(click to enlarge)
Not my work, this is taken from this month's Wire magazine, and it's the first review of Joanna Newsom's triple EP Have One on Me that I've seen anywhere.
Showing posts with label Not My Album Reviews. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Not My Album Reviews. Show all posts
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Not My Album Review: Joanna Newsom - Have One on Me
(click to enlarge)
Not my work, this is taken from this month's Wire magazine, and it's the first review of Joanna Newsom's triple EP Have One on Me that I've seen anywhere.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Not My Review: Drive-By Truckers - The Big To Do
The band's official bio has been updated for the new album, The Big To Do, and is worth a read. Here it is in full...
The Big To-Do (ATO Records)
Release date: March 16, 2010
It seems simplest to understand Patterson Hood as the director and/or producer of low-budget films, which is maybe what he thought he was doing when this all started. Each is released in record album form under the name Drive-By Truckers and features a closely held assortment of friends and combatants.
Ten of those, so far, going back to 1998's Gangstabilly, plus two more under Hood's own name, have delighted the critics and enthralled fans. Each release filled with carefully told, fiercely rendered short subjects. Cinematic songs. Not Ed Wood films, by the way. More…well, did you see John McNaughton's Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer? Or, perhaps better, their friend Ray McKinnon's short, The Accountant?
The new one, the one we're meant to enjoy just now, is called The Big To-Do and ushers in a new relationship with ATO. And it offers up the curious, abiding peace which only great rock can still bring.
Which is not to say that Hood and his long-time fellow-travelers - Mike Cooley (vocals and guitars), along with Brad Morgan (drums), Shonna Tucker (vocals and bass), John Neff (extra guitars, as if there could be such a thing), Jay Gonzalez (keyboards) and studio facilitator David Barbe - travel only on the darkest side of the street. But they do know the road tolerably well.
Well-traveled, they have become a family band: Patterson has a new son, and a daughter; Cooley (nobody calls him Mike) has a trio of little ones, both men betraying more optimism than their songs might hint at. They took most of 2009 off from the road, in part because there was a child on the way and in part because Patterson ended up finishing their last tour on the sidelines with pleurisy. Dog sick. Way worse than hungover.
Somewhat to their surprise they've stumbled into a stable ensemble - not that the Truckers have been anything like Savoy Brown - which confuses even Patterson. "I've loved all the different line-ups, at various times," he says with genuine affection. "They've all had their special things they've done. But this time it seems like our possibilities go a lot further, because there's no drama, no bullshit, and everyone seems really glad to be there all the time. Which is a nice thing. And we really just work well together."
Well, it is suggested, it's about time.
"Yeah, no kidding. That Alabama thing, man."
You have to grow out of doing everything through conflict, right?
"Yeah, no kidding. And…I fortunately don't feel like I have to get divorced again to write a decent song. Thank god."
The Big To-Do was recorded in three concentrated sessions during the first part of 2009: ten days in January, five days in March, ten days in May. That added up to 25 songs, a dozen of which sequenced into The Big To-Do. "We had it mixed, mastered, and completely done, and Cooley wrote the best song that just needed to be on it," Patterson says with his raspy chuckle. This happens a lot with the Truckers, and it's always a good sign. "So we went back in and recorded, mixed, and mastered 'Birthday Boy' pretty much in one fell swoop." Thirteen songs, then.
The balance of the remaining tracks, plus five more they've cut in the interim, will make up the Truckers' next album, which Patterson projects as a quieter affair.
This is, in large part, possible because the Truckers have such a long-standing relationship with David Barbe (ex-Sugar, etc.) and the Athens, GA, studio he calls Chase Park Transduction, which long ago Patterson helped to build so as to earn the right to record there.
"It's gotten to where, that day of set-up time to get sounds and levels and all of that takes us about two hours," Patterson says. "We can pretty much walk in the door, and we know exactly where to put everything to get that sound, so that's just one less thing to have to think about. I wanted to eliminate the distractions."
That clarity of purpose translates into a delicious assortment of Trucker songs themed loosely around crime and (self-) punishment. "The Wig He Made Her Wear," Patterson says, is both a true story (as seen on Court TV) and the closest he's come to making the movie he started out to make a decade or more back. "The Fourth Night of My Drinking" will speak for itself, and "This Fucking Job" (paired thematically with Cooley's wry "Get Downtown") is arguably the most political song the Truckers have made since "Living Bubba." Which leaves the deceptive, airy simplicity of Shonna Tucker's "You Got Another" and "(It's gonna Be) I Told You So" to reckon with.
"We always knew she had that in her," Patterson says, delighted with the emergence of another strong songwriter in the band. "It was never a secret. She was writing songs all along. But watching it come out has been a really amazing thing to behold."
Off the road, incidentally, didn't mean out of work. First off, there was the matter of cutting an instrumental album with the legendary Booker T, having previously served as the backing band to the equally legendary soul singer, Bettye Lavette. Potato Hole turned out all right, got a Grammy nod, and Neil Young added his touches separately even though it's pretty much a Truckers effort. But it's what they learned making Potato Hole that counts most.
"I think doing the Booker album really, really paid off a lot on the musical end of this record, even though stylistically it might not sound anything like that record," says Patterson, and then tells the story.
"We made that record in four days, and that included the first day when it was, 'Booker, it's wonderful to meet you!' Maybe the third song we tracked just wasn't going the way he wanted it to go. We weren't quite understanding what he wanted. We were playing it right, but it wasn't right. All the sudden he just stopped the session. He gathered us around, and he told us a story about a Thanksgiving dinner, and the way it smelt in the house, he'd been on the road a long time, and they were all in - cousins and aunts he hadn't seen in several years. He said, 'It's just a day where nothing happens, but it's all really good.'
"And we sat down and we played it, and we nailed it. It was like a revelation. We're a lyric-driven band, and our songs generally paint scenes and tell stories based on scenes. He instinctively knew that was how we operated. And I think it taught us a lot about how we operated. Going in and making this record, I could tell a real difference in the way the songs hold up musically. We put a little more care into that side of it than I think we ever did before because of what we learned from him."
As for the movie Patterson started writing all those years ago, well, he's no closer to being done with it. "That might just be part of the drive to the songs I'm writing," he admits. And brightens. "I placed a couple of songs in a movie that just came out, shot outside of Knoxville, called That Evening Sun. It's Hal Holbrook's new film, produced by Ray McKinnon."
And then he's off again, headed home to see his family and wondering if maybe Tom T. Hall needs a backing band. It's a beautiful thing to behold.
- Grant Alden
January 2010
Morehead, KY
The Big To-Do (ATO Records)
Release date: March 16, 2010
It seems simplest to understand Patterson Hood as the director and/or producer of low-budget films, which is maybe what he thought he was doing when this all started. Each is released in record album form under the name Drive-By Truckers and features a closely held assortment of friends and combatants.
Ten of those, so far, going back to 1998's Gangstabilly, plus two more under Hood's own name, have delighted the critics and enthralled fans. Each release filled with carefully told, fiercely rendered short subjects. Cinematic songs. Not Ed Wood films, by the way. More…well, did you see John McNaughton's Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer? Or, perhaps better, their friend Ray McKinnon's short, The Accountant?
The new one, the one we're meant to enjoy just now, is called The Big To-Do and ushers in a new relationship with ATO. And it offers up the curious, abiding peace which only great rock can still bring.
Which is not to say that Hood and his long-time fellow-travelers - Mike Cooley (vocals and guitars), along with Brad Morgan (drums), Shonna Tucker (vocals and bass), John Neff (extra guitars, as if there could be such a thing), Jay Gonzalez (keyboards) and studio facilitator David Barbe - travel only on the darkest side of the street. But they do know the road tolerably well.
Well-traveled, they have become a family band: Patterson has a new son, and a daughter; Cooley (nobody calls him Mike) has a trio of little ones, both men betraying more optimism than their songs might hint at. They took most of 2009 off from the road, in part because there was a child on the way and in part because Patterson ended up finishing their last tour on the sidelines with pleurisy. Dog sick. Way worse than hungover.
Somewhat to their surprise they've stumbled into a stable ensemble - not that the Truckers have been anything like Savoy Brown - which confuses even Patterson. "I've loved all the different line-ups, at various times," he says with genuine affection. "They've all had their special things they've done. But this time it seems like our possibilities go a lot further, because there's no drama, no bullshit, and everyone seems really glad to be there all the time. Which is a nice thing. And we really just work well together."
Well, it is suggested, it's about time.
"Yeah, no kidding. That Alabama thing, man."
You have to grow out of doing everything through conflict, right?
"Yeah, no kidding. And…I fortunately don't feel like I have to get divorced again to write a decent song. Thank god."
The Big To-Do was recorded in three concentrated sessions during the first part of 2009: ten days in January, five days in March, ten days in May. That added up to 25 songs, a dozen of which sequenced into The Big To-Do. "We had it mixed, mastered, and completely done, and Cooley wrote the best song that just needed to be on it," Patterson says with his raspy chuckle. This happens a lot with the Truckers, and it's always a good sign. "So we went back in and recorded, mixed, and mastered 'Birthday Boy' pretty much in one fell swoop." Thirteen songs, then.
The balance of the remaining tracks, plus five more they've cut in the interim, will make up the Truckers' next album, which Patterson projects as a quieter affair.
This is, in large part, possible because the Truckers have such a long-standing relationship with David Barbe (ex-Sugar, etc.) and the Athens, GA, studio he calls Chase Park Transduction, which long ago Patterson helped to build so as to earn the right to record there.
"It's gotten to where, that day of set-up time to get sounds and levels and all of that takes us about two hours," Patterson says. "We can pretty much walk in the door, and we know exactly where to put everything to get that sound, so that's just one less thing to have to think about. I wanted to eliminate the distractions."
That clarity of purpose translates into a delicious assortment of Trucker songs themed loosely around crime and (self-) punishment. "The Wig He Made Her Wear," Patterson says, is both a true story (as seen on Court TV) and the closest he's come to making the movie he started out to make a decade or more back. "The Fourth Night of My Drinking" will speak for itself, and "This Fucking Job" (paired thematically with Cooley's wry "Get Downtown") is arguably the most political song the Truckers have made since "Living Bubba." Which leaves the deceptive, airy simplicity of Shonna Tucker's "You Got Another" and "(It's gonna Be) I Told You So" to reckon with.
"We always knew she had that in her," Patterson says, delighted with the emergence of another strong songwriter in the band. "It was never a secret. She was writing songs all along. But watching it come out has been a really amazing thing to behold."
Off the road, incidentally, didn't mean out of work. First off, there was the matter of cutting an instrumental album with the legendary Booker T, having previously served as the backing band to the equally legendary soul singer, Bettye Lavette. Potato Hole turned out all right, got a Grammy nod, and Neil Young added his touches separately even though it's pretty much a Truckers effort. But it's what they learned making Potato Hole that counts most.
"I think doing the Booker album really, really paid off a lot on the musical end of this record, even though stylistically it might not sound anything like that record," says Patterson, and then tells the story.
"We made that record in four days, and that included the first day when it was, 'Booker, it's wonderful to meet you!' Maybe the third song we tracked just wasn't going the way he wanted it to go. We weren't quite understanding what he wanted. We were playing it right, but it wasn't right. All the sudden he just stopped the session. He gathered us around, and he told us a story about a Thanksgiving dinner, and the way it smelt in the house, he'd been on the road a long time, and they were all in - cousins and aunts he hadn't seen in several years. He said, 'It's just a day where nothing happens, but it's all really good.'
"And we sat down and we played it, and we nailed it. It was like a revelation. We're a lyric-driven band, and our songs generally paint scenes and tell stories based on scenes. He instinctively knew that was how we operated. And I think it taught us a lot about how we operated. Going in and making this record, I could tell a real difference in the way the songs hold up musically. We put a little more care into that side of it than I think we ever did before because of what we learned from him."
As for the movie Patterson started writing all those years ago, well, he's no closer to being done with it. "That might just be part of the drive to the songs I'm writing," he admits. And brightens. "I placed a couple of songs in a movie that just came out, shot outside of Knoxville, called That Evening Sun. It's Hal Holbrook's new film, produced by Ray McKinnon."
And then he's off again, headed home to see his family and wondering if maybe Tom T. Hall needs a backing band. It's a beautiful thing to behold.
- Grant Alden
January 2010
Morehead, KY
Friday, July 3, 2009
Watch: Duckworth Lewis Method - Tower Records
Today marks the Irish release date of the Duckworth Lewis Method's debut album. This is an album I've been really excited about, and I am delighted that this day has finally come. It's available in all the usual record shops, Road Records, Tower Records, HMV, all of them really. Speaking of Tower Records, the band performed a nice intimate gig to promote the album yesterday (Peter from 2uibestow was in attendance, lucky bugger) and went down a storm. The new album is also being very well received. Today's Times and Guardian in the UK have given it glowing reviews. I highly recommend you buy it. It's the album of the summer. Ashes or no ashes.
Watch The Duckworth Lewis Method instore at Dublin's Tower Records:
Watch The Duckworth Lewis Method instore at Dublin's Tower Records:
Friday, March 20, 2009
Album Preview: Bob Dylan - Together Through Life
Official cover for Bob Dylan's new album Together Through Life. Also a preview from this month's UNCUT magazine:
We now know that the new Bob Dylan album, which unexpectedly will be with us on April 27, is called Together Through Life. We know also that it was written and recorded quickly.
Dylan had been asked by the French film director Olivier Dahan, who made the Edith Piaf biopic, La Vie En Rose, which Dylan had apparently liked, to write some songs for his new movie, My Own Love Song. Dylan duly came up with a ballad called “Life Is Hard”, and was so inspired the next thing anyone knew he’d written nine more new songs and not long after that – bingo! – here’s Together Through Life in all its rowdy glory.
What’s it sound like? Well, early reports have hinted at a mix of Dylan’s beloved Chicago blues and the loping border country feel of, say, “Girl From The Red River Shore”, the latter courtesy of Los Lobos’ David Hidalgo, whose accordion features on every track, alongside Dylan’s formidable current touring band and as yet unidentified guest musicians.
Both musical elements are indeed here, brazenly matched on nearly ever track, Hidalgo either providing lyrical lilting counterpoint to the band’s hard driving blues muscle or flinging himself headlong into the fray with pumping riffs, as on the jumping “If You Ever Go To Houston” (“keep your hands in your pockets and your gun-belts tied”).
The broad template for much of the album would appear to be, let’s say, “Thunder On the Mountain” and “Rollin’ And Tumblin’” from Modern Times, but in truth these tracks are, overall, much punchier, a raucous edge to everything in sight. Only the noble “Life Is Hard” is in the crooning style of something like “Beyond The Horizon” and even here there’s a ragged edge to things that wasn’t apparent on Modern Times, a rawness – emotional and musical – that separates it from that album and its immediate predecessors, “Love And Theft” and Time Out Of Mind.
Together In Life gets in your face immediately – with the wallop of the cheerfully-titled “Beyond Here Lies Nothin’”, which is driven by spectacular drumming and massed horns, a trumpet prominently featured – and over the course of its 10 tracks doesn’t back off, doesn’t appear to even think about doing so, Dylan’s voice throughout an unfettered roar, a splendid growl.
The album broadly is preoccupied with themes of mortality, lost love, grief, the passing of time, memory, waning days and lonely nights. The mood of these songs, however, couldn’t be more different to the mordant reflection of, for instance, “Not Dark Yet”. Together Through Life is a rowdy gut-bucket, by turns angry, funny, sassy, Dylan heading noisily in the direction of that last good night.
“My Wife’s Home Town”, “Shake Mama Shake” and the stingingly ironic “It’s All Good” – an hilariously-wrought litany of personal and national woe – are all eventfully robust, heartily defiant.
“Forgetful Heart”, meanwhile, is set to a measured stalking beat that recalls “Ain't Talkin'”, while the cantina drift of “This Dream Of You”, with accordion and fiddle taking lead instrumental spots, is fleetingly reminiscent of the first version of “Mississippi” on last year’s Tell-Tale Signs. Elsewhere, there may be things about “Feel A Change Coming On” that will remind you of “Workingman’s Blues”.
On first listen, then, a great album that when it comes out and goes on repeat will get better and better.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Review: Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit in Rolling Stone Magazine
Scan of Rolling Stone's review of the new self-titled Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit album:
3 Stars? You've got to be kidding me... There's not even anything half-negative in that review.
3 Stars? You've got to be kidding me... There's not even anything half-negative in that review.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Spork Review: Ryan Adams - Cardinology
Read my own review here: http://swearimnotpaul.blogspot.com/2008/10/album-review-ryan-adams-cardinals.html
First album review of Cardinology online. Taken from the Twisted Spork.
The new album by Ryan Adams is his most mature and restrained album to date. It is also his most lyrically ambitious. Take a song like “Cobwebs,” where it easy to mistake him for Jeff Buckley as he lets his voice swoop like never before bringing to life his metaphors and imagery. Or the following song, “Let Us Down Easy” which shows a lyrical sophistication that is unlike anything he’s done. It is reminiscent of Dylan’s Blood On The Tracks. There was a poetic clearheadedness about it that seemed to signal the beginning of a new era of songwriting for the artist. It did nothing to diminish the accomplishments of the past, or really to foretell the future, but it added another layer of complexity and value to his body of work. Adams’ resume is already pretty damned impressive, and anyone who dips into the unofficial world of his music quickly realizes that the albums are just the tip of the iceberg. He has to be one of the most prolific modern songwriters and miraculously little of it is crap. Listen to the beautiful ballad “Evergreen” and marvel at the fact that this is the same guy who produced punk albums, heavy metal manifestos, suicide anthems, Grateful Dead-inspired country rock and stabs at every other type of music imaginable. Now he seems content with an album of expertly crafted songs, played with great authority by his superb band the Cardinals. Through their non-stop touring and recording this band now plays with the sympathetic ears of a real band - not just a backing group. Perhaps that’s the secret to the title of the album. Ryan Adams has finally gotten himself into a place of health and productivity in an environment that allows him to realize his musical vision, whatever it is today. He has moved from death-wish prodigy to seasoned poet. Lucky for us.
Watch 'Fix It' in Syracuse:
First album review of Cardinology online. Taken from the Twisted Spork.
The new album by Ryan Adams is his most mature and restrained album to date. It is also his most lyrically ambitious. Take a song like “Cobwebs,” where it easy to mistake him for Jeff Buckley as he lets his voice swoop like never before bringing to life his metaphors and imagery. Or the following song, “Let Us Down Easy” which shows a lyrical sophistication that is unlike anything he’s done. It is reminiscent of Dylan’s Blood On The Tracks. There was a poetic clearheadedness about it that seemed to signal the beginning of a new era of songwriting for the artist. It did nothing to diminish the accomplishments of the past, or really to foretell the future, but it added another layer of complexity and value to his body of work. Adams’ resume is already pretty damned impressive, and anyone who dips into the unofficial world of his music quickly realizes that the albums are just the tip of the iceberg. He has to be one of the most prolific modern songwriters and miraculously little of it is crap. Listen to the beautiful ballad “Evergreen” and marvel at the fact that this is the same guy who produced punk albums, heavy metal manifestos, suicide anthems, Grateful Dead-inspired country rock and stabs at every other type of music imaginable. Now he seems content with an album of expertly crafted songs, played with great authority by his superb band the Cardinals. Through their non-stop touring and recording this band now plays with the sympathetic ears of a real band - not just a backing group. Perhaps that’s the secret to the title of the album. Ryan Adams has finally gotten himself into a place of health and productivity in an environment that allows him to realize his musical vision, whatever it is today. He has moved from death-wish prodigy to seasoned poet. Lucky for us.
Watch 'Fix It' in Syracuse:
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