Scroll down for reviews of releases by Neko Case, Bikeride, Interpol and Snowglobe. Click here for reviews of releases by Myracle Brah, Queens of the Stone Age, Fuzzbubble and Spoon.

Wondermints
Mind If We Make Love To You

(Smile)

smilerec.com

Are the Wondermints the Millenium of this millenium? Possibly. Being the Wondermints has its advantages and disadvantages. On one hand, they tour regularly as the heart of Brian Wilson's back up band and many critics have acknowledged the terrific job they have done in that capacity. On the other hand, they haven't been terribly prolific and their Wilson connection only adds to the expectations weighing upon them. Their debut was a demo, albeit, a terrific sounding demo, the second album was all covers and their last album, 1998's Bali was somewhat of a letdown. Not for a lack of effort. If anything, the band sounded like it was expending every bit of energy to make you smile. This couldn't cover up a lack of great material.

It appears that the Wondermints are no longer intent on trying to be incredible. They're just being themselves, and that's certainly fine. This is the best of their original albums. I still don't think their songwriting equals their performing abilities or sheer grasp of style. But there are a few top drawer numbers, amidst some other solid compositions. That's enough for this team to win with.

The dazzler beyond call is "Shine On", a tune with a number of distinctive parts, both from a melodic and an arrangement perspective. The band mixes a swooping Bacharach-meets-orchpop lushness with a pulsing rhythm bed featuring some funky ‘70s-style electric piano and a bass line that would fit a disco song. Throw in some bright and shiny orchestration and a chorus that reaches for the stars, and the song becomes like a mountain climb – you go up a level, acclimate, go down, go up a couple more levels, go down, and so forth. The song tops itself as it goes along.

It would be nervy to demand anyone come up with 11 more tunes like that. A few venture near that neighborhood. The verses of "Another Way" have that same tinged-with-sadness quality that has pervaded the last couple records from Ben Folds. Again, the band augments with strings to take the chorus in a totally different place than Folds would, moodwise and musicwise. Where Folds takes sad chords and remains tearful, the Wondermints add a wrinkle at the end of the chorus ("Feel the love/and you will find your way") to turn the frown upside down.

Four paragraphs and I haven't even mentioned The Beach Boys? Well, one thing I like about the Wondermints since day one, is their ability to deploy their innate skill at all things Wilsonish without ever rewriting a Beach Boys song. Moreover, they haven't just absorbed Pet Sounds – a lot of that underrated late-‘60s and early-‘70s stuff is part of their D.N.A. You can hear it in the chord progressions and harmonies of tracks like "If I Were You" and "Ride". Especially "Ride", now that I think of it (which happens to feature some Brian dude on backing vocals – good to see the Wondermints give opportunities to up-and-comers).

And "Listen" too. "Listen" gives me chills when it's just comprised of creamy vocals, piano and string accompaniment. The chorus is a steady descent, and verse mists back in climbing back up – the song comes in and out like a small wave breaking and receding on the beach. Breathtaking. Okay, maybe this song is as good as "Shine On".

As is sometimes the case, the album's consistency initially sounds like a drawback. It's hard to grasp on any one part of the album. However, repeated listens will point to highlights that will vary from listener to listener. This is a set of good or great songs, performed with loving care by a flat out great band. Enjoy.

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Neko Case
Blacklisted

(Bloodshot)

bloodshotrecords.com

Neko Case's debut, The Virginian, proved that she was a some kind of singer. The follow-up, Furnace Room Lullaby, established her a songwriter to be reckoned with, with one foot firmly planted in country tradition, but the other foot planted on her own path. Case respects traditions, but not to the point that she won't deviate from form to get her message across. On the last album, some of the songs were autobiographical and took on a folky feel. Here, Case's choice of sidemen immediately gives the songs a special context. In addition to labelmates The Sadies, Giant Sand's Howe Gelb and the members of Calexico cast every tune in their special wide-open as the desert Western sound. I have no clue whether Case wrote these songs with the musicians in mind, or if bringing her songs to these people resulted in the alchemy that turns most everything here to gold.

On her third album, Case fully confirms that she is a true artist, but without any of the fussiness that may imply.
What she's produced here is a distinctive twist on country music – at times it has a gothic orientation, but not from going back to 1920's murder ballad creakiness. Instead, the weepy and echoey backing gives the songs a feeling of coming from a distance, as if they were plucked from the airwaves of some distant radio station. It helps when you have a voice like Neko's. While she in no way sounds like The Blasters' Phil Alvin, like Phil, when she puts the full force of her power of her pipes to use, it's like a train whistle blowing as the train rushes by.
Case doesn't take her voice to the max very often. It's like she has gears in her voice, and she always, always, always has her phrasing tuned precisely where it should be for the song. There may be purer voices out there (her pal Kelly Hogan, who appears on a couple of tracks, comes to mind), but it's hard to think of a contemporary singer who connects with her lyrics as well as Case does. All the better when you are an ace lyricist and pick out covers tailor made for your singing.
The covers are dazzling. "Look For Me (I'll Be Around)" is prime torch singer material, an oft-performed number (Sarah Vaughn is just one of the big names who has recorded it). Sadies guitarist Dallas Good plays some lugubrious spy guitar licks – this actually sounds a bit like "Goldfinger" slowed down. Listen to Case's varied inflections, her choices on when to hold a note and when not to, as she displays her remarkable growth as a singer. Here, she exudes strength in the face of utter resignation. She takes a somewhat similar tack on the old Aretha Franklin hit "Runnin' Out of Fools", moving from mournful to moaning, she tears into the song, dressing down the insensitive lothario who she isn't going to let trick her again. This is a tour-de-force.

Years from now, other singers might tackle Case's own "I Wish I Was the Moon". The song is a simple shuffle, and her lyrics are likewise pared down to just the essential words. It is daring nowadays to rely on simple metaphors and phrases. Yet, those are often the ones that carry the most weight. "Now I've (got) freezing hands/and bloodless veins/as numb as I've become/I'm so tired/I wish I was the moon tonight." Case's words are always carefully crafted – these songs all mean something, convey a feeling or tell a story. She's as comfortable with poetic imagery as she is straightforward details.

Musically, many of these songs rely on minimal strumming. The songs feel like wide expanses of prairie. "Deep Red Bells" is like a painted renditions of a sunset, with great descriptive lyrics: "It looks a lot like engine oil/and tastes like being poor and small/and popsicles in the summer." In the midst of the spare backing, little touches loom large. On "Tightly", Calexico's Joey Burns twanging electric guitar and the combination of Burns on vibes and Case on piano, along with a haunting interlude of backing vocals (Case's voice multi-tracked) create a special world in just a shade over two minutes. The album rarely deviates from the slow tempos, yet it never drags, due to magical atmosphere that pervades each track.

One other brand new classic is "Pretty Girl". Case is singing to a woman in a hospital: "Your heart is so tried and so innocent/while your flimsy blue gown's tied around you/around curves so comely and sinister/they blame it on you pretty girl". The woman has been (purportedly) visited by sin – I take it that the woman has been raped, though the lyric could also be spun that she is having an abortion. Case is telling the woman to be strong. The music, which sounds in the beginning as if it is drained of hope, builds in a middle instrumental break, gaining strength, with Case offering redemption in the last verse.

In a lot of ways, "Pretty Girl" is part of a subconscious theme of the album: strength. Gaining it, losing it, wishing you had it, taking it and using it to get out of a bad situation, or relinquishing whatever is left of it and giving it up. This is a powerful work from an artist who now needs to be considered whenever the best contemporary singer-songwriters are discussed.

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Bikeride
Morning Macumba

(Hidden Agenda)

parasol.com

Listening to this, one word immediately comes to mind, and this goes out to all the Pauline Kael fans out there – fizzy. On their fourth album, California's Bikeride discovers Brazil, though this influence only comes out on some tracks. The band stitches together a wide array of influences throughout the album, and performs with a heaping dose of vim. It's as if the members got together and said, "hey guys, let's put on an album".

The result is one of the few soft-pop albums that could rightly be described as kick-ass, in spots. One such spot is the invigorating "The Americans in Rome". The song fades in on a repeating guitar figure – you almost expect them to start into "The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway". Instead, Tony Carbone starts singing and the song takes on a Motown vamp played by a mod band. Carbone chronicles the journeys of some expatriates who were "wearing white socks/as uniform". The chorus is rousing and anthemic, which perfectly captures the heightened sense of self-importance of the protagonists in this song: "we will taken what we want to/we are the Americans in Rome." Chris Petrozzi pounds like a combo of Topper Headon and Keith Moon and during the instrumental break, Sean How? goes nuts on the toy piano. This would have fit right in with mid-‘70s Sparks.

The band is equally hooky on "Faking Amnesia". They gets funky, in an ‘80s synth-pop kind of way, in the verses. The chorus manages to incorporate both a music hall vibe (think Blur Madness and The Wonder Stuff) with the verve of a high school pep rally. The band's use of dynamics is impressive, and Adam Diebert lays down a nice disco bass line.

Quite a few tracks reflect the Brazilian influence – it is manifested both in some of Carbone's melodies and the instrumental choices made by the band. Wisely, the band integrates this inspiration into its more basic mode, which is a fetching combo of sunny California pop with a bit of British art school thrown in. The ballad "Catch that Spark" is probably the closest to an all-out Brazilian attack, with Logan Bacharach's lovely flute defining the tune. The blend of sensibilities works well on "Norwega" and "Knees on Top". The former track shows off masterful arrangement skills, from the variety of backing vocal approaches in different parts of the song to how the song integrates a variety of instrumental approaches, including an instrumental break that takes you on a trip, from a dissonant guitar noodle to an uplifting horn line that gets you back into the song. On "Knees on Top", Carbone proclaims that "Brazilian music/we won't stop/until we use it/for rocket fuel", and soon the tropical vibes (and by vibes, I mean the instrument) come in. Yet the chorus could come off a Doleful Lions record, though they would not approach it with the vigor demonstrated by Carbone.

That vigor, combined with an ability to also create musical moments of sheer beauty is what is so appealing about Bikeride. The concise "Sleepyhead" (Carbone sings "I would sleep all day if I could") is premised on a creeping rhythm, established in synchronicity by the percussion track and the string accompaniment. The song builds to an inspiring string coda that slams the door shut on the feelings built up in the rest of the song. It's another example of a band that is full of ideas trying to find ways to surprise and delight the listener. This disc is a frothy pleasure.

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Interpol
Turn On The Bright Lights

(Matador)

matadorrecords.com

Post-punk drama, 21st Century style. Everyone is comparing Interpol to Joy Division, but neither the manner of playing or writing is that similar. Better comparisons would be Echo and the Bunnymen, The Chameleons and early Psychedelic Furs, among others. Interpol's rhythm section is simply awesome. Drummer Sam Fogarino is focused on moving the songs along, and adds color where needed. Bassist Carlos Dengler is even better, creatively providing bottom and melodic touches.
Under this foundation, guitarist Daniel Kessler has plenty of space to mix leads and strums. He has studied the post-punk guitar tradition well, and knows how to create a menacing beauty. Singer Paul Banks seems to be inspired in parts by all of the above-mentioned bands, Radiohead and Lou Reed's work in The Velvet Underground. He's pretty good, though he does not rise to the level of Ian Curtis, Ian McCulloch or Richard Burgess. Granted, those are three of the better singers of that era.
Still, the singer is vital when you are doing music like this, which is so infused with drama. Equally, if not more, important is what the singer is singing. Though it might be humorous if the weighty music was accompanied by Shel Silverstein lyrics, it really wouldn't work. The difficulty any band plying this style faces is walking a tightrope – the words have to be important, to match the emotional thrust of the music, but too important and you sound pretentious. On the other hand, spout poetic babble or trivialities and the music gets undermined. While style is part of the substance, it cannot be all of it. Otherwise, who cares?

This is the area where this talented band needs work. Sometimes Banks seems to just spouting the usual indie-rock slacker word jive. Other times, the words come together with the music in a splendid way, such as "Say Hello to the Angels". The composition is an extremely creative one, beginning with an insistent repeating stuttering guitar, into repetitive chords and galloping drums, releasing into a jangle verse that grafts The Smiths with a Motown bassline. Then the band comes to a near halt before exploding in the same mode, racing to the finish.
The playing and hook departments are simply not weaknesses for this band. "PDA" is one of the more forceful numbers, coming closer to Idlewild in the verses, with the omnipresent echoing, reverbed guitar. As I'm listening to this now, even the chorus has the anthemic feel of Idlewild, though it's hard to rally over this: "We have 200 couches where you can sleep tonight". "Obstacle 1" is somewhat of a nick from Television's "Marquee Moon", though the majesty of that song is scuttled and replaced with Interpol's typical tide of passion. And the rhythm section shows off some real deft skills, as the song swings in its own odd way. The one song on here that really smacks of Joy Division is the furious "Roland", though the guitar figure that counterpoints the chorus melody is definitely more in the mode of Echo or The Chameleons. But that's two great flavours that taste great together.

Despite my reservations in the vocal and lyric department, I can certainly recommend this record. Really, my biggest beef is that these guys aren't as good yet as the artists who so obviously inspired them. But they are aiming high and playing their asses off and it's obvious in the bounty of memorable moments and overriding atmosphere that pervades the record. They could end up as good as their inspirations and if they don't, it won't be for lack of trying.

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Snowglobe
Our Land Brains

(Bardot)

bardotrecords.com

This Memphis, Tennessee quartet incorporates a lot of piano (and keyboards in general), strings and horns to augment their well-constructed ‘60s inspired pop songs. The influence of The Beach Boys and The Kinks is readily apparent on some tracks. This is a record that will appeal to fans of the Elephant 6 collective, as this record has some of that relaxed indie feel. However, Snowglobe does not cut corners. This is a well-produced record with some fine instrumental performances throughout.

This album can induce goosebumps (or, I guess down Snowglobe's way they'd be called ‘chillbumps') -- most of the songs are swaddled in melancholy. It's not depressing in any way, sd the music exudes a reflective quality. Even less than happy moments can seem somewhat idyllic through the mists of time, and when reminiscing about them, though there still may be lingering pain, the ability to endure and live on must be celebrated. This album captures that weird convergence of feeling (captured lyrically on the superb "Big City Lights": "The pain in their eyes/could have wilted a flower/the joy in their smiles/nearly lit up the sky").

Though the band tantalizes and enraptures with its mastery of quiet grace, they have a surprising amount of drive. "The Song that Frustrates Us" might be considered an epic. It starts as a simple guitar strum number with a fetchingly artless vocal. The guitars kick up a bit more in the bridge and then some horns waft in. The song stops and switches gears. The song moves in a new melodic direction and the tempo picks up. The intensity then builds for the next couple of minutes as verse follows verse follows verse, the guitars strumming faster, the organ swelling, the drummer drumming faster and the horns reaching ever higher, when the song bursts into a refrain of "da-da da-da-da da-da-da-da-da", repeated like the mantra it is. And at just the right time it let's go, ending with an organ/horn coda that is simple and beautiful and jawdropping.

Appropriately, "Beautiful" is also simple and beautiful, starting with an array of pianos, the main pianner playing a very simple melody/rhythm, with what seems to be a couple other pianos adding embellishments. When the falsetto vocal comes in, more and more little things come in – a bit of high hat, some tambourine and the bass underpins everything (the tempo almost locks into German beer hall sing-a-long). Utterly charming.

The Kinks influence I alluded to earlier is best captured on "Dreamworks". The downcast mood is definitely beaten back by a chorus with stately horns – this chorus isn't a simple two line refrain but winds up and down a path until it reaches its emotional destination. This song matches the inspiring feeling that Ray Davies achieved with some of his songs on the legendary Arthur album. The lyrics are great, describing the dream state, how "yesterday is so far away" while you're dreaming, and after all is said and dreamed, it ends with "the rays of light stick in your skin/you know that you are home again". For all the splendor I ascribe to this track, don't think for a minute that the band is fussy in any way. The layered sound is impressive not just because of the layering but how the band plays with focus and passion.

The rest of the album offers more of the delights described above. This album has a scope and vision, but also has an intimate quality, that makes it seem like the musical equivalent of a really good novel. Though I'm not familiar with any novel that has lovely instrumentals or swinging tracks like "Muse" (sounding like a gothic version of Beulah). And this disc is about 10 to 15 bucks cheaper than most hardcover novels. So check out a novel at the library, buy this disc and listen to it while you're reading (and while you're not reading).

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