Posted on the Sputnik Music Website on September 30:
I had it in my head that this was going to be kind of a throwaway album, but there's actually some pretty good stuff on here.
For the unfamiliar, They Might Be Giants are essentially the duo of John Flansburgh and John Linnell. In the mid-'80s, one of the ways they promoted themselves was by setting up "Dial-A-Song", where they would record a new song every day on their answering machine, and people could call in and listen to the song for free. Over the years, the Dial-A-Song service evolved, first into a website, and then into podcasts, until it was eventually discontinued in 2008.
In 2015, the TMBG announced they were reviving the Dial-A-Song service for a full year. Ultimately, the songs on the new service were released as three separate albums, Glean and Why? in 2015, and Phone Power in 2016.
I have to admit, I haven't listened to Glean or Why?, but when I was looking for some new music to check out earlier this year, I decided to give Phone Power a try. I'm glad I did.
There are 18 tracks on the album, and I'd be lying if I said all of them good. But I'd say that at least half of them are decent, and a few are excellent.
My favorite so far is a strange number called "Trouble Awful Devil Evil". This is a slow, dreamy song with sweet-voiced vocals and some weird electronic pulsing going on, as the protagonist describes blissfully sinking into a bottomless pit and falling for 10,000 years, all of the while remaining oblivious to an armageddon going on around him. And haven't we all been there?
Two other strong tracks are "ECNALUBMA" and "I Love You for Psychological Reasons". I'd describe both of them as being in the same classic TMBG style as their 1988 single "Anna Ng", where the individual lines of the chorus went on way longer than lines usually do, all the while slithering and twisting off into unexpected musical directions. "ECNALUBMA" describes the sudden destructive impulses felt by the singer at the birth of the title character of the song, who seems to be a sort of demon or elder god of some kind. As for "I Love You for Psychological Reasons", it could be about insanity. Or a psychologically abusive relationship. Or both. Or neither. I have no idea, as the lyrics wind along in a dizzyingly and maybe directionless fashion. The one thing I do know is that I like it.
There's also a speeded up and rockier alternate version of "Black Ops", a song originally recorded on the band's 2013 Nanobots album. I think this one benefits greatly from the speeded up pace.
As you can tell, the album abounds with examples of TMBG's strange sense of humor, as people go back in time to thwart one another's assassins (but not really), characters wear Yoda masks and talk like Lou Ferrigno at a convention, and shape shifters take over the planet.
They Might Be Giants has never been everyone's cup of tea. But if you've enjoyed their past material, you'll like them here too. Dial-A-Song or not, this is definitely not a throwaway album.
Rating: 3/5 stars
Sunday, October 9, 2016
Wednesday, September 28, 2016
Review of The Good Rats' "Tasty"
I posted this review on the Sputnik Music website this morning:
It's hard to believe today, but in the 1970s, Long Island had a vibrant original music scene. The legal drinking age was 18. The vehicle seizure laws for DWI arrests were decades away. MADD wasn't yet mad. SADD wasn't yet sad. Consequently, on a suburban island where everybody drives everywhere, there was a vibrant club scene for live music, with large clubs that would pack them in on the weekend, and sometimes even during the week. Out of this scene came bands like Twisted Sister and Zebra. And the kings of pack, standing a step above them all were The Good Rats.
For awhile, it seemed like The Rats were going to break it big nationally. The played venues like Madison Square Garden, The Nassau Coliseum, The Philadelphia Spectrum and even The Hammersmith Odeon in England, playing on the same bill and sometimes headlining for bands like Rush, Journey, Kiss, Meatloaf, Aerosmith and Ozzy Osborne, and all the while receiving FM airplay across the country.
Why they didn't make to the same heights as these other bands is unclear. Some have suggested that at some point, they ticked off the wrong record executives and got blackballed for it. Regardless, if you listen to the Good Rats' music, you hear a hard rock band that elegantly mixed in elements of jazz and blues, a band with strong musical fundamentals and a powerful vocalist who was also a sophisticated songwriter. And as most Rats fans will tell you, Tasty is the band's masterpiece.
Weighing in at 10 songs, the album is a lean, mean masterpiece. It showcases the band's best-known song, the quirky title number, which still gets a little airplay today on so-called classic rock stations, plus a number of other first-rate tracks.
"Tasty" is an atypical number for the Rats. It starts out quietly, as lead singer Peppi Marchello sings about how various ex-band members were replaced, such as the "flying guitar man" who was "going nowhere fast", or the "man named Crazy Ott" who "overplayed his bass a lot", each fired from the band because they couldn't play "tasty". As the song progresses, the tempo picks up as each of the current band members gets to show off their chops. It's kind of a novelty number, but a clever one. Although it's probably their most famous song, it's not the best one on the album.
There are at least 3 songs on Tasty that I'd rate as "excellent". The first is "Injun Joe", based on the Mark Twain character. This is a mid-tempo song that features a driving Native American drumbeat, some of Marchello's angriest lyrics (as the title character rails against society with lines like "I'm gonna take their black robes/I'm gonna wipe my waste on them,") and an excellent instrumental bridge that allows guitarist John "The Cat" Gatto and the rest of the band to shine.
Also top-notch is "Papa Poppa", a powerful rock number that laments the personal frailty of the younger generation who get drawn into things like religious cults because they "worship Mother Dear," even as they cry out for rescue: "Papa Poppa, where have you gone? ... Disciplinarian, where have you gone?"
Perhaps the best of all is Marchello's most autobiographical song, "The Songwriter". This song closes the album, and by the end of Marchello's career, it was also the song The Rats used to close almost all of their live shows. "The songwriter can make you laugh or cry," he sings. "He's pumping gas at night just to survive/And all he asks of you is to sing his songs/and put his name in lights where it belongs."
All of the other songs on Tasty are at least worthwhile. The basic sound is hard rock, but with some sophisticated embellishments, and a couple of unconventional numbers thrown in for good measure (besides the album's title track, there's a tongue-in-cheek song called "Fred Upstairs and Ginger Snappers" which sounds like a number from a 1930s dance film). Marchello's vocals are somewhere between Geddy Lee and Meatloaf, the songs feature strong two- and three-part harmonies throughout, and while Gatto's guitar playing stands out, the rest of the band (Mickey Marchello on rhythm guitar and vocals, Lenny Kotke on the bass and Joe Franco on drums) are no slouches either.
Peppi Marchello and The Good Rats may not have ultimately seen their name "in lights", but they were inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2008. Tasty was one of the reasons why. Hopefully some new listeners will give it a listen, and partake in some of the pleasure it's given Rats fans over the years.
Rating: 5/5 stars
Sneak peek: My next Sputnik review, hopefully in a week or so, will be of Memories of Love by Future Bible Heroes.
It's hard to believe today, but in the 1970s, Long Island had a vibrant original music scene. The legal drinking age was 18. The vehicle seizure laws for DWI arrests were decades away. MADD wasn't yet mad. SADD wasn't yet sad. Consequently, on a suburban island where everybody drives everywhere, there was a vibrant club scene for live music, with large clubs that would pack them in on the weekend, and sometimes even during the week. Out of this scene came bands like Twisted Sister and Zebra. And the kings of pack, standing a step above them all were The Good Rats.
For awhile, it seemed like The Rats were going to break it big nationally. The played venues like Madison Square Garden, The Nassau Coliseum, The Philadelphia Spectrum and even The Hammersmith Odeon in England, playing on the same bill and sometimes headlining for bands like Rush, Journey, Kiss, Meatloaf, Aerosmith and Ozzy Osborne, and all the while receiving FM airplay across the country.
Why they didn't make to the same heights as these other bands is unclear. Some have suggested that at some point, they ticked off the wrong record executives and got blackballed for it. Regardless, if you listen to the Good Rats' music, you hear a hard rock band that elegantly mixed in elements of jazz and blues, a band with strong musical fundamentals and a powerful vocalist who was also a sophisticated songwriter. And as most Rats fans will tell you, Tasty is the band's masterpiece.
Weighing in at 10 songs, the album is a lean, mean masterpiece. It showcases the band's best-known song, the quirky title number, which still gets a little airplay today on so-called classic rock stations, plus a number of other first-rate tracks.
"Tasty" is an atypical number for the Rats. It starts out quietly, as lead singer Peppi Marchello sings about how various ex-band members were replaced, such as the "flying guitar man" who was "going nowhere fast", or the "man named Crazy Ott" who "overplayed his bass a lot", each fired from the band because they couldn't play "tasty". As the song progresses, the tempo picks up as each of the current band members gets to show off their chops. It's kind of a novelty number, but a clever one. Although it's probably their most famous song, it's not the best one on the album.
There are at least 3 songs on Tasty that I'd rate as "excellent". The first is "Injun Joe", based on the Mark Twain character. This is a mid-tempo song that features a driving Native American drumbeat, some of Marchello's angriest lyrics (as the title character rails against society with lines like "I'm gonna take their black robes/I'm gonna wipe my waste on them,") and an excellent instrumental bridge that allows guitarist John "The Cat" Gatto and the rest of the band to shine.
Also top-notch is "Papa Poppa", a powerful rock number that laments the personal frailty of the younger generation who get drawn into things like religious cults because they "worship Mother Dear," even as they cry out for rescue: "Papa Poppa, where have you gone? ... Disciplinarian, where have you gone?"
Perhaps the best of all is Marchello's most autobiographical song, "The Songwriter". This song closes the album, and by the end of Marchello's career, it was also the song The Rats used to close almost all of their live shows. "The songwriter can make you laugh or cry," he sings. "He's pumping gas at night just to survive/And all he asks of you is to sing his songs/and put his name in lights where it belongs."
All of the other songs on Tasty are at least worthwhile. The basic sound is hard rock, but with some sophisticated embellishments, and a couple of unconventional numbers thrown in for good measure (besides the album's title track, there's a tongue-in-cheek song called "Fred Upstairs and Ginger Snappers" which sounds like a number from a 1930s dance film). Marchello's vocals are somewhere between Geddy Lee and Meatloaf, the songs feature strong two- and three-part harmonies throughout, and while Gatto's guitar playing stands out, the rest of the band (Mickey Marchello on rhythm guitar and vocals, Lenny Kotke on the bass and Joe Franco on drums) are no slouches either.
Peppi Marchello and The Good Rats may not have ultimately seen their name "in lights", but they were inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2008. Tasty was one of the reasons why. Hopefully some new listeners will give it a listen, and partake in some of the pleasure it's given Rats fans over the years.
Rating: 5/5 stars
Sneak peek: My next Sputnik review, hopefully in a week or so, will be of Memories of Love by Future Bible Heroes.
Tuesday, September 27, 2016
Review of Paul Kantner and Grace Slick's "Sunfighter"
One of the things I like about the Sputnik Music site is it gives me a chance to review some albums (old or otherwise), to expose them to some people who may never have heard them.
The first review I wrote for the site was for Paul Kantner and Grace Slick's 1971 album Sunfighter. I'm copying it for you here:
Sunfighter was released in 1971 by Paul Kantner and Grace Slick, a year before the dissolution of Jefferson Airplane and 3 years before the start of Jefferson Starship. For my money, it's stronger than anything they ever recorded with either of those two bands, a true unknown jewel of an album.
It starts right off with a bang with "Silver Spoon," Grace's ode to cannibalism, and how great is that? With lyrics like "Your mama told you never /To eat your friends up with your fingers and hands/But I say you ought to eat what you will/Shove it in your mouth any way that you can," this song grabs you right from the start and never lets go. I'd always assumed the song was a tongue-in-cheek critique of man's (or in this case, woman's) cruelty to man, but it turns out that Slick wrote this as a slap in the face to militant vegetarians. Regardless, the combination of a really superior Slick vocal, a piano line that holds the song together, and sprinklings of Papa John Creach's electric violin, makes this one of the two strongest tracks on the album.
The other is "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves," Kantner's nod to the feral life, wherein he imagines himself running through the hills at night with his pack while Gracie taunts him (and us) "I suppose you could yell at your dog/He'd be barking his face right back at you!" This song has a great slow guitar intro, then picks up the pace as the wolfpack launches into action.
There is also plenty of hippie chic and San Francisco psychedelia throughout the album, in songs like the title track "Sunfighter", a number that laments the destruction of the environment, and the beautiful rolling piano of "Million", a song about people coming together.
The album cover depicts two hands rising up out of the ocean and holding up a naked baby, who, in fact, was Kantner and Slick's daughter China Kantner. And although I think that their ode to her, "China" is actually one of the weaker tracks on the album, it's notable for the unfortunate first line"She'll suck on anything you give her," a lyric I'm sure the child really appreciated when she reached middle school. (Thanks a lot, Mom and Dad!)
"China" excepted, though, the album is generally first-rate, featuring most of the members of Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship playing on various tracks, plus guest musicians and vocalists like Jerry Garcia, David Crosby and Graham Nash. Even the two shortest numbers, "Diana" and "Diana 2" pack an impact, as they are both not only worthwhile odes to the Roman hunter goddess, but also social commentaries.
Paul Kantner passed away this past January, but Sunfighter is great example of some of his, and Grace Slick's, finest work. It's an album that captures the spirit of the early seventies and it's also just a great deal of musical fun. I recommend it to all listener's open to the sixties/seventies San Francisco sound.
Rating: 4.5/5 stars
It starts right off with a bang with "Silver Spoon," Grace's ode to cannibalism, and how great is that? With lyrics like "Your mama told you never /To eat your friends up with your fingers and hands/But I say you ought to eat what you will/Shove it in your mouth any way that you can," this song grabs you right from the start and never lets go. I'd always assumed the song was a tongue-in-cheek critique of man's (or in this case, woman's) cruelty to man, but it turns out that Slick wrote this as a slap in the face to militant vegetarians. Regardless, the combination of a really superior Slick vocal, a piano line that holds the song together, and sprinklings of Papa John Creach's electric violin, makes this one of the two strongest tracks on the album.
The other is "When I Was a Boy I Watched the Wolves," Kantner's nod to the feral life, wherein he imagines himself running through the hills at night with his pack while Gracie taunts him (and us) "I suppose you could yell at your dog/He'd be barking his face right back at you!" This song has a great slow guitar intro, then picks up the pace as the wolfpack launches into action.
There is also plenty of hippie chic and San Francisco psychedelia throughout the album, in songs like the title track "Sunfighter", a number that laments the destruction of the environment, and the beautiful rolling piano of "Million", a song about people coming together.
The album cover depicts two hands rising up out of the ocean and holding up a naked baby, who, in fact, was Kantner and Slick's daughter China Kantner. And although I think that their ode to her, "China" is actually one of the weaker tracks on the album, it's notable for the unfortunate first line"She'll suck on anything you give her," a lyric I'm sure the child really appreciated when she reached middle school. (Thanks a lot, Mom and Dad!)
"China" excepted, though, the album is generally first-rate, featuring most of the members of Jefferson Airplane/Jefferson Starship playing on various tracks, plus guest musicians and vocalists like Jerry Garcia, David Crosby and Graham Nash. Even the two shortest numbers, "Diana" and "Diana 2" pack an impact, as they are both not only worthwhile odes to the Roman hunter goddess, but also social commentaries.
Paul Kantner passed away this past January, but Sunfighter is great example of some of his, and Grace Slick's, finest work. It's an album that captures the spirit of the early seventies and it's also just a great deal of musical fun. I recommend it to all listener's open to the sixties/seventies San Francisco sound.
Rating: 4.5/5 stars
Late September, and I'm So Behind
You'd think that with me hardly working all summer, I'd be all caught up on my new-music listening, but it actually works the other way. I've gotten so used to doing my new-music listening in my car, driving to and from work, that when I'm not working I actually get further behind. So I'll be really lucky to even have my Best of 2016 lists done by March like I usually do. Pretty sad.
Best new stuff I've heard since my last post are the new Garbage CD, which didn't grab me at first, but then it grew on me, and new the CD by Tegan and Sarah, which is catchy, although I have to say it seems like more of the same from these two. I'm not complaining (maybe I am?) -- I like what they do, so more of it is OK. But it doesn't seem like they're challenging themselves (or their listeners) at all, so I don't know. I'm still sorting out my feelings about it.
Meanwhile, I've got so much new music for 2016 that I've decided (reluctantly) to toss the Nightwish album out of contention for the Best of 2016 stuff. I love the album, but it's really from 2015. Would have likely made my Top 10, though.
While I've had some downtime, I've been continuing to use the Sputnik Music site. It works kind of like Wikipedia -- it's user driven. So I've been updating webpages in some of the more neglected areas of the site, including their obscure '80s bands (like Haircut 100), their southern rock bands (Poco, anyone?), and their (God help me!) soft rock bands (think Christopher Cross. OK, don't). I've also added some obscure novelty bands, like Killer Pussy, the Sic Fucks, Total Coelo and The Chainsmokers.
One thing makes me kind of sad, though. The majority of the site's users seem to be college kids and twenty-somethings, and there are a lot of metal heads on there. It can be kind of cool in some ways. For example, someone recently created a list of their top 20 (or so) albums by Finnish Death Metal bands. Now, I wouldn't have thought you could even get 20 different Finnish Death Metal albums in the U.S., and I'll be damned if I don't check a couple of them out -- I'm all about experiencing new things. So the site can be very educational.
But interacting on the site has really driven home to me that no matter how much you love music, and how determined you are to stay up to date with new music, sooner or later, your tastes just become more peculiar to yourself, and it's just impossible to stay relevant to the music of today.
You'd have thought having kids would have taught me that, but I've always just figured that your kids have to hate your music whether they really do or not. It's automatic. They'd get kicked out of the union if they ever admitted they liked something you like.
But my interactions on the Sputnik site have driven home to me that it's just impossible for a 59-year-old man to hear music the same way a twenty-something does. When I listen to '70s music, I'm remembering when it was still new, but when they listen to '70s music, they hear it as oldies, something from the distant past. And I hear new music differently, too. I hear it through ears experiencing it in context with almost five decades worth of music listening, while they're hearing it almost fresh.
So even the new stuff I like is very different from what they like, and it's not true just of me vs. the metal kids, but even of me vs. the alternative kids. I liked last year's Sufjan Stevens album, for example. I thought it was quiet, with some moments of real beauty. But there was also something a little off-putting about it. I think because of the subject matter, there's an aspect of it that was unpleasant, sort of like having to visit a friend in the hospital.
But these kids love it! It was near the top of almost every Best of 2015 list I've seen on the site. And stuff that was simpler, but for me more enjoyable, like the new Matt and Kim album, is kind of looked down on there. The number one alternative album of 2016 on Sputnik Music so far is the new one from Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, a band I've just never been able to drum up enough interest in to even check out.
I don't know. Maybe this is just particular to the users of this site. But I've noticed that even on YouTube, reviewers I like such as John of ARTV review a lot of stuff I like, but he hears it way differently than I do. And I have the uncomfortable feeling that a lot of what I'm hearing as cutting-edge pop rock, they're hearing as (gulp!) generic soft rock.
Basically, I think what I'm saying is I just can't get these damned kids off of my lawn!
Ah, what do they know? I think it's really that my taste is right, and theirs is underdeveloped. At least, that what's I'm going to keep telling myself.
***
On a completely different subject, I recently watched The Eurythmics' Peacetour concert DVD, and I thought it was first-rate. It inspired me to go and listen to their Peace CD, an album I never gave that much attention too. Unfortunately, the results for that were mixed. The first half of the album is excellent, but the last third or so is kind of boring. I do recommend that concert DVD, though. It features the best of the Peace album, plus a bunch of their classics. And Annie Lennox was in fine voice that night.
***
Anyway, I have to go take some Geritol and wring out my Depends.
Later, guys.
Best new stuff I've heard since my last post are the new Garbage CD, which didn't grab me at first, but then it grew on me, and new the CD by Tegan and Sarah, which is catchy, although I have to say it seems like more of the same from these two. I'm not complaining (maybe I am?) -- I like what they do, so more of it is OK. But it doesn't seem like they're challenging themselves (or their listeners) at all, so I don't know. I'm still sorting out my feelings about it.
Meanwhile, I've got so much new music for 2016 that I've decided (reluctantly) to toss the Nightwish album out of contention for the Best of 2016 stuff. I love the album, but it's really from 2015. Would have likely made my Top 10, though.
While I've had some downtime, I've been continuing to use the Sputnik Music site. It works kind of like Wikipedia -- it's user driven. So I've been updating webpages in some of the more neglected areas of the site, including their obscure '80s bands (like Haircut 100), their southern rock bands (Poco, anyone?), and their (God help me!) soft rock bands (think Christopher Cross. OK, don't). I've also added some obscure novelty bands, like Killer Pussy, the Sic Fucks, Total Coelo and The Chainsmokers.
One thing makes me kind of sad, though. The majority of the site's users seem to be college kids and twenty-somethings, and there are a lot of metal heads on there. It can be kind of cool in some ways. For example, someone recently created a list of their top 20 (or so) albums by Finnish Death Metal bands. Now, I wouldn't have thought you could even get 20 different Finnish Death Metal albums in the U.S., and I'll be damned if I don't check a couple of them out -- I'm all about experiencing new things. So the site can be very educational.
But interacting on the site has really driven home to me that no matter how much you love music, and how determined you are to stay up to date with new music, sooner or later, your tastes just become more peculiar to yourself, and it's just impossible to stay relevant to the music of today.
You'd have thought having kids would have taught me that, but I've always just figured that your kids have to hate your music whether they really do or not. It's automatic. They'd get kicked out of the union if they ever admitted they liked something you like.
But my interactions on the Sputnik site have driven home to me that it's just impossible for a 59-year-old man to hear music the same way a twenty-something does. When I listen to '70s music, I'm remembering when it was still new, but when they listen to '70s music, they hear it as oldies, something from the distant past. And I hear new music differently, too. I hear it through ears experiencing it in context with almost five decades worth of music listening, while they're hearing it almost fresh.
So even the new stuff I like is very different from what they like, and it's not true just of me vs. the metal kids, but even of me vs. the alternative kids. I liked last year's Sufjan Stevens album, for example. I thought it was quiet, with some moments of real beauty. But there was also something a little off-putting about it. I think because of the subject matter, there's an aspect of it that was unpleasant, sort of like having to visit a friend in the hospital.
But these kids love it! It was near the top of almost every Best of 2015 list I've seen on the site. And stuff that was simpler, but for me more enjoyable, like the new Matt and Kim album, is kind of looked down on there. The number one alternative album of 2016 on Sputnik Music so far is the new one from Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, a band I've just never been able to drum up enough interest in to even check out.
I don't know. Maybe this is just particular to the users of this site. But I've noticed that even on YouTube, reviewers I like such as John of ARTV review a lot of stuff I like, but he hears it way differently than I do. And I have the uncomfortable feeling that a lot of what I'm hearing as cutting-edge pop rock, they're hearing as (gulp!) generic soft rock.
Basically, I think what I'm saying is I just can't get these damned kids off of my lawn!
Ah, what do they know? I think it's really that my taste is right, and theirs is underdeveloped. At least, that what's I'm going to keep telling myself.
***
On a completely different subject, I recently watched The Eurythmics' Peacetour concert DVD, and I thought it was first-rate. It inspired me to go and listen to their Peace CD, an album I never gave that much attention too. Unfortunately, the results for that were mixed. The first half of the album is excellent, but the last third or so is kind of boring. I do recommend that concert DVD, though. It features the best of the Peace album, plus a bunch of their classics. And Annie Lennox was in fine voice that night.
***
Anyway, I have to go take some Geritol and wring out my Depends.
Later, guys.
Tuesday, August 30, 2016
Sputnik Music
So I've actually had more going on on the written webpage musicwise than I've had either viewing or listening to music. My latest passion is a webpage called Sputnik Music at www.sputnikmusic.com. It's not new, but it is new to me.
I've been looking for a decent site for new alternative music, and this one is pretty good. I read Pitchfork, but I find that I completely disagree with their taste -- albums that they say are great I usually find so-so, and invariably new albums I love are either not reviewed or given mediocre-to-negative ratings.
I like Sputnik Music largely because it's a little like Wikipedia -- it has a staff, but it's largely viewer maintained. Community members have the opportunity to write reviews and rate albums they like (or don't like). Members also have the ability to add albums to the site, and while there's a concentration on new music, they cover music going back to the '60s.
I've been adding artists previously missing from the site, like The Good Rats, Priory and Antigone Rising, and adding missing albums for bands like Future Bible Heroes and Quarterflash.
I'll probably put some reviews up for a few of the artists I've been working on. The site has been running a little slow for the last few days, though, so I'll wait until it gets up to speed.
These days, there are a couple of ways I find new music. I subscribe to Alternative Press, which is a little punk- and hardcore-heavy for my taste, but I usually find some interesting bands there. I also find good stuff on the satellite radio station Alt Nation (which Denise subscribes to), and on the Music Choice Alternative channel on my cable TV. And I keep up with new releases on Amazon.com, especially releases from bands I've already heard good stuff from in the past. (I really miss the annual Good Times Long Island Music Festival as a means of finding new local bands, though, although I do still find some interesting local bands in Good Times).
In the meantime, I've finally got some tickets for some upcoming live shows to look forward to, but I'll wait to post them until after the fact (so you don't all rob my house).
I missed out on the recent Twenty One Pilots show at Madison Square Garden. Denise bought tickets for the kids, but I passed because I wasn't that familiar with the band. Then, after she bought the tickets, I got to hear their "Heathens" song from the Suicide Squad soundtrack and decided I really liked it. Oh well. You snooze, you lose. (I also missed out on Mutemath as the opening act because we didn't know they were part of the show until D. and the kids got there). Anyway, they all loved the concert, although they didn't love having to stand for an hour and a half on the LIRR all the way home. So boo, LIRR. You guys suck.
Best CDs of the year that I'm enjoying so far are the self-titled album from Andy Black (otherwise known as Andy Bierstock of Black Veil Brides fame), and the new full-length album by promising young Poughkeepsie band Against the Current.
'Til next time ...
I've been looking for a decent site for new alternative music, and this one is pretty good. I read Pitchfork, but I find that I completely disagree with their taste -- albums that they say are great I usually find so-so, and invariably new albums I love are either not reviewed or given mediocre-to-negative ratings.
I like Sputnik Music largely because it's a little like Wikipedia -- it has a staff, but it's largely viewer maintained. Community members have the opportunity to write reviews and rate albums they like (or don't like). Members also have the ability to add albums to the site, and while there's a concentration on new music, they cover music going back to the '60s.
I've been adding artists previously missing from the site, like The Good Rats, Priory and Antigone Rising, and adding missing albums for bands like Future Bible Heroes and Quarterflash.
I'll probably put some reviews up for a few of the artists I've been working on. The site has been running a little slow for the last few days, though, so I'll wait until it gets up to speed.
These days, there are a couple of ways I find new music. I subscribe to Alternative Press, which is a little punk- and hardcore-heavy for my taste, but I usually find some interesting bands there. I also find good stuff on the satellite radio station Alt Nation (which Denise subscribes to), and on the Music Choice Alternative channel on my cable TV. And I keep up with new releases on Amazon.com, especially releases from bands I've already heard good stuff from in the past. (I really miss the annual Good Times Long Island Music Festival as a means of finding new local bands, though, although I do still find some interesting local bands in Good Times).
In the meantime, I've finally got some tickets for some upcoming live shows to look forward to, but I'll wait to post them until after the fact (so you don't all rob my house).
I missed out on the recent Twenty One Pilots show at Madison Square Garden. Denise bought tickets for the kids, but I passed because I wasn't that familiar with the band. Then, after she bought the tickets, I got to hear their "Heathens" song from the Suicide Squad soundtrack and decided I really liked it. Oh well. You snooze, you lose. (I also missed out on Mutemath as the opening act because we didn't know they were part of the show until D. and the kids got there). Anyway, they all loved the concert, although they didn't love having to stand for an hour and a half on the LIRR all the way home. So boo, LIRR. You guys suck.
Best CDs of the year that I'm enjoying so far are the self-titled album from Andy Black (otherwise known as Andy Bierstock of Black Veil Brides fame), and the new full-length album by promising young Poughkeepsie band Against the Current.
'Til next time ...
Tuesday, August 16, 2016
The Astonishing
Before I start, one quick correction to my last post: When I listed upcoming albums by Long Island artists, I listed one by Jack's Waterfall. Actually, the album, Tribal Dance Party, was put out by a different Jack Licitra project, White Spider. Both the White Spider CD and most of the CDs by Jack's Waterfall are available on what is probably the best site out there for independent artists' music, CD Baby.
***
Today I'm going to talk about an album that won't reach my Top Ten this year, which is unfortunate because it might well be the most ambitious project of the year. I'm talking about The Astonishing, a 2-CD rock opera by the Long Island progressive rock band Dream Theater. Why am I writing about an album that won't reach my Top Ten? Mostly because it's a project where the band aimed for the stars, and I respect them for that, even if they fell short.
I've put a lot of work into listening to this album, maybe even more than I normally do. My usual process for a new CD is this: I put four new CDs out in my car at a time, and play them through in rotation four times each. When I have a double album project, I generally put the first disc and the second disc in two different groups, so one rotation of CDs isn't overly dominated by any one band. (It keeps my ears fresh). When I've done this, I replace the CDs in my car with a new group, then bring the old CDs in and listen to them twice more with headphones. For this set of listens, I'll listen to the various discs of a multi-disc album together. Finally, I pick my top songs for each CD and listen to them again in order of preference. (This not only gives me a pretty good grasp of a new album, it also lets me create a list of top songs for the year to work from when I pick my Top 20 Songs.) For The Astonishing, I also read the plot synopsis on Wikipedia to make sure I understood it, and when I listened with headphones, I did so while reading along the lyrics provided in the CD's booklet.
OCD, anyone?
As you might expect from a band like Dream Theater, this is a complex piece of music. They wrote it inspired by the great rock opera's like Tommy, and by television and film epics such as Game of Thrones and the Star Wars saga. So what's the verdict? Sadly, it's mixed.
For one thing, on those first listens, I couldn't make heads or tails of the plot. Now this isn't damning in and of itself. It's been many years since those first few times I listened to Tommy, but I suspect I didn't understand the plot without lyrics sheet then either.
Briefly, here's the story: The opera is set in a dystopian future, where society is run by a tyrant, and the general population has forgotten music. Their only entertainment is provided by floating electronic noise machines. In the far part of the empire, a man has arisen who is named by the people as their savior because he brings the gift of music. This chosen one falls in love, and is loved in return by the emperor's daughter. This daughter is accidentally killed, but with an assist from the people who were inspired by him, the hero, Gabriel, sings his lover back to life. The Emperor sees the error of his ways, the noise machines are turned off, and the people look forward to a brighter future.
So the plot is a little bit sappy. And it seems even more so, because too many of the characters have names that describe their personalities -- the Emperor is called Nefaryus (nefarious, get it?!), while his daughter is named Faythe (faith, get it!?), and Gabriel's brother, the head of the rebel army is Arhys (Aries, get it!?). This problem is underscored by the fact that most of songs involving Faythe just emphasize this corniness -- "Act of Faythe," "The Faythe That Divides" and "Losing Faythe." Barf.
Now the album has garnered mostly positive reviews, many of them particularly praising the vocals of James LaBrie, who provides the vox for the entire double album. Apparently, LaBrie worked extra hard to develop and differentiate between the different characters. Unfortunately (again), I found his performance to be one of the weaknesses of the album.
For starters, I think LaBrie is a decent vocalist -- his voice is strong, and it's not an unpleasant voice -- it doesn't make you want to reach for the dial to turn him off. However, his voice just isn't interesting enough to make you want to listen to him without a break through an entire double album's worth of music. It might seem unfair to compare The Awakening to an all-time great album like Tommy, but that's what they were shooting for, so that's what I'm measuring them by. And not only does LaBrie's voice lack the beauty of Roger Daltry's, but The Who also sprinkled in the vocals of Pete Townshend and John Entwistle to keep the sound fresh and interesting.
And hard as LaBrie might have worked to try to differentiate between characters, on those first few listens when I wasn't reading along with the script, I couldn't distinguish between many of the songs sung by Gabriel and those sung by Faythe, and I especially couldn't pick apart when he was singing the villanous and/or warlike roles of Nefaryus, Arhys and Nefaryus's son Daryus. Which leads to another problem, namely that the vocals for these roles were often unpleasant precisely because they emphasized the villainy and/or aggressive nature of these roles.
I feel bad making these criticisms. There's a lot to like here. Some of the music is beautiful, and it's certainly complicated and ambitious. I applaud the band for shooting so high, and I applaud LaBrie for the effort he clearly put into the work, even when it wasn't always successful. And I will admit that when I listened while reading along, I found The Astonishing more enjoyable. I've developed an affection for the work, and it's definitely worthwhile enough that I'd jump at the chance to see the band perform it live. Ultimately, though, I found the band's previous eponymous album more satisfying. And the bottom line is I have to admit that when the two discs were in my car rotation, I found that I wasn't looking forward to their turn coming up -- I was more excited to hear less ambitious CDs like the new Santana album or the new Miike Snow CD.
***
While I'm on the subject of progressive rock, one of the concert DVDs I picked up recently was a performance of Rick Wakeman's Journey to the Centre of the Earth, from a 1975 concert in Melbourne, Australia, with the accompaniment of the Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestra.
I remember as a teenager being thrilled by the CD version of Journey. In a time of ambitious projects like Emerson, Lake & Palmer's version of Pictures at an Exhibition, Tomita's Snowflakes Are Dancing and Wakeman's own Six Wives of Henry VIII, I thought this composition raised classical-based rock music to a new height, and maybe even raised Wakeman to the heights of Bach and Mozart.
Again, I was a teenager.
Watching it now, I have to admit there are times that the work is cringeworthily pretentious, particularly during the narrative segments. Nevertheless, there's still a lot to enjoy and admire here.
The concert includes an entire performance of Journey, plus segments on Wakeman's other two top-selling albums, Six Wives and The Myths and Legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. While Six Wives of Henry VIII is probably the Wakeman piece held in the highest esteem these days, I've always thought King Arthur was his finest work, and the excerpts from that record ("Merlin" and especially "Guinivere") were the highlights of the show.
The performance isn't note perfect. Wakeman, wearing his traditional white glittery robe, flubs some notes here and there, and the band wasn't always in perfect sync with the orchestra. Nevertheless, if you're a fan of progressive rock in general and Rick Wakeman in particular, this DVD will surely bring a smile to your face. And there are some extras here, as most of the band was brought back together to talk about the tour.
***
Today I'm going to talk about an album that won't reach my Top Ten this year, which is unfortunate because it might well be the most ambitious project of the year. I'm talking about The Astonishing, a 2-CD rock opera by the Long Island progressive rock band Dream Theater. Why am I writing about an album that won't reach my Top Ten? Mostly because it's a project where the band aimed for the stars, and I respect them for that, even if they fell short.
I've put a lot of work into listening to this album, maybe even more than I normally do. My usual process for a new CD is this: I put four new CDs out in my car at a time, and play them through in rotation four times each. When I have a double album project, I generally put the first disc and the second disc in two different groups, so one rotation of CDs isn't overly dominated by any one band. (It keeps my ears fresh). When I've done this, I replace the CDs in my car with a new group, then bring the old CDs in and listen to them twice more with headphones. For this set of listens, I'll listen to the various discs of a multi-disc album together. Finally, I pick my top songs for each CD and listen to them again in order of preference. (This not only gives me a pretty good grasp of a new album, it also lets me create a list of top songs for the year to work from when I pick my Top 20 Songs.) For The Astonishing, I also read the plot synopsis on Wikipedia to make sure I understood it, and when I listened with headphones, I did so while reading along the lyrics provided in the CD's booklet.
OCD, anyone?
As you might expect from a band like Dream Theater, this is a complex piece of music. They wrote it inspired by the great rock opera's like Tommy, and by television and film epics such as Game of Thrones and the Star Wars saga. So what's the verdict? Sadly, it's mixed.
For one thing, on those first listens, I couldn't make heads or tails of the plot. Now this isn't damning in and of itself. It's been many years since those first few times I listened to Tommy, but I suspect I didn't understand the plot without lyrics sheet then either.
Briefly, here's the story: The opera is set in a dystopian future, where society is run by a tyrant, and the general population has forgotten music. Their only entertainment is provided by floating electronic noise machines. In the far part of the empire, a man has arisen who is named by the people as their savior because he brings the gift of music. This chosen one falls in love, and is loved in return by the emperor's daughter. This daughter is accidentally killed, but with an assist from the people who were inspired by him, the hero, Gabriel, sings his lover back to life. The Emperor sees the error of his ways, the noise machines are turned off, and the people look forward to a brighter future.
So the plot is a little bit sappy. And it seems even more so, because too many of the characters have names that describe their personalities -- the Emperor is called Nefaryus (nefarious, get it?!), while his daughter is named Faythe (faith, get it!?), and Gabriel's brother, the head of the rebel army is Arhys (Aries, get it!?). This problem is underscored by the fact that most of songs involving Faythe just emphasize this corniness -- "Act of Faythe," "The Faythe That Divides" and "Losing Faythe." Barf.
Now the album has garnered mostly positive reviews, many of them particularly praising the vocals of James LaBrie, who provides the vox for the entire double album. Apparently, LaBrie worked extra hard to develop and differentiate between the different characters. Unfortunately (again), I found his performance to be one of the weaknesses of the album.
For starters, I think LaBrie is a decent vocalist -- his voice is strong, and it's not an unpleasant voice -- it doesn't make you want to reach for the dial to turn him off. However, his voice just isn't interesting enough to make you want to listen to him without a break through an entire double album's worth of music. It might seem unfair to compare The Awakening to an all-time great album like Tommy, but that's what they were shooting for, so that's what I'm measuring them by. And not only does LaBrie's voice lack the beauty of Roger Daltry's, but The Who also sprinkled in the vocals of Pete Townshend and John Entwistle to keep the sound fresh and interesting.
And hard as LaBrie might have worked to try to differentiate between characters, on those first few listens when I wasn't reading along with the script, I couldn't distinguish between many of the songs sung by Gabriel and those sung by Faythe, and I especially couldn't pick apart when he was singing the villanous and/or warlike roles of Nefaryus, Arhys and Nefaryus's son Daryus. Which leads to another problem, namely that the vocals for these roles were often unpleasant precisely because they emphasized the villainy and/or aggressive nature of these roles.
I feel bad making these criticisms. There's a lot to like here. Some of the music is beautiful, and it's certainly complicated and ambitious. I applaud the band for shooting so high, and I applaud LaBrie for the effort he clearly put into the work, even when it wasn't always successful. And I will admit that when I listened while reading along, I found The Astonishing more enjoyable. I've developed an affection for the work, and it's definitely worthwhile enough that I'd jump at the chance to see the band perform it live. Ultimately, though, I found the band's previous eponymous album more satisfying. And the bottom line is I have to admit that when the two discs were in my car rotation, I found that I wasn't looking forward to their turn coming up -- I was more excited to hear less ambitious CDs like the new Santana album or the new Miike Snow CD.
***
While I'm on the subject of progressive rock, one of the concert DVDs I picked up recently was a performance of Rick Wakeman's Journey to the Centre of the Earth, from a 1975 concert in Melbourne, Australia, with the accompaniment of the Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestra.
I remember as a teenager being thrilled by the CD version of Journey. In a time of ambitious projects like Emerson, Lake & Palmer's version of Pictures at an Exhibition, Tomita's Snowflakes Are Dancing and Wakeman's own Six Wives of Henry VIII, I thought this composition raised classical-based rock music to a new height, and maybe even raised Wakeman to the heights of Bach and Mozart.
Again, I was a teenager.
Watching it now, I have to admit there are times that the work is cringeworthily pretentious, particularly during the narrative segments. Nevertheless, there's still a lot to enjoy and admire here.
The concert includes an entire performance of Journey, plus segments on Wakeman's other two top-selling albums, Six Wives and The Myths and Legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. While Six Wives of Henry VIII is probably the Wakeman piece held in the highest esteem these days, I've always thought King Arthur was his finest work, and the excerpts from that record ("Merlin" and especially "Guinivere") were the highlights of the show.
The performance isn't note perfect. Wakeman, wearing his traditional white glittery robe, flubs some notes here and there, and the band wasn't always in perfect sync with the orchestra. Nevertheless, if you're a fan of progressive rock in general and Rick Wakeman in particular, this DVD will surely bring a smile to your face. And there are some extras here, as most of the band was brought back together to talk about the tour.
Sunday, July 17, 2016
New Year Half Done
Well, the "new" year is already more than halfway done, and I've slowly been starting to listen to some of this year's offerings.
First off, it's been nice to see that many of Long Island's local artists have been weighing in with their own contributions to the 2016 music banquet. The list of local acts who have come out with new CDs in 2016 includes Roger Silverberg, Rorie Kelly, Toby Walker, The Hitman Blues Band, Amanda Jayne, Jack's Waterfall, Miles to Dayton, Dream Theater and Nine Days. And national acts Taking Back Sunday and Bayside both have albums coming out within the next few months.
I'm slowly getting over my apathy from earlier in the year and starting to enjoy some of this year's music. I've been particularly impressed with the new Joy Formidable CD. This is a band whose previous two albums left me mostly underwhelmed. Much like Florence + The Machine, they've always had a few good cuts on each album, enough to keep me coming back, but not enough to move their CDs anywhere near my Top 10. This time, though, I think that's going to change. The CD is called Hitch, and I'm finding several of its tunes stuck in my head.
I'm also enjoying the new Gwen Stefani CD This Is What the Truth Feels Like. I'll be the first to admit it's sheer pop and musical empty calories, but what can I say? I like it.
Another album that's been blowing me away was really released in 2015, but I'm counting it as a 2016 release. I'm talking about the CD Endless Forms Most Beautiful by Finnish epic metal band Nightwish. What happened is I saw it on a list of upcoming releases for 2016, bought it, started enjoying it, then discovered that the original version of the album was released last year and the version I've been listening to was only listed as new because they added an all-instrumental version of the original disc to the package. But too bad, it's on my list of 2016 releases and I'm keeping it there.
Finally, for metal lovers, I'd also like to mention that both Anthrax and Megadeth have pretty strong new albums out for 2016.
In the meantime, I still haven't been out for any live music lately. Denise and I have some tickets for a few shows later in the year, but I never did find any summer shows that interested me enough to attend, at least none in venues I'm comfortable in.
Instead, I've continued scratching the live music itch as best I can by catching up on concert DVDs, mostly of my favorite bands of the '70s, '80s and '90s.
I've also seen a few classic concert videos I'd never caught before, including The Band's The Last Waltz, The Rolling Stones' Ladies and Gentlemen: The Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin's The Song Remains the Same. Of these three, I liked the Zeppelin DVD the best. Led Zeppelin has never been one of my top favorite bands, but the concert, taken from their Houses of the Holy tour, reminded me of the things I do like about them.
I few DVDs I particularly liked were U2's Under a Blood Red Sky and Procol Harum's Live at the Union Chapel. The U2 video was shot at an amazing concert venue, Red Rocks in Colorado, where the amphitheater is literally carved out of a mountainside, and it was filmed during a period of time where I think the band was at their strongest, in between my two favorite U2 albums, War and The Unforgettable Fire. The Procol Harum DVD was also shot in a unique venue, London's Union Chapel.
The best DVD I've watched recently, though, had to be Fleetwood Mac's The Dance. It catches the classic Fleetwood Mac lineup of Stevie Nicks, Lindsey Buckingham, Christine McVie, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood in top form from their 1997 reunion tour. This is pop rock at its finest.
For all of these classic concert videos, though, I admit I'm starting to get hungry again for some actual live music. Stay tuned.
First off, it's been nice to see that many of Long Island's local artists have been weighing in with their own contributions to the 2016 music banquet. The list of local acts who have come out with new CDs in 2016 includes Roger Silverberg, Rorie Kelly, Toby Walker, The Hitman Blues Band, Amanda Jayne, Jack's Waterfall, Miles to Dayton, Dream Theater and Nine Days. And national acts Taking Back Sunday and Bayside both have albums coming out within the next few months.
I'm slowly getting over my apathy from earlier in the year and starting to enjoy some of this year's music. I've been particularly impressed with the new Joy Formidable CD. This is a band whose previous two albums left me mostly underwhelmed. Much like Florence + The Machine, they've always had a few good cuts on each album, enough to keep me coming back, but not enough to move their CDs anywhere near my Top 10. This time, though, I think that's going to change. The CD is called Hitch, and I'm finding several of its tunes stuck in my head.
I'm also enjoying the new Gwen Stefani CD This Is What the Truth Feels Like. I'll be the first to admit it's sheer pop and musical empty calories, but what can I say? I like it.
Another album that's been blowing me away was really released in 2015, but I'm counting it as a 2016 release. I'm talking about the CD Endless Forms Most Beautiful by Finnish epic metal band Nightwish. What happened is I saw it on a list of upcoming releases for 2016, bought it, started enjoying it, then discovered that the original version of the album was released last year and the version I've been listening to was only listed as new because they added an all-instrumental version of the original disc to the package. But too bad, it's on my list of 2016 releases and I'm keeping it there.
Finally, for metal lovers, I'd also like to mention that both Anthrax and Megadeth have pretty strong new albums out for 2016.
In the meantime, I still haven't been out for any live music lately. Denise and I have some tickets for a few shows later in the year, but I never did find any summer shows that interested me enough to attend, at least none in venues I'm comfortable in.
Instead, I've continued scratching the live music itch as best I can by catching up on concert DVDs, mostly of my favorite bands of the '70s, '80s and '90s.
I've also seen a few classic concert videos I'd never caught before, including The Band's The Last Waltz, The Rolling Stones' Ladies and Gentlemen: The Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin's The Song Remains the Same. Of these three, I liked the Zeppelin DVD the best. Led Zeppelin has never been one of my top favorite bands, but the concert, taken from their Houses of the Holy tour, reminded me of the things I do like about them.
I few DVDs I particularly liked were U2's Under a Blood Red Sky and Procol Harum's Live at the Union Chapel. The U2 video was shot at an amazing concert venue, Red Rocks in Colorado, where the amphitheater is literally carved out of a mountainside, and it was filmed during a period of time where I think the band was at their strongest, in between my two favorite U2 albums, War and The Unforgettable Fire. The Procol Harum DVD was also shot in a unique venue, London's Union Chapel.
The best DVD I've watched recently, though, had to be Fleetwood Mac's The Dance. It catches the classic Fleetwood Mac lineup of Stevie Nicks, Lindsey Buckingham, Christine McVie, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood in top form from their 1997 reunion tour. This is pop rock at its finest.
For all of these classic concert videos, though, I admit I'm starting to get hungry again for some actual live music. Stay tuned.
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