Mark Kozelek
The Finally LP
Calo Verde Records
originally published January 7, 2009
Admittedly, this review has been composed without the benefit of a perspective many readers may feel is important (maybe essential). Everything about April, the critically lauded album Kozelek released earlier this year under the moniker Sun Kil Moon, is a complete mystery to me.
A mere eight months after April (the album and the month) it may be easy to dismiss The Finally LP, a collection of cover songs culled from previously released tribute records, as nothing more than a throw-away, year-end indie-rock cash grab or a Kozelek fan club collectible. Leaving that dirty work to cynics, let's instead offer positive spin. This is the album that folks unfamiliar with the plaintive melodies, incisive lyrics and mild tones Kozelek traffics in should use as springboard for further examination - especially if you're a fan of the more familiar artists (Low, Will Oldham, Stephen Sondheim) whose songs are reinterpreted within.
Calm, valley-raised polled Herefords offer absent glances in black and white on the cover, and the pace of the record is just as casual as the less-than-urgent amble of a content cow. Forgive Kozelek for conjuring memories of 1979 and Christopher Cross (he of "Sailing" fame) on the Hüsker Dü ditty "Celebrated Summer," and instead stand impressed by the quiet and acoustic, yet untempered take on "If You Want Blood." Who knew the coffeehouse version of AC/DC would sound so perfect?
Titmachine
"We Build a New City" b/w "1989" 7-inch
Siltbreeze
originally published January 7, 2009
If there's one thing this world needs, it's more good-natured willful incompetence, at least in the realm of noise rock, and not, y'know, governance. We've had enough incompetence in that area. Thankfully, the world is also where Germany's Titmachine hangs out. Also thankfully, Titmachine is not and never can be the president (and not because they're girls, but because they are Germans. I'm sure there'll be a girl president some day. Maybe even in Germany!). Titmachine's second single of '08 features some more awesome Flipper-style nonsense, a thudding monolithic fury topped off with shrill German shouting. Their cover of German new wavers Palais Schaumburg's "We Build a New City" attains a startling modicum of semi-professionalism, but "1989" puts that fear to rest. It's like an imperial march collapsing in on itself. Now, I just have to remember to CTRL-F and replace the word "incompetence" with "primitivism" before sending this in.
Disturbed
Indestructible
Reprise
originally published January 7, 2009
So, I put this CD on and promptly blacked out. When I woke up I was in a Black Hawk helicopter above Fallujah and I was like "What the fuck?"
That's how powerful this music is. But seriously, folks, this really happened. My time in the shit, in the weeds as the more polite folks might put it, is no laughing matter. It was grisly as fuck. We ate dirt, no joke. We had to. We didn't have much else around, to tell the truth.
Wikipedia will tell you (at press time) that eating cactus and camel will get you over the hump (har!), but that's a damn lie, and any serviceman or woman will tell you the same. At this point, I cannot say with definitive truth to myself or to common knowledge whether I can say I "blame" Disturbed, or if I have them to thank.
It's probably because it's in drop D tuning. I swear, put on a Helmet record and my pulse triples. That's a new variable in genetics right there, if you ask me: previously undocumented. And the wordlessly guttural vocals, don't forget those - perhaps Jonathan Davis of Korn is more prescient than we give him credit for. Let's not forget that Korn valiantly fought the FBI on indecency charges when their latter-day album Frankenchrist was accused of being child pornography, due to H.R. Giger's phallus-and-lady-part-themed artwork. Even when Jonathan Davis' San Francisco apartment was unceremoniously raided, he continued to fight for his right to expression. Wait, I'm sorry... that's Jello Biafra and The Dead Kennedys. What was I talking about?
Larkin Grimm
Parplar
Young God
originally published January 7, 2009
If the Young God label, famous for recognizing and recruiting the talented Devendra Banhart and Akron/Family, doesn’t immediately evoke feelings of respect and intrigue about Parplar, further elaboration on the label’s history is likely moot; but I will quickly suggest that the label pushes the creative envelope, and I appreciate that.
This particular release fits cozily into the “new weird America” genre heading that Young God has in no small part facilitated the legitimacy of in popular culture, and with co-production from label founder (avant-everything mogul and Swans creator Michael Gira - who also produced albums for the aforementioned DB and A/F), Grimm’s Parplar sounds like a major record, which is to say it is carefully polished.
That doesn’t mean by any stretch that you should expect to hear digital noises, though. Grimm’s aesthetic is raw, but quirkily domestic - rhythmic punctuation and vocal experiments color the disc in this performing lion sort of way, but there’s a feeling in retrospect that the disc would benefit from unraveling at the seams a bit. Grimm’s voice is nice and notably malleable, and a few songs have pulled the ears of my mind, but as much as I enjoy the looped acoustic guitars and native-sounding instruments, I can’t help but feel that I’ve heard a lot of this stuff before, perhaps even recently on Juana Molina's Un Día.
Overall, though, it’s a nice 40 minutes, which I prefer to take in the evening.
Los Campesinos!
We Are Beautiful We Are Doomed
Arts & Crafts
originally published January 7, 2009
This is sorta like Broken Social Scene, but with real teen angst and heavy English accents. That is to say: it’s interesting and melodically dynamic music made by a large-ish band - just turned up to about energy-level eight. For the most part, it’s inoffensive, but every once in a while a lyric will jump out at me that makes me want to tear the disc out of the player and destroy it. But, in fairness, a humorous or intriguing lyric will jump out about an equal amount of the time. But overall the lyrics are awesome, if you’re 15.
We Are Beautiful We Are Doomed falls only shortly (less than nine months) after these Welsh youngsters’ “debut” release (the aptly titled) Hold on Now, Youngster... and like that earlier release, this one finds itself well within the favorable territory on the critical-darling-o-meter. I don’t think it’s totally unfair, but I’m more inclined to call it middle-of-the-road. It’s certainly fun, and the accompanying tour DVD is a pleasant and tactful 20-minute presentation generously included, but as far as the inventiveness of the music, I have to say “good try.” Here’s why: the songs have many overlapping layers, polished and produced to stern expectations, and the lyrics are mostly compelling, but there’s really no risk here, sonically speaking. If you haven’t heard distortion and machine noise filling in quick-tempo numbers that pulse beneath synth and xylophone flourishes from their glued-to-a-stick by old reliable violin melody and the presence of a drummer dynamics, then breakfast is ready. But you’ll probably like it best if you’re 15.
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