid Angel and Decapitated, and a handful of others)--such as At the Gates--even the classics (like Emperor here) were introduced to me by a single soul, to whom I tend to give credit for most of my metal awareness. He and I still talk metal now and then, of course, but also the odd other chunk of music, since neither of us is married to it in exclusivity.

Eels - Shootenanny! (2003)

 SpinArt Records ■ spart 128

 

Released June 2, 2003

Produced by E

Reorded and Mixed by Greg Collins; A4, A6 by Ryan Boesch
Additional Engineering by Greg Burns, Alicia Guadagno

Mastered by Bernie Grundman; A6 by Dan Hersch

Side One:	Side Two:
All in a Day's Work Saturday Morning Good Old Days Love of the Loveless Dirty Girl Agony	Rock Hard Times Restraining Order Blues Lone Wolf Wrong About Bobby Numbered Days Fashion Award Somebody Loves You

The list of artists I've so far covered that I've listened to longer than Eels is relatively short and largely composed of the least surprising artists for me to have known for a long period of time.¹ I actually made my way into Eels fandom on the cusp of my freshman year of college, at the suggestion of my then-girlfriend, who owned Daisies of the Galaxy (in its infamously, hilariously self-censored version) and Beautiful Freak, both of which I owned before too terribly long after that, alongside their two closest temporal relatives: 1998's Electro-Shock Blues and 2001's Souljacker, which was still the most recent album at the time. A year later, this album was released, and you can bet, by then, I was picking it up right around the release date.

My Eels records are--somewhat shockingly--apparently the most valuable records I own. I don't own a ton (the others are the 2x10" Electro-Shock Blues and the last album, Wonderful, Glorious on the same format, but in a different colour, as well as End Times with its "A Line in the Dirt" 7" companion), but people will apparently pay a lot for them. It's less that it's shocking for quality or popularity, and more for the fact that it has felt more like the Eels crowd is shrinking than growing, so why they would remain so expensive when the audience is (I think?) dwindling, I don't know. Still, right now the only vinyl copy of this record listed at any sites I'd ever check to see if I want to pick up a record I can't readily find² is at one of three sites, and they start from $125 US. Yowza! That's almost ten times what I paid for it a decade ago!

Echo and the Bunnymen - Crocodiles [US Release] (1980)

Sire/Korova Records ■ SRK 6096

Released July 18, 1980

Produced by The Chameleons (Bill Drummond, David Balfie) and Ian Broudie (Tracks A4, B1)
Engineered by Hugh Jones and Rod Houison (Tracks A4, B1)

Side One:	Side Two:
Going Up Do It Clean¹ Stars Are Stars Pride Monkeys Crocodiles	Rescue Villiers Terrace Read It in Books¹ Pictures on My Wall All That Jazz Happy Death Men

¹Not present on original UK release, but included on a bonus 7" with early pressings

While Paul Westerberg's strange "side solo act thing" Grandpaboy is still echoing through my head at the moment, a mild spur toward writing here has convinced me to take up the reins and launch in again, after a good many weeks of just not feeling it and not wanting to half-ass it instead. Of course, that kind of approach can occasionally work, but this is intended to be a joyful thing, not a chore, and everyone I know wasn't even keeping up after I started slipping more toward weekly entries, so it isn't as if I've left a relative gap for anyone paying attention (PS: if I have, you should probably tell me. If someone else is interested, there's far more reason to stick to doing this more regularly!)

When I think of post-punk, my first thought is still pretty consistently of Gang of Four. It's not fair, of course: one of the things I even like most myself is the insane variance of styles and approaches bands that appeals to me most about the genre (and its sometime-close relative, post-hardcore). Echo & the Bunnymen kind of exemplify one of the far bounds of what I think of--mostly because they aren't a sound I think of at all. Much like The Boomtown Rats or the Talking Heads and punk,¹ I'm aware of the classification and even the justifications, but I think of them more as popular, familiar, readily grasp-able bands. Mainstream or pop, even--not in that bizarre, disparaging sense most use those terms in now, just in the sense of more familiar instrumentation and song-writing, even if with a clear identity. I can't pin down what it is that makes my brain draw the lines where it does, except perhaps to say that here I think it's the dominance of Ian "Mac" McCulloch's voice, particularly over Will Sergeant's guitar, but that's just a guess, as it's an instinctive thing.

Intermission IV [End of "D" Part 1, Or: Intermission MCMXXVII]

It has been much slower than before--my last intermission (not counting John's little deviant one) was four months ago. It's been a busy year suddenly--two new jobs, and more hours at one of them than I had at the one I started with when this blog started six months ago, a trip out of town, a new turntable, and a variety of odd occurrences in their own little ways have had their effects on my ability to keep this thing up-to-date. Of course, the addition of many records to my collection as I find new stores, make trips, and feel a collector's passion ignited isn't helping either. You may even notice I have seven artists uncovered in that collage above, and only two of them are singles. Some (Dead Kennedys) I've been looking for, some I've known for a while, and some I've been meaning to look further into than I have--and one was part of my large purchase of records from the Arctic Rodeo label in Germany.

It's a bit of a weird letter, D. It does tend to include an awful lot of metal--dark and death alone start with "D" so it does kind of fall to reason, even if only one of those bears out in my own collection of records. I wouldn't be averse to a copy of Death's Symbolic or Dark Tranquility's The Gallery, but the former has only received narrow European pressings, and the latter is not unreasonable for the various 2xLP etched incarnations, but is a lesser desire. A little more Dead Kennedys would not go amiss (Plastic Surgery Disasters, perhaps--skipping the copy of Frankenchrist I once saw was silly of me), and I occasionally ponder copies of Depeche Mode's Black Celebration and Deep Purple's Fireball when I see them. I could easily rock some Dinosaur Jr. or happily a copy of The Dismemberment Plan's Emergency & I ($75 and up! Somewhat lower and I might be watching it...). I've had an eye on Doomtree's self-titled release for a while, after stupidly passing up on it when it was released. Finding either Drive Like Jehu album would be cool, too--especially snagging a copy of Yank Crime that includes the 7" it originally did!

E's a short letter, unsurprisingly, with a whopping four artists hiding in it, only one of which might be surprising to people who know me--or, at least, unfamiliar. It does happen to contain my most valuable record of all, though--at least, based on what people will apparently pay for a copy!

If you feel like it, take a vote on the first artist to appear under that letter's umbrella: Echo and the Bunnymen, who may, at this point, be most famous for "The Killing Moon", which was already a single, but was also featured in the theatrical cut of Donnie Darko.

Drive-By Truckers - Go-Go Boots (2011)

ATO Records ■ ATO 0093

Released February 15, 2011

Produced, Engineered, and Mixed by David Barbe

Mastered by Greg Calbi

Side One: Side Two: I Do Believe Go-Go Boots Dancin' Ricky Cartoon Gold Ray's Automatic Weapon Everybody Needs Love Assholes The Weakest Man Side Three: Side Four: Used to Be a Cop I Hear You Hummin' The Fireplace Poker Where's Eddie The Thanksgiving Filter Pulaski Mercy Buckets

I came in to the Drive-By Truckers at a curious time: I was still working at Borders, and participated in the (extremely limited--about five stores) testing for vinyl sales. It was around 2008-2009, and the selection was largely limited, leaving me unsure of what actually led to titles appearing there. Certainly, it was a store in the Southeast (although a unique town within the state and region), and the Truckers do not suffer the absence of a following there. It did lead to my very mild introduction to Ryan Adams, which has served me well, though I didn't actually do anything with it for years. I saw our copy of DBT's 2008 album Brighter Than Creation's Dark. The art by Wes Freed was intriguing, and the title, too--I was reluctant, as I was still overcoming a lot of my resistance to "twang" in music, and the band's name was a dead giveaway for containing just that. At some point, I gave in and did pick up a CD copy of that same album, and found myself falling for it rapidly.

It wasn't long before I was going to see the band and buy all their albums--indeed, in 2010 I saw them play two shows on two concurrent nights, which was quite an experience. But the curious time is something that involves knowing about the band's history--initially responsible for a pair of interesting but often thought to be somewhat "slight" early albums (Gangstabilly and Pizza Deliverance), they really broke through and into their own with 2001's Southern Rock Opera, which addressed some of the issues that would in some way typify the band as both people and a musical entity--the "holy three" of frontman Patterson Hood's childhood in Alabama: football, via Bear Bryant, race politics in George Wallace, and music in Lynyrd Skynyrd. Some overlap, some confusion, some mixed signals and messages, all adding up to "the duality of the Southern Thing" as Hood wrote on that album. After its release, Jason Isbell joined the band and they released their most acclaimed pair of albums: 2003's Decoration Day and 2004's The Dirty South. To this day, many clamour for Isbell (now solo and successful at it, as I will prove here later on) to rejoin, even if only in brief or for a tour, or what have you, but he left after A Blessing and a Curse in 2006--and that's where 2008's Brighter Than Creation's Dark came in.

Dr. John - Locked Down (2012)

Nonesuch Records ■ 530395-1

Released April 3, 2012

Produced by Dan Auerbach

Engineered by Collin Dupuis

Mixed by Dan Auerbach and Collin Dupuis

Mastered by Brian Lucey (Magic Garden Mastering)

Side One:	Side Two:
Locked Down Revolution Big Shot Ice Age Getaway	Kingdom of Izzness You Lie Eleggua My Children, My Angels God's Sure Good

I always end up with mixed feelings about projects like this. Are people going to only buy it because of Auerbach, not knowing the good Doctor? Is the Night Tripper going to be lost behind the black fuzz of Auerbach, despite playing his very own keys? Does any of that matter at all?

I don't have an answer to any of those, especially the last question. I, myself, bought the album because of both of them. I've been into the works of Mac "Dr. John" Rebennack for years now--somewhere around college I piled him in with Leon Russell and Todd Rundgren--the solo artists from (approximately) the 70s who had hits, but ended up enjoying more "visibility" (audibility and not visibility, I should say...) in the works of others--Rundgren as a producer, Russell as songwriter and session man, and Dr. John as a muppet¹. More to the point, their sounds were unusual--but not so unusual as to be in the range of post-punk's occasional peculiarities or any similarly "extreme" experimentation. Nice home-brews of sound, reflecting personal musical pasts, cultural and regional ones, or some mix of both.

Brian Eno and David Byrne: My Life in the Bush of Ghosts

Written by guest editor, John Edge.

Sire Records ■ SRK 6093

Released in February, 1981

Produced by Brian Eno and David Byrne
Engineered by Neal Teeman, Eddie Kervin, Dave Jerden, Stacy Baird, and John Potoker
Mastered by Greg Calbi

Side One:	Side Two:
American is Waiting Mea Culpa Regiment Help Me Somebody The Jezebel Spirit	Qu'ran Moonlight in Glory The Carrier A Secret Life Come With Us Mountain of Needles

Voices:

Side One:

1. Unidentified indignant radio host, San Francisco, April 1980.
2. Inflamed caller and smooth politician replying, both unidentified. Radio call-in show, New York City, July 1979.
3. Dunya Yusin, Lebanese mountain singer. (From 'The Human Voice in the World of Islam', Tangent Records TGS 131).
4. Reverend Paul Morton, broadcast sermon, New Orleans, June 1980.
5. Unidentified exorcist, New York City, September, 1980.

Side Two:

1. Algerian Muslims chanting the Qu'ran. (Same source as 3).
2. The Moving Star Hall Singers, Sea Islands, Georgia (from 'The Moving Star Hall Singers' Folkways FS 3841).
3. Dunya Yusin (See 3).
4. Samira Tewfik, Egyptian popular singer (from 'Les Plus Grandes Artistes du Monde Arabe' EMI Records.)
5. Unidentified radio evangelist, San Francisco, April 1980.

Hey, everybody!  I made it back.  Didn't drink too much scotch (mixed it up with a little gin, a Fitzgerald cocktail, to be exact).

Anyway, you may have noticed a bit more information up there than is the usual.  That's because this album is a bit different from most (rock, at least) records.  All of the vocal sounds (I dare not say vocals) are sampled from various sources.  At the time of its release, this was a radical move and, in retrospect, was a pioneering one.  This makes for an interesting contrast to my Flipper review, where the lyrics were on the spot.  My Life has no real lyrics to speak of.  In fact, nearly half of the songs (Regiment, Qu'ran, The Carrier, and A Secret Life) are in Arabic¹.  Some that are in English (Mea Culpa in particular) are so heavily edited and modified, that they may as well be in a foreign language.  But, this is a record where the voices are part of the music, rather than cutting through it or floating above it.  The spoken parts add to the mix of instruments (and quite a mix it was, Help Me Somebody featured 14 different instruments allotted their own tracks in the mix) and sustain or even lead the rhythm of the tracks.

Day Whatever - Flipper, Album Generic Flipper

Written by guest editor, John Edge.

Subterranean Records ■ SUB 25

Released in April, 1982

Produced by Gary Krimon

Side One:	Side Two:
"Ever" (Loose) - 2:56 "Life Is Cheap" (Loose) - 3:55 "Shed No Tears" (Shatter) - 4:26 "(I Saw You) Shine" (Shatter) - 8:31	"The Way of the World" (Shatter) - 4:23  "Life" (Shatter) - 4:44 "Nothing" (Loose) - 2:18 "Living for the Depression" (Ant/Loose) - 1:23 "Sex Bomb" (Shatter) - 7:48

Or perhaps the album title is Album and the band name is Generic Flipper.  Who cares?

Anyway, RC roped me into writing these dopey record reviews which I really don't have time for.  I've got a full time job, a kid, and all kinds of other shit begging for my time.  But whatever, I've had a particularly hard day at work and have about five brain cells to work on, so now's the perfect time to write a review. 

This is one of those great punk albums I really cut my teeth on as a teenager.  The sludginess, the depressing/uplifting lyrics, the general us vs them attitude all made me think I wasn't the only one who thought and felt that way.  Seem cliche?  Give me a break, we were all teenagers once and I was a damn good one.  Anyway, this album still stands lyrically as the closest to my personal worldview as any other I've ever heard in the intervening years.  

A little background on Flipper (the band, not the insufferable show): In the early eighties, punk rock bands and especially the offshoot hardcore groups were ratcheting up tempos and honing their sound to razor sharp clarity and tonality, Flipper hazily veered off in the complete opposite direction.  Their sound is mired in a drug fueled stupor. Flipper's songs take the breakneck hardcore of Black Flag, Dead Kennedys, and Minor Threat and slow it to a slug's pace.  Maybe they loved Sabbath?  Maybe they were just not good enough to play fast?  Or maybe they were just the perfect foil to Minor Threat: slow, sludgy, long songs, gleefully drunk and fucked up on all sorts of chemical entertainments.  They have two bassists.  That's all you really need to know.