The explosion of material that resulted in the Magnetic Fields' triple-disc opus 69 Love Songs would've wiped out the average tunesmith, but mastermind Stephin Merritt wields a pen of bottomless ink. Like a long-distance runner, he paced himself, saving up material lest his many guises should grow restless. The 6ths released Hyacinths and Thistles the following year; 2002 saw the sophomore effort from the Future Bible Heroes and the soundtrack to the James Bolton film Eban and Charley; and in 2003 he scored yet another soundtrack, this time to the Katie Holmes drama Pieces of April. Nearly five years after Love Songs, the Magnetic Fields returned with i, a "synth free" collection of love, life, and loss that relies heavily on cello, guitar, and that most selfish of vowels, the letter I. Merritt's kitchen produces pop confections that can rot teeth, but the bitter aftertaste owes more to Randy Newman than it does Belle & Sebastian. He may be a stalker of clever rhymes about hopeless romantics and lost opportunities, but it's the failed and despondent receiving the brunt of his obsessive detail. On the deceptive lullaby "I Was Born," he laments, "Growing older is killing a child who laughed and smiled at anything." The specter of age is not immune to the pain of a broken heart, and the dense Brill Building aesthetic of songs like "I Don't Believe You" and "Looked All Over Town" resonate with the kind of desperation that's usually reserved for the young and naïve, but has manifested itself into -- to quote a song title from the 6ths -- an "Aging Spinster." Musically, i isn't that much of a departure from previous outings, as the "organic" instrumentation is often treated with the same effects that Merritt utilizes on his synth-based recordings. Cabaret-style pieces like "In an Operetta" are lent added weight by the self-described "awful" singer's newfound range, and when he unveils a surprisingly sweet and delicate falsetto on the gorgeous closer, "It's Only Time," the listener's voice breaks right along with him. There are plenty of prolific artists putting to tape their every whim, and Merritt's no exception. He may spread himself thin when overseeing his army of side projects, but when he leads his Magnetic Fields into battle, the results are always in the public's favor. (AMG)The Magnetic Fields - I (2004) {{link in comments}}
The fourth release in Tom Waits' series of skid row travelogues, Small Change proves to be the archetypal album of his '70s work. A jazz trio comprising tenor sax player Lew Tabackin, bassist Jim Hughart, and drummer Shelly Manne, plus an occasional string section, back Waits and his piano on songs steeped in whiskey and atmosphere in which he alternately sings in his broken-beaned drunk's voice (now deeper and overtly influenced by Louis Armstrong) and recites jazzy poetry. It's as if Waits were determined to combine the Humphrey Bogart and Dooley Wilson characters from Casablanca with a dash of On the Road's Dean Moriarty to illuminate a dark world of bars and all-night diners. Of course, he'd been in that world before, but in songs like "The Piano Has Been Drinking" and "Bad Liver and a Broken Heart," Waits gives it its clearest expression. Small Change isn't his best album. Like most of the albums Waits made in the '70s, it's uneven, probably because he was putting out one a year and didn't have time to come up with enough first-rate material. But it is the most obvious and characteristic of his albums for Asylum Records. If you like it, you also will like the ones before and after; otherwise, you're not Tom Waits' kind of listener. (AMG)
The acclaim and exposure Peaches received for her debut album, The Teaches of Peaches, definitely didn't inspire her to make her act more mainstream for her second album. If anything, from its title on down, Fatherfucker is even more explicit and outre. That Peaches is still trying new things and pushing the envelope should be a good thing; sometimes it is, but there's a limit to just how far sheer outrageousness will take her. In fact, Fatherfucker's most "outrageous" moments are its weakest: the album's opening track, "I Don't Give a ...," loops Joan Jett's "Bad Reputation" while Peaches screams "I don't give a f*ck, I don't give a sh*t." It's an explosive introduction to the album, but not a particularly good one. Likewise, "Rock 'n' Roll" apes her debut's "Rock Show" with diminished results, and "Kick It," the duet between Peaches and Iggy Pop, should be more exciting than it actually it is (was "some people don't like my crotch" the best they could come up with?). These songs, along with the potty-grade sexuality of "Shake Yer Dix," could give the mistaken impression that Peaches is just rehashing her previous work with less creativity, but that's not entirely true. Several of Fatherfucker's tracks rival and surpass The Teaches of Peaches when it comes to being witty, sexy, and danceable at the same time: the stark beats on "I'm the Kinda" leave all the more room for Peaches to name-check Sodom, Gomorrah, and Rocky Balboa; "I U She" celebrates try-sexuality with drums like a revving engine; and "Back It Up, Boys" is a booty-shaking tribute to the right side of men's backsides. Interestingly, the cooler, atmospheric songs on Fatherfucker are its best and most immediate moments, as opposed to the buzzy electro-pop songs that dominated The Teaches of Peaches. "The Inch" and "Bag It" close out the album with a spare, eerie sexiness, but the album's best songs are — perhaps not coincidentally — its least blatantly sexual. On the vampish "Operate," Peaches preys on some unsuspecting, unconscious man to use for experimental surgery, while on the whispery electro-blues of "Tombstone, Baby" it sounds like she's on the lam (possibly for carving up that guy in the previous song). In some ways, it's too bad that Peaches didn't wait to come up with more full-fledged tracks like these to flesh out the album; as it stands, there are enough good tracks to make a solid mini-album. People looking to finally cremate electroclash's remains will find some fuel for the fire here, but ultimately this album is neither the triumph or the disaster that it could've been. (AMG)
More than most Quentin Tarantino soundtracks, Inglourious Basterds is about the movie, not the album, standing as a companion to the film instead of as its own entity. Ever the iconoclast, Tarantino hardly feels beholden to his film's WWII setting, threading in Billy Preston's blaxploitation funk "Slaughter" and David Bowie's new wave "Cat People" between Jacques Loussier, Lalo Schifrin, and a heavy dose of Ennio Morricone, who contributes four of the album's 14 tracks. Of course, Schifrin and Morricone aren't exactly period-correct to WWII either, but one of the major thrusts of Tarantino's film is that it's a movie about World War II movies, so blurring the lines is logical and consistent with his body of work. This also applies to the soundtrack, which has the same kind of genre-bending eclecticism as any of his other films (all it lacks is excerpts of the film's dialogue), but even if it is in the same spirit, it doesn't have the feel because these selections, as a whole, require familiarity with the film in order to sound cohesive (a problem also shared with the soundtrack to Kill Bill, Vol. 2). That said, every cut here is interesting, sometimes wonderful -- the Morricone is vivid, as are the obscure soundtrack selections from Charles Bernstein and the Film Studio Orchestra -- and once you've dialed into QT's wavelength, this soundtrack does provide plenty of pleasure. (AMG)
Originally released by the German label Kitty-Yo in 2000, The Teaches of Peaches is a crash course in Peaches' (aka Merrill Nisker) punk-disco burlesque. "Sucking on my titties like you wanna be callin' me all the time like Blondie/Check out my Chrissie be-Hynde it's fine all of the time" she sings on the opening manifesto "Fuck the Pain Away," which crystallizes her sound and approach -- her music is equal parts sex, humor, rock, and dance, with her frank, and often frankly hilarious, lyrics riding atop stark drumbeats, throbbing basslines, and repetitive but undeniably rockin' guitar riffs. Trashy, energetic tracks like "Rock Show" and "Lovertits" -- which is strangely reminiscent of the Stones' disco period, à la "Emotional Rescue" -- put the "rude" back in rudimentary; it's the kind of cleverly stupid music that's made by pretty bright people. Indeed, it's quite possible to read all sort of women's studies theories into Peaches' music; she's unrepentantly, triumphantly sexual and turns the tables by objectifying guys (particularly on "AA XXX," where she sings, "I like the innocent type/Deer in the headlights," and on the funny, kinky "Hot Rod," where she demands "Huh? What? Show me whatcha got/Rub it against my thigh"), but the fact that her sexually explicit music isn't presented as a bravely feminist act is, paradoxically, exactly what's so liberating about it. Things start to falter on The Teaches of Peaches when the tempo slows down and the electronic elements are emphasized, as on "Diddle My Skittle," "Suck and Let Go," and "Felix Partz," which feel a little draggy compared to the album's high-octane first half but do have a hypnotic pull that's worth noting. However, the flirty, disco-inspired "Set It Off" and bitchy breakup song "Cum Undun" express her punk attitude and dance ambitions much more naturally. And even though songs like "Sucker" sound a bit warmed-over, it's fairly remarkable for an artist with such a brash, distinctive style that she doesn't start repeating herself until the very end of the album. Funny, sexy, outrageous, and danceable (not to mention endlessly quotable) all at once, The Teaches of Peaches is a great introduction to a unique artist who defines herself by gleefully blurring boundaries. The 2002 reissue on Beggars/XL includes a bonus disc of covers and remixes that map out Peaches' influences and contemporaries, including her versions of Jeans Team's "Keine Melodien" and Berlin's "Sex (I'm A)," a new version of "Felix Partz" featuring Gonzales, Kid 606's remix of "Fuck the Pain Away," and a mix of "Set It Off" by Tobi Neuman. (AMG)
Talking Heads found a way to open up the dense textures of the music they had developed with Brian Eno on their two previous studio albums for Speaking in Tongues, and were rewarded with their most popular album yet. Ten backup singers and musicians accompanied the original quartet, but somehow the sound was more spacious, and the music admitted aspects of gospel, notably in the call-and-response of "Slippery People," and John Lee Hooker-style blues, on "Swamp." As usual, David Byrne determinedly sang and chanted impressionistic, nonlinear lyrics, sometimes by mix-and-matching clichés ("No visible means of support and you have not seen nothin' yet," he declared on "Burning Down the House," the Heads' first Top Ten hit), and the songs' very lack of clear meaning was itself a lyrical subject. "Still don't make no sense," Byrne admitted in "Making Flippy Floppy," but by the next song, "Girlfriend Is Better," that had become an order -- "Stop making sense," he chanted over and over. Some of his charming goofiness had returned since the overly serious Remain in Light and Fear of Music, however, and the accompanying music, filled with odd percussive and synthesizer sounds, could be unusually light and bouncy. The album closer, "This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)," even sounded hopeful. Well, sort of. Despite their formal power, Talking Heads' preceding two albums seemed to have painted them into a corner, which may be why it took them three years to craft a follow-up, but on Speaking in Tongues, they found an open window and flew out of it. (AMG)
Howard Shore's third collaboration with filmmaker David Cronenberg represents the composer's most tautly atmospheric work to date. Created largely via Synclavier, Videodrome's eerie electronic effects and subtly ominous melodies brilliantly evoke the film's hallucinatory eroticism while at the same underscoring the media manipulations that galvanize its narrative. Like Cronenberg, Shore is fascinated by the physical interrelationships of man and machine, and while Videodrome boasts the structural complexity and harmonic language that are hallmarks of creative thought, its cold, remote textures and manipulated sounds bear few traces of human participation. This is music that harnesses the transformative power of technology to warn against its growing influence over everyone. (AMG)
If a music-nerd version of Animal House set in 2005 is ever made, "Daft Punk Is Playing at My House" -- the boisterous opener of LCD Soundsystem -- would make an ideal theme song for the fraternity on which it is based. The self-conscious, awkward music obsessives pledging into this fraternity would have to pass a complex trivia test, own a compulsory list of records, and, as a hazing ritual, ask to dance with someone in public. If LCD Soundsystem's James Murphy were the least bit open to the concept, he could be the fraternity's advisor. Judging from a handful of singles and this album, he'd be more than qualified. His first A-side, 2002's "Losing My Edge," laid all his cards on the table, name-checking nearly everything that has been branded indispensable by a record store clerk during the past 20 years. This is someone who clearly owns tons of records and cannot escape them when making his own music. Acid house, post-punk, garage rock, psychedelic pop, and at least a dozen other things factor into his songs, and he's not afraid to be obvious. On occasion, he doesn't even allow fellow nerds to play guessing games. This is the case with "Never As Tired As When I'm Waking Up" -- drowsy/dazed John Lennon vibes through and through -- as well as the drifting/uplifting "The Great Release" -- an alternate closer to either of Brian Eno's first two solo records. Otherwise, Murphy's songs cough up references from his subconscious or are put together as if he's thinking more like a DJ, finding ways to combine elements from disparate sources. "Movement" careens into high-energy guitar squall after a pounding beat and cranky synths; "On Repeat" happily replicates the scratches and jabs of guitar heard from A Certain Ratio, PiL, and Gang of Four, but its mechanical pulse and curveball synth effects couldn't be any more distanced from those three groups. Nothing here exceeds the brilliance of "Beat Connection" or "Yeah." Like just about everybody else these days, Murphy's more skilled at creating isolated tracks than making full-lengths, even though this particular full-length has few weak spots and unfolds smoothly as you listen to it from beginning to end. The bonus disc, containing all the stray single tracks, adds a great deal of value. (AMG)
If you're familiar with the Dario Argento Giallo/Thriller then you'll know what great music this is from Goblin. Not 'officially' playing under the name Goblin, it's still the same talented guys giving us some effective, creepy tunes, some great electronica and some perfect prog-rock guitar and synth syncopation. Along with the original LP tracks, the CD also contains eight new previously unreleased versions. (moviegrooves)
The story line on Rabbit Fur Coat is this: for her first venture outside of celebrated indie sensations Rilo Kiley, singer/songwriter Jenny Lewis has made a "white soul" album, along the lines of Dusty Springfield or Laura Nyro. Which is why, of course, she brought in Kentucky duo the Watson Twins to provide bluegrass harmonies for the entire record. Which is to say that Rabbit Fur Coat doesn't quite live up to its billing -- especially when compared to The Greatest, Cat Power's genuine white-soul album that hit the stores the week after Lewis' solo affair. What Rabbit Fur Coat brings to mind is not Laura Nyro but, perhaps inevitably, Neko Case and the stark, arty Americana intimacy of her breakthrough, Furnace Room Lullaby. Not that Lewis has Case's throaty voice or commanding presence -- she can growl and slide into notes, but at her core she has a small, fragile voice, one that lends this muted set of songs intimacy, even if it also brings them to the verge of cutsiness. And that's not a word that should be associated with Rabbit Fur Coat, an album that's designed to be a comforting late-night confessional, from rousing stompers like "The Big Guns" through the bluesy crawl of "Rise Up With Fists" to bittersweet ruminations like the seemingly autobiographical title track and the cheerful, gangs-all-here singalong to the Traveling Wilburys "Handle With Care." Musically, this hits the mark -- not only does it return Lewis to the country leanings of Rilo Kiley's first album, it feels suspended in time and space, the perfect soundtrack to 2 A.M. But the spareness of its sound also puts undue emphasis on her writing, and while she can structure a song, she tends to overwork her lyrics, cramming too many words into a phrase and moralizing like a college sophomore ("Still they're dying on the dark continent/it's been happening long enough to mention it" or "Are you really that pure sir?/I thought I saw you in Vegas/it was not pretty/but she was," where the Watson Twins helpfully respond with "not your wife"). At her best, her songs have a grace and flow that obscure these flaws -- such as on "Happy," whose melody and attitude are not all that far removed from her most prominent booster in rock's old guard, Elvis Costello -- and -- even if they're still quite prominent upon any close listen. And since Rabbit Fur Coat is an album that's designed for close listening, that's a bit of a problem, but as a pure sonic experience, it's a moody, atmospheric listen that never gets quite as melancholy as it suggests and holds together better than any Rilo Kiley album to date. (AMG)
I Love Rock N' Roll, Joan Jett's first record with the Blackhearts, was a tougher, louder album than Bad Reputation, primarily because her new backing band gave her a more coherent sound. That dynamic, hard rock crunch is what made the title track into an international hit, but it also gives the album dimension -- not only can Jett & the Blackhearts tear up heavy glam rockers, but they also pull off the mock psychedelia of Tommy James & the Shondells' "Crimson and Clover" with aplomb. On the whole, I Love Rock N' Roll doesn't have as many strong songs as its predecessor, but the band's muscular, gritty sound makes the album just as good as Bad Reputation. (AMG)
Recorded and mixed in a month at The Red Barn in Palenville, NY in January 2007, American Hearts is dark and sardonic but it's not a claustrophobic, tortured not troubled as you'd expect. The record is actually quite beautifully stark and stripped-down and well played, filled with great melodies and warm production. The songs are wonderfully influenced by an amalgam of folk and blues, filtered through the mind of someone who knows what makes a great rock song breathe.
On a break from wreaking garage-punk havoc with the Horrors, keyboardist Spider Webb and bassist Tomethy Furse reinvented themselves as Moog droogs Spider & the Flies on Something Clockwork This Way Comes. Given that the Horrors' biggest influences -- which include Joe Meek, Screaming Lord Sutch, and the Syndicats -- are at least a few decades old, it's not a surprise that Webb and Furse know a thing or two about vintage electronic music as well. Throughout these seven songs, the pair get outlandish sounds out of their synths and pay homage to electronic experimentalists like Wendy Carlos, Delia Derbyshire, and the rest of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop composers; "Desmond Leslie" is an aptly metallic, clanking tribute to the musique concrète artist and sci-fi writer. Webb and Furse's Meek worship continues with "Jungle Planet," which, with its exotica-tinged drums and radar-like synths, sounds like a kissing cousin to I Hear a New World's alien field recordings, which, like Something Clockwork This Way Comes, was also a concept album about visiting other planets. Spider & the Flies are aided and abetted by producer Barry 7, whose late, great group Add N to (X) is also a major influence on the duo. The album's centerpiece, "Metallurge," which 7 co-wrote, fizzes, buzzes, and growls like one of his former band's wonderfully short-circuiting contraptions. As it unfolds, Something Clockwork moves from spacy heights like "Million Volt Light" and "Space Walking" -- a track whose whistling synths could announce the arrival of the TARDIS -- to the dancefloor beats of the vaguely industrial "Teslabeat" and "Autochrome," which pays homage to more recent inspirations like Juan Atkins. Though Something Clockwork This Way Comes feels like Spider & the Flies are walking in the shoes of their influences, they pay their respects ably and entertainingly, and if nothing else, it shows the pair has great taste. (AMG)
When A.A. Bondy was lead singer for Verbena, the band was often accused of lifting large portions of its sound and style from the Rolling Stones (on its first album) and Nirvana (on Into the Pink). So with that history, it makes a certain sense that Bondy's second solo effort, When the Devil's Loose, recalls another artist, in this case Ryan Adams. The largest part of this comes from Bondy's voice, which bears a reasonable aural resemblance to Adams and his sweetly jaded tone, though Bondy shows off a bit more sonic weight and a less studied demeanor. But the music isn't all that far away from Adams either, though if this is by design rather than accident, at least Bondy has the good sense to embrace the straightforward and emotionally powerful sound of Heartbreaker rather than the more scattershot style of Adams' subsequent solo efforts. Most of When the Devil's Loose was cut with just a bassist (Macey Taylor) and drummer (Paul Buchignani) accompanying Bondy and his guitar, and the sessions have an air of gentle melancholy that brings out their graceful balance of blues and country accents; the minimal backing emphasizes the late-night vibe of the music, and the deep lonesome wanderings of the melodies are an ideal match for the downbeat storytelling of "On the Moon," "Oh the Vampyre," and "The Coal Hits the Fire." Bruce Watson's production is subtle and nonintrusive, and that works beautifully in favor of the songs, which clearly play best without excess gingerbread and with Bondy's voice and lyrics placed front and center. When the Devil's Loose might share some reference points with another singer/songwriter with a similar offhand affection for roots music, but A.A. Bondy seems to be developing a voice of his own despite all the surface similarities, and the result is a quietly powerful album of songs that cut deeper into the heart and soul than you might expect at first glance. (AMG)
The original soundtrack for the 1971 cult giallo (known in the US as Lizard In A Woman's Skin, directed by the mighty Lucio Fulci) perfectly matches this psychodrama murder mystery thriller involving LSD, psychoanalysis, lesbianism, and extremely gory dream sequences.
