Yearly Archives: 2012

Nov 12 2012
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METAL MONDAY, Songs & Singles, Videos

METAL MONDAY: Australia’s Barbarion Have A Pretty Funny Video

Australian metal heads Barbarion have released a very slick, funny music video for their song “My Rock.”  Never heard of Barbarion [sic]? Well, me neither but someone must really like them, because the slickness of this video screams major label.  It feels like the kind of video you’d see back in the heyday of MTV with it’s oppressed, angry young metal fan.  Watching it, I was reminded of the video for Michael Jackson’s “Black or White” or Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It.”

“My Rock” the song is inoffensive but mostly fun, I’m interested in hearing what the rest of their music sounds like.

Anyway, if you need smile (or just a good laugh) take five minutes and check out this video:

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Nov 11 2012
8 Comments
Ramblings, Songs & Singles, Sort-of-Music-Related

Adele Achieve’s Double-O Status with “Skyfall”

I saw the latest James Bond movie, SKYFALL, this weekend and boy is it a doozy. After the disappointing QUANTUM OF SOLACE (stupid Writer’s Strike), the Bond producers wisely pulled out all the stops to make sure that SKYFALL was top-to-bottom brilliant.  Oscar Winning Director Sam Mendes brings his usual confident, steady hand (not to mention cinematographer) to the proceedings and manages to do the impossible: make a 50 year-old movie series seem fresh and relevant.

Mr. Kiss-Kiss Bang Bang.

There are a lot of criticisms one can lob at a Bond movie, but for me the first thing that either pleases or disappoints is the theme song.  The last two films in the long-running film franchise have had less-than-stellar songs…in fact, even though I’m a pretty big Bond fan, I had to go look up what the last two songs were in order to write this post.  CASINO ROYALE, a fantastic reboot of the Bond series was shackled with the boring, unimaginative song “You Know My Name” by Soundgarden/Audioslave-mope Chris Cornell.  Besides being overly-generic, the song had nothing to do with the movie.  I know that these films usually have ridiculous, impossible to use-in-a-song titles…but “You Know My Name” wasn’t able to tie in any way to the film: weak-sauce.

Speaking of ridiculous titles: QUANTUM OF SOLACE.  As a Bond fan, I like to pretend that this film doesn’t even exist.  This isn’t a film blog, so I’ll spare you all my armchair analysis, suffice to say during the middle of the movie I turned to my wife and whispered: “I am so bored right now.  This is boring me.” There is nothing worse that can be said about a film than it’s boring. “Another Way To Die,” the film’s theme song isn’t boring in the least.  In fact, a little boring might have been a good thing for the Alicia Keys/Jack White duet.  The song is pairing of two really great artists who really do not go together well.  The track is overstuffed and Jack’s fuzzy guitar, usually an asset, detracts from the proceedings because a Bond theme song is not supposed to be down and dirty or indie rock it’s supposed to be glamorous and high class.

Ever since Paul McCartney & Wings excellent “Live and Let Die,” the Bond producers have chased that elusive dragon: a theme song that’s both good for the film AND a massive pop hit. As a result, a lot of really cheesy bands have contributed theme songs over the years that now seem a head-scratch worthy.  How could we have grown as a culture had Lulu, Rita Coolidge, and Sheena Easton not been allowed the honor of performing Bond themes (?).  If you are a little fuzzy on who Lulu or Rita Coolidge are, it’s okay: they’re musical footnotes.

Sometimes flash-in-the-pan stars put out decent theme songs, like a-ha’s “The Living Daylights” for Timothy Dalton’s first outing as Bond (THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS).  And let me go on record as saying that Duran Duran’s “A View To A Kill” is 1,000% better than the film A VIEW TO A KILL.  But did we really need a Sheryl Crow or Garbage Bond theme? And do you even remember what songs they did?  I didn’t.

Which brings me to Adele’s song “Skyfall.”  SKYFALL has so many good things that by the time it was over I had (nearly) forgotten how good the theme song was.  “Skyfall” is a great example of how to do a Bond theme song right.   Just grabbing any popular artist of the moment and having them turn in a song isn’t the way to go.  Instead, a real singer was hired.  Adele is an amazing singer.  She’s also a very talented song writer!  Taking a glance back at Bond themes of yesterday, I can’t help but notice that many were written by composer John Berry and not the act performing the song.

Adele’s “Skyfall” works not only because she’s such a good singer-songwriter, but because her style of music fits with the elegant, glamorous world of the Bond films.  She’s a classy artist who’s song will sound just as classy tomorrow, or even ten years, as she sounds today.  Maybe the song is a little old-fashioned, but I guarantee it’ll hold up infinitely better than a song like Gladys Knight’s “License To Kill” or Madonna’s “Die Another Day.”  I’m not sure if “Skyfall” is going to be a smash #1 hit, but it’s a great song that isn’t boring to sit through AND just as important doesn’t embarrass the franchise. Which, let’s face it, has a lot to be embarrassed about (I’m looking at you Roger Moore). 

Oddly enough, all of this makes me think about Amy Winehouse.  Winehouse was the #1 pick of both fans and the film’s producers to do a Bond theme.  She was rumored to have been approached to perform the theme song for QUANTUM OF SOLACE, but it wasn’t to be.  I remember when Adele first broke a few years ago, the first comparison made was to Amy Winehouse.  The two are alike in many ways: both are women whose style is very much rooted in classic pop/jazz standards.  Both wrote really personal, really good songs.  Both were given amazing, powerful voices that don’t,  on the surface seem to really fit their bodies. But whereas Adele is down to Earth and grounded, Winehouse was a complete and utter wreck.

Winehouse and Adele actually remind me a lot of Bond and SKYFALL’s villain Raoul Silva.  Silva is a former MI6 agent gone bad, he’s essentially an evil Mirror Universe version of Bond.  I think that Adele is the white knight version of Amy Winehouse’s dark knight.  I don’t mean to say that Adele is good and Amy Winehouse is bad, just that they’re different sides of the same coin.   Adele is like the Winehouse who didn’t succumb to her fame: or Winehouse is Adele who did.

After the movie I had trouble thinking about anything else besides this strange irony.  Winehouse was never able to do a Bond theme, even though she seemed so well suited for it.  Then SKYFALL comes out and there is Adele, doing a theme song that’s the best one in years.   I feel like there should be a term for when art and life collide so perfectly.

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Nov 09 2012
4 Comments
Album Reviews

SUNKEN CONDOS by Donald Fagen

Duos are a funny thing.  A band is like the engine of a car; there are multiple parts working in tandem and all are needed for everything to work.  Solo artist are like trapeze artists, they walk the high-line naked and alone.  If they fall, they fall with all eyes squarely on them. Duos, however, are a bit tricky.  Good duos, the really successful duos, are not made by the merger of two good solo artists but rather the joining of complementary talents. The relationship falls somewhere between husband & wife and mosquito & a pulsing vein.

*Flush*

So what happens when a duo parts ways? Well sometimes it’s good.  And sometimes it’s very messy.  The best example I can think of as far as a messy breakup is Simon and Garfunkel.  When their duo ended it meant great things for Paul Simon…and pretty much the end of Art Garfunkel.  Maybe that’s cruel, but I can name 10 Paul Simon songs, but I can’t name one Art Garfunkel song.

Steely Dan started out as a band and then devolved into the duo of Walter Becker and Donald Fagen.  Of the two, I’ve always liked Fagen better.  Fagen always seemed cooler to me.  When I found out that Donald Fagen had put out a new solo album this month, I was intrigued but not in any rush to hear any of the music.  I’m a pretty big Steely Dan fan, but I’ve yet to really venture into any of Becker & Fagen’s post-GOUCHO output.   I’ve heard nice things about TWO AGINST NATURE but I’ve been hesitant.  Steely Dan has always existed for me as a bit of a relic, a late 1970’s throwback.

But, someone forwarded me mix of Fagen’s solo stuff on Spotify and one track stuck out: “I’m Not The Same Without You.”  The horns.  The velvety groove.  The nasally sneer.  The chic, icy poetry.  Equally biting and mournful, “I’m Not The Same Without You” is everything that the best Steely Dan songs were.  In fact, had I not known it was a Fagen-solo track, I’d have just assumed that the song was from one of the two newer Steely Dan albums.

So I reluctantly dived into SUNKEN CONDOS (pun intended). And I’m here to tell you, that it’s good.  It’s really, really good. If you enjoy the acerbic wit and jazzy sensibilities of Steely Dan, you’re gonna love SUNKEN CONDOS.  Fagen’s album is everything there is to love about Steely Dan, but slowed down just a tad and with a bit more of a jazz-edge.

The album opens with “Slinky Thing,” which is a pretty good description of the album as a whole, actually.  It’s a classic bit of Fagen neuroticism, detailing the unease of dating a much younger woman (the titular “Slinky Thing”).  It reminded me a great deal of “Hey Nineteen.”  And that’s a good thing.

“I’m Not The Same Without You” is definitely the album’s lead-single and as I mentioned before, it’s really good.  As is the last track “Planet D’Rhonda,” about an insane (or insanely fun?) woman that you just can’t leave.  It has all the element of a Steely Dan song, but seems slower and feels a bit stripped-down.  I’m sure Becker could have gone nuts on this, and pretty much all the songs on SUNKEN CONDOS…but he didn’t.  He didn’t because this is the Donald Fagen show, and as such, the songs are a bit mellower.  Some might see that as a bad thing, or a weakness of the SUNKEN CONDOS, but I actually dig the laid-back mood of the album.

My favorite song on the record “The Weather In My Head” which compares the turbulent climate change-infused storms to the self-doubt and depression plaguing the song’s narrator: They may fix the weather in the world, just like Mr. Gore said, but tell me what’s to be done about the weather in my head? I think that’s a great line.  “The Weather In My Head” is a great blues song and it totally knocked my socks off the first time I heard it.  Usually Fagen’s writing is so damn obtuse and distant, that it takes a few listens before things sink in, so I was shocked when I not only understood the song’s meaning on the first listen.  I also found myself wholeheartedly agreeing with the song’s sentiment.

Solid songwriting, impeccable production and musicianship abound on SUNKEN CONDONS.  In fact, the only misstep is on “Out of the Ghetto” which sits in the middle of the album.  It’s (up) tempo feels off  compared to the rest of the album’s slower, unhurried pace. But the biggest problem I have with the song is in the lyrics: the talk of “discos” in 2012, even if Fagen’s being ironic, turned me off.  In fact, the song’s tongue-in-cheek take on race struck me as all wrong.  I think Fagen’s heart is (mostly) in the right place but I could see the song being…shall we say…misinterpreted by lesser minds.  “Out of the Ghetto” is definitely not the track I’d put on for someone new to Steely Dan or Fagen.

Overall I’d recommend SUNKEN CONDOS.  It’s a good album that’s inspired me to seek out more of Fagen’s more recent output, as well as made me interested to hear what Becker does when he’s not kicking it with Fagen.

 

EDIT: It was pointed out to me by a commenter on Facebook (seriously, why aren’t you friends with Defending Axl Rose on Facebook? Go “Like” it right now) that “Out of the Ghetto” was in fact a cover.  And in fact, they were correct the song is an Isaac Hayes covers, which not only explains the strange disco reference, but also adds all sorts of interesting shades of irony to the song.  Fagen is an interesting, complicated, cat.  My knowledge of 1970’s R&B/Soul music is laughably limited, so I would like to thank my friends over at Facebook for pointing this error out to me. 

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Nov 08 2012
3 Comments
Ramblings

Celebrate No Shave November With These 10 Best Rockin’ Beards

Hooray! The temps are getting lower, the leaves are turning colors, and I’m all out of vacation time at work…which means it’s NOVEMBER! As I’m sure you’re all aware, it’s also “No Shave November.”  Now, the MAN would have you believe that having too much hair is a bad thing, but you know better, don’t you? Long hair and beards are the most rock ‘n roll thing there is.  I’m doing my part to let grow, as I do every winter.  Does my boss like my beard? I don’t know because I don’t ask.  A winter-coat is important to survive the harsh Mid-West winters…but it’s even more important if you’re gonna ROCK!

To celebrate No Shave November, I thought I’d count down my Top 10 All-Time Greatest Rock Beards.  Yes, ZZ Top is on this list.

10. Jim Morrison.  I know most of you like to think of Jim as a clean-shaven, sober, upstanding member of society…but not me.

9. Scott Ian.  The Anthrax guitarist is pretty much world-famous for his facial hair.

8. Dave Grohl.  The Foo Fighter’s frontman has the kind of beard you wouldn’t mind taking home to meet your mother.

7. George Harrison.  The quiet Beatle was an understated guitarist and an amazing beard-grower.

6. Jim Ford.  While not a household name, Jim Ford’s song writing inspired Nick Lowe, who covered his song “36 Inches High.” 36 inches was also his beard length (give or take).

5. Willie Nelson.  This man rocks. Plain and simple, as does his beard which is just as famous as Lincoln’s.

4. Paul McCartney.  The cute one got married an rocked an awesome 70’s beard.  It was good times.

3. Jerry Garcia.  I think we’re all grateful  for Jerry’s awesome bushy beard.

2. Frank Zappa.  Controversial, as Zappa is mostly known for his manicured mustache and soul patch, still a beard in my book.

1. Billy Gibbons.  Come on, who else?

For more beard-related fun, why not stop by and visit my friends over at Beards.org. And remember, shaving is for little sissy babies!

 

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Nov 07 2012
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I Read The News Today Oh Boy, News Like Item, Ramblings, Sort-of-Music-Related

The GnR Poster Too Risqué For Las Vegas

The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino has yanked down a city-wide ad for the historic (sorta) Guns ‘N Roses concerts taking place in Las Vegas this month after a bunch of anger/complaints from the citizens of Las Vegas.  The poster, which incorporates artwork from painter Robert Williams* bizarre sci-fi painting titled “Appetite for Destruction,” has a lecherous robot in a compromising position with a defenseless, splayed woman.  Oh, and her shirt is ripped open and her panties are around her ankles.  You know, typical Disney stuff.

This is not the first time that the band’s use of this painting has caused controversy.  Back in 1987, retailers refused to stock GNR’s debut album APPETITE FOR DESTRUCTION because Axl & Company wanted to use it as the cover art.  In the end, the band fell to label pressure and alternate artwork was used.  The painting is more batshit-stupid than rocking.  At least, that’s my opinion.  I don’t understand GNR’s continued insistence on using it to represent themselves, to be honest.

I’m astounded that the bean counters over at the Hard Rock actually agreed to run the ads.  What better way to convince people that your brand is fun for the whole family than a leering, rape-y robot?  To be clear, I hate this painting and I wish GNR/Axl would get over their massive hard-on for it...however Las Vegas is known the world-over as “Sin City.”  We’re not talking about Orlando, Florida or Branson, Missouri.  We’re talking about the smutty-ist, gambling capital of the country. A place where shady looking dudes hand out flyers of chicks you can legally pay to know (like in the Biblical sense).

I can’t imagine the ad was the most misogynistic thing the fanny-pack wearing masses of Las Vegas are being subjected to in a city where selling women is mostly legal.  I was recently in Times Square and that place was stuffed to the gills with super-porny clothing ads.  I know it’s not the same because none of the Gap ads were violent, but as we all know sex sells and this shit is everywhere these days.  Again, I’m not saying I think this ad should be plastered at the airport, welcoming families to Las Vegas (which it was), but I think Las Vegas needs to check itself.  I mean, this is Las Vegas we’re talking about.  And this poster is a drawing.  It doesn’t depict actual human beings, unlike the prostitute ads.

In the end, I can’t help but think that this is just a publicity stunt.  This controversy was not only foreseen  but wanted, I suppose to generate interest in the concerts and get us all talking–in which case: mission accomplished. Las Vegas should take a long look in the mirror and GNR should put “Appetite for Destruction” (the painting) to rest.

Lovely.

*Not that Robert Williams

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Nov 06 2012
6 Comments
Ramblings, Songs & Singles

“Imagine A Jump”: The Greatest Van Halen/John Lennon Mash-Up

Last week while I was bunkered down in New York City, waiting for Hurricane Sandy to do her worst, my wife’s best-friend Becky bravely sacrificed her iPhone’s battery so that we might have some tunes by candlelight.  I love going through people’s iTunes, I find it a nice way to both get to know AND judge the shit out of someone.  My iTunes is an atrocious mix of the best and worst of rock, pop, jazz, country, and blues music.  There’s things in it that I’m proud of…and a lot that I’d rather you just skip over.

Imagine there’s no Red Rocker.

Becky’s iPhone was filled with a lot of her favorite bands: Green Day and Barenaked Ladies.  Not exactly my cup of tea, but I’d say I like both those bands enough.  Anyway, as I browsed her iTunes, I noted that she had Van Halen’s “Jump” one her phone twice: once from the album 1984 (GREAT album by the way) and again from a Greatest Hits compilation.  I laughed and pointed this out.  She had an explantation, but there was no need: “Jump” is great song so why NOT have it on your phone?

Becky loves it when I take pics of her sleeping, that’s why we’re such good friends.

Becky also had a large quantity of The Beatles on her phone, as well as some John Lennon solo stuff. That got me thinking, had Becky heard Mighty Mike’s “Imagine A Jump”? She hadn’t, and it really bummed me out.  Mighty Mike is this French DJ that does mind-blowingly awesome mash-ups.  Seriously.  Before Mighty Mike, I thought DJ’s and mash-ups were lame, but this guy’s Queen/Michael Jackson mash-ups changed my mind.

I strongly urge you to go on his blog and download/listen to all his songs, there’s not a single bad one in the bunch.

“Imagine A Jump” is one of Mighty Mike’s best.  It’s the acapella/vocals of Van Halen’s “Jump” merged with the hauntingly simple piano of John Lennon’s classic “Imagine.”  The best part? The (slowed down) vocals actually work with “Imagine.”  The upbeat, devil-may-care Van Halen song is transformed into a downbeat, depressing ode to suicide and desperation.  I know that doesn’t sound particularly fun but it’s actually a cheeky bit of fun.

This is amazing. Thank you Mighty Mike:

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Nov 06 2012
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I Read The News Today Oh Boy, News Like Item, Ramblings

Axl Rose On Jimmy Kimmel: My (Delayed) Reaction

I understand that this is now old news at this point, but I’ve been unable to write about Axl Rose’s recent appearance on Jimmy Kimmel.  Part of the reason was that I was horribly stranded in New York City during the recent super-storm/clusterfuck.  But another part was my brain’s slowed reaction to the appearance.

Axl was appropriate for the entire interview, except for his stupid hat.

On one hand, I found Axl’s first major TV interview to be a colossal disappointment and a great relief.  It was disappointing because Axl looks like someone’s bloated dad.  Look, I’m a fat, nerdy music writer so I can say it:  Axl used to be a rock adonis, and now he’s pudgy old guy.  The hat was also stupid.  I know it’s not cool to be balding or whatever is going on under that hat…but for crying out loud Axl, that hat makes you look insane.  It’s easy for me to say own your baldness when I still have a head full of hair, but I think it’s pretty vain when rock stars refuse to take off their hats/headbands.  You know who my all-time rockstar hair hero is? James Taylor.  James Taylor went bald and took it like a man. He didn’t bother with any coverup or conspiracy, he was like “this is what my head looks like.”  Kids today might not think it ballsy but there was a time when James Taylor was known for his giant mane of hair.  He wasn’t a hair-metal guy by any stretch, but he did have nice hair.

Enjoy all that sexy hair, 1970’s James Taylor, cos it won’t last…

But I digress. This post is not about hair.

So Axl’s gotten old, I can deal with that.  The bigger disappointment was also the thing that gave me tremendous relief: Axl Rose wasn’t insane or weird (hat not withstanding).  He was plainspoken, friendly, and engaged in talking with Jimmy Kimmel.  Kimmel even made a point of saying how surprised he was that Axl was talking to him during the interview.  The pictures of Axl’s Halloween Tree and his story about how he likes to see kids freak out when they see it was cool.  Some might say that the critical and commercial failure of CHINESE DEMOCRACY has humbled Rose, and that’s why the man we see is so down-to-earth and normal.  But I don’t see it that way.  The way I see it, Axl without all the bullshit is just a normal dude like you or me.

I’m sad that he wasn’t bizarre and we didn’t get some crazy sound bytes out of the appearance–but mostly I’m glad to see that Axl isn’t the douchebag the media have portrayed him to be.  On a side side note, I was glad to see The Whigs perform later on in the episode (I’ve seen them live a few times and they’re awesome) but I was REALLY REALLY sad that Guns ‘N Roses didn’t play a song instead.  How awesome would that have been?

Lastly, the reason we got this odd bit of Axl publicity: the Vegas shows.  Had I not just spent all my money and remaining vacation time stranded in NYC, I think I’d actually go out and catch one of the GNR Vegas shows.  In a perfect world, the last show of the band’s month-long stand would be televised or streamed online AND we’d get a Live Album released next year.  But the reality is: after these shows, the US probably won’t see Axl or Guns ‘N Roses for a while.  Maybe I’m wrong, I hope I am.

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Nov 04 2012
3 Comments
Songs & Singles

Flaming Lips & Tame Impala Collide On “Children of The Moon”

In my review of the latest Tame Impala album, LONERISM, I noted that Tame Impala sounded a bit like Oklahoma freak-rockers The Flaming Lips.  I think that both bands share a common 60’s-LSD-Beatleband strand of DNA, but what would happen if the two bands were to meet?  Would a rainbow-colored funnel of sunshine spew trippy death all over existence? Or would they just make a  really nice song?

The Flaming Lips are good at a lot of things, but spelling is not one of those things.

Turns out they’d just make a really nice song.  The Flaming Lips put out an album of collaborations this year called THE FLAMING LIPS AND HEADY FWENDS (sic) which features Tame Impala.  The song, “Children of The Moon,” might not be as epic of mind-blowing as one would hope…but it is really good.

The song leans more towards the Australian rockers mellow-gold rather than The Lip’s more purple nurple sound.  Still, you can definitely hear how The Flaming Lips magnified Tame Impala’s more understated vibe (to great effect I think).

Check it out:

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Nov 04 2012
5 Comments
Album Reviews

LONERISM by Tame Impala

Australian daytrippers Tame Impala burst onto the collective consciousness in 2010 with their fantastic debut album INNERSPEAKER.  That record, which I once described as perfect Sunday morning chill-out music, set the bar pretty high for the band.  I honestly didn’t expect to hear from Tame Impala so quickly, especially after lead singer/songwriter Kevin Parker released an album of similarly psychedelic (but far woolier) tunes under the name Pond in March of this year.  Much to my delight, however, Tame Impala is back with their new album LONERISM.

In case your’re wondering, the sign on the gate reads: “Dogs, even on a leash, are not admitted beyond this point.”

What I find most interesting about the album is that it’s both a leap forward and a step back.  Sonically, the album is lightyears ahead of INNERSPEAKER, which itself was hovering at the very finge of our soloar system.  The band pushes the band’s sound even further into space with it’s  heavier use of synthesizers.  Parker has said in interviews that LONERISM is more prog/indulgent that the last record.  And while that typically is a negative, in this case the songs on LONERISM run wild without running completely away (the longest song clocks in at just over six minutes).  The band’s vast, spaced-out sound is pushed to the limits on such tracks as “Mind Mischief” and “Apocalypse Dreams.”  Both tracks sound like a calmer, mellower, less cartoon version of The Flaming Lips.  LONERISM also recalls Todd Rundgren, whom the band has cited as a major influence.

That said, LONERISM is also a bit of step back in that lyrically the majority of the songs deal with personal issues of loneliness, isolation, and social awkwardness.  The best example of this is the woe-is-me jam “Why Won’t They Talk To Me?” in which Parker sings about being alone and only thinking he’s happy. This material would probably seem whiny, self-pitying, and immature except that it’s swathed in a big bouncy beat.  The trippy vibe takes an emo kids lament and transforms it into the inner musings of a stoned philosophy major.  The albums themes of isolation are also represented on the album’s cover, which is a photo taken by Parker at a French public park.  I think the shot of the happy people viewed through the bars works best with “Why Won’t They Talk To Me?”  Tame Impala was smart to both expand their telescope sonically while at the same time write more personal songs. It keeps the band from floating away entirely into the stratosphere where the listener is unable to relate to them.

Sitting amongst the green.

Special mention should be made concerning the band, specifically Kevin Parker’s affinity for John Lennon.  John Lennon’s ghost looms large on LONERISM, specifically on the albums best songs “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards,” “Sun’s Coming Up,” and “Elephant”.  Parker’s vocals eerily channel the former Beatle throughout the album, but on “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards” sound like a lost PLASTIC ONO BAND track.  “Sun’s Coming Up” sounds like a sleepy/boozy Lennon demo for one of his piano ballads. “Elephant” which is my favorite track on the album, sounds like “For The Benefit of Mr. Kite” merged with “I Am The Walrus.”  It’s a lumbering rocker that wouldn’t stick out too much on MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR.   The homage/influence of Lennon will probably turn off as many people as it switches on.  I don’t think it’s 100% fair to give Tame Impala too much grief about this because:

1. The dude can’t help who he sounds like

and

2. There are worse things to be like than John Lennon.  Do Tame Impala rip off The Beatles? No.  Do they re-invent the wheel? No, but what they create vast sonic murals of trippy space rock and they do it well–end of story.

Ah. Freak. Out.

Tame Impala have forged a solid second record with all the big, epic sound you’d expect from the band that brought us INNERSPEAKER.  However, more than just delivering more of the same, the band has stretched their legs and dug a little deeper for LONERISM.  The album, while not as top-to-bottom perfect as INNERSPEAKER, still manages to capture the imagination and delight the listener.  To say that LONERISM is a headphones album would be the understatement of the year.  Switch off the lights, pop in your ear buds, and close your eyes.

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Oct 29 2012
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Ramblings, Songs & Singles

“Fats Domino” by The Features

Tennessee rockers The Features have become one of my favorite bands through double-osmosis: I dragged my wife to a Kings of Leon show a few years ago and they were one of the opening acts.  So impressed with their sound, my wife did something she never does and actually went out bought some of the bands CD’s.  The Features are probably one of the hardest-working bands I’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing–six times in less than 4 years.

Beyond the endless touring, however, The Features also consistently release an album every year (give or take) that’s really good.  The band’s song writing has not only been solid as a rock, but they’ve done that rare thing in rock where they’ve stayed true to themselves while still managing to grow artistically AND appeal to an increasingly wider audience.  Most recently, the band was featured in a national TV spot for a big American car company.

WILDERNESS, the band’s latest album is fantastic…but you should hear them all.

The Features seem to be a band on the verge of breaking big, and when that day comes I’m going to feel very smug.  But because I’m a Hipster-Soothsayer, I’m going to be a bit sad, too.  I mean, can a band so down-to-Earth and workman-like endure the harsh spotlight? I wouldn’t think so, but then I heard “Fats Domino” from the band’s most recent album WILDERNESS.

“Fats Domino” is a soft battle-cry, but a battle-cry nonetheless.  It’s about all the things we need, or don’t need.  It’s a list of everything not needed…and the one thing that we can’t live without: Rock ‘n Roll. “You can take everything except my rock ‘n roll, my love, put down Fats Domino.”  The song, which is in the context of a relationship ending, on the surface is about a dude asking for his records, but beyond the surface “Fats Domino” is about nourishing, enduring magic of rock music.  We live in a modern world full of so much crap that, quite frankly, none of us need.  “Fats Domino” is a song written by a band that has it’s priorities in order and their heads on straight.  That it’s called “Fats Domino” and not “Elvis Presley” or even “Chuck Berry” is both telling and extremely comforting. Not only do The Features know where they as a band are going, they know where rock has been.

I think this sort of musical literacy and historical awareness is not only endearing but also very comforting. I’m comforted that The Features love rock music.  They don’t just live it, eat, sleep, and breathe it–they know it intimately.  The Features aren’t rock stars, they’re craftsmen.  The albums they make are strong, sturdy chairs like those built by master-carpenters; beautiful to look at but also very functional.

So I don’t worry about The Features getting success and losing their heads.  The only thing that I worry is that the success will remain elusive for them, not for their sake….but yours.

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