June Album Reviews

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Absolutely Love & Adore:

Fleet Foxes (self titled) – Layered haunting harmonies. Voices ringing out like bells. An updated CSNY with less twang, more melancholy. Particularly love “He Doesn’t Know Why”, “Oliver James” and “Your Protector”. But you may want to start with “White Winter Hymnal” which is probably their biggest hit so far. LOVE!

Sea Wolf “Get to the River Before It Runs Too Low” (EP) – This came out before their full album you may remember me raving about, but I didn’t get the EP until I saw them live. I already had two songs off it, but I’m so glad I got it because “Sea Monuments” is just lovely. Yay Sea Wolf!

Joseph Arthur “Vagabond Skies” (EP) – Third of the four EPs he’s putting out this year. Plus a full album due September 30! Happy for me because I just can’t get enough of this dude’s music. My favorite off this EP is the first song “Slow Me Down”, but really I like the WHOLE THING. 🙂

The Fratellis “Here We Stand” – These guys are just pure infectious fun, I don’t know see how it would possible to not enjoy their music. They just make me want to stand up and dance!! Michelle doesn’t like this album as much as their first, but it pushes all the right buttons for me. My faves are “Baby Doll” and “Shameless” which gives me a total John Lennon vibe.

Favorite Singles (not on any of the above albums):

  • “Landlocked Blues” (live from Pantages Theater) Conor Oberst
  • “Backwards Walk” Frightened Rabbit
  • “Josephine St” I Love Math
  • “My Only Offer” Mates of State
  • “When I Get to the Border” She & Him
  • “No One Else Like You” Joey Ryan
  • “Hologram” Katie Herzig (awesome lyrics!)
  • “You, Me & The Bourgeoisie” The Submarines (from this album)
  • “Bang My Drum” Danielia Cotton
  • “Beyond the Pale” Scott Kempner (total old school feel)
  • “Saint C3cili4” Sunlight in Architecture
  • “Alright, Okay” Ryan Auffenberg
  • “The Ground That We Stand On” Hawksley Workman

Other Albums I Liked:

  • Lil Wayne “The Carter III” – Most hyped rap album of the year? It’s got some of the same issues all rap albums have (sooo many songs, soooo many guests), but there’s a lot more singing, R&B style harmonies, etc., than on other comparable albums. I love “Mrs. Officer”, also “Mr. Carter” and “Comfortable.”
  • The Audreys “When the Flood Comes” – I randomly bought an album by the Audreys when Mariko and I went to Oz (2006?) based on the cool photo on the cover. Fortunately turned out I really really liked it! I don’t like this album as much, it’s a bit less inviting. But it’s just as pretty… Like. Certainly. But don’t love.
  • Port O’Brien “All We Could Do Was Sing” – You know when you rush off and buy a full album based on the strength of one awesome song? And then you get the album and it’s just not what you expected because that awesome song is not really the real style of what they do? And then you do like the album but you never get into it THAT much? Yeah, this is that album. That song? “I Woke Up Today” (brilliant!). Other songs I also enjoy are “Stuck on a Boat” and “Fisherman’s Son”.

Not really for me / but maybe for you!:

Shearwater “Rook” – So I thought I would love this. It’s somewhat in the vein of Sea Wolf or Fleet Foxes, that layered choral-feelin’ music people are doing these days, somewhere between folk and pop. The difference really here is the vocals which are quite…hmmmm. I guess I’d say a bit “operatic”, along the lines of Rufus Wainwright, Jeff Buckley. Which is fine, just not my favorite style. But the real reason I have a rough time with this album is it’s just soooo sooooo sad. (Yo, I get my sadness on the inside, ha ha ha. But really.) I really like “Leviathan, Bound” (pretty! chiming!), “Century Eyes” (more upbeat) and “The Hunter’s Star (pretty!), but honesty listening to this just makes me get all quiet and lonely and curl up in a corner and bang my head against the wall. So I’m kinda avoiding it actually.

Jakob Dylan “Seeing Things” – Another album that while lyrically/musically has things to recommend it….but it makes me so sad I just can’t listen to it. Super slow and dirge-like and I don’t think that’s his strength as a musician. I am a bigger fan of the Wallflowers than most people I know, but I don’t love this. And the lyrics to “Will It Grow”, I’m sorry, are just over the top.

James Hunter “The Hard Way” – I really liked his previous album. I actually really like think this is a good album too…but turns out I don’t have much interest in listening to it. As with Duffy that I talked about last month, this just isn’t a style of music I often find myself reaching for.

Shamefully have either not listened to at all, or not all the way through, or so few times that I can’t legitimately offer an opinion:
None! 🙂

Getting PSYCHED for Monolith.

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I know, I know, I’m getting so old and cranky, I seem to mostly regret festivals afterward….but I just couldn’t resist the lineup for this one PLUS the bonus of visiting Colorado friends, staying for free, drinking beer, playing with puppies… Yeah yeah yeah.

Anyway, one of the BIG reasons to buy a Monolith ticket is to see The Avett Brothers, who technically I SHOULD have already seen since I had tickets to their House of Blues show in Chicago (least favorite Chicago venue) but I blew it off during a horrific w-0-r-k week.

Check out the video Alicia posted and the live performance Heather posted and I mean… OK so maybe they’re a little more country than what you usually listen to? But they are also maybe a little more awesome than what you usually listen to. Yay yay yay! Can’t wait!

Lyrics of the Afternoon

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Girl, that’s so not cool in so many ways
These were supposed to be my carefree single days
Instead I’m punching walls and coming up with ways
Ways to win you back from your new man.
Right now he’s a-probably moaning your name
The thought of it is driving me insane
Got to get religion just to ease the pain
Of thinkin’ about you loving your new man.
-Mason Jennings “Your New Man”

Love this song. Love “Fighter Girl”. But have mixed feelings about the overall album.

Fantasy: The Hob’s Bargain, by Patricia Briggs

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Another – typically as you might expect from who the author is – completely entertaining, engrossing fantasy novel.

Dear Ms. Briggs,
Every book of yours I read just breaks my heart a little bit more than the last one. The characters are so enticing; smart and funny and strong and so many other things that you wish people were in your real life. I just want their stories to go on and on and on…
Seriously,
I want to marry Kith, do you know a real him for me?,
Duff.

Finally.

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I think this is the best (baking) cookbook review I’ve ever read.

I’m so OVER stupid people going on and on about how hard things are. Or patronizing, say for random example, SHITTY bakeries that sell SHITTY TASTING BLAND AND STUPID cupcakes* and oohing and aahing over them because good lord cupcakes are just sooooo hard to make FROM SCRATCH.

People are idiots. I’m so over them. Baking is a stress reliever. Just ask Maida Heatter.

*If you’ve ever walked to my apartment, I THINK YOU KNOW THE SOURCE OF THIS FRUSTRATION.

In Concert: She & Him

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Oh yeah, baby, this was a GREAT show. [Minus the opener. I’ve decided not to say much about openers unless they were really good. My advice in this case: Don’t get there early if you’re going to see these guys.]

Zoey Deschanel has *such* a lovely voice and she can really open it up much more than you’d guess from the album. It’s also got a very distinctive edge to it which really lends itself to this country/folky type of tune. The full band sets often felt like a throwback to June Carter or Patsy Cline. But when she and M.Ward did some one-on-one stuff, it had a more modern feel. Equally entertaining either way, I really liked when they did some harmonizing/trading vocals back and forth. I haven’t been able to get into his solo stuff, but I though his voice worked well in counterpoint to hers.

The kind of show you just come out of HAPPY. So happy that you wind up drinking and talking and drinking and laughing and drinking [and eating mini corn dogs and doing karaoke] and getting home with only a few hours to go before the alarm goes off? Perhaps.

If they are coming to your town, they come very highly recommended.

Oh! and they played two new songs that were both really great! Yay!

Lollapalooza: Friday

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I was not a good ‘paloozer this year. I only bought a ticket to the least crowded day; and then I was soooo damn lazy that I couldn’t even be bothered to walk to the other field to see bands I really wanted to see (Stephen Malkmus, I’m sorry, will you forgive me?) when my friends were determined to see someone else. As a result, I only saw two “new to me” performers. Grrrr. Totally annoyed with myself in retrospect but I had fun at the time so I guess I just need to get over it.

Rogue Wave – Third time I’ve seen them this [fiscal/school] year so nothing very surprising. Still, a fun performance despite being so early in the day. Can’t really get enough of the lead’s voice.

The Kills – Yay!!! They were awesome. Totally enjoyable set. Loud and sassy and even better than on the album. Woot.

The Black Keys – They fall somewhere between the Raconteurs and (early) Rolling Stones. Rock with a bit of rollicky blues-i-ness. I thought they sounded great even though I was perfectly happy to be far from the stage where I could sit when I wanted to. The kind of performance that when it ended I immediately wanted to go buy every album. Really solid.

Cat Power – She was on what I consider the worst stage at Lollapalooza. There’s concrete, you have to stare into the sun, there’s a walkway/sidewalk right in what would be great seating. Yeah, I just couldn’t deal. She sounded fine but I bailed for the record store, although technically I was listening to her the whole time I was there / I just wasn’t devoted to the performance.

The Raconteurs – These guys are just great live. But as with Rogue Wave and Cat Power, I’ve seen them before, I knew what to expect. Jack White is really a great performer, he brings out the best in the rest of the band. A solid, enjoyable show.

Radiohead – Well, you must be aware by now that I’m not Radiohead’s greatest fan. In fact, I find them hardly listenable at this point. And I’ve already seen them at a festival and not thought it was a good venue for them. So I listened to song one, nice, cool lights, fine. And then song two started. And it was a song I didn’t like. The call of home and shower and bed was too strong. See ya later, Thom Yorke, maybe next time you’ll impress me enough to stay. But not today.

So there you have it. Saw two new performances and enjoyed them, four repeat performances and enjoyed two of them, and was generally the lamest Lollapaloozer-er ever. It *could* be I’m just getting too old and cranky for this shit.

YA/Fantasy: Breaking Dawn, by Stephenie Meyer

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The fourth in the sparkly vampire series, I really struggled to get through this one. Not that I didn’t finish it the same day I started, but that I found myself very annoyed with it early on and really pushed through only because I just HAD to know how it ended.

The first three I whipped through in a weekend and found them exhilarating and entertaining DESPITE the sloppy writing. So perhaps I had a harder time with this one because I wasn’t already on Bella’s emotional rollercoaster when I started. Whatever the reason, there were a number of things I just found too ludicrous here to really enjoy. But I sort of wondered going in if that would be the case.

As an adult, I can see all the weaknesses. As a teenager, I’m sure I would have [purposely] completely overlooked them and been swept right along.

Mystery/Fiction: The Likeness, by Tana French

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Wow. Soooooo good.

A follow-up of sorts to her debut “In the Woods”, taking the #2 character from that book and putting the focus on them (and I hear an auxiliary character in this book will be the focus of her third).

Really intriguing mystery, characters that become sooooo real… The descriptions are rich and thick, and the emotions are layered and tangled.

French has just written two of the most interesting, and unusual, mysteries out there.