Album Review: Wilco — “Wilco (The Album)”

It’s ironic that as the U.S. collectively shits the bed, Wilco — the band that built a career on articulating modern American angst — hasn’t sounded this upbeat in a decade. Coupled with the feather-light Sky Blue Sky, Wilcologists may call this the group’s “rose period.” You could also call it what it is: frontman Jeff Tweedy is pretty much through making grand statements in favor of jamming out with his band. Unfortunately, said jams — and (The Album) as a whole — just can’t compete with their best work.

Things get off to a promising start with the deliciously meta “Wilco (The Song),” and the epic “One Wing” and murder-fantasy “Bull Black Nova” are obvious highlights. But not even a Feist cameo can save the pleasant-but-limp “You and I,” and the rest of the album kills time between catchy dad-rock (scolding lyrics like “Come on, children, you’re acting like children” are, like, the definition of dad-rock) and songs that are good-enough yet ultimately forgettable. The band that once successfully tried breaking our hearts with cross-genre experiments has seemingly settled for a smoother road, but at least Tweedy — who famously struggled with panic attacks and pill addiction — sounds happy. The guys in Wilco are no longer killing themselves to reinvent the wheel; they’re simply content to enjoy the rest of the ride.

(Read my 2007 review of Wilco’s Sky Blue Sky after the jump.)

Album Review: Regina Spektor — “far”

Since being “discovered” by the Strokes in the early 2000s, Regina
Spektor’s been polishing her act for the mainstream. The end result is far, a surprisingly dull record featuring almost none of the playfully whacked, creative gusto that was, up until now, her trademark. The rough edges Spektor once proudly flaunted have been sanded down by no less than four (!) producers, and while there’s an occasional bright spot (the moody “Genius Next Door,” the bouyant “The Calculation”), much of the record resorts to the kind of preachy pop treacle she used to be the antithesis of. (She does mimic a dolphin during “Folding Chair,” but it just doesn’t feel the same. Sigh.)

Music bloggers roasted Spektor when her Begin to Hope track “Fidelity” made an appearance on scrubs-opera Grey’s Anatomy, but at the time I wrote it off as a happy convergence of art and commerce. But far sounds too much like rom-com fishing. Note to ReSpekt: if you don’t want people to think you’re writing songs for Grey’s, don’t start one with “No one laughs at God in a hospital.”

I never meant to do you harm

It’s been a while since I’ve posted an illustration to the blog, but this one — Coldplay frontman Chris Martin grinning through the whacks he’s taken by music critics — seemed decent enough to trot out.

I was a Coldplay fan when they released their debut, Parachutes (which is still a good album) — back when I was really, really into bands from the UK. Just when I was interested in listening to quieter, more contemplative music after an alt-rock hangover, Coldplay was there to provide the soundtrack. And then, they got popular. Really popular. I was totally excited to hear sophomore outing A Rush of Blood to the Head, and it struck a nice balance between their humble acoustic roots and their “rock band” ambitions. They lost me around X&Y, though — too much “biggest band in the world” posturing and not enough substance, or even memorable songs.

I was torn on their last release, Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends (read my June 2008 review after the jump) but I didn’t outright hate on it like the “asshole” music critics targeted by Current freelancer Abbie Kopf in this week’s issue. (At least, I don’t think so.) Anyway, it’s a great breakdown on the breakdown between the critical community and a band that just wants everyone to sing along. Check it out.

Album Review: God Help the Girl — “God Help the Girl”

Stuart Murdoch, Belle & Sebastian’s master storyteller, conceived the musical God Help the Girl sometime around 2004. Five years later, Murdoch’s still working out the details (like, um, a screenplay), but that didn’t stop him from finishing the soundtrack. Murdoch auditioned vocalists from both sides of the Atlantic in search of the perfect voices for his lovelorn, misfit (yet ironically always gorgeous) characters and hit the twee jackpot with Catherine Ireton (who plays Eve, the titular girl in need of divine intervention). Ireton’s strong yet feather-light voice admirably carries the record, a collection of well-crafted songs that recall B&S’s simpler, string-filled early days while paying homage to ’60s girl groups and old-school musicals.

There are a few kinks, though: Brittany Stallings’s showy rendition of “Funny Little Frog” is more American Idol than American Bandstand, and Murdoch teeters on the line between clever and corny until he inevitably stumbles on a few lyrical clunkers (see “Pretty Eve in the Tub”). Eve wishes that “life could be musical comedy,” but it seems Murdoch has been living one all along. We should be grateful to be let in on his latest head-movie — even if its runtime is only 45 minutes.

Album Review: Dirty Projectors — “Bitte Orca”

Bitte Orca is a strange creature. The Dirty Projectors’ newest is like some kind of awkward yet beautiful bird, seemingly incapable of flight due to its Frankensteinian anatomy (displaced rhythms, off-kilter guitar picking, stretched-out vocal harmonies, and then there’s frontman/zookeeper Dave Longstreth’s voice — so pinched and trembling it sounds like affectation). And yet, the album soars anyway, high on its own joyful weirdness. It helps that, unlike previous (even weirder) DP releases, Orca finds Longstreth turning his plethora of musical ideas into actual songs before hitting “record” — handclappy opener “Cannibal Resource” and pseudo-dance-rocker “Stillness Is the Move” even have sections that resemble choruses. Exquisite acoustic ballad “Two Doves” courts convention even harder but is a much-appreciated (and flat-out lovely) mid-album breather before Longstreth looses his menagerie again. Obtuse yet oddly inviting, Bitte Orca may be tough to catch up to — even after repeat listens — but it’s a fun chase anyway.

Album Review: Grizzly Bear — “Veckatimest”

From the first jazzy chords of kinetic album opener “Southern Point,” Grizzly Bear has a spring in its step — the kind of sly self-possession that signals the group knows something you don’t (and not just the proper pronunciation of Veckatimest). Their confidence isn’t unfounded: This isn’t just the Brooklyn band’s finest record to date; it’s one of the top releases of the year. Co-frontmen Ed Droste and Daniel Rossen have proven to be students of the Lennon/McCartney tradition, with Rossen providing the album’s sharpest moments (“While You Wait for the Others”) and Droste providing the sweetest (“Cheerleader” and the heart-stoppingly gorgeous “Foreground”). The biggest surprise: “Two Weeks” is going to be the pop song of the summer, coasting on Chris Bear’s tasteful, propulsive drumming and four-part doo-wop harmony so bright it could part clouds. This isn’t just GB’s “pop” record, though — the careful sonic textures that colored Yellow House are back, and better. Rather, Veckatimest is the sound of a young group realizing and building on its potential, stretching out in all directions at once without stretching itself too thin.

Album Review: St. Vincent — “Actor”

Pixie dream girl Annie Clark (aka St. Vincent) cornered the market on delicate, too-cute indie-pop with her debut, Marry Me. Actor, however, trades wide-eyed naïveté for jaded maturity, as Clark — who once penned a tune called “What Me Worry?” — now frets about being saved from what she wants and waking up the neighbors with shouting matches. Looks like the honeymoon is over.

Actor is a huge leap forward for Clark, who simultaneously focuses her songwriting while expanding her lush orchestral arrangements. Horns swoon and strings swoop prettily throughout, but just when things get too precious, Clark bitch-slaps her whammy bar over fuzzed-out, syncopated saxophone blurts that sound like Maceo Parker having a panic attack (check out the brilliant kiss-off stomp of “Actor Out of Work” and “Marrow”). Despite all the dark, gorgeous noise, Clark’s bewitching vocals and vivid lyrics still take top billing. In “The Party,” she paints an elegant, convincing portrait of after-hours love over unusually stripped-down piano and drums: “I sit transfixed by a hole in your T-shirt / I’ve said much too much, and they’re trying to sweep up.” It’s one of the album’s only understated moments, but Clark lends it as much drama as she does her lovingly bent Hollywood arrangements. Actor is undoubtedly one of the year’s best so far, and deserves a standing ovation.

Album Review: Camera Obscura — “My Maudlin Career”

Glaswegian indie-outfit Camera Obscura are the official ambassadors of twee, crafting reverb-soaked, string-adorned, ’60s-tastic pop under the watch of hopeless romantic (and brooch enthusiast) Traceyanne Campbell. My Maudlin Career is their least tentative release to date, radiating a swagger that shoves terminally catchy tunes like “French Navy” and “Swans” from the gymnasium wall to the dance floor. But Maudlin’s heart comes from the slow jams, with the sweetly aching “James” setting the mood for albums’s highlight — the gorgeous, Spector-esque “Careless Love.” Even on the girl-group homage “The Sweetest Thing,” Campbell tends toward melancholy, cooing, “You challenged me to write a love song / Here it is, I think I got it wrong.” Actually, she got it right: Campbell may be stuck in a twee time warp, but she knows that as sweet as relationships can be, there’s usually a bitter end lurking around the corner.

Album Review: Bat For Lashes — “Two Suns”

I’m not sure why, but when confronted with a wholly unique, genre-busting, 21st-century sound, the default formula for describing it is to compare it to stuff we’ve already heard. So, yeah, Natasha Khan (aka Bat For Lashes) kinda sounds like PJ Harvey + Tori Amos x Björk² — but sophomore effort Two Suns is more than the sum of its influences.

Both intimate and sprawling, Suns effortlessly marries world rhythms, laptop-tronica, and good-ol’-fashioned piano balladry into an oddly compelling work held together by Khan’s magnetic, haunting vocals. Sure, Khan is prone to fits of hippie-dippiness (propulsive opener “Glass” references crystal towers, emerald cities, and a knight in crystal armor in less than 30 seconds), but she’s pop-culture savvy, too: The Karate Kid-inspired “Daniel” totally sweeps the leg of Peter Cetera’s sap-fest “Glory of Love.”

Album Review: Metric — “Fantasies”

Emily Haines should probably go in for a chest X-ray. According to Fantasies opener “Help I’m Alive,” she can hear her heart “beating like a hammer” — a possible symptom of cardio-related illness. We can safely rule out arrhythmia, however, because Metric pounds out a lock-step rhythmic groove that is impossible to deny — even when their sterile, radio-ready riffs don’t hit as hard as Haines’s plaintive lyrics. (Exception: the soaring, majestic chorus of “Sick Muse” is quite possibly the cure for clinical depression.)

While Haines kicks her bandmates’ asses on rockers like “Gold Guns Girls” and “Satellite Mind,” she’s more effective when she doesn’t have to work so hard to be heard. On “Collect Call,” the rhythm section cools off, giving lines like “keep me closer / I’m a lazy dancer / When you move, I move with you” room to resonate.