I Was Wrong When I Decided I Would Never Meet Somebody Like You

With The Civil Wars on what looks to be an indefinite hiatus, there is an opening for the co-ed folk duo with weird sexual tension corner. Enter Grace and Tony, a self described “punkgrass” band with the same esthetic as The Civil Wars. Oh yeah, and Tony in Grace and Toby is Tony White, little brother of John Paul White of The Civil Wars. But where The Civil Wars sound like later day, Rick Rubin produced albums by The Avett Brothers, Grace and Tony sound like the rawer early records of The Avett Brothers.

But where the individual members of The Civil Wars are actually married to other people, Grace and Tony is an actual couple married to each other. Maybe this is why their debut album November is a bit cheery than his older brother band. They introduce themselves on November with Hey Grace, Hey Tony, a bouncing, old timey duet. That is followed up with the most angst riddled song Holy Hand Grenade, but still something that will get your toe tapping.

The most haunting the duo gets on the album is the title track. But there is really nothing on November which suggests they will have much success crossing over like The Civil Wars or even get they song played on crappy television shows when the writers run out of ideas and just throw in a montage to fill the hour. This duo will probably appeal to a very small niche; basically those who hear the term “punkgrass” and think cool. I am sure Grace and Tony will also be big at the next Steam Punk convention, especially the song Electricity Bomb.

Song to Download – Holy Hand Grenade

November gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Lets Take it Back to Straight Hip-Hop and Start it from Scratch

Without a doubt, Eminem is the artist of the 00’s; the guy sold about forty million albums sold worldwide and even his weakest album that he even described as, “Eh” still went double platinum and featured two top ten singles. But Eminem was definitely getting stale circa Relapse, each album’s first single got cheesier and cheesier and We Made You while the rest of the albums got darker and darker to the point where Relapse was essentially horrorcore. A year later, Eminem got clean, released recovery and his biggest hit of his career with Love the Way You Lie. Still I met that album with a resounding “eh” too. But at least there was not a cheesy lead single which was instead replaced with Not Afraid, an apologies for the uninspiring Relapse album.

Fast forward three years and during the middle of an otherwise unwatchable MTV Video Music Awards, there were two promos for the upcoming new Eminem album featuring a Rick Rubin produced, Billy Squier sampling, Beastie Boys referencing song Berzerk. When it hit the internets the next day in its entirety, I was ready to call it the best Eminem song since Lose Yourself. Then he released the stadium anthem Survival (seriously, all high school and college bands better be learning this song as you read this) which is the second best song he has done since Lose Yourself.

So for the first time ever, I was excited for an Eminem album with his seventh release The Marshall Mathers LP 2. Why a sequel to his thirteen year old album? Who knows, probably marketing (segments of Stan and The Real Slim Shady do get resurrected). The album does have an old school feel to including Berzerk and Eminem name drops plenty old school rappers and jams on Love Game, yet another track produced by Rick Rubin which samples the sixties teen pop song Game of Love by Wayne Fontana & The Mindbenders.

All four Rick Rubin produced songs are built around well known rock songs. Obvious first single Berzerk is by far the best but by the fourth Love Game, you start to wonder why they would sample this. The Zombies sampling Rhyme or Reason has Eminem answering the questions Time of the Season ("What's your name?" "Who's your daddy?") and is reminiscent of the last time he sampled classic rock on Sing for the Moment and takes aim at his absentee father who gets referenced occasionally but rarely gets his own song (especially compared to his mother). So Far… flips Joe Walsh’s Life Is Good which does not work as well as it should have. Maybe Rick should have saved that beat for Kid Rock who would have known to do with the southern rock jam.

The new album does not stay completely in the past. Rap God features a futuristic beat that Jay-Z would have loved to come across his desk during his Blueprint days (but could not handle it these days) and Em just slays it as one as his best flows to date. Even more impressive is the song goes six minutes and he never slows down and actually builds with every second. The album does slow down on back end. The Monster featuring Rihanna just falls flat compared to Love the Way You Lie. Headlights is another ode to his mother, but this one is a sincere apology made worse by the inclusion of the dude from Fun.. And for those wondering where the song that takes down pop tarts, on the album closer he admits he is bored with that, “So who’s left? Lady Gaga? Bieber? Nah.” But overall, this is the rare sequil that lives up to the original.

Song to Download – Berzerk

The Marshall Mathers LP 2 gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Musings from the Back 9: Music Edition XVIII

After being a critical darling for years, Kings of Leon shot for rock supremacy with their fourth album Only By the Night (okay, technically they tried with their previous album but failed) and became the biggest band in the land thanks to throbbing rock songs like Use Somebody and Sex on Fire. Like most rock bands, they did overindulge with their follow up (of course they brought in a black southern church choir for the album’s first single). Then on cue, like every other brotherly based band (see the Gallagher’s, the Robinson’s, the Davie’s et. al.), they imploded on themselves while on tour. After a three year layoff repairing those bruises, the Followill brothers (and one cousin) are back with Mechanical Bull. Sure it will not do as big as Only By the Night, and maybe not even Come Around Sundown, but it sounds like the most fun they have ever had. Case in point is first single Supersoaker: no “serious” rock band has been this silly and catchy since U2 released Discotheque. Songs like Family Tree are just as fun. They do occasionally try for stadium anthems again like Come Back Again, but the album is much better when they are clearly just sitting back and having some fun.

Mechanical Bull gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.


Diane Birch quite possibly made the best seventies blue eyed Philly soul album of this century with her debut Bible Belt. But that was four years and since then it sounds like Birch updated her sound by a decade because sophomore outing Speak a Little Louder is a decidedly more eighties shoe-gazing new wave sound which is more in the line these days with the music of Daughter than Mayer Hawthorne. Speak a Little Louder is a more synth driven, darker sound than her debut. Although the music of the title track is very reminiscent of Michael Jackson’s Stranger In Moscow (I would have never thought of Jackson as a shoe-gazing fan of synths, but after making this connection, it makes his sound more interesting than I first thought). The best song on the album Tell Me Tomorrow which is the most upbeat, and least synth dependent song on the album. There are a couple of other influences throughout the album, Love and War has a disco beat to it, Pretty in Pain is the closest she get to the sounds of her debut, while Frozen Over sounds like a long lost Pat Benatar song. I appreciate Diane trying to expand her sound, but I do prefer the Philly soul version. Now I wonder which nineties genre will inspire her for her third album.

Speak a Little Louder gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.


The latest trend for legacy artists is to rerecord their biggest hits with the biggest stars in country today. Both Lionel Richie and John Fogerty have done so in the past year. The latest to do so is Willie Nelson. But do not expect Willie to just piggyback past artists. First off, as the title To To All the Girls... suggests, Willie only duets with the fairer sex. And do not expect Willie to bring out his biggest hits and just add a female voice to them, really aside from Always on My Mind there is not a massive hit of Willie’s on this album. Half of the songs on the album are written by other people like Bill Withers and even Folgerty’s own Have You Ever Seen the Rain, one of the album’s best as recorded with his daughter Paula. And though he brings out heavy hitters like Miranda Lambert and Carrie Underwood, most of his duet partners are his contemporizes like Dolly Parton and Loretta Lynn as well as some newbies like Brandi Carlile and Melonie Cannon. All the songs are ballads and at eighteen tracks, that does drag on a bit. But like his fellow Highwayman Johnny Cash, Willie is still aging quite well.

To All the Girls… gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Let Me See Your Skeleton Well Before Your Life Is Done

Back in August, John Mayer dropped his second album in fifteen months. Paradise Valley pretty much sound like the cheerier B-side to Born and Raised. Something must be in the water supply on the folk-rock circuit because The Avett Brothers are back with Magpie and the Dandelion just thirteen months after the release of their last one. After recording the folk version of U2 album I and Love and You, the band reconvened with producer Rick Rubin to release their most mellow, traditional folk album The Carpenter and had enough material left over to release an entirely new album.

Much like the latest John Mayer album, Magpies and Dandelion definitely sound like it was recorded during The Carpenter session (probably because it was) but may even be mellower than its predecessor. One of the few upbeat tracks, which happen to be the best song, Another Is Waiting which harkens back to the group’s pre-Rubin days ware their sound was more raw and unrefined. Other than that, one of the few other upbeat tracks is the album opener Open Ended Life which featured a rare electric guitar. Do not worry Avett purists, it is a sign of a new direction and the song also features plenty of banjo and even a harmonica for good measure.

I do wish that Open Ended Letter was sign of a slight change in direction because most of the rest of the album just comes off as B-sides of songs off The Carpenter. Really. Magpies and Dandelion and The Carpenters is essentially just a double album just happened to be released a year apart. The album does deviate a few other times from the mellower side of folk, Morning Song soars like then anthemic songs from I and Love and You or the sweet vocals and acoustic guitar live track Sounds Like the Wheels (if you have never seen The Avett Brothers live or at the very least listen to one of their live albums, remedy that soon). Still, if The Avett Brothers release another album in just thirteen months, I will not be complaining.

Song to Download – Another Is Waiting

Magpies and Dandelion gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Everybody’s Thinking That They’ll All Be Delivered Save it in a Box Like Lost and Found

Two years ago, Pearl Jam celebrated their twentieth anniversary with a Cameron Crowe directed documentary and now the band is back after their longest layoff in between albums (four) with their tenth album, Lightning Bolt. While many of their peers from the alt-rock nineties are content with putting out albums for an excuse to hit the nostalgia circuit with new songs giving fans an excuse to go to the bathroom, Pearl Jam hit a career resurgent with their 2006 self titled album which was their best album since their early nineties output.

That continues with Lightning Bolt, the first couple songs that recall those first three albums. Getaway is just classic, straight ahead rock reminiscent of Last Exit. That is followed up by Mind Your Manners and the band has not been this agro since Spin the Black Circle. Lightning Bolt may be at its best when it has its more classic rock elements like on the title track which would have been in heavy rotation on AM Radio in the seventies as well as the first couple tracks.

It is not all retro for the band and they have clearly grown up over the last couple years. Sure the band has recorded a few ballads in their days, some with power behind them, but Sirens may be the band’s first traditionally sounding power balled they have ever recorded, complete with an “ah, oh” repeating ending. The song will certainly raise a few lighters when performed live in concert (for better or worse; it may take a couple weeks before I decide which side I fall down on). For a song more on the pure ballad side, Sleeping By Myself may be the sweetest song the group has ever done and sound like something that would sound less out of place on Eddie’s ukulele album than a Pearl Jam album.

The album does get a little interesting in the middle with Infallible, Pendulum, and the swinging Let the Records Play but they are not the big chances they took on Vs. or Vitology. Lightning Bolt ends with another uncharacteristic ballad Future Days that may have also been written during Vedder’s ukulele period, this time complete with strings. But it is another sweet and hopeful song that shows that the band is one of the few that actually ages well. If Pearl Jam continues on this path, it may be a while before they get to the album full of “bathroom“ songs phase of their career.

Song to Download – Future Days

Lightning Bolt gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Nothings Gonna Wake Me Now Cause Im a Slave to the Sound

Lorde was not the only highly buzzed about new artist to release an album last week (see my review: I'm Kind of Over Being Told to Throw My Hands in the Air). Much like Lorde, Haim built their buzz with critically adored EP and plenty of high profile endorsements (in the case of Haim wide ranging artists from Rihanna to Mumford & Sons have express support) but unlike Lorde the three sisters of Haim (and one unseen male drummer) have also build a reputation of a great live act playing basically every major festival over the past year.

Unlike Lorde whose debut album was made up almost entire of new songs, Haim does recycle half the songs on their full length first album Days Are Gone from their previous EP’s, whether this is a good thing or not depend on if you already bought the EP’s or not. Even as a listener it is a bit disappointing that much of the album is not new. But to steal the NBC’s slogan from decade, if you are just hearing of Haim for the first time, the songs are new to you.

If you are new to Haim, there is a reason why everyone from Rihanna to Mumford and Sons are championing the trio; they check almost every musical box you can think off. The first thing I heard was Falling (which is also the first track on the album) which harkens back to Southern California rock of the seventies like Fleetwood Mac, a comparison that deepens as each sister trade off lead vocals, but they also combine their voices that are reminiscent of nineties RnB. They go deep on RnB with songs like Go Deep with its penetrating bass worthy of any slow jam from two decades ago. There is also a pop sensibility of that other sibling band Hanson, but since all the members of Haim are legally able to buy beer, there is not an underlying cheesiness to them.

Haim’s influences sometime get too prevalent. Most notably on the first new single off the album The Wire which completely lifted another seventies So-Cal band The Eagles guitar riff from Heartache Tonight. And on Forever, it is hard not to hear the synthesizers from New Order’s Bizarre Love Triangle. It is a fine line between homage and stealing and Haim toes the line a little too close a couple times on Days Are Gone.

For those familiar with Haim’s previous EP’s, the group gets weird and dark on some of the newer tracks on the album which makes it more diverse than the very homogeneous Pure Heroine that Lorde put out. My Song 5 sound more like something you would hear on a Dirty Projectors album than from the group that put out the Forever EP. While Let Me Go is a menacing track to that could have been a hit on alternative rock stations back in the nineties.

Last Tuesday was the deadline for the 2014 Grammy awards which is probably why Haim and Lorde (and a few other artists) dropped their album on Monday. Both are angling for a Best New Artists nomination, which should be a lock for both, along with Kacey Musgraves as well as maybe Capital Cities, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis (assuming they are eligible, the rules for the category are fuzzy so not so new acts like Imagine Dragons and Kendrick Lamar may also be in the mix even though they do not seem very "new"). And the last two entrants may be the ones to beat next January, being fresh in a voters mind is usually a good thing. Lorde may have the inside track because of the smash Royals but Days Gone By is a much more fun album.

Song to Download – Falling

Days Are Gone gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

I’m Kinda Over Being Told to Throw My Hands in the Air

“For so long, pop music has been this super-shameful thing, where people don't want to be associated with it, they want to be on Pitchfork. But the way I see it, pop music doesn't have to be stupid, and alternative music doesn't have to be boring; you can mesh the two together and make something cool.” Lorde ladies and gentlemen. The teenager from New Zealand slowly rose up the American pop charts with her song Royals until it hit number one on the iTunes charts where it has locked down for two straight weeks.

Royals is a sly song that draws you in with lyrics about Cristal and gold teeth but it is not until the third or fourth listen when you realize that it not just another song about wealth and greed but an anti-materialism song making fun of the people that glorify such things. Now one has pull off this switch-a-roo better since Rage Against the Machine attacked angry teenagers with loud guitars and lines like “(Expletive deleted), I won’t do what you told me,” before getting them to realize that some that work forces in fact do burn crosses.

Royals is the only holdover from her Love Club EP (which is a shame because Bravado may be the third best song she has done while and Million Dollar Bills, Love Club as well as The Replacements cover Swinging Party from the Tennis Courts single would have also been some of the better songs on the album but I am sure they will be added to the “Deluxe Edition” at some point) to be included on her full length debut Pure Heroine. Tennis Court, which was released as a single back in spring, is also on the album. As hinted at on those previous releases, the full length album features songs that sound like what Lana Del Rey wishes she can make: music that is sparse and epic at the time and sound like what The xx may sound like if they aspired for pop chart dominance. All with lyrics by someone who realizes there is no upward mobility for her living in a city you will never see on screens and she is fine with that with shot at people who foolishly aspire to that lifestyle but do not even want to work for.

The devil may care attitude does wane near the end of the album when she starts singing about Glory and Gore and putting White Teeth Teens on blast. But Pure Heroine does finish strong with A World Apart, the second best song here after the smash hit single. It is the most danceable track Lorde has done in her short career and the first time she features a song that has something that resembles a guitar. Though the subject matter is still the same as the previous songs on the album (“people are jerks”), it is much more fun as she starts dancing in the world alone. If Lorde can put out music this good as a teen, it is hard to think how good it will be when she gets some more experience under her belt. Or maybe this is it, and she will be starring horrible Syfy movies in twenty year (sorry Debbie Gibson). Here is hoping for that former and there are enough Lorde like singers to follow that will bump the Katy's, Gaga's, and Miley's off the pop charts for good.

Song to Download – If you already picked up Royals from The Love Club EP, gives A World Alone a download

Pure Heroine gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

I am Sharper than a Razor, Eyes Made of Lasers

Yes the second album from Janelle Monáe, The Electric Lady is a concept album. And not only is a concept, it is actually a sequel to her debut album and an EP before that which are about time-traveling messianic cyborg named Cindi Mayweather, played by Monáe, who’s been tasked with delivering an oppressed people from the clutches of The Great Divide, a dastardly corps of other time traveling robots. But do not let the concept album label or the sci-fi plot scare you off, if you went into the album without that knowledge, you would not even notice it at all except for three interludes presented as a radio talk show host DJ. And those tracks can be easily deleted if you download the album.

On her debut, Monáe set herself up as the new millennium, slightly more feminism version of Prince with a live show reminiscent of James Brown. So it is apropos that the purple one himself shows up on the first full song on The Electric Lady pulling out his killer falsetto and a guitar solo, but the real star of Givin Em what They Love is one of the funkiest bass lines you will hear all year. This starts an onslaught of collaborations with Erykah Badu (Q.U.E.E.N.) and Solange (Electric Lady) showing the ladies can be funky on their own.

Naturally things slow down when Miguel shows up for Primetime, a song the just oozes pure sex. Ladies, you may just get impregnated by it just from listening highlighted by another great groove (seriously, Janelle’s bassist needs to show up on ever RnB record for the next decade) and is an instant add to any baby-making playlist.

After the guests have left the building (the bane of Justin Beiber fans existence Esperanza Spalding does show up on the penultimate track) and two more dance songs, it sounds like Monáe is trying to audition to sing the next James Bond theme starting with Look into My Eyes. And not one of those crappy modern day Bond Themes, but one from a cool sixties Bond movie. And though the album slows down for a bit in the second half, it does finish strong What an Experience, a syth driven song that would not have sounded out of place on the radio back when Price was ruling it back in the eighties. The Electric Lady is an upgrade over The Archandroid and here is hoping that the final saga of Cindi Mayweather is even better still.

Song to Download – PrimeTime

The Electric Lady gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

A Little Bit of Summer Is What the Whole Year’s All About

Each previous John Mayer album had a definite musical theme. Room for Squares was his pop album. Heavier Things was his soul album. Continuum was his blues album. Battle Studies was his crappy concept album about dating Jennifer Aniston. While last effort Born and Raised was his folk album. From the first listen of Paper Doll, the first single off of Paradise Valley, it sounded like John may be going back to his Heavier Things days with its more experimental guitar sounds against a lazy track. But as it turns out Paradise Valley is essentially a sequel to Born and Raised released just fifteen months prior, complete with the same producer, Don Was, with a few exceptions.

The most fun part of a new Taylor Swift album is trying to figure out which song is about whom. The biggest gimmie on any album was Dear John, a not at all thinly veiled reference to Mayer and John was not at all happy, essentially calling it bad songwriting to be so obvious. Maybe John has changed his tune or thinks he is more clever because it is hard to hear Paper Doll and not think of Swift especially the lie about being “22 girls and once” considering her last album featured a song entitled 22. Even more directed is Dear Marie which sounds like John trying to reconnect with a high school crush. But then again, who really cares about some chick that he went to high school with.

Musically Paradise Valley is akin to Born and Raised, but thematically, the two are much different. The last album saw Mayer wallow in his own sorrow of bad press (from the Swift break up to his racist genitalia) where he found himself trying to convince himself that he is “a good man with a good heart.” Apparently Mayer is done with the whiskey to dull the pain because Paradise Valley is a much more cheery affair. Album opener Wildfire is a rumbling jaunt. After an album hiatus, Mayer brought back a token cover song. This time around he reworks Call Me the Breeze by J.J. Cale, a song even more poignant after his death last month. But the song is still a great driving down a country road kind of song.

Mayer has long collaborated with other musicians only his albums but Paradise Valley is the first time he lets other singers take over the vocals. First up is girlfriend Katy Perry for the duet Who You Love where the two mixed matched pair try to explain their relationship to little avail. It is clear why Perry just sings cheesy pop music because her voice is just not suited for more serious material and just makes Mayer come off as cheesy. Frank Ocean shows up on Wildfire. No, not the opening track, there is another song of the same name as track number eight. In true Frank Ocean fashion, his Wildfire, the song only features his voice, is weirdly beautiful and has no connection vocally or musically to the Mayer version aside from having the word “wildfire” in it. After Mayer appeared on Ocean’s debut and Ocean appears on Paradise Valley, one has to wonder if their singer-songwriter version of Watch the Throne is next for both of them.

Song to Download – Paper Doll

Paradise Valley gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

A Very Spoilery Review of the Red Dawn Remake

I have a kinship towards the alumni of Dillon High School so I will support their movies no matter how crappy they are (*cough*The Roommate*cough*). So this past weekend I had a Tyra Collette double feature of G.I. Joe: Retaliation and Red Dawn. I did not have high hopes going into either of them but G.I. Joe was enjoyable, it had Trya, The Rock, Channing Tatum died early on and there was a really cool fight scene on the side of a mountain, so it was an enjoyable two hours for the most part. Sure the film suffered from Blockbuster fatigue where every summer movie for the last five years has to feature at least one city blow up.

Full Discourse Notice: I should not before going into deal about the updated version, I have never seen the 1984 original of Red Dawn and really all I know about the film is from what I learned from the I Love the 80’s segment which was basically telling a story about how much Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey hated each other on that set and how ironic they went on to star together in Dirty Dancing. So if you have not seen the Red Dawn reboot (or The Avengers or Terminator 2), stop reading now or you are about to be spoiled.

Red Dawn started out enjoyable enough, it had Trya, Tim Riggin’s father, Thor, and some cool fight scenes. Sure the plot was flimsy, the way the North Koreans were able to invade an American city with no U.S. military backlash was a little silly and I never figured out why some Americans were in detainment camps while others were able to come and go in the city as they pleased.

But the movie moved into guilty pleasure territory when Jeffery Dean Morgan showed up with his Navy Seal buddies showed up and added some much needed comic relief. They also set up the climactic battle which came to a satisfying finale when Thor killed the big bad Korean who killed his father at the end of the first act with his father’s gun. So all is well, the Wolverines make I back to the base with the piece of technology that will help rid America of the Koreans, Thor goes over to Tyra for a celebratory make out session… and gets shot in the face. What the frack!?!

Obviously the writers wanted to go for a shocking ending and killing off the main protagonist does the twist. But where the surprise twist at the end of, say, Memento, makes you instantly want to watch the movie again as soon as the credits roll, the shock ending only makes people irate. It is bad to kill off the main protagonist just minutes before the ending but you certainly do not kill him off in a surprise attack, at least give him an honorable death like, well, I was going to say Agent Coulson in The Avengers, but he may not have actually died. The only example that is coming off the top of my head was the time The Terminator melted himself down for the good of mankind at the end of T2.

The writers apparently did this so Thor’s douchebag little brother would have this grand transformation from selfish douchebag at the beginning of the film to the leader of the insurgency at the end. But you know what writers; I still did not care about the douchebag brother by the end. If you really needed the douchebag brother to have some grand transformation, how about just shooting Thor in the leg? Then the ending is douchebag brother giving his big speech, then walk off the stage where Thor is in a wheelchair and says to his douchebag brother, “Dad would be proud of you. I am proud of you.” End Movie.

But no, you have to go with the stupid ending. There is a reason no other film kills off the main protagonist a minute before the credits run, because the audience does not want to see it. Instead of the audience telling their friends, “You should go see Red Dawn because of the surprise ending,” they are going to tell them, “Avoid Red Dawn at all costs, it has one of the worst endings of all time.”

Red Dawn gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

What Rhymes with Hug Me?

Had you told me back in January that the song of the summer would end up coming from Robin Thicke, I would have thought you were crazy (granted had you told me in January 2012 that the song of that summer would come courtesy of a Canadian Idol castoff, I would have thought you were much crazier). Nothing against Robin Thicke, but up to this point he had been making middle of the road blue eye soul that was much more suited for the bedroom than the block party. Yet here we are in the middle of summer and it looks like Blurred Lines will end up edging out the superior Get Lucky as the unofficial song of the summer.

Sure Thicke has an unfair advantage considering that the song was already an established summer jam when Marvin Gaye released the song under the title Got to Give It Up, Pt. 1 all the way back in the summer of 1977 (well that and hot naked chicks). Much like the song, the album Blurred Lines is Robin’s first full foray into dance music. There really is only one slow jam, and the Rest of My Life does not even show up until late in the album at track number nine.

Thicke’s transition into dance music is not as smooth as the song Blurred Lines the song would suggest. The lyrics can get very cringworthy like the obvious date-rapey vibe of the title track (though I find the lyrics to sound like that of a middle school boy hoping to get lucky by being persistent). Even worse is when he actually admits, “I want to shop for your underwear” during Take it Easy on Me. The beats are not much better. Unfortunately Pharrell only produced the title track while Thicke himself co-produced over half of the other tracks. Dr. Luke produced the worst track on the album Give it 2 U which sounded like a LMFAO castoff that Thick tried to imagine.

The album is so derivative, there are times where I actually thought I was listening to a new Justin Timberlake song (most notably Ooo La La), and that is not meant to be a compliment. The best track on the album is one of the few non-dance songs and is not even a baby-making song. The Good Life is a mid-tempo driving with the windows on a summer evening kind of song. Almost modern do-wop but not too much where it sounds like he is stealing Bruno Mars soun. The album would have been much better if there were more songs like this and fewer songs that were completely derivative of significantly better songs.

Song to Download – The Good Life

Blurred Lines gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

I Don’t Want to Fight but I’ll Fight For You if I Have To

What exactly is going on with The Civil Wars? The release the best debut album of the decade so far, start winning Grammy’s with Taylor Swift, then out of nowhere while on tour in Europe, they canceled the remainder of that tour and went on hiatus due to “internal discord and irreconcilable differences of ambition.” What!?! Despite the discord they managed to record another album (or two if you count the predominately instrumental soundtrack to A Place at the Table with T-Bone Burnett). The discord continued with the lack of promotion of the album which so far has only involved two interviews by Joy Williams and a music video which is just a bare bones behind the scenes recording the song. The other half of the duo, John Paul White, has yet to say anything on the album or pretty much everything since the dilution of the tour last year.

In the interviews, Joy continually says that if you want to know to the group, just listen to the new album. We got a sneak peak last month when the duo released the first single of the self titled sophomore album The One that Got Away. As in “I wish you were the one that got away.” It actually reminded me of I Got This Friend from the first album with the line “If the right one came along” and The One That Got Away is the dark twisted sequel to I Got This Friend. The One That Got Away is that dark and ominous. Sure most of their debut was very moody, but The One that Got Away made most of Barton Hollow sound like I Want You Back. The Jackson 5 version.

On first listen as the album as a whole, it is hard not to dwell on the “irreconcilable differences of ambition” part of the statement because it is very noticeable who much more of Joy is heard on the album with John Paul relegated to just harmonies on half of the tracks. It is easy to assume that Joy is the more “ambitious” at least in terms of output which is backed up by she is the only one currently doing press.

After the first single the best song on the album is Dust to Dust (which follows the equally troublingly titled Same Old Same Old). The song features the closest thing the group has ever done to a groove, and it is a slow groove that could have become a Middle School slow dance staple if the subject matter was not so depressing. And to emphasize just how darker this album is (aside from the eerie cloud of smoke on the cover) is the choice of cover last time around. As previously mention lat time out, they turned I Want You Back into a ballad. On The Civil Wars, the do opted for Disarm, the one of the angstiest of all the angsty Smashing Pumpkins song which children of the nineties will remember as the song where Billy Corgan screamed over and over again, “I used to be a little boy.” The Civil Wars stripped the song of any angst, and pretty much everything else but an acoustic guitar and turned it into the most haunting song in the short catalogue. Which is saying a lot.

Much like Fleetwood Mac Rumours, the music The Civil Wars made out of internal discord is heartbreakingly awesome (The One That Got Away even features a similar bass breakdown from The Chain). Hopefully much like Fleetwood Mac, The Civil Wars can find a way to continue to make great music together for another decade. Or three.

Song to Download – The One That Got Away

The Civil Wars gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

When the Music's on She Can Do No Wrong

After years of trolling in relative obscurity, a blue-eye soul man finally had a smash hit this year. But enough about Robin Thicke, let’s talk about a blue eyed soul man who actually deserves big success: Mayer Hawthorne. Where Thicke needed six album to reach the top of the pop charts, Mayer Hawthorne is still on album number three just releasing Where Does This Door Go. But much like Robin, he worked with Pharrell Williams, who has had a career resurgence this year, who produced three songs on the album.

None of those tracks have the instant catchiness of Blurred Lines, but The Stars Are Ours sound like something that may have come out of a session from Pharrell’s other summer smash hit Get Lucky if he skipped the electric sound of Daft Punk and made a song completely organic. Pharrell also contributed to what is probably Mayer’s most personal song yet, Reach Out Richard about his father.

The cover and title may suggest a more reflexive turn (and the title track is a bit darker and as close to Pink Floyd as a blue eyed soul man can get), but the album is a much more danceable affair than his previous two. And Mayer also trade in his trademark falsetto for his normal tenor voice for most of the album, one of the few time he goes into the upper register is the last song Pharrell produced on the album and Wine Glass Woman is the song where Hawthorne sound most like Pharrell. The album closes with maybe the least Mayer Hawthorne song he has ever recorded with All Better, it is still in his retro wheelhouse, but trades in old time soul to oldies pop in the vein of The Beatles type power ballad. It may not come with a song off of Where Does This Door Go, but if there is any justice, Mayer Hawthorne will have his breakout moment very soon.

Song to Download – The Stars Are Ours

Where Does This Door Go gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Say What You Wanna Say and Let the Words Fall Out

With her first two albums, Sara Bareilles recorded two late songs that were not so thinly veiled at her record company still looking for a single, which both Love Song and King of Anything became to launch the albums. Either the record label did not meddle this time around or she was tired of writing snarky anti-love songs because the first single off her third full length album The Blessed Unrest was the positive and upbeat Brave.

Maybe the record company should have irate Sara because the self empowering anthem Brave is the weakest of the three lead singles (but at least we got to see her dance in the music video which was entertaining in itself). And without the instant smash single to lead the album, the rest of The Blessed Unrest feels like a bit of a letdown as a whole without a song to latch onto.

Despite that lack of something initially bring you in, there is still plenty of good songs on the album, just nothing great. If you like your Bareilles songs to go towards the mellow stripped down route like Gravity, check out the loungey (in a good way) Manhattan. That is followed up with the spacey, equally as beautiful Satellite Call which may very well be her weirstest song o date. The album ends with December, a passionate ode to a past love. But The Blessed Unrest would probably be more memorable if it started up with something snarkier.

Song to Download – Manhattan

The Blessed Unrest gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Someone’s Gonna Get Hurt and it’s not Gonna Be Me

Skylar Grey released her first album under the name Holly Brook back in 2006, a year before the female singer-songwriter boon launched by Sara Bareilles. But the Wisconsin native was much more moody than the others that came out of Southern California. Seven years, a name change and a bunch of singles that did about as good as her previous iteration, her sophomore album Don't Look Down is finally out.

Not surprising since Grey has made the in between years writing and singing hooks for rappers like Dr. Dre, Diddy and most famously wrote the Rihanna part for Eminem’s Love the Way You Lie, the new album takes on a more electric feel compared to her predominately acoustic debut (the piano only album closer White Suburban is the only song here that would not sound out of place on the Holly Brook album) . There are guest spots from Big Sean, Angel Haze and Eminem even repays the favor. Except none of those songs work especially the Eminem assisted C’mon Let Me Ride which aims for the charts with overly charged double, and a couple single, entendres but just comes off as embarrassing even if the song was meant to be either semi or fully ironic.

Though the music has taken a decidedly more hip-hop songs which rely heavy on drum loops, vocally and lyrically, the new album sound very similar to her debut (with decidable more expletives littered throughout the album). The songs oscillate between moody and sweet effortlessly (which the exceptions of whenever a rapper shows up to take you out of the mood). The best of the former is Final Warning where Skylar goes where many before her in the past decade have gone before by taking revenge on a former boyfriend. But where Carrie underwood is cute when she talks about taking a baseball bat to a dude’s pickup truck, when Skyler talks about picking up a knife, says, “Somebody’s gonna get hurt and it’s not gonna be me,” and then taunts him with some na na’s, you actually fear for the guy. And yourself a little.

On the nicer side of the album, Sunshine is an upbeat song and if you strip away the drum machine and add some banjo, the song could easily become a country radio hit. Don’t Look Down can be a bit schizophrenic at times, but Skylar Grey is turning out to be much more interesting than Holly Brook.

Song to Download – Final Warning

Don’t Look Down gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Got Me Feeling Like Brody in Homeland

After their Watch the Throne album, both Kanye West and Jay-Z took unconventional routes to roll out their next solo albums. In lieu of a proper music video, West projected trailers on the side of building across the country guerilla style. Jay-Z on the other hand went the corporate route announcing his album in a four minute commercial during the NBC Finals, and just days before the release of Yeezus, of another religious inspired titled Magna Carta... Holy Grai, sponsored by a Smartphone who would give away a million downloads via an app. And instead of a single or music video, Jay-Z just released the lyrics sheet for multiple tracks which saw Jay bite not one, but two much beloved 1991 alt-rock tracks Smells Like Teen Spirit and Losing My Religion.

The anticipation was immediate because of that ad which featured Jay hanging out with producers Rick Rubin, Pharrell, Timbaland, and Swizz Beats who helmed some of Jay’s best tracks. In a later interview, Rubin admitted he had no involvement in the new album, Jay just brought him in for the documentary. As it turns out pretty much the whole album was produced by Timbaland with his hands on seventy percent of the album while Pharrell and contributed on two songs and Swizz only popped up once. So all that anticipation went out the door before the album dropped unless you had the app and would be getting an A-List album for free or if you wanted to hear just how Jay ruined the Nirvana and R.E.M. songs.

You will not have to wait to hear just how Jay-Z desecrated Smells Like Teen Spirit because it shows up on the title track that opens up the album. And just when you think it could not get worse, the “I am stupid and contagious” chorus is also sung by Justin Timberlake. Even had I had the free app, I would have deleted this track on principal alone. Heaven featuring lyrics from Losing My Religion is not much better. The track also sounds like it loops two notes from Stairway to Heaven (though not officially sampled) and it is hard not to cringe when Jay starts singing, “That’s me in the corner” off-key. It was cute when he did that to “And I wish I never met her at all” but not on a song like this.

It is apropos that Jay-Z gave away a million copies of the album because Magna Carta… Holy Grail just sounds like a mixtape which is not worth actually paying for. Half the songs sound they were created by Jay asking for song ideas in the studio, and people started shouting out random ideas: like “hey Hov, try Tom Ford… Picasso… Oceans (hey why don’t we get Frank Ocean on that track too?).” And some of the lyrics are just as puzzling like when Jay says he is “feeling like Brody in Homeland.” Huh? Is he being a traitor? Does he have crazy sex with law enforcement agents? Is he a Manchurian Candidate for a smartphone company? Does this mean Jay-Z cannot pleasure himself while in the presence of his naked wife? Did his daughter already drive over some homeless man? And why is he giving such a long shout out to Miley Cyrus? He spent more time on her than she did in Party in the U.S.A. (and then revealed she does not have a favorite song by him and does not even listen to Jay-Z). Then there is the Mommie Dearest sample in Jay-Z Blue: Blades of Glory it is not. Magna Carta… Holy Grail is just weird. But not even interesting, pushing boundaries weird, but what were you thinking weird. So congratulations to everyone who snagged the free app, because this mixtape is not worth actually putting money down for. Now if you excuse me I have a sudden urge to go buy a smartphone. Maybe an Blackberry.

Song to Download – BBC

Magna Carta… Holy Grail gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

A Monster Is About to Come Alive Again

When you are dealing with a genius, you are going to have to put up with some eccentricities, be it Prince changing his name to an unpronounceable symbol or Van Gough cutting his ear off. Then there is the case of Kanye West. His trilogy school themed albums stand up against the first three albums of any artists ever. But after Graduation, West’s mother died and he broke up with his longtime girlfriend and instead on continue his college esthetics of those first three albums, he instead made an emo-rap album more depressing than any of the horrible shoe gazing of the time.

It was also around this time when even I as one of Kanye’s most ardent defenders was having trouble sticking up for the guy after stunts like the Taylor Swift incident and the ill-timed “George Bush doesn’t care about black people comment.” But after his emo opus, Kanye was back on point with My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, Watch the Throne and even Cruel Summer had a couple hot tracks (if you are able to edit out Big Shawn). Apparently more accessible Kanye albums come in three because out next is Yeezus which one Rolling Stone writer said “makes Radiohead's Kid a look like Bruno Mars by comparison.” I believe he meant it like a compliment, but this listener did not take it that way.

Like most people, my first experience with Yeezus, was when West performed New Slaves and Black Skinheads on Saturday Night Live, not really the best idea considering the show’s legendary poor audio for musical guest, but considering the lo-fi feeling of the songs, it actually might have been appropriate. Based on the two songs alone, it sounded like he was trading in the annoying emo rock of the 00’s that he aped on 808’s and Heartbreaks for an even more darker time period with the new wave sound of the early eighties with bands like Joy Division.

As it turned out, those two songs were some of the most “musical” songs on the album Yeezus instead starts off with On Sight which sounds like it samples some Artari games from the eighties. And most of the songs follow that sparse industrial that throws in even weirder effect like the screaming in I Am a God or the weird almost air-horn distortion in Hold My Liqour, does turn into this psychedelic trip at the end that sounds like a hip-hop Pink Floyd (Guilt Trip also has a trippy Pink Floyd feel to it).

Yet the most surprising song on the album is the closer Bound 2 which musically sounds like classic Kanye with its sped up soul sample (looking back this was foreshadowed with snippets in On Sight and at the end of New Slave) but he still sounds as angry as he does on the rest of the album and some dark synthesizers seep through by the end of the song. I am not sure if the ending means that things are not as bad as the first nine tracks on Yeezus would suggest or it itself suggest on his next album Kanye will revisit his backpacking days. Either way, rumors suggest we will learn that answer sooner than later be it Watch the Throne II or Cruel Winter as soon as by the end of this year.

Song to Download – Bound 2

Yeezus gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.

Musings from the Back 9: Music Edition XVI

To put into perspective just how long it has been since Black Sabbath put out an album with Ozzy Osbourne, I had not even been born yet and I am old enough to remember when Dr. Dre started working on Detox. Really, when I think of Ozzy, I think of his cheesy power ballads from the lat eighties / early nineties. Which I guess is better than the generation or two that came after me who think Ozzy only as a reality star. But their reunion album 13 got me intrigued if only because it was being produced by Rick Rubin who may have the greatest batting average among producers since the band last released an album together. Unfortunately unlucky 13 is a rare swing and a miss as it turns out sounding exactly what a bunch of sixty year olds playing heavy metal would sound like. A Johnny Cash redefining album that Rubin produced, this is not. And it is mostly Ozzy’s fault who sounds phoned in (anyone who saw his reality show probably knows why) even though Tony Iommi’s riff are for the most part still haunting as ever. I just wished Rubin pushed them more. The most intriguing song on the album is Damaged Soul where the harmonica sends the song into a bluesy direction before getting drowned out by Iommi’s guitar. I just wished 13 had more moments like that.

13 gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.


Back in the late nineties, electronic music became such a big fad even Eric Clapton and R.E.M. were making albums that relied heavily on drum machines. At the same time, Barenaked Ladies were enjoying their biggest success creating music more organically. Fifteen years later we are in the second electronic boon and the Ladies finally jumped on board with the trend on their tenth studio album Grinning Streak (depending how you count them). They never drop the base or any of those other annoying trends in EDM these days, but the album is easily their more electronic embracing to date. Well that is primarily the opening song Limits, after that all the hints of electrics are tempered down. The rest of the album may have been more interesting if it were more like the opening track. And despite the title Grinning Streak, the trademark wit the band usually has is once again downplayed. I always thought the token rapper Ed Robertson was the fun guy in the group, but ever since Steven Paige has left the group, their album as much less fun.

Grinning Streak gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.



Tom Petty once sang about the ups and downs of being a rock and roll star during Into the Great Wide Open and one line that always stick out to me is when he sings, “their A&R guy said ‘I don’t hear a single.’” That line comes up occasionally when I listen to albums like the last Jimmy Eat World album. Invented was good, but nothing on the album really stood out as being particularly great. Same goes for their latest Damage. You are still getting a solid ten song, which really does not add anything new to their catalogue. But alas I do not hear a single worth downloading and if you already own Bleed American and Furtures, you really do not need to add Damage to your library.

Damage gets a on my Terror Alert Scale.