CD reviews
Park
Building a Better_______ Lobster/ 2006 ♥♥♥♥½ |
It’s tough to provide an unbiased review for a CD by a band that has been a favourite of mine for several years. However, Park’s previous album, the amazing It Won’t Snow Where You’re Going, did leave me with high standards for comparison with this, their new disc, Building a Better _______. Park took some time off in the past couple years as lead singer Ladd Mitchell released a solo disc (another great record), but this release is nothing short of brilliant. The CD has several great tracks, but to give a better understanding of why this band is so good, simply listen to “Hide and Seek.” Only Park could write a song that includes “olly olly oxen free” in their lyrics and not sound ridiculous. Similar musically to the likes of Moneen, Park provides a very unique
and individual instrumental structure for each song and combines it
with heartfelt lyrics. My favourite tracks are “The Trophy Wife” and
“Mississippi Burning,” which provide a great opening to the disc that
also manages a solid finish with two more great songs, “Irukandji” and
the above-mentioned “Hide and Seek.” The only downside may be that there
isn’t much of an effort on the part of the band to try something new,
but why mess with a good thing? All in all, the record is solid from
beginning to end, and will definitely rank up there with their previous
albums. |
Blood Meridian
Kick Up the Dust Outside Music/ 2006 ♥♥♥ |
If you ask me (though I admit this is speculation) Matt Camirand,
lead singer and songwriter of Vancouver’s Blood Meridian
(named after Cormac McCarthy’s brutal, powerful novel)
wants us to believe that his scruffy indie beard, perhaps
stained and dribbling with various organic fruit juices, is
in fact a blood-encrusted, sun-singed assemblage of ruddy
stubble. Reductive critical-geographical clichés aside, there’s
no doubt Blood Meridian is going for a western sound on
Kick Up the Dust, and for the most part, though the album
lacks originality, the atmospheric and layered sound is
sumptuously realized.
As a singer, Camirand goes for an attitude-over-accuracy
approach, which can be grating in large doses, as it tends to
undermine his melodies. If he had a super-badass voice, like
Lou Reed or Iggy Pop or Bob Dylan or Nick Cave, this would
be fine, but he doesn’t, so it isn’t. Lyrically and thematically,
Blood Meridian seems to be presenting its bitter resignation
as a potential path to redemption. “Our time here’s so
short/we’re just God’s little joke/Let’s show him how little we
care,” sings Camirand on “Kick up the Dust,” a song that,
like most of the album, is sonically very appealing but too
melodically and structurally predictable. Likewise with “Soldiers
of Christ,” which sounds way too much like a White
Stripes rendition of Harry Chapin’s “Cat’s in the Cradle.” I realize
this is a potent insult, so I should stress that the song’s
violent Southern Gothic lyrics involve no maudlin father-son
elegizing whatsoever. |
The Dears
Gang Of Losers Maple Music/ 2006 ♥♥♥♥ |
Their last original full-length album was 2003’s No Cities
Left. After touring incessantly in support of that album the
title can likely be taken as a statement of fact for the Dears.
While the band did find time over the last three years to
release a live album, fans that caught the live shows during
that time have been salivating at the prospect of a new album
of original works. That’s because the band road-tested
much of the material on Gang Of Losers and these new
songs were met with a very strong response. I first heard a handful of the songs on this album in January of 2005. The Dears were in the middle of a threemonth European tour when they performed at Whelan’s in Dublin. The energy and anguish that vocalist Murray Lightburn conveyed during that night’s performance of “Hate Then Love” is capably recreated on this record and it proves to be the highest of highlights.
Gang Of Losers is divided into two parts on the track
listing — much as if it was an LP. Apart from the “Sinthro,”
part one is a loud, pulsing start to the album replete with
Lightburn’s emotionally tortured delivery of unhappy sentiments
like “nobody wants you,” (as on “Death or Life We
Want You”). Part two pulls back without sacrificing energy
on “You and I Are a Gang of Losers” and Lightburn’s wail
becomes a hushed cry. The album isn’t quite the uniform,
stellar work that No Cities Left was, but it’s a thoroughly
enjoyable listen and a worthwhile addition to the Dears’
canon. |
The Land
The Land Earthology Records/ 2006 ♥♥♥ |
Recording out East but returning home to Winnipeg to release
their album, the Land are part of a burgeoning scene
I’m calling “Menno-Folk.” It’s delicate folk with a rural feel
and lyrics that touch on love and faith. Judith Klassen and Simon Neufeld spent time in St. John’s, Newfoundland and found the place conducive to recording this album. However, the sound of their self-titled debut is firmly rooted in the prairies. The pair may sing about living “near the ocean,” and leaving “behind the grasses,” but their home still makes its presence felt. More apparent than their roots is the duo’s love: some of the best moments on this album are the honest depictions of love, including one of the most impressive “love songs” I have heard in quite some time — “I Believe.” The lyrics are so simple and direct I am surprised they haven’t been written before now, and the violin sounding out “Heart and Soul” midway through the song works, against all odds.
I have two minor complaints about this album and I
mention them less to criticize than to indicate what I look
forward to from a future release. The first is that the lyrics
— when they’re not simple and direct — can be cloying
and overly precious. Consider, for instance, “I wanna
wear you in/just like my favourite shirt,” from “Wear You.”
The second is that Neufeld’s voice doesn’t always match
Klassen’s — hers is a clear and precise instrument while his
recurrently warbles off-key and distracts the ear. These are
relatively minor complaints though, and this is a promising
debut album. I look forward to catching the Land live. |
The Panic Channel
(One) EMI Recordings/Capitol Records/ 2006 ♥ |
The Panic Channel’s Steve Isaacs (vocals, guitar) and Dave
Navarro (guitar, bad facial hair, icy glare, perpetually visible
chest) reportedly met backstage at an MTV Video Music
Awards show and made such an impression on one another
that five years later they decided to form a band. Washedup
grunge guitarist meeting MTV VJ backstage at an MTV
awards show and the two deciding to start a band sounds
to me like a staggeringly bad idea, but the Panic Channel
forged ahead anyway and have now released their debut
album (One). Opening track “Teahouse of the Spirits” isn’t as bad as you’d expect — it merely sounds like below-average Foo Fighters (who are themselves already below average) — but things quickly go downhill and by the third track, “Bloody Mary,” it’s clear that the Panic Channel are merely treading water in the grimy, ammonia-smelling swamps of corporate post-grunge. Isaacs, as a singer, has no distinctive qualities whatsoever and certainly no sense of irony. His overwrought and over-earnest delivery is just the ticket, I guess, for the overwrought and over-earnest lyrics he’s forced to sing: “and you feel like crying/you want to scream out/but the tears won’t fall/the words won’t come.”
It should be noted that I didn’t listen to any more than
five songs on (One) and that the album features thirteen
songs in total. This is very critically irresponsible, I admit,
but the rate at which the album seemed to me to be getting
worse as it went along forced me to intervene before it got
too late, so I stand by my decision. |
The Early November
The Mother, The Mechanic, and The Path Drive-Thru Records/ 2006 ♥♥♥½ |
The Early November deserve credit. Not too many bands
attempt to release a triple album of all new material. The
first disc, The Mechanic, is primarily emo-rock, growing on
their previous material of borderline pop punk. Tracks like
“The Rest of My Life,” and “Decoration,” suggest a step in
the right direction for the band, and provide a good start
to what could potentially be a long listen if you are in the
mood to experience all three discs. The other two stand-out
tracks are “The One That You Hated,” and “Figure It Out.”
They really showcase vocalist/songwriter Arthur Enders’ ability
to write songs that make you want to both mosh and
slow-dance. The second disc, The Mother, is much mellower and features the addition of several instruments including trumpet, piano, violin, etc.. The Early November really hang themselves out there compared to their previous material, and I must say it works. With the exception of the fun, wanting- to-skip-sounding “Hair,” the rest of the disc has a very alt-country feel, especially with the middle tracks “Driving South,” and “Scared to Lose.” At times it has a real I Can Make a Mess Like it’s Nobody’s Business (Ender’s solo project) feeling to it.
The final disc, The Path, contains 24 tracks that vary between
the distorted spoken word of songs like “Guess What,”
which sounds like a children’s song, and the almost circussounding
“We’re Finding Something Out.” The disc only has
a handful of actual songs that really aren’t anything special.
In total, much credit is owed in attempting a triple-disc, but
I think a single or double disc would have been sufficient. |
