Archive for April, 2011

Tom Vek "A Chore"

British accents are very good for conveying boredom and petty annoyance in pop music without actually sounding boring or annoying. In his new single "A Chore," Tom Vek sings about soul-crushing routine, though the perspective is a bit unclear. I prefer to hear this as sung in the second person -- it's better as an expression of disassociation from oneself than a harsh judgment of someone else. Vek's voice gets across an angry self-loathing, but there's a wit to it. It's not simple self-pity. It's more like gallows humor, tied to a track that's heavy and lurching, but stops just shy of overbearing. Buy it from Amazon.

Anni Rossi "Candyland"

Anni Rossi has been a strange artist to watch develop over the past few years. She started off violently slashing at her viola and singing in a wildly expressive style punctuated with wordless, orgasmic bleats. Then she rerecorded her material, toning down her quirks and dialing down her manic energy. Now she's mellowed out even further, to the point that she hardly sounds like the young woman who made the Afton EP. The songs on her new album Heavy Meadow are rigid and minimal, with melodies that seem to connect between tightly snapping beats like taut, thin wires. Her early material seemed totally unhinged, but this is all about deliberate restraint. "Candyland," the opening track set the tone -- light but uptight, sweet but aloof. She comes close to the glassy-eyed bliss of Talking Heads' "This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody)," but Rossi still has too much fire in her to seem that disassociated and blank. Buy it from Amazon.

Eleanor Friedberger "My Mistakes"

There's something very particular about the Friedbergers -- an unmistakable cadence, a distinct sensibility. Even still, you can tell when a Fiery Furnaces song was primarily written by Eleanor -- the lyrics and meters aren't so overstuffed; her voice shows more softness and vulnerability; the words seem more personal and much less academic. "My Mistakes," the first song to emerge from Eleanor's first solo album, plays out like a thoughtful diary entry over a lightly bopping arrangement that leaves plenty of open space for her voice. I find the specific qualities of Eleanor's voice so endlessly charming and so difficult to describe -- I love the depth of character that comes through in her tone, enunciation and rhythm. She has one of those voices you hear and you can intuit so much, a whole person contained in a specific timbre. The best vocalists have this presence, this particular humanity. She's unquestionably one of my all-time favorites. Visit the Merge Records site.

Paul Simon "The Afterlife"

Paul Simon's version of the afterlife sounds a lot like the life we already know: A lot of mundane encounters and tedious bureaucracy broken up by moments of sublime, confusing beauty. You don't get any answers, no greater purpose is revealed. You still have to deal with everyone else and jockey for status. And, of course, the closest you get to communing with some divine force is hearing the melody of some silly pop song. Buy it from Amazon.

Hauschka "Radar"

I saw Hauschka in concert at Joe's Pub in Manhattan on Saturday, and it was remarkable. Haushka -- aka Volker Bertelmann -- performed as a duo with Samuli Kosminen, a Finnish percussionist who was just as inventive with rhythm as Bertelmann was on the piano. Bertelmann is amazing to behold. There's a theatrical element to watching him alter his piano with various objects and devices, but even beyond that, his physicality is fascinating. Like a lot of truly great players, his body language appears to be loose and fluid -- it all looks intuitive and easy. They played a fair amount of material from Salon des Amateurs, stripping down the arrangements while building the rhythms up to something more thumping and visceral than what is on record. The version of "Girls" was especially great; I wish I could share that with you instead of this studio version. Bertelmann and Kosminen were on to something really special here -- the specific tonalities of prepared piano, complex neo-classical melodies, a touch of improvisational energy, the rhythmic intensity of house music. The music on Salon des Amateurs is very close, but a bit mannered. This performance went further. It sounded wild and fresh, like something that could breathe new life into classical, dance, rock, whatever. I recommend that you go out of your way to see Hauschka, especially if you happen to be a musician. Buy it from Amazon.

Fleetwood Mac "Second Hand News"

I’ve heard a lot of pretty graphic and frank songs about sex in my life. When I was 14, I was way into pop songs with lyrics such as "I want to fuck you like an animal" and "I want to be your blowjob queen." So why is it that as an adult I find that a line like "won’t you lay me down in the tall grass and let me do my stuff" strikes me as sooooo much more dirty? I figure it must be the sweetness of the sentiment along with the tension between the specificity of the location and the vagueness of the action. Rumours is rather famously the product of some very dark times for the members of the band, but it never sounds dreary or depressive. "Second Hand News" sets the tone with its springy rhythm and bright notes -- it's optimistic, it's confident, it's sexy. When Stevie Nicks comes in on harmony, she joins Lindsey Buckingham in singing "when times go bad, when times go rough," and I think that is meaningful. He's more passive-aggressive and spiteful on "Go Your Own Way," but in this song there's at least a chance of reconciliation, even if there's no hope for a reunion. ("I've been tossed around enough.") This certainly qualifies as a kiss-off song, but it's worth noting that its climax is self-deprecating: "I'm just second hand news, I'm your second hand news." Buy it from Amazon.

Lindsey Buckingham "Time Precious Time"

Buckingham's guitar playing on this song is astonishing, total virtuoso stuff. It's a gorgeous cascade of finger-picked notes, with each plucked note coming fast but sounding like a slow-moving spiral. When the chorus comes in, it's physically jarring and stunningly beautiful -- his voice seems to move against the guitar notes and a subtle harmony of treated vocals. He sounds like he's defying time itself, trying to impose his will on something he has no ability to control. At the same time, the piece feels meditative and patient. It's a swirl of mixed emotions about aging, but at the center there's some wisdom and clarity. Buy it from Amazon.

Lindsey Buckingham "I Want You"

"I guess I had to prove / I was someone hard to lose." That's an interesting line. He sounds embarrassed by his vanity and insecurity, and maybe even his self-awareness. But this is a common feeling, I think -- this desire to make someone regret letting you go. Lindsey Buckingham wrote the album Go Insane while breaking up with Carol Ann Harris, his girlfriend of six years. They met while she worked as a receptionist at the studio where Fleetwood Mac mastered Rumours. From what I've read, the dynamic of their relationship was very different from his romance with Stevie Nicks. When Stevie and Lindsey were down and out in the years before joining Fleetwood Mac, Lindsey insisted upon Stevie being the breadwinner. She supported the both of them as a waitress while he hung around all day, playing his guitar and honing his skills. Years later, when Lindsey met Carol, he was a big rock star. He supported her for years, and took care of her after they broke up. Despite the differences, both women say they were focused on making him happy. "It was very lonely," Harris told Rolling Stone in 1984. "I think I lived my life for Lindsey. I really felt it was important for me to be there for him, whether or not he was there physically, but for him to know I was there at home. He needed me there emotionally. It was rough. I don't think I can remember relaxing the whole time I was with him." This context adds a lot to the music on Go Insane. Getting beyond the "someone hard to lose" thing, "I Want You" sounds desperate but oddly happy. He sounds glad to be dependent on someone, and eager to set things right, if just to get back on balance. The music has a manic, antsy quality that is exaggerated by the vocals, which bounce around the channels in a way that makes the track feel as if it has no center. He plays a somewhat straightforward guitar solo near the end, but somehow the sound of a guitar is inexplicably weird in this context. Every time I hear that part it sounds surprising to me. Maybe it's the expressive high notes in that part -- even in a song that can be best described as "light-hearted yet hysterical," that bit is especially bugged-out. Buy it from Amazon.

Buckingham Nicks "Crying in the Night"

Buckingham Nicks, the album Lindsey and Stevie recorded as a duo before joining Fleetwood Mac, has been out of print for nearly 30 years and has never been issued on CD. At this point, this is just sort of weird. Obviously, we live in the internet era and if you want it, you can find it, but at least on a symbolic level this music should be out there to buy. "Crying in the Night," a Stevie number, is the album's best cut. Their personalities certainly come across in this song, but they aren't fully formed just yet. Stevie sounds great on this -- she'd evolve into a more witchy persona later on, but here she's witty and down to earth. (Something about the way she repeats the phrase "wreck your world" a second time for extra emphasis makes me smile very hard.) Lindsey's guitar style isn't quite there at this point, but his guitar parts here are very impressive regardless. The chords have a great breezy quality, and the chord changes are dynamic and ambitious without disrupting the flow of Stevie's melodies. As it turns out, he was always very good at arranging her songs and framing her voice. One more Lindsey Buckingham post tomorrow!

The choice of singles from Tusk is totally mystifying to me. I mean, I get that leading with "Tusk" is a show of hubris and that "Sara" is Stevie Nicks' personal favorite, but there just seems to be a lot of missed opportunities for radio hits. Of the Nicks songs, I would've gone with "Angel." As for Christine McVie, she didn't really come up with anything too compelling for the record, which is strange since she is otherwise the group's most reliable hit maker. Lindsey Buckingham's songs from this period have a reputation for being quite odd, but the truth is, he wrote the best candidates for singles on the record. It's a shame no one had the sense to give them a push.

Fleetwood Mac "What Makes You Think You're the One"

In a catalog full of high quality break-up songs, "What Makes You Think You're the One" is almost certainly Lindsey's finest kiss-off. It's brutal and self-righteous and blind to its own hypocrisies. It's an upbeat, pleasant tune, but the rhythm is as agitated as it is peppy, and his voice takes on a strained, peevish tone. This song is essentially an expression of petty annoyance, and its perkiness comes out of the smug satisfaction of feeling like you've got the upper hand in an emotional conflict.

Fleetwood Mac "Walk A Thin Line"

The soft rock hit that never was! "Walk A Thin Line" may be my favorite Buckingham composition. The most striking thing about the song is that it conveys this very powerful sense of isolation, but also this sort of clear-eyed confidence. It's the sound of a guy who totally believes that he's making the right decisions, no matter how precarious his position may be. He feels persecuted and judged by his peers, but he's too proud to back down. Instead he attains a gentle grace and embraces a patient outlook. The music approaches that laid back tranquility, but the high treble notes in his guitar betray a nagging doubt. Buy it from Amazon. More Lindsey Buckingham tomorrow!

Fleetwood Mac "Monday Morning"

Lindsey Buckingham is a hopeless romantic, and writes almost exclusively about love and relationships. His lyrics are conversational, but usually aren't the things you actually say to someone. In "Monday Morning," his first track on a Fleetwood Mac album, he really lays it on the line with some very frank words about a relationship that has run its course without ever really starting. He comes off as more bitter in later songs but here he's very warm and sweet, expressing his frustrations while quick to remind the woman being addressed that he has nothing but love for her. I love that this song is so kind despite being about someone leading him on and toying with his heart. The sound is so sunny too -- it gallops along, a bit chunky in its tones but still light and breezy. Mick Fleetwood's drumming is key to pulling this off; his fills keep the piece snappy and brisk, particularly when the song seems to plunge into that excellent "I don't miiiind" bridge into the chorus. Buy it from Amazon.

Fleetwood Mac "Hold Me"

"Hold Me" is a Christine McVie song, but Buckingham is the dominant figure on the recording. Technically the song is a duet between Christine and Lindsey, but her cool voice recedes into the mix as his more passionate phrasing takes the lead. He brings all the fire to this song -- after he finishes singing, his guitar solo carries much of the emotion in the piece. This is a breathtaking composition; harmonically sophisticated and atypical in structure without calling much attention to its form. There are so many dazzling bits of melody here -- McVie's piano figures, the lead vocal part, the cascading harmony in the chorus, the subtle chug of John McVie's bass line. I love the way this plinking percussive part is the earthy counterpoint to the ethereal quality of the chorus. This is a truly an ensemble performance, but I credit Buckingham with getting it all to fit together so perfectly. This is what happens when a brilliant piece of songwriting is realized by a thoughtful producer and a group of musicians who play to their strengths but not necessarily their usual habits. (By the way, the original demo version by Christine McVie is significantly different -- still a very good song, but nowhere near as great as what it becomes once Lindsey gets his hands on it.) Buy it from Amazon. Stay tuned, there will be more Lindsey Buckingham tomorrow.

Fleetwood Mac "The Ledge"

A huge amount of time and effort went into crafting and recording Fleetwood Mac's Tusk, and yet its sequencing seems totally random. For example, I can't think of many first tracks less suited to opening an album than "Over and Over," a country rock ballad by Christine McVie that is so minor and low key that she may as well sing "bury this on side four" in the second verse. This song, one of the most square soft pop tracks in the entire Fleetwood Mac catalog, is immediately followed by "The Ledge," a Lindsey Buckingham tune that is probably their all-time weirdest recording. The only reason you would front load these two tracks would be to deliberately confuse and alienate the band's audience, which at this point in time was something in the neighborhood of 16 million people in the United States alone. So yeah, it's not too surprising that about 15 million of those people took a pass on Tusk. "The Ledge" isn't very representative of Lindsey's material on Tusk -- and has virtually no aesthetic connection whatsoever with McVie and Stevie Nicks' contributions -- but it sets a tone for the record and establishes him as something of an eccentric. "The Ledge" is a like a caricature of Buckingham's persona, exaggerating his trebly tone and high-strung character to the point that it becomes funny and a little grotesque. It's also a radical deviation from his band's established aesthetic, casting aside the polished perfection of Rumours for this perverse, intentionally sloppy and manic sound. It's not as if Lindsey invented weird, arty pop, but there's something about his weirdness that strikes me as particularly human and distinct. Even when he lets it all hang out, he sounds uptight and wired. That overcharged quality carries through the rest of his Tusk material, even the really pretty ballads. I'm sure you can chalk some of this up to the amount of cocaine he was snorting at the time, but if you look at his entire body of work, it's obvious that this odd energy is essential to his personality. It's just dialed all the way up for "The Ledge," that's all. Buy it from Amazon.

Lindsey Buckingham "It Was I"

This Gary Paxton cover from Buckingham's first solo album Law and Order is another good example of his willful perversity. It's a really sweet and straightforward pop song, but Lindsey pitches everything up a bit for a peculiar effect. It seems a bit more child-like, but also really cheap and plastic. (It's almost Christmas-y.) The sound is just slightly off, but it makes a huge difference. It's so much more colorful and evocative than if it had been played entirely straight. You really feel the youthful romance here. You know how in movies flashbacks are often shot with a different film stock or filter or something to signal to the audience that they're in a different time and place? The treble-heavy tonality of this track does a similar trick. Buy it from Amazon. Stay tuned. There will be more Lindsey Buckingham tomorrow.

Tune-Yards "Powa"

I don’t know much about Merrill Garbus’ life, but I feel like I know a lot about her voice, which might be a separate thing. Garbus sings like a person who, at some point in the not-too-distant past, stopped caring about holding herself back. “Powa” starts off sorta gentle and demure, but as it progresses, there’s a clear physicality to her vocals — a startling, defiant swagger. Unlike a lot of “swagger” you hear in modern pop music, it’s not a put-on or thinly veiled insecurity. It doesn’t sound like control or a desire to be controlling either. It’s more about self-possession, and making a clear decision to be exactly who you are and go for what you want, and take what you deserve after years of feeling unworthy. “Powa” is a song about sex, and it feels triumphant and glorious, like a long-earned reward. There’s still conflict and angst, but it all disappears in moments of pure pleasure, as when Garbus’ voice shoots up into into high notes, yanking us up with her into her giddy stratosphere. You feel her pleasure along with her, but you know that it’s an abstraction. If you really want it, you’ve got to get it for yourself. You’ve got to be more like Merrill. (Originally posted on January 4th 2010) I've lived with "Powa" for a while now, and I'm pretty confident in saying that it ranks among my favorite songs of all time. I feel like I could gush endlessly about it -- in addition to what I wrote over a year ago, I know I could go on and on about every detail in the structure, performance and production of this piece. But the thing that really blows me away is this: "Powa" is a song about love and sex that factors in insecurity about one's body. When you think about how common it is for people to feel awkward about their bodies -- if not outright disgusted by them -- it is shocking to realize how rarely this comes up in songs about love and sex. Sex tends to be idealized and abstracted in music, in a way it's not that different from Hollywood or pornography. "Powa" is astonishing not only because it presents the singer as a fully-formed person with body image issues and stress and real world problems, but because it expresses genuine love and gratitude for someone with whom she has true intimacy. Aside from Carole King's wonderful "(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman," I can't think of many songs on this level of quality that articulate this sort of feeling. Buy it from Amazon.