Record Roundup: Cornucopia Of Folk And Americana

I hate to feel that I’m keeping music from people, so before I start my Best Of 2018 series, here are quick takes on some excellent albums in the realms of folk and Americana. I think you’ll find some of them perfect for wintry nesting as the sun sets early and snow brushes the window panes. Others may be good for the family gatherings that can define this time of year.

Raoul Vignal - Oak Leaf It’s rare that you hear an album this assured and accomplished from a well-known artist. But when someone flying under the radar presents such an exquisite piece of work as Oak Leaf, it feels even more astonishing. On this second album by the French singer-songwriter, finger-picked guitars weave a spell alongside occasional shimmering vibes or a gentle sax. Drums tick away minimally in the background. Over it all is Vignal’s hushed voice delivering (in English) introspective confessions and musings. I see a danger of Vignal becoming a “musician’s musician” or a “best-kept secret.” It's up to you not to let that happen.

Olivia Chaney - Shelter Both the production (by Thomas Bartlett) and Chaney’s voice are so polished that I was at first turned off by this, her second album. But then it dawned on me that there was a flood of emotion being held back by a levee of glassy perfection. The key to this is her stunning version of O Solitude, a 300-year-old song by Henry Purcell. The feeling in it is baked into the lyrics and Purcell’s haunting melody, which is the standard she’s set for her own songs. Her lofty ambition is more than repaid, making for a special listening experience. I also wouldn’t complain if her next album was entirely Purcell, John Dowland, and other centuries-old British luminaries. 

Ocean Music - Jorge Marco Turino, Beach Captain, Etc. I’ve written before about the wondrous music of Richard Aufrichtig, which he usually puts out as Ocean Music. While he has been fairly prolific in 2018, I have it on good authority that the best is yet to come. The first of these is a five-song EP of originals, played solo with either piano or acoustic guitar. It’s a beautiful recording and his expansive songs are easy to get lost in. Beach Captain is mostly covers, some old, like Bird On A Wire, and some newer like Joanna Newsom’s Clam Crab Cockle Cowrie. He always goes deep, making them his own, no more so than in a mournful take on Someday by The Strokes. We’ve also been graced with a shimmering, powerful version of Aufrichtig’s Ghost Song with a full band, the closest any recording has yet come to the Ocean Music live experience. Finally, we have two songs from a recent concert at Baby’s All Right - I was there so you can trust me when I say this is just a hint of how great it was. But it’s par for the course for Aufrichtig to drop hints; here’s hoping we get the full story in 2019. 

Phil Cook - People Are My Drug Spending time with Cook’s music is like feeling the sun on your face after a week of rain. This is especially true in concert, as a recent show at Bowery Ballroom (with Andy Jenkins opening!) proved yet again. He draws you in with his smile and seals the deal with his killer guitar and sweet voice. Those last two elements are present on this follow-up to 2015’s  Southland Mission, as well as an increased interest in gospel fervor. That means the album is plenty inspiring, even if the songwriting is a little less sharp. My only other quibble has to do with the inclusion of Amelia Meath of Sylvan Esso on several songs - but that’s just because I don’t really like her voice or her band. I guess the divine Alexandra Sauser-Monnig wasn't available! If you feel differently, you will likely be thrilled with her contributions here. Either way, it’s a fine album and if you get a chance to see Cook on stage, don’t hesitate!

The Dead Tongues - Unsung Passage I first caught wind of Ryan Gustafson, who performs under this name, when he opened for and played with Phil Cook at Rough Trade. He quickly lodged in my mind as a master of all things stringed, as well as a fine singer and songwriter deep in the American vein. Now we have his most assured record yet, weaving a spell through a variety of country and folk-tinged textures and settings. To my ears he’s most effective when he pushes it furthest, as on the haunting Ebb And Flow or My Other, which, with its flutes and strings, is the first song that’s reminded me of Nico’s magisterial Chelsea Girl since I first heard that record. It’s fantastic, easily one of the most gorgeous songs of the year. But this whole record deserves your attention. If you give it that, you will likely become a fan of The Dead Tongues. 

John Calvin Abney - Coyote Go take a look at issue #116 of Off Your Radar for a kaleidoscopic look at Abney’s last album, Far Cries And Close Calls. Done? Good. Now, believe me when I say this one is even better. The production alone is worthy of note, burnished and warm, like an old oak table - and the songs are just as solid. Abney’s voice has a touch of Wings-era McCartney and he’s learned a few songwriting lessons from the former Fab as well. These aren't annoying earworms, though, but rather songs that employ sophisticated and unexpected chord changes in a relaxed and naturalistic fashion. This makes for songs that are memorable but also nourishing, repaying repeat and close listening. If Coyote doesn’t significantly expand Abney’s audience, I don’t know what will. 

Anna St. Louis - If Only There Was A River Every once in a while something in my Spotify Discover Weekly playlist will floor me, causing me to stop what I’m doing and make sure to find out all the W’s: who, what, when. Last week it was a song from St. Louis’s previous album, First Songs, something with hypnotic fingerpicking, beautiful singing, and a shapely melody. That came out in 2017 and just as I was cursing Spotify and the world for keeping it from me, I noticed she had a new album out. This is a more fully produced affair, but thankfully Kyle Thomas and Kevin Morby have nurtured St. Louis’s talents rather than blanketing them in their own ideas. The songs are exquisite enough on their own - the task is not to ruin them and at that Morby and Thomas more than succeed. Numerophiles who own Catherine Howe's What A Beautiful Place may find a point of reference. This is an album people will be talking about - don’t wait around for an algorithm to deliver it to you.

Billy Joseph & The Army Of Love - You Know Which Way To Go This is my first cousin, OK, but that's not the only reason I've had his latest record on repeat. This is just an excellent collection of soulful rock & folk - and sometimes just plain soul in the Al Green and Robert Cray stylings of Second Time Around. The production is expansive and well-tailored to every song, including a very original take on Suspicious Minds. Stinging guitar leads (either by Nick Kirgo or Billy himself) are lavished on the album with an almost gustatory pleasure and the horns on Holiday Song are sublime. The lyrics can cut to the quick, as on that last song, as honest a depiction of holiday loneliness as has ever been written. "Bing Crosby's on the TV set, I can see him through the window of a furniture store," Billy sings in a line worthy of a scene from a Douglas Sirk classic - just one of the gems to be found on this impressive record. If you live in L.A., he's probably playing somewhere tonight so go out and see him do his thing.

Jeff Tweedy - Warm For the last few years (maybe since the excellent Sukierae) it’s been a bit of a toss-up whether or not a Tweedy product is going to truly touch me or just be another expression of consummate competence to be admired and put away. While it’s early days yet with Warm, which is his first true solo album in a 25-year career, I’m pleased to report that I believe this is one of the former. As always, the songs are well-written, but the sense of intimacy, the feeling of someone hoping their hard-won truths will help get you through, is welcome. The musical settings are spare, sensitive - listen to the drumming on From Far Away - and lived-in, harkening back to John Wesley Harding or Plastic Ono Band. Tweedy’s mastery of the pithy lyric is also on full display, using a few words to carry heavy freight, like the chorus of the title track: “I don't believe in Heaven/I keep some heat inside/Like a red brick in the summer/Warm when the sun has died.” There’s enough wisdom on Warm to fill a book - and Tweedy has one of those, too! Listen, read, and celebrate one of our master artists hitting a new peak. 

Don’t these albums sound like they would be fodder for a great playlist? Gotcha covered (except for Oak Leaf)! See below or click here. What else would you add?

You may also enjoy:
Record Roundup: Forms Of Escape
Outliers, Part 1: Oracle Hysterical and Thomas Bartlett-Nico Muhly
Outliers, Part 2: Seabuckthorn and David Garland
Autumn Albums, Part 1
Autumn Albums, Part 2
The Wilco Diaspora Part 2: Tweedy & Son

Record Roundup: Rock On (And On)

I made a tiny zine about long songs - let me know if you want a copy!

So far, 2017 is proving to be a good year for what we still call rock music. Part of the vitality of the form can be felt in two emerging trends I have observed starting earlier this year.

1. Live Albums: Rock has always thrived on stage and one of its central challenges has been capturing that lightning in the studio. A good live album bypasses that issue and gives us the raw, uncut power we seek (although sometimes with a little tweaking). As I noted in my review of the excellent and exploratory live album by Brazilian psych-rockers Boogarins, official concert releases haven't been so common lately. But even before that album came out, Sleater Kinney put out the explosive Live In Paris, which must have been manna for fans, as was Carrie & Lowell Live by Sufjan Stevens. Hiss Golden Messenger also put out a beautiful document of an early concert from their current tour. Get it for free - and if it doesn't compel you to by a ticket next time M.C. Taylor comes to town, I don't know what will. Perhaps this trend is a reaction to the bolted together industrial strength shiny objects that dominate the top 40. Either way, it's a heartening development and I think there will be more. 

2. Epic Tracks: Long songs by rock bands is another trend that has ebbed and flowed ever since Dylan waxed Like A Rolling Stone and The Doors ended their debut with The End. While they've never gone away entirely, this was the first year that I've felt moved to start gathering songs longer than seven minutes in a Spotify playlist imaginatively called Epic Tracks 2017. Maybe it's the Blackstar effect, as the title track from Bowie's final album was a 10-minute masterpiece, or it could be inspiration from Car Seat Headrest, who turned heads in 2016 with The Ballad of Costa Concordia, which powered on for 11 minutes and change. 

When it came to starting up the playlist, more than one song from Father John Misty's astonishing Pure Comedy could have made the cut. Tough choice, but I picked the incantatory expanse of Leaving L.A., which devastates in one minute and causes a snarky chuckle in the next, to finish the mix. His old colleagues Fleet Foxes are also included, represented by First Of May/Ôdaigahara, the suite-like first single from their upcoming album. 

A less expected occupant is my cousin, Billy Joseph, with the title track to his lushly produced album Ride On The Mystery, which finds him pushing his voice into new places, before letting guitars and synths take over. I was also surprised - and most pleasantly - to hear Jay Som stretch out on For Light, the last song of Everybody Works, her striking collection of sophisticated indie - all recorded in her bedroom. She really can do it all. 

While lengthy songs are common in metal, Mastodon's latest, Emperor of Sand, is such a killer return to form that I dropped Jaguar God into the list. The Feelies have also been known to play long and, as it happens, my favorite song from their lethargic new album is In Between (Reprise), a blistering 11 minute rocker. LCD Soundsystem is another sacred cow that disappoints as often as it delights, but fortunately their new single is in the latter category and one song, Call the Police, is a natural fit for the playlist at just over seven minutes. 

Keep me in the loop on anything I've missed - I'm hoping the Epic Tracks 2017 playlist itself goes to epic length by the end of the year!

In addition to the albums mentioned above, here are three other rock albums that I've been returning to often.

The Courtneys - II This is a familiar sound: driving rhythms, guitars that chime, grind, and mesh, taut bass lines, edgy-sweet female vocals, a whiff of the 90's. Familiar enough, in fact, that I almost turned away. But then the hooks got their hooks into me, the band's conviction and craftsmanship became more convincing, and the lyrics revealed a sly commentary on the nostalgia the music seemed to represent: "You'll never get old and you'll never die/It just makes me want to cry." It's an addictive, joyful collection that improves on their debut in every way. No sophomore slump here! Start with Silver Velvet or Lost Boys (yes, an homage to the Kiefer Sutherland classic) to see if your boat gets afloat. The Vancouver-based band is on an extensive world tour (sometimes as an opening act), which will be returning stateside in September. I wish I could see them at the High Watt in Nashville, but I will gladly settle for Park Church Co-op in Brooklyn on October 15th. 

Novella - Change Of State This is also a second album, although the Londoners have been honing their sound since 2010. All that hard work paid off in their distinctive debut, Land, which came out in 2015. So Novella's progress is more incremental than The Courtney's, but it shows in the greater focus they bring to their crystal-clear psych-rock, which starts with flowing melodies and marries shimmering guitars to a hypnotic beat that casts back to Klaus Dinger's motorik drumming in Krautrock pioneers Neu. First-timers should dial up the title track or A Thousand Feet, with its haunting refrain of "But there's nothing there," and a spacious arrangement that probably gives plenty of opportunities to stretch out in concert. Now if they would just play NYC...or at least make a live album.

Spoon - Hot Thoughts By now an American institution, Spoon returned after three years with yet another terrific album, their ninth in a 20 year career. The production shows even more attention to detail than their last, They Want My Soul, which is saying a lot. Their ongoing fascination with techniques borrowed from hip hop and R&B continues to inject sonic excitement into the songs, which are already little wonders of jagged chord changes and jarring emotions. Dave Fridmann (known for his work with the Flaming Lips) is once again their able co-conspirator in the production chair, and I also note that main songwriter Britt Daniel is using co-writers outside of the band, which is unusual. I'm not sure if that is the source of the more telegraphic, minimalist style of some of the lyrics, or some other aspect of the songs.

Another difference is that the core of the album was recorded as a quartet, without multi-instrumentalist Eric Harvey, who had been a member since 2004. This seems to expose the other players' contributions - in a good way, with Rob Pope shining especially bright on bass and adding a post-punk edge to keep things from getting too polished. Jim Eno is forever superb on the drums and newest member Alex Fischel continues to deploy intriguing keyboard textures while also being Daniel's sparring partner on guitar. These changes in personnel and process may be what it takes to keep things fresh this far into their career. While they have sometimes been accused of being formulaic, I can safely say that nothing else they've put out sounds like the nearly ambient Pink Up, which could almost be from side two of Bowie's Low, or Us, a melancholy instrumental laced with spacey sax (by Ted Taforo) that transports me to the futuristic L.A. of Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. It's an adventurous ending and one that points in new directions. Like rock music itself, Spoon continues to be surprisingly durable and rewarding - long may they reign.

P.S. If the music described herein is in your sweet spot, follow my Rock, Folk, Etc. playlist on Spotify to hear more and keep up with new releases.

You may also enjoy:
Boogarins Live: Parallel Play
Long Time Coming
Bulletproof Spoon
Live Review: Play Misty For Me

Epic Tracks 2017