New Music Reviews: Iron & Wine, Charles Bradley, The Decemberists, Smith Westerns, Social Distortion, Destroyer, Tennis

A run down of some new releases from the past month.

stationtostation Pick Of The Month (January):

Iron and Wine-Kiss Each Other Clean

Goodbye cozy and intimate. Hello spacious and vast. On Iron and Wine's fourth full length release, "Kiss Each Other Clean", lead man Samuel Beam has pretty much thrown away any of the lo fi recording style that fans from past albums such as "Our Endless Numbered Days" and to a lesser extent, "The Shepherd's Dog" maybe came to cherish. Those recordings were intimate affairs you could take comfort in enjoying in a small room. Here we've got Beam playing to the rafters in a sense with a multitude of different instruments and an overall cleaner proudction you'd find on classic AM 70's gold records.

There is no need for alarm here, though. If Beam had a crayon box with eight colors in the past, he picked up the sixty four pack with crayon sharpener for this affair. Whether it be the addition of saxophone on "Me & Lazarus", marimbas and vibraphones on "Monkeys Uptown", or the flutes found on "Rabbit Will Run", the one thing that fortunately stays constant throughout this huge palette of sound is Beam's strength of being a fantastic singer/songwriter. His poetry musings of a man with a bruised heart still stay intact and his songs for the most part remain charming affairs as found on the opener "Walking Far From Home", the should be a breakthrough single this year for the band, "Tree By The River", or the catchy doo wops backing the sweet "Half Moon". Other songs such as the forced funkiness of "Big Burned Hand" or the epic, unfocused closer "Your Fake Name Is Good Enough For Me" may seem a bit out of place on an Iron and Wine album, but they do keep things interesting, and that is part of the charm here. "Kiss Each Other Clean" never collapses under the wight of these new studio tricks and extra instrumentation. If anything, it just becomes another Iron and Wine album you probably need to hear. It's like a technicolor rainbow that is just as warm and rewarding as past efforts. A small triumph.
Grade: A-

JHO Picks:
Walking Far From Home
Tree By The River
Half Moon
Glad Man Singing
  IRON & WINE - Tree by the river by MarMat7681
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Charles Bradley-No Time For Dreaming

If some offerings of late have dipped their feet into the pool of the classic soul era, "No Time For Dreaming" is where the listener is allowed to dive head first into some fantastic deep, southern soul. Sixty two year old Charles Bradley may at first seem like he's borrowing form legendary artists such as Otis Redding, Marvin Gaye, and James Brown, but his grizzled voice is truly unique in itself. He channels Gaye on "The Telephone Song" right down to the spoken word at the beginning of the song, gets straight down Redding like on the fantastic opener "The World (Is Going Up In Flames)" and lets out some straight up soulful vocals James Brown style on "The Golden Rule" and "Lovin' You, Baby".

What makes these songs truly sizzle is the combination of Bradley's vocals with a remarkable backing band sounding true to the classic sound of Stax musicians assembled on "No Time For Dreaming". Every song stays true to the retro soul sound, from the great horns to the great rhythm and drum sections, that produced so many classic albums back in the sixties and seventies. Themes range from politics ("The World (Is Going Up In Flames)", to heartbreak ("I Believe In Your Love"), to a brief history of the hardships and difficulties Bradley has tackled through his long life ("No Time For Dreaming" and "Why Is It So Hard"). It's a truly remarkable affiar, one that sounds like a remake of a classic album, but truly original and brand new in material courtesy to the always sturdy "Daptone sound" in its finished product. Highly recommended for fans of soul music, old and new.
Grade: A-

JHO Picks:
The World (Is Going Up In Flames)
Golden Rule
No Time For Dreaming
Why Is It So Hard
  The World (Is Going Up In Flames) - Charles Bradley by dylandynamo
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The Decemberists-The King Is Dead

Look, I'm still trying to get around the Decemberists lead single "Down By The Water" not breaking into "Maps and Legends" or "The One I Love" from R.E.M. The familiariarity is uncanny. Perhaps it's because Peter Buck helped on three of the songs including "Down By The Water" on the "King Is Dead". The Decemberists latest release finds the band in a more direct approach to their sound which may delight people who jumped off the Decemberists bandwagon with the overwrought "Hazards Of Love" released in 2009. Songs tend to bask in American folk roots instead of succumbing to the bands tendencies to jump off the deep end with progressive, art rock influences from the past.

The harmonica on songs like "Water" and the opener "Don't Carry It All" are straight out of the Neil Young "Heart Of Gold" catalog while the slide guitar on "Rise To Me" is rustic beauty you'd think about hearing on Wilco's A.M. album. Just as fine are the slower ballads "January Hymn" and "June Hymn" which both drip with warm and wistful vocals by Colin Meloy. If there's a knock I've got is while the band seems to tackle Americana elements left and right, it still feels a bit calculated and missing the key ingredient of looseness that makes a classic American folk album possible. Instead, it becomes more commercially ready no matter how hard you turn that those strings of the fiddle that begin "All Arise!" But if more commercial ready is the endgame, the Decembeists have hit a home run. "The King Is Dead" is currently the number one album on the Billboard Hot 100. Who would've ever thought that possible? A solid, accessible album if even a bit by the numbers.
Grade: B

JHO Picks:
Don't Carry It All
Rise To Me
January Hymn
Down By The Water
  The Decemberists - Rox In The Box by Vicente P.S. 
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Smith Westerns-Dye It Blonde

These young lads (not one being above twenty yet I believe) from Chicago have put out one outstanding sounding album for their sophomore release: "Dye It Blonde" (a play on the stones "Paint It Black", get it?). There is a ton to like about the sound and songs here. Each one has an opening layer of strings and keyboards that balance out a guitar that comes straight off your favorite T. Rex or Mott The Hoople album. Lead off song "Weekend" practically enshrines everything that sounded great about glam rock in the seventies in a little under four minutes from the carefree vocal style of Cullen Omori ("A girl like you...") to the great production of music including a lead guitar that makes you think David Bowie's Mick Ronson has come back from the grave to recreate "A Song For Bob Dylan". The band's big strength is the music itself, each song sounding like pristine pieces of glitter pop left on the cutting room floor of a seventies band that sound ready for 2011. The upbeat songs "Imagine Pt. 3", "End Of The Night", "Dance Away" simply bounce along rambunctiously and the more middle of the road pieces, the absolute stunner "All Die Young" and "The Only One", never let in any piece of sappiness that may bog things down.

My lone issue with "Dye It Blonde" is that while Smith Westerns politely borrow the glam rock sound, the lyrics and underbelly of the whole affair is sorely missing the seediness and sexuality that those great classic albums from the early seventies provided. Musically they are light years ahead of where they are in life. Maybe some rough and tumble years can help add some grit to their songs, because grit is what is holding back "Dye It Blonde" from being an instant classic. Still a great listen and should please fans of the band and pick up some more as the year wears on.
Grade: B+

JHO Picks:
Weekend
All Die Young
End Of The Night
Dance Away
  Smith Westerns - All Die Young by Indie Aufsatz 
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Social Distortion-Hard Times & Nursery Rhymes

28 years after debuting on to the L.A punk scene with "Mommy's Little Monster", Social Distortion still have not lost their trademark rockabilly meets punk infused with roots rock formula. With their first album in seven years time, "Hard Time & Nursery Rhymes" finds Mike Ness singing more tales of hard luck guys in the same vein as he did on classic albums "Social Distortion" and "Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell".

"Hard Times" has a fantastic 1-2 opener with an instrumental that purely burns like a psycho surf classic before opening up into pure classic Stones era "California (Hustle and Flow)" with Ness growling "Take me down/Take me on down the line" accompanied with female background singers. From there, things can be a little uneven with many high points including the thundering lead off single "Machine Gun Blues" with Ness singing about being a gangster to the slow burn of "Bakersfield".  A couple lower points are when Ness sounds begins to self parody himself a bit "Diamonds In The Rough" and a Hank Williams' cover "Alone and Forsaken" just doesn't seem to fit well. But in the end, Ness seems to thrive on being comfortable in the band's survival ("And I'm still alive and I will survive/I can take what life's got to give/Just need a little time") on "Still Alive". "Hard Times & Nursery Rhymes" will undoubtedly make long time fans ecstatic as it's another worthy addition to their catalog.
Grade: B+

JHO Picks:
California (Hustle & Flow)
Machine Gun Blues
Bakersfield
Can't Take It With You
  Social Distortion - Hard Times And Nursery Rhymes by Epitaph Records ___________________________________________________________________________________
Destroyer-Kaputt

"Wasting your days chasing some girls alright, chasing cocaine through the backrooms of the world all night." These are the lines you first hear on the self titled song "Kaputt" and it pretty much sums up the whole atmosphere of the album in a nutshell. Dan Bejar's ninth studio album wreaks of "Bright Lights, Big City" style seediness as he more or less doesn't sing these songs as much as he breathes life into the lines to push them through their icy landscapes. It bathes in that smooth, quiet storm atmosphere of early eighties soft rock while borrowing a lot (I mean a ton) from the New Romantic and Sophisti-Pop of eighties bands like Spandau Ballet and Prefab Spout.


If those bands or atmosphere is not your cup of tea, you are going to find the saxophones, synths, and heavy handed dramatics a bit too much on "Kaputt". Those saxophones, for instance, are going to wreak like Kenny G. But for some odd reason, the combination of all these elements works. "Kaputt" is an album that requires extra attention and additional spins for rewards to seep in. And if you become acquired to Bejar's mood, then songs like the excellent opener "Chinatown", the early New Orderish "Savage Night At the Opera" or the ever occurring theme Bejar keeps throwing out through the affair "A Song For America" are going to be the favorites here. "Kaputt" is an album that fans of are going to be the erratically diehard for while anyone else is going to be left scrathcing their heads trying to figure out the fuss. Or you could be in my boat: giving this repeated spins finding new nuances to enjoy that I didn't hear before. This is a grower without any doubt.
Grade: A-

JHO Picks:
Chinatown
Savage Night At The Opera
Kaputt
Song For America
  Destroyer - Chinatown by haibee_mirage

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Tennis-Cape Dory

The story of a married couple (Denver duo vocalist Alaina Moore and the kitchen sink Patrick Riley) selling everything they own to buy a sail boat and sail up and down the east coast to gain inspiration for writing their debut album is fascinating at best. The album cover sporting an eighties pin up girl from the mall is every bit as fascinating. The songs themselves on "Cape Dory" are all nuggets of songs filled with 50's girl doo wop singing by Moore whose vocals don't exactly strike with a sense of urgency or passion but yet fill the air like a gentle sea breeze. Her vocal take on "Marathon" sounds timeless and effortless as a nifty organ sets a muted 50's drive in atmosphere. Elsewhere, Riley brings guitars reminiscent of the Walkmen to the forefront with a nice use of jumpy bass lines to accompany Moore's sweet voice on "Baltimore".

But as a whole, digesting 28 minutes worth of these ten songs in one sitting (it feels longer than 28 minutes somehow) you start to feel the songs' strengths aren't enough to keep things from feeling a bit misguided and by the end, well, a bit dull. Each song in itself is a cupcake, good as an occasional song in a mix with others. But eating all ten cupcakes at once leaves you eating empty calories at one time. And "Cape Dory" is unfortunately, an empty calorie type of album. First disappointment of 2011.
Grade: C

JHO Picks:
Take Me Somewhere
Marathon
Baltimore
  Tennis - Baltimore by www.ohfancy.de // OhFancy

Source: http://www.jhostation.com/2011/02/new-music-reviews-iron-wine-charles.html

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