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Mark Sanders Reviews, May, 2004
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down for reviews of the latest releases by
Elf Power, Rosie Thomas and Blonde Redhead
Elf Power
Walking With the Beggar Boys
(Orange Twin)
orangetwin.com
It is time for alternative rock to be fun
again. For most of the '90s the camps were pretty divided:
"serious" artists had to be morose, while anything
less was considered fluffy or, at the very least, ironic.
Maybe it was a backlash to the '80s and we were flogging ourselves
for all the spandex and boy-makeup of yesteryear. Elf Power
is an example of how all that is way, way in the past now.
Walking With the Beggar Boys is a sincere effort to put smiles
on everyone's faces, and maybe to even get their asses shaking
too. The band is obviously influenced by the past 20 years;
the '80s because they sound like the Cars or R.E.M. (strange
bedfellows, admittedly), and the '90s because they've simply
been around for nearly a decade. Their last effort, 2002's
Nothing is Going to Happen, found the band covering everyone
from the Frogs to Husker Dü. On this one, they set the
fuzz pedals on warp speed, ditch the covers, and emerge sounding
like an entirely new band -- aided, no less, by recent additions
Eric Harris (of Olivia Tremor Control) and Craig McQuiston
(of the Glands), and longtime frontman Andrew Reiger's elliptical
lyrics and soapy vocals. Anyone who listens is the better
for it: most of these songs are single-worthy, though each
retains its own charm. "Hole in My Shoe" is vaguely
reminiscent of David Bowie's "Modern Love," the
title track features fellow Athenian Vic Chesnutt, but the
unifying force throughout is clearly Reiger. Ranging from
Moog-inflected melodies to subtle acoustic numbers, Walking
With the Beggar Boys is a treat for any fan of guitar-driven
pop.
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Rosie Thomas
Only With Laughter Can You Win
(Sub Pop)
subpop.com
Slowing things down is easy. Keeping it engaging
is not. The multifarious pitfalls are as follows: if your
lyrics suck, playing slow makes it more obvious; if the structure
and instrumentation stays the same, playing slow makes it
sound more redundant; and if you're obsessed with dreams of
teddy bears, angels and Irish castles, playing slow makes
it sound like Rosie Thomas. Only With Laughter Can You Win
is an album with everything going for it -- the girl's signed
to the venerable Sub Pop label, and even has Mr. Sam (Iron
and Wine/this-week's-new-Dylan) Beam singing on one track.
For anyone familiar with Iron and Wine's grainy, lo-fi texture
and Old Testament-via-Faulkner ruminations, it's easy to contrast
with Thomas' wholly different approach -- namely, slick production,
concert hall vocals, and a host of guest vocalists. She has
just enough indie cred to make you think her lyrics matter,
but when listening, it's hard to deny the fluffy schoolgirl-diary
theme that's evident throughout Only With Laughter….
Then there's the Jesus thing. Despite Thomas' peerless singing
voice, cast in the same mold as Sarah McLachlan, her overly
simplistic preaching eclipses every well-executed syllable
she utters. Give this one to your 12-year old niece; she may
get a good two years out of listening to it before finding
something with more substance (on the scale of, say, Jewel).
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Blonde Redhead
Misery is a Butterfly
(4AD)
4ad.com
Swirling, breathy vocals, shimmering guitars,
slow death, newfound depths to melancholy -- welcome to Blonde
Redhead’s winter-tinged world. Misery is a Butterfly,
their first effort on venerable indie imprint 4AD, finds the
group (Italian expats/twins Amedeo and Simone Pace, Japanese
chanteuse Kazu Makino) honing a unified sound throughout --
while Misery isn’t a “concept album,”
it certainly does follow a sober, coherent theme, both instrumentally
and lyrically. A theme that is, like the enigmatic bandmembers
themselves, kind of complicated. Makino’s disaffected,
tempered wail is chilling from the opening lines of “Elephant
Woman,” a song which immediately sets Blonde Redhead
apart from both their past efforts and the band their most
often compared to (namely, Sonic Youth). This album proves
they can be just as noisy and intense, but without losing
any of the seductiveness that was the band’s stock-in-trade
in the first place. Fans of their 2000 masterpiece, Melody
of Certain Damaged Lemons may be turned off initially
by the refined, crisper tones and images on Misery,
but anyone who’s up for the challenge is richly rewarded
by the album’s end. Amedeo, with lead vocals on five
of the album’s 11 tracks, sings equally as eerily as
Makino, a high-pitched, glossy chirp which may be one of the
most distinctive in art school-influenced indie rock today
(a feat, that). Half-live, half-synthetic drumming and cellos
also figure prominently in their sultry, despondent sound,
reminiscent of earlier Radiohead or Godspeed You Black Emperor
-- two bands who, like Blonde Redhead, regard pain as an icon
of something not only inevitable, but beautiful as well.
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