NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS - Let Love In / Murder Ballads / The Boatman's Call / No More Shall We Part (reissues)

With the latest four reissues of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Mute puts the finishing touches on making their complete studio discography available to the masses. This is also probably the best entry point for anyone looking to get a firm grasp on their music. While their mid-'80s efforts might be too muddy or offputting for casual listeners, the combination of clean production and the trail set from Henry’s Dream and The Good Son (reissued last year) led to these next four albums, each critically acclaimed and containing some well-known duets, as well as staple tracks of their catalogue that you would recognize without even knowing it.

The beauty of these four albums is that they can be broken into two groups. Let Love In and Murder Ballads contain a healthy mix of brooding and sinister songs that build with an almost quiet intensity or just go for broke with a frenzy of noisy rock. While the lyrical content on Murder Ballads is self-explanatory, the lyrical content of Let Love In feels just as seedy, but with a touch more of lost love and songs rooted in self-deprecation (best shown with the bookending "Do You Love Me" parts one and two, and "Let Love In"). Not to be ignored are the two character pieces, "Loverman" and "Red Right Hand". These songs are essential to the feel of the album, giving us some of its loudest and quietest moments without ever losing their ferocity. Let Love In was their first album that really reached a large North American audience: "Loverman" was covered by Metallica, while "Red Right Hand" has the distinct honour of being used in both an X-Files episode and Dumb and Dumber.

While Murder Ballads shares tight production with its precursor, the overall sound is more in tune with Henry’s Dream, its approach being more acoustic and almost stripped down. This is the first and only album of Nick Cave’s to sport a "Parental Advisory" logo, though it has been removed for this reissue; let that set the tone for this macabre album. The songs range from almost tender and loving (most notably the duets with PJ Harvey and Kylie Minogue) to harsh and graphic ("Stagger Lee"). This album generated a lot of interest and acclaim, especially with the MTV crowd with the video for "Where the Wild Roses Grow." This album feels a little bit like the end of a chapter in the book of the Bad Seeds, but it goes out with a bang.

The album that would follow would surprise listeners. Instead of 52 minutes of songs describing characters from the darkest corners of the planet, we were given a piano-driven album full of soft sad songs full of introspection from the man in control. Using his failed relationships with PJ Harvey and the mother of his first-born son as inspiration and the feelings that came out of this, The Boatman's Call is a record unlike any other he had done at this point. If you take the prettiest parts of The Good Son and the song "Watching Alice" but drastically revamp the lyrical content, you can conjure up an idea of this album. It's hard to determine which songs are about PJ Harvey, but theres no doubt that "Black Hair" and "Green Eyes" are about her. This album is sad and there's no way around that. All you have to do is listen to the third track, "People Ain’t no Good" (or you can watch Shrek 2 and wait to hear it there). We wouldn’t hear again from Cave for four years.

After intense rehab stays for severe alcoholism and heroin addiction (an addiction Cave had gone back to since his days in The Birthday Party), Cave returned in 2001 with No More Shall We Pass. While this album is similar in sound to The Boatman's Call, it's more explorative with gorgeous female background vocals, piano-driven passages that feel more atmospheric, a solid helping of strings, and Cave exploring his vocal range with solid results. Taking all of these elements, it's safe to say that this is probably the prettiest album The Bad Seeds have made to date. While Cave’s lyrical approach still deals with personal loss and heartache, the feel here isn’t as hopeless as it was on his previous release, with bits of hope shining in and out throughout this almost 70-minute album.

Depending on if your musical preference lies in a prettier or noisier realm, with this round of remasters you’re guaranteed to at least an hour or two of top-notch songwriting from someone with severe staying power. Now in 2011, Cave is the only original Bad Seed left in the group due to Mick Harvey’s departure (you can find him on his latest solo album or on PJ Harvey’s latest release). Slowly reaching their 30-year mark, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds have failed to lose their touch, and you won’t find harder proof than these four new reissues.

JENNIFER CASTLE - Castlemusic

I don't want to fall into the trap of suggesting that the best music is unforced and natural in its execution. From Bowie and Madonna to Of Montreal and Kanye (and at many points in between), great numbers of artists have made compelling, engaging and even honest music as a direct result of forced reinventions and unnatural posturing. But all that aside, you’ve gotta give it up for the people who can just address a microphone directly and capture your imagination and ears completely. Especially when their end product is arguably just as mysterious as those of chronic shape-shifting performers.

Jennifer Castle is that type of artist. On her first foray out from under the Castlemusic moniker (which instead becomes an album title—no need to reinvent oneself entirely!), Castle delivers nine songs woven with a timeless, ageless skill. They are tunes of great emotional heft and spiritual weight that still float by like translucent pillows of sound. Part of the appeal of Castle’s music is how she’s able to infuse some rather traditional folk instrumentation with touches of psychedelic wandering, and even menace. On "Neverride", a gentle drifting acoustic stroll is dragged strangely off-path by an intoxicating high warble. Elsewhere, like on the mystic sleepwalk of "Powers" or the mellotron séance of "Misguided", she channels a personality both threatening and benign—it’s remarkable how the same songs can sound equally creepy and gorgeous depending on the moment of listening.

The same can really be said of the whole album. Even on its most energized tune—the shuddering tremolo blues of "Poor As Him"—Castle’s music sits like a static-laden channel-between-channels on your TV dial. Despite having so much in it that you recognize—the flutes, the slide guitar, the percussion—the whole of her songs often feel like they don’t quite exist in an assigned space. And yet, they remain wholly natural and honest. In that way, perhaps the naming of her album wasn’t just a last-minute brain cramp, after all. Castlemusic claims for its namesake a personalized plot of musical territory—both immediately familiar and full of new discoveries. 

(Jennifer Castle will be performing live in our shop on Tue. May 24 at 7pm.)

BISHOP MANNING AND THE MANNING FAMILY - Converted Mind: The Early Recordings

This is one super cool release, one that seems to spit out endless new favourites every time I give it a spin. Coming off like a family-affair doppelganger to the Staple Singers, Bishop Manning and his family churned out positively righteous guitar-driven gospel soul in the '70s with the kind of fervour that only a born-again can deliver. 

Manning has a story that would sound like such a bad cliché were it not true. Born Dready Manning in North Carolina in 1934, he picked up the guitar at age 6 and eventually followed the familiar bluesman path of playing juke joints and drinking a whole lot of booze. That was until 1962, when he began spouting blood from the nose and hemorrhaging, only to be "saved" by the prayer of neighbours. By the mid-'60s, Manning had started the family business with his wife Marie and their five kids, sending his recordings to Hoyt Sullivan, a '70s gospel impresario who apparently told the family that the records were making no money, despite the opposite being true.

Still playing today, Manning must be very pleased to have this come out and, with hope, will make a couple of bucks from this 28-song collection rammed with sanctified greatness. The set is a major coup for Fat Possum, and will likely be a contender on year-end lists. Most songs here feature the avuncular Manning on vocals and his vibrantly bright-toned rhythm guitar sound, best heard on "I Wanna Thank You Jesus" and "Something Inside Of Me". He takes on the country gospel standard "I Am A Pilgrim", a childhood favourite of his, with aplomb, a song he loved from an early age that works perfectly with the rest of his down-home rural soul. He shakes thing up by allowing his family to take turns on the mike.  Wife Marie takes a couple of leads, and then there’s little Paul’s prepubescent rasp on "I Know You Been Good To Me". It’s all deliriously great stuff, and a gem well worthy of its resurrection. Best gospel reissue of the year? Nope. This is one of the best releases of the year, period. In Manning's words: Thank you, Jesus!

CAITLIN ROSE - Own Side Now

Few debut albums garner the kind of advanced accolades as the debut full-length from Nashville’s Caitlin Rose. Lauded by the folks at Rough Trade as their #4 record of last year when it was released in the UK, Own Side Now also bagged alternative weekly Nashville Scene’s top album of 2010 award, even though it hadn’t yet been released. Praise of this sort is most often reserved for indie bands selling the latest sounds, haircuts, and beards, yet Rose surprises by not being trendy at all. Rose takes Americana, a mostly tired genre, and breathes life into it with honesty and a set of stellar songs. This is the kind of disc that slowly reels you in through the warmth of Rose’s winsome voice and production from Mark Nevers (Lambchop, Will Oldham) and Skylar Wilson (Justin Townes Earle).

There’s a familiarity to her voice and songs—nothing revolutionary, but this is comfort food. Don’t mistake it for complacency, though. It’s not original in the radical sense, just in the way that it takes a unique talent to take tradition and make it relevant again. She’s a masterful interpreter, covering (and besting) Fleetwood Mac on "That’s Alright". (On her first EP, she bravely took on The Rolling Stones’ "Dead Flowers" with an understatement that justified the cliché bar-band cover.) Her voice is achingly pretty, but never precious ("Learnin' to Ride" and "Own Side"), which makes listening to this record such a rewarding experience. Check for yourself the fine line (or should I say huge distinction?) between hype and well-deserved praise.

DANIEL ROMANO - Sleep Beneath the Willow

Daniel Romano is back with Sleep Beneath the Willow, his second album in less than a year. It's been out for well over a month, but just because it’s taken us a little while to get around to writing about it doesn’t mean we’re any less enamoured with it. Quite the opposite in fact—Sleep Beneath the Willow is front-to-back one of this year’s most arresting records.

It was only last June that the Welland, ON native put out his debut Working for the Music Man (through his own label, You’ve Changed Records, which has quickly earned a reputation for quality). It's actually quite alarming how far Daniel has come in such a short amount of time between releases. As great as ...Music Man was, at times it relied too heavily on traditional material. This time around, Romano has really stepped up his songwriting, hitting every single song out of the park. His voice has also matured—take a listen to something off 2009's Daniel, Fred & Julie and compare it to the new album's leadoff track "Time (Forgot to Change My Heart)". He's Dallas Good, Leonard Cohen and Aaron Riches wraped into one, and with backing vocals provided by three very talented singers in their own right (Lisa Bozikovic, Tamara Lindeman of The Weather Station, and Misha Bower of Bruce Peninsula, making her second appearance), some songs could easily pass for Gram Parsons.

Yes, the music shares a lot with the country greats of the past, but it’s something that should be celebrated, not disregarded. Sure, the sound he helped develop in his old band Attack in Black was far more original, but the songs he is writing today feel timeless.

FLEET FOXES - Helplessness Blues

This band may call Seattle home, but its sonic kinship with the American South—in particular, Appalachia—has been well-chronicled. Guided by the congenial twang of leader Robin Pecknold, the band's debut LP (as well as their second EP, Sun Giant) made them Sub Pop's newest (and, some might also say, their unlikeliest) star signing.

It's not that there's much un-indie about their sort of music, but whether it's with college-radio-approved ramshackle creepiness (Bonnie "Prince" Billy or Bill Callahan) or arena-harkening widescreen rock (My Morning Jacket and Band Of Horses), few like-minded bands play a brand of Appalachian folk-pop as reverential as these Foxes. There is little modernity to songs like "White Winter Hymnal" or "Mykonos", both of which were steeped in time-honoured approaches—tones made decades prior. By not chasing a current zeitgeist, their music feels pure. Spiritual, even.

This has never been truer of the band than on Helplessness Blues. A few reviews have so far commented on this record feeling darker, but I would contend that it's not so much darker as more refined. This album dials back even the few AM pop detours of their past releases to create a remarkable distillation of their musical essence. It's the sound of them being them, and it's something you've got to admire—on the heels of a breakout 2008-09, the band refuses to either artfully complicate or commercially simplify their sound. The record oozes with welcoming confidence.

Even multi-part tracks such as the excellent "The Plains/Bitter Dancer" and the towering "The Shrine/An Argument" retain a buoyancy that makes them easy company. On the shorter side of things, their cup runneth over with highlights: "Montezuma", "Battery Kinzie", and especially the instantly gorgeous "Lorelai" are all stunners. Few things on this LP aren't.

Does anything measure up to the previous high watermark of those cascading harmonies of "White Winter Hymnal"? Maybe not, but Fleet Foxes don't seem perturbed by the challenge of surpassing it, and neither should you. Throughout this record, there's a level of comfort and trust in one's own capabilities that is completely at odds with its title. These guys are anything but helpless—and nothing here is gonna give you the blues.

MIRACLE FORTRESS - Was I The Wave?

When their debut Five Roses came out in 2007, Miracle Fortess were still a largely unknown group. In fact, they weren’t even a group (yet), but rather the solo project of Graham Van Pelt, a member of Montreal dance-pop group Think About Life. Nevertheless, the album quickly struck a chord with the press, making its way onto the Polaris Prize shortlist mere weeks after its release. It struck a chord here, too: Five Roses is, without hesitation, one of this writer’s favourite albums, ever. Its feedback-drenched guitars and '60s pop melodies combined to create something truly special.

So, naturally, after such a long gap between albums, any fan would be apprehensive about something new. Thankfully, despite taking what seemed like forever to come out, Miracle Fortress’ new album Was I The Wave? was worth waiting every second. Whereas the first album owed much to Brian Wilson, the new batch of songs takes more from another Brian. Yes, Brian Eno’s imprint is all over this album, whether it’s one of his vocal works like Another Green World (which Van Pelt takes cues from in the brilliant sequencing of the record, with songs split up by lovely instrumentals), or ambient affairs (opening track "Awe" sounds like a lost cut off of Cluster & Eno).

While Five Roses had more straight up pop songs, Was I... satisfies in other ways. As mentioned before, it's obvious that a lot of care went into the album's song cycle. The album's most challenging (but excellent) songs make up the first half of the album, while all the real earworms start on Side B (think of it as the opposite of David Bowie's Low). Still, it's an effective strategy. As soon as it's done, you're going to want to flip that record and start over, guaranteed.

(Miracle Fortress will be performing live in our shop on Fri. May 13 at 4pm.)

TV ON THE RADIO - Nine Types Of Light

For a band that has been defined so successfully by its artfulness, there seems to be something oddly straightforward about their fourth full-length, Nine Types Of Light. The beats are not as obviously skittish as before. The signature juxtaposition of big-moment rock and jaunty indie-funk is no longer as prevalent. All told, the album doesn't feel nearly as distinctly off-kilter.

But initial appearances can be deceiving, and this is especially the case here. For this record is really just as TV On The Radio-esque as any of their other albums, only now their unique group personality has been generally dialed back to embrace the quieter side of their music. Where on 2008's Dear Science gentler tracks like "Stork And Owl" or "Family Tree" sat in a minority to the volume (in both senses of the word) of the rest of the album, Nine Types Of Light is proudly populated mainly by ballads and introspective moments.

The record is, mind you, far from some Victorian tea party. "Caffeinated Consciousness" is as big and satisfyingly fat as they've ever been—an exhilarating romp replete with juicy horns and a wide swagger. "Repetition" takes a literal lead from its title, with singer Tunde Adebimpe's frantic reciting of "My repetition/my repetition is this!" urging the band into increasingly fierce and focus playing. But both of these heavier highlights arrive in the album's second half, after a calmer tone has largely been set.

In the space left by this reflective approach, more subtle nuances are able to flourish. Adebimpe and guitarist/vocalist Kyp Malone have never been afraid of pushing both the highest and lowest ends of their registers. This daring really pays off on Nine Types. The vocal highwire act at the end of "Keep Your Heart" is astounding in its lack of embarrassment, with Adebimpe pushing his falsetto to its absolute peak. On the back of playing and production that is rich but never overdone, the gesture—which would sound patently ridiculous on its own—elevates the song beautifully. "Killer Crane" barely gets over a slow boil, but contains a chorus that easily boasts one of their most gorgeous melodies. What's more, the track is supported by an ever-evolving cast of 'character actor' instrumentation—whether strings, guitar drones, and a host of otherworldly tones, nothing attempts to unseat the song's lead. It may register as a bit of a mid-album lag at first, but upon the fifth listen, "Killer Crane" is a mature, regal stunner.

Which is basically true of the entire record—with such a general weighting toward the band's more contemplative—and less extroverted—side, it's not surprisingly that it takes a little longer for things to register. But in certain ways, Nine Types Of Light is an even stronger statement of this group's greatness. The approach shown throughout this record isn't self-satisfaction or a lack of ideas: it's the understanding that they really can now do so much with so little. In the scheme of an entire career, I can see this becoming a real sleeper of a fave for fans of the band. It might just already be my favourite.

NICK LOWE - Labour Of Lust

There's been a bunch of awfully long reviews on this site lately, so let's keep things nice and direct on this one.

Do you like songs? Then buy this album.

(Too short?)

Honestly, you could argue that there's a lot to be said about Nick Lowe—a hugely underrated artist whose relative obscurity is surpassed only by his exceptional skill with a song. As the second in Yep Roc's reissues of Lowe's earliest solo LPs (the first being the reissue of 1978's Jesus Of Cool—our store's number one reissue of 2008), Labour Of Lust isn't nearly as sardonic as its predecessor, but is no less sharp or brilliant. Moving on from critiquing the music industry to examining affairs of the heart, Lowe's songs here are by turns full of humour, bravado, wistfulness and always have an insightful eye for the peculiarities of human behaviour. 

The crown jewel is, of course, "Cruel To Be Kind", a song so perfect in its every aspect that you could teach a whole course on songwriting from it. But there are no weak links here. As biting and wry as Lowe is throughout, he was no disrespectful punk—killer musicianship and tastes that range from country and AM pop, to R&B and bare-knuckle bar anthems make for a breathlessly brilliant half hour that references a broad spectrum of styles. Throughout it all, Lowe's quick wit and self-deprecating nature keeps the album's personality singular and endlessly charming.

For the uninitiated, Yep Roc's twin Lowe reissues are a gift from the gods. It's never too late to discover an album as great as this.

So, like I was saying: buy this album.

PANDA BEAR - Tomboy

Over what has felt like a year (and actually nearly has been...), we've been receiving warnings, hints, teasers, and full-on singles off Tomboy. It's the kind of online hysteria and anticipation that's normally reserved for a Radiohead album (at least before that particular band caught on to the idea of sending out their press releases and albums within the same week). But instead, the record in question is the latest solo release from Noah Lennox, an artist who—despite membership in the increasingly beloved Animal Collective—bears a considerably smaller public profile.

The palpable excitement here acknowledges just how high the bar was set by his last effort, 2007's surprising Person Pitch. That record was a total shot in the dark. A heady intellectual collage of looping sounds and twelve-minute meandering epics, it still managed to deliver an immediate rush courtesy of a child's toy box worth of sugary harmonies and giddy charm. It’s a rare thing when an album is so obtuse and yet so quickly captivating as Person Pitch was. It really did change things, especially when you consider what happened after Animal Collective released Merriweather Post Pavillion in 2009.

Usually when artists reach this point, they do one of two things: stay firm and embrace this plateau, or retreat. Retreat is a strong word, but based on Tomboy, Lennox has little interest in staking a further claim to the high ground claimed by Person Pitch. Sure, the charming harmonies still swirl lugubriously in pools of syrupy reverb. Loosely related lyrics are still repeated in ever-turning trance-like incantations. Found sounds and beats still play under woolly blankets of synths and treated guitars. But the mood is decidedly darker this time around. There’s no ecstatic changing of the guard mid-song as on Person Pitch’s early highlight, "Take Pills"; no epic rhythm jam like "Bros" that ends in a sequence so golden and honeyed, you can practically feel the warmth of the sun on your face.

Instead, Lennox’s statements are shorter and more controlled. He may allow for moments that get lost in their own joy (the ascending "Afterburner" is a stunner), but overall—and for all of its excesses in terms of effects—the record feels concerned with not letting go too much. This approach does, however, morph into other types of pleasure. The title track is a heavy piece of work—commanding and concise, it grows in stature with each play. The beats in "Slow Motion" trip and bump beguilingly into a hiccuping vocal pattern that plays addictive tricks on the mind. And the wistful yearning of "Last Night at the Jetty" says a lot about the state of longing with its melodies (a good thing, considering you’re lucky if you can make out five of the words that he’s singing throughout).

Lennox has often stated in interviews that he’s most happy when his music is made quickly and intuitively—the more belaboured the effort, the worse the end result. Without Person Pitch preceding it, Tomboy is frankly not the sort of album that would be getting the attention it is. But even if it wilts a little in the glare of expectation, it remains an awfully beautiful and charming listen. And an honest one, at that.

JONNY - S/T

Jonny is the super-group (or more precisely super-duo) of Norman Blake of Teenage Fanclub and Euros Childs, formerly of Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci. The two met each other when their respective bands toured together in 1997. From there, Norman Blake contributed backup vocals to Gorky’s’ How I Long To Feel That Summer In My Heart LP in 2001. In 2006, the pair got together at Blake’s house in Glasgow to record an EP. Those tracks are included here as a bonus set of four tracks. Luckily for us, the two continued to write a full-length together, the end result being this wonderful debut.

At first glance, the pairing seems natural enough. They’re both non-English Brits (Norman’s a Scot, Euro a Welshman) who established their careers in the '90s. Both are celebrated songwriters with unique gifts for hook-driven pop music. But at closer inspection, they are quite different artists. Childs is a highly idiosyncratic songwriter who sings about animals and whimsical themes; Blake has maintained his Big Star and Byrds blueprint over two decades. Interesting fact: In 2005, Teenage Fanclub (in which Blake is one of three songwriters) released Man Made, followed up by last year’s Shadows. In less time, Euros Childs has released five solo albums!

While the majority of the album was written together, Childs has sole authorship of five tracks. Even on the shared songs, Childs’ unique vocal timbre and accent mark their territory and show him to be the top dog here. Still, it’s a more successful synthesis than some might expect, with the two playing to their similarities while allowing enough of their distinctive hallmarks to seep through.

Both are energized and seem to be having a great time harmonizing with each other and being a bit silly, setting the tone on "Wich Is Wich", the album opener with its goofy lyric and short Moog solo. Lead single “Candyfloss” is pure Gorky’s-channeling-"Incense and Peppermints" in the verses, before flowing into the classic Teenage Fanclub harmony sound for the bridge—a perfect melding of their individual talents. "Circling the Sun" is Blake’s shining moment, with everything one could love about his songwriting.

Clearly, Childs and Blake care too much about each other’s music to treat the project as a cast-offs bin. This sounds nothing like a vanity side project, and everything like a contender for best duo performance of the year! 

TIMBER TIMBRE - Creep On Creepin' On / LOW - C'mon

If there's one thing that has come to be generally prized in modern Western music, it's originality. Since shortly after the dawn of the singer-songwriter, few things seem to stick in the craw of listeners like the sense that an artist is on auto-pilot—that we've heard this all before, but it was better the first time around.

And if there's one thing that can forestall the need for a musical act to bust out of their comfort zone, it's having that comfort zone be a sonic trademark so immediately recognizable and inimitable that we can only really get our fix from one source: them. This pair of new releases are by two artists of the latter category, but each are at very different points in their respective careers. 

For Toronto's Taylor Kirk and his Timber Timbre alias, his fourth full-length will be his second to many—and likely his debut to even more. Released at the start of 2009 (initially on the Out Of This Spark label), his previous self-titled album grew steadily in reputation over that year. It was reissued by Arts & Crafts within months, before finally being anointed as album of the year in Eye Weekly's nationwide critics' poll (as well as on the 2009 staff list for this very store). The masterful and succinct record was a perfect expression of the sound Kirk had honed over his two albums prior—that of a panhandling apocalyptic folk musician who somehow wrangled Screaming Jay Hawkins' band into backing him up (no doubt by calmly convincing them of the hell that would await them if they dared not do so). It was bewitching, haunting, and (much to the credit of this city's ever-evolving music scene) utterly unique. 

What's more, as great (and as praised in these parts) as Timber Timbre was, the album still made a relatively small splash, meaning that there's little reason for Kirk to tinker with his distinct formula this time around. As such, Creep On Creepin' On arrives with a clear mission: to feed our fix.

In this respect, this record is a great success. As swampy and intoxicated(-ing) as ever, the album wanders into our ears with complete confidence in its considerable powers. The music is a little denser than before, but never is it showy—see the single-note tension of the strings that close "Black Water"; the banging and clattering that walk through "Swamp Magic"; and, especially, the truly heavy atmosphere created by the stomping, all-hands-on-the-freakiness-deck of "Woman". Whether the product of greater touring, an actual recording budget, the sense that more is at stake with this record, or all of the above, Timber Timbre is much as before, only with a little more muscle on its bones. This is uneasy listening that holds true to its original (in both senses of the word) musical intent. 

Similarly to Mr. Kirk, when Low first arrived on the scene in 1993, they were like no other—even considering the presence of slowcore pioneers Codeine, Galaxie 500 (with whom they shared their first producer, Kramer—no, not the one from Seinfeld...) and Bedhead. Using only brushes on a cymbal and a snare drum, their backbeat was anything but: just a skeletal wisp of a pulse. Delicate sinews of guitar and bass were likemindedly dispensed sparingly. 

But the real ace-in-the-hole was the harmonizing of Mimi Parker and Alan Sparhawk. The couple sang together with a frank beauty that conveyed so many things regardless of the words being sung: patience, fear, commitment, hope, apprehension, and, of course, love. It was so particular a blend that I suspect they could have continued to milk the template set out by their first three albums to this day with little harm done to their livelihood.

But it's to their credit that they did not. While the winning combo of Sparhawk and Parker have kept all their albums in the same ballpark, the band has since toyed with home recording (1997's Songs For a Dead Pilot EP), collaborations with the Dirty Three (2001's In The Fishtank EP), distortion and overdubs (2005's The Great Destroyer), and drum machines and loops (2007's Drums and Guns). All along the way, they have continually hammered and prodded at their style, daringly pushing at its form to see just how distorted its visage could become while still remaining recognizable as them.

With the brand new C'mon, Low appear ready to reap the rewards of such dedicated fiddling. For this—their ninth full-length—is the most direct, immediately appealing, and for all intents, 'pop' album the band has yet done. It is a record by a band who now appear ready to take a victory lap with the original voice they created all those years ago. It's not that the band sounds exactly as they did in '93 (they sound far more warm and lush than they did then, and their songwriting is better seasoned), but this is the first Low album in a while where the production mandate of the record doesn't outshine the songs.

From the charm of "Try To Sleep" and the gentle pressure of "Especially Me" to the all-out epic growth of "Nothing But Heart", Low have written ten tracks of a very high quality, a reminder why the mighty Robert Plant covered them not once, but twice on his last album. No matter how unique Low's style was, they wrote great songs then. And they're writing even greater ones now.

As much as Low's adjustments over the years have provided a solid counter to kneejerk criticisms that all their songs sound the same, it really is this quality that sees them enduring as a great, if cult, band. They still satisfy a fix, but they do it with songs that would also sound great if taken in another direction entirely by someone else. In other words, they've grown successfully within their confines.

It's early in Timber Timbre's case, but one senses that Taylor Kirk will experience similar growth at some point, for as excellent as they are, his records still get by a little more on the power of their personality than the strength of their songs. But Creep On Creepin' On's fuller arrangements and spooky interludes display evidence that he's thinking about such growth already, a way to expand artistically while honouring the aesthetic his band so completely inhabits. In the meantime, that eerie, addictive personality of his is more than persuasive enough to buy him the time he needs to get to the next level.

OBITS - Moody, Standard and Poor

The title of this, the second album by Obits, is a pretty apt description of the contents within—in a good way. This record is full of biting, ornery tales played in a straight-ahead punk/garage style by four well-seasoned underground rock dudes who have never gotten close to being rich.

Yep, it could have been a real drag to get through. What saves Moody, Standard and Poor from being a tired bitch session by a bunch of dreary old men is that it's all presented with a dry frankness and—despite titles like "You Gotta Lose", "Everything Looks Better in the Sun" and "Beggin' Dogs"—a genuine joy of playing rock n' roll. Of course, when I say "joy", it's more the kind of pleasure that Oscar the Grouch takes in telling kids to "Scram!" than anything else.

As the main mouthpiece (and grouch) of the band, vocalist/guitarist Rick Froberg is the key to the group’s success here. His steel wool scratch of a pissed-off wail has already been an integral part of two of the best rock bands to come of out of the U.S.: Hot Snakes and Drive Like Jehu. In Obits, he's toned his voice down a touch (no doubt attempting to preserve his sour-honeyed throat) and as a result, he’s grown from disgruntled art student into a sort of Woody Guthrie with a huge throbbing hangover. It’s a shift he wears well and pulls off with ease—he's a man of the working class, but he's got a terrible headache and absolutely no patience.

The band backs up Froberg’s gritted-teeth ranting with a garage/punk/blues hybrid that pulls deeply from the shared goals of those three styles—namely an insistent beat and relaying the message that life is a goddamn unfair bastard. On highlights like "I Want Results" and "Killer", Froberg and the group lurch and prowl with a direct, full-bodied menace. It’s seething, gnarled stuff that few young bands have the goods to match.

Elsewhere, particularly on the instrumentals and the two tracks where second guitarist Sohrab Habibion takes the mic, things are a little more staid. These moments really convey just how much Froberg’s presence makes the band. That said, when the pair trade call-and-response duties on "Shift Operator", the blood races back into the group quite fast.

It’s true that two albums in, Obits hasn’t yet done anything to cast a shadow across either Drive Like Jehu or Hot Snakes’ legacies. But there’s something compelling nonetheless in the honest, humble, and decidedly not innovative approach of the group. Even having Habibion sings a tune or two speaks to an egalitarian approach of guys who are far more concerned with enjoying themselves than 'making it'. Nothing fancy. No frills. Just four men laying it down nice and heavy. When you’ve got a singer as giftedly tense and unsettling as Froberg leading your charge, you could do a lot worse than to keep it simple.

NEIL DIAMOND - The Bang Years 1966-1968

This one’s been leaving the store on a consistent basis, and the reasons are plenty. The only things you need to know, though, are that this is Neil Diamond, and that these are his first two albums, shuffled around from their original running order to best show off the talents of a young and hungry songwriter before he became overwrought and often schmaltzy. 

In the early '60s Diamond paid the bills as a hack songwriter, recording stray singles both as a solo artist and as half of Neil & Jack with Jack Packer. In 1966, with the help of Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich, he signed to Bang Records. With Barry and Greenwich also serving as his producers, Diamond’s songs and impassioned delivery guaranteed a string of hits in their own right, and a cache of songs that would be sung by countless others over the years. 

He hit the ground running, and in the time covered by his debut The Feel Of Neil Diamond and its follow-up Just For You produced a repertoire of pop standards that most musicians would love to have produced in their whole career, much less in the space of two years! Yes, you’ll know "Kentucky Woman", "I’m A Believer", "Red Red Wine", "Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon", "Monday Monday", "Cherry Red", "Solitary Man", and maybe more. 

Dissatisfied with his contract with Bang and feeling the need to move on from simple pop pleasures to a more introspective direction, he made a break for it, signing to a subsidiary of MCA and entering into years of legal disputes with Bang. From 1968 to 1973, Bang would find creative ways to reissue Diamond’s material in various forms, mangling the originals with overdubs, premature fade-outs, fake stereo, or different vocal takes. Happily, this reissue preserves "The 23 Original Mono Recordings", as the cover boldly states in its left margin.   

JULIANNA BARWICK - The Magic Place

As far as album titles go, this is about as perfect and to the point as it gets. Following her debut Sanguine from a couple of years ago and last year’s Florine EP, Brooklyn’s Julianna Barwick has produced the most beguiling album of the year so far with The Magic Place.

With little more than her voice and a cathedral full of reverb, Barwick carefully builds up layer upon layer of mostly wordless vocals that reach high enough levels of intensity to rival the heights reached by that magnificent Pastor T.L. Barrett reissue from last year. Barwick’s transcendence, however, is much closer to European choral music traditions (think Le Mystere de Voix Bulgares without the brain-mulching dissonance) than it is to soul-cleansing American black gospel. She is the anti- (counter-? contra-?) Enya, vocal ambient music that can be as unnerving as it is overwhelming in its beauty. She is much closer aesthetically to Kevin Shields, who achieved a similar effect on My Bloody Valentine’s more repetitive pieces, such as "To Here Knows When" or on the feedback-driven "Glider". And way back in the '60s, David Crosby nailed down a blueprint for Barwick’s sound on "I’d Swear There Was Somebody Here" from his debut If Only I Could Remember My Name, perhaps his most moving piece, a spectral a capella fragment which, until now, has remained unrivalled.

Much of the magic of this album comes from the singer’s knowledge of when to let the reverberations ring out. She never gets Wagnerian with it, allowing the power of her music to come from timbre more than tumult. Compositionally speaking, her works are built around stacked melodies (her live performances are, no doubt, based on loops) rather than shifting harmonies. Most striking is "Keep Up the Good Work", both gorgeous and terrifying as it features her characteristic upper range with a highly vertigo-inducing vocal swoop. Its power is ineffable, something that does not feel created but, like a force of nature, like something that always was.

With only the barest occasional accompaniment on piano and other effects for colouration, Barwick continues to forge her original path, establishing herself as (literally) one of the most original voices on the scene right now.  

THE DODOS - No Color

Apparently, a lot of people found The Dodos' previous effort, 2009's Time To Die, a bit of a letdown. Even though I wasn't one of them, No Color is without a doubt an improvement over that record. Loose and surprisingly noisy and heavy when so inclined, it's an awfully thrilling album that astutely seizes a moment. For at this point, The Dodos need to solidify their claim to our ears. So fast is the pace of modern pop culture that the praise heaped upon their 2008 breakthrough, Visiter, feels a lifetime away. With new flavours of the month arriving like swarms of aphids, what's a little indie duo to do? You make an album that is catchy and brawny throughout, even when it meanders into extended instrumental passages or folksy finger-picking.

It helps hugely that not only are The Dodos excellent players, but they also have highly distinct voices on their instruments. It's an immense compliment to the talents of guitarist Meric Long and drummer Logan Kroeber that despite playing the two most normal positions in rock, the combined effect rarely sounds like that of any other band. Even the decision to include the mighty Neko Case throughout the record does not derail the band's unique personality. Instead, she finds a perfectly supportive role on tracks like "Don't Try to Hide It"—present, but never in the flashy, scene-stealing way she's so often claimed with the New Pornographers, blending in beautifully.

Which is great news, because after the somewhat-failed experiment of adding a third member during the Time To Die period (vibraphonist Keaton Snyder, who does make contributions to No Color but is no longer a full member), Long and Kroeber now seem to have a full understanding of what makes them so special. They're locked into a syncopated brand of punky, folky pop that is not easily replicated. Hearing the pair blast through the seriously schizo fuzzed-out coda of "Going Under" is to be left without any doubt of their powers. As an album that is both full of energy and highly ruminative, No Color stomps all over the idea that Time To Die’s title was meant literally as any kind of band-ending mandate. Long may they play.

KEREN ANN - 101

Keren Ann is awfully easy to miss in a crowd. With neither the bluster and raw sensuality of a neo-soul belter nor the esoteric, quirky delivery of an indie poster girl, she's hardly one to command your ear immediately. Instead, she's more of the Charlotte Gainsbourg mold—cool to the point of being vaguely flat (both in key and emotion), it's easy for detractors to dismiss her entirely as having a rather underdone quality.

But if one takes a moment to view that 'underdoneness' as instead being understatedness, Ann's stock rises fast. For nothing about her music ever sounds desperate to impress—she goes about her business with a quiet intelligence and tasteful sophistication. The respectful space she gives her listener to either stay and soak in it or simply just get up and walk away may leave her open to abandonment, but it also creates a far stronger bond with those who opt in.

All that said, if an artist as demure as Keren Ann could ever be accused of going for the jugular, it would be on her latest, 101. This disc is by far her most varied in approach, and also boasts both her most poppy and most orchestrally heavy tunes.

Her previous self-titled effort had a minor breakthrough with the hushed, Velvet Underground-style tremor of "Lay Your Head Down"—a terrific song that muted its insistent 4/4 pulse as though it was afraid to be too direct. 101's "My Name Is Trouble", however, has no such reservations, opening the album with a steady, bass-driven groove that is miles away from the tentative beginnings of past efforts like 2003's lovely Not Going Anywhere. Then throughout, Ann is increasingly eager to try out new ways of communicating her thoughtful takes on the woes of love. The haunted commitment of "Run With You"; the tight, palm-muted pop of "Sugar Mama"; the giddy barroom piano of "Blood On My Hands"—all of these display sides of Ann that, while not wildly divergent, are new takes on her normally one-dimensional delivery.

In the end, the furthest askew she ventures is on the album closer and title track. At first, "101" is a fairly straight-forward slice of couture Parisian orch-pop right from the (Serge) Gainsbourg playbook, with Ann counting down from 101 in detached, breathy spoken-word and matching each number to a different item. The items listed are at first rather random, occasionally hitting on a well-known combo ("78 revolutions per minute", for example). But as the countdown nears its conclusion, the iconography suddenly becomes increasingly religious: "12 tribes of Israel", "7 days of creation", "5 books of Moses", "2 tablets of stone" and, finally, "one God". It's a jarring conclusion that not only has one hitting replay again to try and catch an earlier pattern they might have missed, but which also serves as a vivid reminder that part of this singer's mixed lineage is traced back to Israel.

It's a bit of a funny feeling to have such naked proclamation of faith wrapping up an album that is more concerned with examining secular concerns. But then again, it's precisely this sense of boldness that has been lacking from Keren Ann's past efforts. No one's going to confuse her with a protest singer or a confrontational artist, but with 101 she's found a way to stand slightly further out from the crowd while retaining her quiet smarts.

ELBOW - Build A Rocket Boys!

"Help the aged", Pulp's lead singer Jarvis Cocker once sang, and it's a lesson that fellow English gents Elbow seem to have taken to heart on their fifth album. Guaranteed, no other album this year will have a lyric rhyming "adventures" with "dentures", and if one does, it’s likely it won’t mean it as sincerely as they do here.

The Bury quintet have never been the most youthful or hip of bands—even when they were pegged as one of about a dozen 'new Radioheads' back in 2001 with their excellent debut Asleep At The Back, they were informed more by cerebral forefathers like Peter Gabriel and Talk Talk's Mark Hollis than the Thom-Yorke-fronting-U2 of Coldplay or Starsailor. Furthermore, much like the decor at your grandma's, their music had a habit of always being presented just so. That goes there. This goes over here. Hardly Top Of The Pops.

What saved the band from being overly stodgy and stiff were that such orderly presentation was done in service of some excellent songwriting (with the occasional musical choice being just inventive enough to surprise), and their singer, Guy Garvey. Garvey possesses a voice laden with snarky wit, wry humour, heart-bursting power, and the most eloquent of phrasing. The man is capable of wrenching purity out of even the most saccharine and overused sentiments—highly useful seeing as Elbow are, if anything, a rather sentimental band.

But by making an album that is essentially all about youth, old age, and the chasm of understanding and perspective that exists between them, a near Herculean task has been placed on Garvey’s shoulders: making an album about such things compelling. To make the stakes even higher, the undersung rhythm section of drummer Richard Jupp and bassist Pete Turner—often responsible for both the band’s most hypnotic and exhilarating sequences in the past—are given conspicuously little to do on Build a Rocket Boys!. Instead, much of the album relies on the band’s other strong suit: that of highly patient, delicately handled poetic pop.

All four of Elbow’s past albums have come out of the gate strongly, and Rocket is no exception. "The Birds" is an eight-minute stunner—the kind of slowburning song that Elbow have managed to perfect over their tenure—featuring in equal measure taut, spare rhythms; lush, pastoral beauty; and a complete range of emoting from tender whispers to full-throated pleas. And all without ever becoming too maudlin or too cheery. And while second track "Lippy Kids" has decidedly less range to it, it similarly says so many poignant things without resorting to cliché that the opening combination really is a total knockout. All of which makes what follows a bit of a letdown at times.

Tracks like "With Love" and first single "Neat Little Rows" have the goods to be the intriguing meditations on mortality and friendship they aspire to be, but get bogged down in some heavy-handed decisions (an everyman’s choir and overly dramatic keyboard stabs, respectively). Then settling into a five-song midsection of uniformly low-key numbers, it would appear that this Rocket’s initial rush is made to fade fast.

But this is where Elbow’s hard-won maturity comes to the fore. In lesser hands, the drifting "The Night Will Always Win" or nearly a cappella "The River" would flatline the album completely. Instead, here is where the band is arguably at their most potent. Sure, it takes some belief on the part of the listener, but damn if it isn’t a sacrifice worth making. By the time the choir is making its second prominent appearance, in the appropriately arms-raised conclusion of "Open Arms", the album is in full flight again, this time making terrific use of the added vocal heft.

This is Elbow’s first album since winning a well-deserved (if still surprising) Mercury Prize for 2007’s The Seldom Seen Kid. It’s surely not something lost on these vets, who have slogged it out in Britain’s indie trenches long enough to have believed they’d never see days like this. That Build A Rocket Boys! lacks any sense of trying to capitalize on that success with a single-heavy, arena-sized album is honourable and all, but you could also rightly accuse the boys of simply not being up to the task. After all, love them or hate them, Coldplay certainly took the bull by the horns when the chance came and proved that they could write some moment-worthy songs in the process.

But Elbow have always been a far more complex band than that, and if Rocket proves nothing else, it’s that these five men are more than comfortable risking most listeners missing their point, as long as it means they can make it clearly to some. So when the record concludes, it is not with hyperbolic bluster, but with a brief reprise of "The Birds" (sung unpretentiously by an amateur piano tuner named John Moseley) and "Dear Friends", an homage to the most tender and enduring of bonds we humans can forge. Humble and rich in unflinching emotion, moments like this—not a potential radio single—is why Elbow matter. Credit them hugely for still having the good sense to know that.

THE STROKES - Angles

Career paths in music are rarely a unique journey. For any one trajectory—good or bad—carved by an act, you can be assured that several other bands from the same scene will follow a similar arc. Take The Strokes and Interpol. Both bands were a crucial part of the reemergence of New York City as a leader in the 'rebirth' of cool rock that accompanied the new millennium. Both released debuts heralded as instant classics, and quickly followed them up with sophomore releases met with nearly as much praise.

Then the dreaded 'misstep.' First Impressions Of Earth and Our Love To Admire were both labelled as such upon arrival—a kind of sympathetic mulligan that implies that this disappointment is more about the album in question than the band. Don't worry, the hopeful messages goes, this band has still got it; they just stumbled a little here. But here's the thing about missteps: you only get to make them once.

When Interpol's dreary self-titled effort of last year seemingly confirmed that the band was indeed stuck treading brackish water, and that Our Love was no false apparition, it was sad to see such a great young band fall so fully out of favour. With the release of Angles—an album that shares much more in common with First Impressions of Earth than that band's beloved first two LPs—many seemed poised to treat The Strokes with like-minded disdain, but I would encourage folks to not follow suit so fast.

For one thing, at least Angles is the product of an adventurous sonic palette. While Interpol shows us a band completely paralyzed by the thought of stepping outside their Joy-Division-in-an-airplane-hangar comfort zone, this record is all over the map. Calypso techno, snickering new wave, hazy ballads: it's all here, plus a few garage rave-ups just to remind us of their halcyon days. Much of the thinking around Impressions was that, as a misstep, it was an untrue representation of the band. But what if this development was in the cards all along? What if the answer to the titular question posed by their debut, Is This It?, was in fact an emphatic: "No way!"

I suppose you still have to like the album. Which I do, much more so than expected, considering I was never one to count the band as a favourite. True, the band's internal discord has been common knowledge for a while now, something that would suggest this is not the band at their best or as intended. But it's worth acknowledging the added freedom a band like The Strokes have today as opposed to even a decade ago. As has been already mused on these pages by this writer (most recently while discussing the new Cut Copy), deciding you wanted to sound like Television, Gang Of Four, The VU, Wire and so forth in 2001 was easy-peasy. Making tunes that sounded like The Cars and Duran Duran? Not as much.

Now that all bets are off in that department, many of us (musicians and fans alike) are getting the chance to judge the pleasures of our youth in a new light. In this way, the hiccuping pop of "Two Kinds of Happiness" works just fine, as does the nervous rush of "Taken For A Fool"—the fact that both tunes could be lost cuts from the soundtrack to The Karate Kid really doesn't bother me.

Lots of folks are complaining that Angles lacks the danger and desperate cohesion of their debut. To which I gotta say: in what world were The Strokes ever that dangerous, really? Or even desperate? It takes a lot more than a gloved hand on a woman's butt and a song about cops to make a band truly gritty. Angles is definitely not the band's best record (I'll personally take Room On Fire there), but it is a good one that gets better the more you live with it. And if it's the one that finally outs The Strokes as just a good pop band—and not rock 'n' roll's new saviours—then I'd say that's a good thing, for them and us.

VA - Cartagena! Curro Fuentes & The Big Band Cumbia & Descarga Sound of Colombia 1962-72

Soundway strikes again with another mind-blowing Colombia-themed comp, this one purportedly a follow-up to Colombia! The Golden Age of Discos Fuentes, the set that helped kickstart the current wave of chic for música-costeña. The real follow-up has mysteriously been stuck in limbo for the last couple of years, with release dates coming and going every few months. In the meantime, we have more of a companion piece than a proper follow-up, as this release takes Curro Fuentes as its focus.

Curro was the youngest brother of Antonio Fuentes, big boss of the mighty Discos Fuentes, the label which dominated the Colombian industry and is responsible for shaping the sounds and trends of the country since its founding in the mid 1930s. Curro, 20 years younger than his more famous brother, formed his own label, Discos Curro, and with legendary merecumbé bandleader Pacho Galán he formed the imprint’s house band, Sonora Curro, and embarked on a career that kept the brothers and their respective labels on their toes in a friendly competition to put out the hottest records in Colombia. When Curro set up shop in Bogotá, he established a partnership with the Philips label, becoming artistic director and immediately setting out to work with the Lucho Bermudez. Much of the material comes from Curro’s Bogotá period.

The second main period comes from his return to the Caribbean coast, and features young bands that played the newer salsa sounds in the red-light district of Cartagena, including Los Seven del Swing, and groups led by Clodomiro Montes and Lalo Orozco. The introduction of the electric bass created a massive bottom end that drove the dancers and collectors wild.

Selected by a killer team of Miles Cleret, William Holland (DJ Quantic), Toronto DJ Sean Uppal, and regular liner note writer Roberto Ernesto Gyemant, the set features a wide range of sounds: cumbia, gaita, hard driving porro, salsa, and jamming descargas. It’s a cracking set that’ll warm up any party, and will tide us over quite nicely while we wait for the follow up to Colombia!, apparently slated for an October release. 

(Miles Cleret of Soundway Records will be special guest DJ at the next installment of Turning Point, taking place Sat. April 9th at the Garrison; tickets are $10 at the door only.)