OUR WEEKLY COLLECTION OF SHORTER REVIEWS
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Roots of Dub Funk, Ovuca, Echo and the Bunnymen, Basement Jaxx, Landspeedrecord!, The Stingers, Flaspar, Marilyn Nonken, Tom Johnson, Touched By a Janitor, I Am the World Trade Center, Venus Hum, The Dollar Canon, The Ben Phillips Band, Sloppy Meateaters, Byron the Bulb, Soulfarm, The Beatings, Nad Navillus, Jeff London, Heidi Berry, Static Eden, Made for TV Movie, Eyuphuro, Red Animal War, Spike Priggen, Cosmic Funk, Mellow, Tinsel, Narcoleptics, Stabbing Westward, El Greco, African Travels, Mark Laliberte
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Various Artists / Roots of Dub Funk / Tanty (CD)
On a certain level, dub is a purely functional form of music -- sonic mind candy for stoners, tapping into an endless now of a groove that may change (or not), may have instruments come, go and bounce around with tape echoes fluttering behind, but is essentially the same, continuous and unending. So the repetition found in most of the tracks on the misnamed Roots of Dub Funk is excusable, up to a point. Some tracks are pleasant enough; the contributions from European producers The Technician and Alpha and Omega are easy background music. Other songs awkwardly try to attempt cross-genre dub-fusion with hip-hop and two-step styles that sound like a soundtrack for some Jamaican-themed mall food court. Ultimately, there's too little that's truly funky (in any sense of the word) on this collection of overly-sequenced and under-developed tracks. --
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Ovuca / Wasted Sunday / Rephlex (CD)
Ovuca is a young fellow from Finland. Although I've never heard of him before (How scandalous!), this is apparently his fourth release on the Aphex Twin's Rephlex label. The Aphex Twin stamp is all over these tracks, particularly in the preponderance of cranky, angular beats laid over happy bunny melodies. It's not a bad influence to have, of course, but it makes it difficult to discern what, exactly, is coming from Ovuca's obviously hyper-creative mind and what's just rehashed Rephlex noodling. That said, Wasted Sunday is a very enjoyable disc, with a friendly, skittery vibe, lots of well-crafted sounds and enough off-kilter beats to keep the robots confused for weeks. Particularly interesting are the tracks in which Ovuca seems to be trying other genres on for size; "Meltman/Meltdown man", for instance, could almost be hip-hop. This is a tweaky and clever disc from a talented new (or not so new) knob twister. --
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Echo and the Bunnymen / Flowers / spinART (CD)
Outside of a few tracks here and there, I was never overly impressed by Echo and the Bunnymen. Their work always seemed a bit lazy to me; not that it is shoddy or incomplete, but simply that the band lacked energy. Their latest does little to change this impression; from the opening track onward, the music seems to drag just a bit behind the beat. As evidenced by "SuperMellowMan", their knack for penning lush songs is still intact. Filled with gongs, a rich guitar line, and Ian McCulloch's luxurious voice, this track, and the whole album, could have been a wonderful treat if it only had a touch more oomph. --
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Basement Jaxx / Rooty / Astralwerks (CD)
Dance acts don’t come much bigger than Brixton beat demigods Basement Jaxx. Rooty, the duo’s sophomore effort, takes the same everything-but-the-kitchen-sink approach that made their debut, Remedy, an international success. Much like labelmate Fatboy Slim, The Jaxx's true brilliance lies in their music's blatant stupidity; after all, everyone’s a slave to the beat, and nobody knows this better than Felix and Simon. They pull out all the stops on their first single, "Romeo", its pliant groove and catchy-as-hell vocal line making it a shoo-in for club anthem of the summer. "Breakaway" follows the Big Beat rulebook to the letter, while the slow motion funk-out "Broken Dreams" is the greatest song Timbaland never wrote. Then, just as things are really starting to kick into high gear, the lame breaks of "I Want U" kill the party. Though The Jaxx tries valiantly to restore the groove, there is no escape from the cliché ridden "Get Me Off" or the watered-down Euro-house of "Crazy Girl". Slowly but surely, the dance floor empties. Ironically, Rooty is eventually done in by its complete and utter stupidity, proving that this is one joke that’s not quite as funny the second time around. --
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Landspeedrecord! / On the Racetrack / Honey (10")
Known for their clever wit and sharp bite, Landspeedrecord! deviate from their musical norm on this four song 10", dumping vocals and acerbic lyrics in favor of exploring the world of ambient, slightly experimental instrumentals. Throbbing bass lines and plenty of cheeky samples are embedded in each of these tunes, creating a visceral musical experience that taunts your brain with its unnerving reality. Mike C's guitar twists and turns, slicing through the immediate vicinity, its spacey notes and reverberating chords ripe for mind-mangling. Have Landspeedrecord! dramatically changed their style and headed into the unheralded waters of ambient electronics? It's doubtful...but On a Racetrack proves that the band can do just about anything it pleases, including this newfangled adventure into the world of systematic, angular jazz-pieces that soothe without any nasty menthol smell. --
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The Stingers / Self-Titled / Self-Released (CD)
Guy Ritchie's films (or at least their soundtracks) have revived my interest in "proper" ska (but don't worry; I still hate third-wave crap like Save Ferris). The Stingers, while by no means "just" a ska band, handily recall the Specials and Selecter (and occasionally Fishbone); their sound is authentic and spontaneous, with minimal studio gloss. Here, they prove themselves to be comfortable and conversant in all the building blocks of ska -- R&B, jazz, dub calypso, rock, etc. -- and, as "Punk at 15" proves, they're not without a sense of humor. I bet their live show is red-hot, but you wouldn't know it from The Stingers, which is far more laid-back than any bar gig you'll ever see -- unless they're playing poolside. The disc satisfies, but I suspect that a live recording would be ten times better, energy-wise. --
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Flaspar / Erotic Jetplane Stylings / Sour Cream and Velvet (CD)
Flaspar are part of the growing contingent of home recording artists with a penchant for Kraftwerk and goofy samples. Music that would have been impossible thirty years ago is now easily produced on a home computer -- an object almost as popular the television set. With ready access to production tools comes the supplemental criticism, "Anyone can do that!" While this assumption seems to be true, Flaspar and others like them are participating in a musical revolution of sorts: they are the early 21st century equivalent of 1977, though on a much smaller scale. Subsequently, with albums like Erotic Jetplane Stylings, the critical-listeners' (that's you guys) emphasis shouldn't focus entirely on the artist's technical proficiency, because there aren't any predominant forms of insight -- and if there are, the listener in most instances remains ignorant of them. Therefore, the listener should attempt to comprehend the album as it relates to both their own and the artists' individual interests, motivations and even neuroses. While Erotic Jetplane Stylings doesn't break any creative stratospheres, its bleeps, bloops and samples are charting out the music that should one day permeate, in some form, all aspects of forward-moving aural expression. --
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Marilyn Nonken / American Spiritual / CRI (CD)
While solo, experimental piano music doesn't often make waves on MTV News -- the required level of attention being both too long and too focused for most of today's callow youth -- Marilyn Nonken's hour-long excursion into rhythmic and melodic abstraction rewards close attention. All four of American Spiritual's pieces were composed specifically for the pianist, now in her late twenties, over the course of four years. Nonken provides clear and illuminating liner notes: of "Chelsea Square", by Jeff Nichols, Nonken says, "[the piece] moves between areas of dense and stormy polyphony, which subsides in lyrical yet tension-filled interludes." And she's right: hands flying across the keyboard, Nonken follows a bewildering flurry of seemingly random notes, which fall away just as suddenly into pools of quiet introspection. The music is occasionally overshadowed by the sheer weight of the notes, and it's easy to get lost inside these sprawling pieces. Michael Finnissy's "North American Spirituals", at twenty minutes the longest and in some ways most beautiful of the pieces here, fuses its titular source material with the American tradition of experimental music and Nonken's precise playing, to form a compelling whole. --
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Tom Johnson / The Chord Catalog / (CD)
Minimalist Tom Johnson's Chord Catalog is, to say the least, an obsessive work. The 60-minute piece is a complete and systematic recitation of every possible combination of notes within the span of one octave. For those math guys out there, that's a total of 8178 chords. The rules of the game are very simple: Play all the two-note chords first, then all the three-note chords, then all the four-note chords, etc. Play them in such a way that all possible combinations with a given top note are played together. Pause whenever the top note moves up. That's the piece. By the time the last chord (the only possible thirteen-note chord) sounds, you're, admittedly, pretty saturated. At the same time, you've been slowly and surely (albeit a bit laboriously) taken on a voyage. The textures of eleven-, twelve- and thirteen-note chords are dramatically different from the two-, three- and four-note chords. This is really the essence of minimalism. The material is stark and limited and the rate of change is snail-like, but there is, nonetheless, distinct direction -- where you end you end up is clearly a different place from where you began. For you hardcore conceptualists out there, this record is Nirvana. --
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Touched by a Janitor / New Rule to Self / Feudal Enterprise (CD)
I’ll just go right ahead and bypass any jokes/comments regarding this band’s name, which is possibly the worst I’ve ever come across. Luckily, these three guys from San Francisco are much better at playing their instruments than they are at naming things (all six songs here are, thankfully, untitled). TBaJ play angular, instrumental math rock, which skillfully sputters and jumps from percussive dissonance into flowing melodies then quickly back again. None of the songs lasts over three minutes; instead, the drummer and dual guitarists efficiently weave intricate patterns into nonlinear song structures and odd tempos, creating mini schizophrenic symphonies. While New Rule to Self certainly contains creative ideas presented in an urgent fashion, it isn’t a "must own" if you're not already interested in the genre. --
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I Am the World Trade Center / Out of the Loop / Kindercore (CD)
Only one good thing came out of the break-up of vastly underrated retro-popsters Kincaid: Daniel Gellar can now concentrate solely on his beat-savvy side-project, I Am the World Trade Center. Crafted entirely on a laptop computer, Out of the Loop is a 45-minute romp through a beat-infested wonderland of crafty sampling, jarring rhythms and saccharine-laced female vocals (courtesy of Gellar’s girlfriend Amy Dykes). In Dykes, Gellar has found the perfect host for his intergalactic dance party; her sultry croon dominates Out of the Loop and helps turn his dream into a reality. Sounding something like the head-on collision of Saint Etienne and Art of Noise, songs like "Analogous" ooze the sort of seductive sexuality that Nancy Sinatra would have traded her knee-high white boots for. On the techno-fied "Look Around You" and the sample-happy "Holland Tunnel", Gellar has free reign to let his mind, not to mention his mouse, run wild, while "September" will undoubtedly have ad agencies lining up to license it for the latest VW or Volvo ad. Heartbroken Kincaid fans, cheer up: Out of the Loop may make you forget that Kincaid ever existed. --
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Venus Hum / Self-Titled / (CD)
At its best, Annette Strean's voice is comparable to Dot Allison's singing; it ascends the same heights, and can bring emotion soaring through any song. Here, her beautiful voice is supported by synthesizer duo Tony Miracle and Kip Kubin, who provide their "diva" with a complicated yet accessible blend of eighties pop and Bjork-like oddities. The word "accessible" makes me, at least, breathe a sigh of relief. Venus Hum not only respect a medium that can pull its listeners from out of the doldrums and into a state of near-ecstasy, but they repeatedly try to serve us with these mysterious transcendent moments. More frequently than not, the band succeeds; when they don't ("Sonic Annie" and "Run Annie Run"), it's because the Sugarcubes influence is so overpowering that it leads Annette to betray her own unique gifts and become a Björk clone in contemporary dress. --
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The Dollar Canon / Are You Here? / Lamplight (CD)
Are You Here? highlights the Dollar Canon's emo-tinged pop sounds. The band's name says it all; they sound like the sort of dubious bargains you find in the "dollar store" (Which, as the name implies, is a shop in which everything costs a dollar, and may not even that modest financial outlay - Ed). Well-crafted but cheaply made, the music is serviceable and sound, but not exciting, and lacks a fancy exterior and anything resembling stylistic "punch". The lyrics aren't extraordinary, and the guitar lines alternate between fuzzy and melodic. The arrangements are without that je ne sais quoi that says "Wow". A friend once suggested that shitty bands always manage to find shitty names, as though the names and the bands are magnetized. This band isn't even exciting enough to be bad. Take on an empty stomach. --
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The Ben Phillips Band / Freak Like Me / eec (CD)
There is something about an artist naming a band after him or herself that has always made me cringe (see The Dave Matthews Band). It seems to rather blatantly declare that the other players are less important. Granted, in the case of The Ben Phillips Band, Phillips does do most of the work (songwriting, guitar and vocals), but Tommy Vinton and Mark Paquin (drums and bass respectively) deserve credit for filling out the rollicking, seething sound of Freak Like Me. Fragile egos aside, The Ben Phillips Band takes a worthy stab at rock greatness, imitating a bastard combination of Blink 182 and Cheap Trick. Unfortunately, for all of its great moments (the somber "Save Me Now" and the extremely catchy "No One Listened To The Radio"), Freak Like Me has a tendency to drift into the land of the overly melodramatic Goo-Goo Dolls, as on "I Know". As debut albums go, Freak Like Me shows promise, but the band should take a few more risks next time around. From where they stand now, The Ben Phillips Band could land themselves on Top 40 radio or the next Dawson's Creek soundtrack -- neither of which I necessarily consider to be positive things. --
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Sloppy Meateaters / Forbidden Meat / Orange Peal (CD)
Would it surprise you to learn that the Sloppy Meateaters play melodic punk rock? It didn't surprise me. However, despite song titles like "Fat Chicks" and "Talkin Bout Jesus", these guys aren't a bunch of goof-offs; "Fat Chicks", for example, details the horrors of working in a gas station booth and never getting to talk to the hot girls, all of whom use credit cards and pay at the pump, while the less desirable titular gals come inside. Songs like "Fat Chicks" make it clear that the Sloppy Meateaters are pretty young, and their lyrics are more earnest than artful. Indeed, sometimes they're as painfully clumsy as...well, anything else a teenage boy might say. Happily, what the band lacks in lyrical cleverness is made up for by some solid instrumental skills. These guys rock surprisingly hard, with chunky, confident riffs taking the place of the hesitant, half-assed playing that characterizes so many youthful punk bands. Perhaps that's why they're not called the Sloppy Guitarplayers. --
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Byron the Bulb / Helf! / Apotheosis (CD)
In a world where someone like Britney Spears is given a rougher time over whether she presents a suitable body image for young girls than over the impact of her insubstantial music, it's easy to say that independent music should be free of such concerns. The quality of the music, more than the packaging or other exterior qualities, is what should really matter. Unfortunately, this is not true -- and one finds a case in point with Helf!. At times, this Minnesota trio writes passable pop songs, as is the case with the awkwardly named "A World Record for Bovine Skeletonization". Most of the album, however, is lost to poor production, creating a mess of untuned guitars and overpowering background vocals; it is, at times, painful to listen to. While the lo-fi approach works for some bands, Byron the Bulb is clearly not among them. --
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Soulfarm / Scream of the Crop / Desert Rock (CD)
This mystifying assortment of grooving jams, world-music inspired ditties and crafty jazz influences leaves me wondering when the actual "soul" will be harvested from the Soulfarm. This New York City trio's rock numbers get my head spinning; their complex nature will leave the average music listener in the dark. However, the more country-inspired tunes twang some tempestuous notes that sound like the genuine article. Most impressive are the Middle Eastern-inflected bits, which apply winding Semitic lines and spiritually powerful invocations, creating a truly welcome sound. Somewhere between Blind Melon and your favorite get-stoned-and-jam band, Soulfarm takes each member's expert musicianship and creates some mighty lofty moments; they'll either leave you stunned and confused or anxiously clawing for another taste of these musical farmers' hybrid fruit. --
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The Beatings / 6 hz / Crapulent Cinema (CD)
6 Hz's first song starts out slowly, and rather like Modest Mouse's "Teeth like God's Shoeshine", it gradually evolves into a punk song. It thereby conveys two distinct moods, which is one mood more than your average punk song. Similarly, with one or two arguable exceptions, this EP is a step up from other punk EPs. At its best moments, it seems like a modern version of Pink Floyd's Wish you were Here, as most of the songs are themed around people who've lost their souls in their day-to-day bustle. The album peaks on the third track, "Shark Attacks are on the Rise", as different psyche-voices intermingle and the instruments pulsate. The Beatings have a good feel for how punk music should sound; while their music is rarely complex, they always manage to change it before it gets boring. It might take you a few listens to understand the lyrics...but once you do, you'll see that they're as impressive as the music. --
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Nad Navillus / Self-Titled / (CD)
Composer Dan Sullivan plays guitar on all seven of these tracks, three of which are augmented by Rob Sullivan on bass and guitar and Suzanne Roberts on violin. Sullivan's solo tracks are quietly busy folk-rock numbers, with some nice finger picking and multi-layered melodies. His compositions don't seem to have very much formal drive to them, and they sometimes end up sounding a bit too back-porch noodly for my tastes. The three group pieces are rather strange; I can't decide whether they're purposefully out of tune and disjointed, or whether the players just couldn't play well together. They're similar to the solo pieces, but with string bass and violin adding drones and occasional accents to the busy guitar lines. Sullivan's compositions are mostly pleasant, and at certain points on this disc he succeeds in creating some nice, dreamy moods, but there's not a lot here that really commands my attention. --
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Jeff London / Col. Summers Park / Hush/Jealous Butcher (CD)
If you want to play the singer/songwriter game these days, you need to do it with some real panache; otherwise, you're likely to wind up as another faceless performer with pretty songs and a nice voice. Jeff London obviously wants in on the action, but Col. Summers Park leaves something to be desired. Sure, London can pen a catchy tune, and his voice has a plaintive-yet-rustic troubadour quality, but he lacks any distinguishing characteristics. He’s not as lovestruck as Elliott Smith, or as clever as John Wesley Harding, and he’s obviously had better luck in the relationship department than, say, Dashboard Confessional’s Christopher Carrabba. Songs like "Routine Abandonment (lifeboat)" and "Cat on a String" float past on pleasant folk-pop melodies and sickly-sweet harmonies, but never leave you with any feelings stronger than mild satisfaction. The game out there is tough, and based on Col. Summers Park, it’s unlikely that Jeff London is going to get called up to the majors any time soon. --
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Heidi Berry / Pomegranate: Heidi Berry: An Anthology / 4AD (CD)
Pomegranate is aptly named -- it's both puckery-sour and sublimely sweet. Retrospectives are a bit sad, usually suggesting that a great artist is at or near the end of his/her productive career. This album is intended to review and revive Berry, who hasn't made an album in five years. Her music echoes Nick Drake (natch), Dusty Springfield and the more modern Beth Orton, with some harder-rock, traditional Indian and VU influences thrown in for spice. Quiet and meditative, Berry is a second-tier folk-singer-songwriter, and she's not a bad influence for new songwriters. She won't rock your world, but you will be moved. If you don't own any of her albums, get Pomegranate. Unless you're a Berry nut, though, owning any of her other albums would be enough. --
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Static Eden / Receiver / Self-Released (CD)
Static Eden combines tried and true rock-hooks with the idiosyncratic confluence of good-guy vocals and drudging metal-infused guitars; imagine the guy from Blink 182 heading up Tool. I don't mean to characterize them as a dreadful amalgamation of evils, but rather as a case in which the product is greater than its parts. Their second full-length, Receiver, portrays the group as a sort of neo-prog effort. An uninhibited approach to eclectic instrumentation is evident throughout the emphatically produced disc, while the songs retain a pop slant, with condensed melodies replacing the six-minute barrage of a Yes or Journey. You won't find anything post-whatever here, but the disc's fervent urgency leaves the listener with something worthwhile. --
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Made for TV Movie / Self-Titled / Jealous Butcher (CD)
Made for TV Movie is, broadly speaking, one of those bleak, angular, noisy punk bands. Their music is intense and emotional, but the sheer vehemence of their performance and variety of their attack distances them from cookie-cutter emo bands. I particularly enjoyed PJ Aylward's drumming; efficient and intuitive, he hits his drums hard, providing the disc with a nice "live recording" spontaneity. Ultimately, the record works because the band clearly hasn't forgotten that Most People Need Melodies, and they take care to temper their jagged, bristling chords with some ear candy. When they go for all-out noise -- as in "How Did We Get Here Last Night", the end of which sounds like a jet engine test -- they do so with such gusto that only the most sensitive listeners will miss the melody. --
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Eyuphuro / Yellela / World Music Network (CD)
Zena Bacar, Eyuphuro's frontwoman, is known as the "golden voice of Mozambique". Her tender yet incisive take on Afro-pop is certainly worth a listen. Socially conscious lyrics combine with laid-back, percussive grooves, melodic, contrapuntal guitars and subtle horns to produce the kind of music you'd expect from an African diva and her band. Bacar shares songwriting and singing credits with Issufo Manuel, and both musicians deserve accolades for creating music of such gentle melancholy. I'm particularly haunted by "Ayaka"; its translated lyrics go something like this: "My husband likes it if I go down to the river to fetch the water...But if I want to learn something he starts to get angry...He gets jealous and asks if I intend to have a higher education than him..." There are some envelope-pushing moments here, too, when the Afro-pop starts to sound like Coltrane -- just dig the sax at the end of "Ethuila Exeni" and you'll see what I mean. Clearly, this is African music of the post-information age. These guys grew up with more than just local sounds in their ears, and their music benefits greatly from their literacy. --
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Red Animal War / Breaking in an Angel / Deep Elm (CD)
In a word, Red Animal War is jarring. The quartet specializes in intricate start-stop rhythms that give their tunes a desperate urgency. The guitars mirror the rhythms by creating a complex patchwork out of lines that, if considered alone, would sound simplistic. Added to this unsettling mix are the vocals of Justin Wilson and Matt Pittman, who overlay and interrupt one another, further heightening the sensation of crisis. Breaking in an Angel is heavy in the emotional sense of the word; similar to other emo-core albums, this emotional weight can seem either sincere or overwrought, depending on your mood. Therefore, if you feel like you're trapped in a corner, waiting for the other shoe to drop, Breaking in an Angel is a fine disc to play. --
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Spike Priggen / The Very Thing That You Treasure / Spike Priggen (CD)
Next time I'm getting over a terrorizing, head-over-heels heartbreak, The Very Thing That You Treasure will be in the driver's seat, helping me cry myself into the nearest telephone pole. Until then, this unbelievably depressing CD will be sitting on my shelf, safe from unsuspecting ears that can't deal with its gut-wrenching power. Priggen definitely has issues with chicks, as several tunes (including "Every Broken Heart" and "She Used To Be My Baby") highlight a borderline obsessive-compulsive singer-songwriter bloodletting his emotions onto a recorded medium. Priggen has a way with words, and his exceptional lyrics weave intricate tales of desperation and loss that somehow, by the disc's end, inspire a sense of hope and yearning. Nonetheless, this potent collection of tear jerking, honky-tonk pop tunes is a marvelous expression of calculated emotional outbursts. Medical authorities should be contacted immediately, as this CD should only be allowed into your CD player with a prescription from your local psychiatrist. --
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Various Artists / Cosmic Funk / Quango (CD)
As promised, previously defunct label Quango is back with the first in a series of compilations. This time out, they've brought together seven different artists, including Funky Lowlives and SK Radicals, for an album of funk as interpreted by the London dance club scene. The strongest moments on Cosmic Funk are the groove-heavy "Latazz" from Funky Lowlives (the only artist to contribute multiple tracks) and Kaidi Tatham's surreal "Armz Arh Deh". Perhaps the most true to what the average person would consider to be funky, however, is East Village Headz' entrancing "Rude Vibez". Cosmic Funk is more than just an interesting compilation; it's a promising start to Quango's rebirth. --
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Mellow / Another Mellow Spring / CyberOctave (CD)
This record could also be called Another French band that tries too hard to sound like Air. The disc's press release promised a super-chilled blend of Syd Barrett, Nick Drake and the Beatles -- but sometimes press releases lie. In reality, the album is a diluted amalgamation of cheesy Euro-dance beats, vocodered vocals and maladroit production work. The closest the group comes to whipping up a retro-inflected frenzy is the vaguely King Crimson-esque squall of opener "Shinda Shima". From there, the trio begins to spiral downward into an abyss of lame posturing ("Sun Dance"), tedious and predictable keyboard workouts ("Instant Love") and a song so unbelievably monotonous that it might actually put you to sleep ("Lovely Light"). Even the mighty Fila Brazilia isn’t able to make "Mellow" interesting enough to warrant repeated listens. With the French dropping gems like Moon Safari, Discovery and Super Discount into our laps, there is simply no room for a stone as unimaginative and unpolished as Another Mellow Spring. --
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Tinsel / The Lead Shoes / Keyhole (CD)
The band wears their album title literally, with their fragile melodies squashed by all the dramatic weight they're shoehorned into their songs. In "Rebecca", which sets the tone for this sometimes-experimental work, the band's bookish words ("I will carve a woodcut of your name/ Ink it up so proudly") do not thrust through the song like a passionate lover; instead, the band sends us on a "Gutenberg Museum" field trip. No feelings of romance and longing are generated, but you will swear to have seen each piece of rusty metal type that was used to set the lyrics. It's an odd sensation, successfully maintained throughout the course of this droning and strangely compelling album. Every instrument used in the album's creation -- be it viola, accordion, guitar or found noises -- supports the male and female talk-sing vocals with an almost unhealthy hesitation; indeed, to hear the instruments "cough", you'd think that The Lead Shoes was the equivalent of an exotic new disease. --
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Narcoleptics / Monkey Steals the Peach / Self-Released (CD)
On the basis of their song titles ("You Can't Polish a Turd", "Sweet Tarts and Anal Rape", "Kill Your Parents, Eat Your Dog, Do Drugs"), you'd probably expect the Narcoleptics to be some seriously nasty, or at least wanna-be-seriously-nasty, punk rockers -- perhaps a cross between the Impotent Sea Snakes and the Locust. Musically, they're more of a wise-ass take on the heavier side of the emo spectrum, full of nervous bass lines and thick, grunge-inspired riffs, with vocals so raw-throated that they border on parody and lyrics jam-packed with sex and violence. This would be a recipe for disaster if the Narcoleptics didn't have some above-average songwriting chops; their tunes, while sometimes sludgy, prove to be surprisingly melodic and enjoyable. You won't doze off while listening to Monkey Steals the Peach, that's for sure. --
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Stabbing Westward / Self-Titled / Koch (CD)
Stabbing Westward, led by the Christopher Hall, really want to be famous. Over the course of four albums they’ve gone from NIN wannabes to lite-metal in their search for glory. Overall, this is a decent mainstream rock album, and it has its plusses: the production is polished, but not in a bad way, and there are some very catchy, radio friendly songs like "Perfect" and "Happy". Fans of their last album will like this. Unfortunately, the worn-out Goth image and miserable lyrics sung with forced, breathy emotion ruin this for me: "I’ve spend my whole life trying to fuck the loneliness away. I die inside, when I think of all the people I have damaged. I’ve been wasted." Just about everything else is so contrived it hurts. Let’s face it, Stabbing Westward do what they do well, but I won’t pretend I’d hesitate changing the station if I heard any of these songs on the radio. Maybe Hall should sell his soul for fame; he’d really have Goth cred then. --
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El Greco / Crap-A-Doodle-Doo / Self-Released (CD)
Under the name Big Dumb Face, Limp Bizkit guitarist Wes Borland recently released his solo debut, Duke Lion Fights the Terror. Given the quality, or lack thereof, of his "day job" output, many were likely surprised by the wide variety of genres encompassed by his debut. Crap-A-Doodle-Doo has much in common with Big Dumb Face -- and not just because El Greco opened for Borland and Co. on their recent tour. Metal, electronica and hip-hop are combined throughout the album, the key difference being that Crap-A-Doodle-Doo answers the question of what Big Dumb Face would sound like fronted by Fred Durst. Homophobia, not to mention stupidity, fuels most of the lyrics. The album feels self-indugent -- particularly the half-hour-long final track, which, given a complete overhaul and a good producer, could probably be dismantled and turned into ten shorter songs. Certainly, such weirdness is to be applauded in itself -- but as El Greco proves, being different is not the same as being good. --
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Various Artists / African Travels / Six Degrees (CD)
This is a mixed bag of African/electronic crossover tracks, ranging from forceful to dull to disappointing. Masters at Work's entry ("MAW Expensive"), for instance, is a reconstruction of Fela's "Expensive Shit" that accomplishes nothing except to make me wonder why I'm listening to their version when I could pull the original off my shelf. Other tracks however, such as Mabi Thobejane and Bob Holroyd's efforts, are pulsing, driving and repetitive in the best possible way, creating a cross-cultural connection that harkens to the finer moments of, say, African Head Charge (though with a decidedly different stylistic blend). Beat Pharmacy's contribution, "In the Sun", blends drum and vocal loops, studio trickery and some funk guitar licks to fine effect -- grafting technology to traditional music needn't mean just faking instruments with keyboard presets. --
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Mark Laliberte / Pillowscenes Soundworks (1996-1999) / Thinkbox (CD)
Laliberte is a photographer and multimedia artist from Windsor, Ontario. Pillowscenes collects the audio portions of a series of photo and sound installations which used speaker-lined pillows to create a "soundscape as part of a storytelling language". Primarily sample loop-based, his audio compositions strive for a strong emphasis on juxtapositions, forced contrasts, issues of perception. You hear children's songs superimposed on ominous beeps and scraping sounds, intentionally banal women's voices, dark horn loops, some loping jazzy basslines, all building to an appropriately late night art-noir approach. Unfortunately, from the audio alone, it's difficult to tell which portions of this are intended as commentary and which are to be taken at surface value. There's obviously a critical eye being cast across some of the subject material, but in some places the music seems to be striving for a straight-faced "dramatic" atmosphere, which muddles the ironic stance to which other sections seem to aspire. Without of the visual elements of these works, you're left wondering what (and how much) you are missing. In the future, Laliberte's work would perhaps be better served with a CD-ROM package, the better to incorporate both the visual and the audible. --
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gz - george zahora | nw - noah wane | am - andrew magilow | ib - irving bellemead | jj - jason jackowiak | td - theodore defosse
rd - ron davies | js - jenn sikes | rt - ryan tranquilla | al - amy leach | jw - john wolfe
az - alex zorn | ea - ed anderson | jk - josh kazman | ec - eric cook | mp - matthew pollesel
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