Sneaky Submarine

SORRY

2010-01-03T10:17:00.000-08:00

I have been a very, very bad blogger, and I'm sorry. One of my New Year's resolutions is to do better by you, the faceless dozens who once upon a time would stop by intermittently to peruse my shouts into the wilderness, to maybe, perhaps discover an artist of whom you'd never heard, or to read a new take on one you'd already discovered.

Whatever.

A lot's happened. I have a baby now. (Hi, Emmylou.) I'm engaged to a wonderful lady. (Bonjour, Becca.)

Check back. I'll do my best.

2 CLOSE 4 COMFORT: DUFFY Vs. SHANIA

2008-08-19T13:04:00.000-07:00

Maybe I'm crazy -and I'm not saying anybody's stealing from anybody- but that song "Mercy" by Duffy reminds me an awful lot of Shania Twain's "If You're Not In It For Love (I'm Outta Here)."

Here's Shania's song:

And Duffy's tune:

The Duffy song is pretty awesome, and I never hated the Shania one as much as I probably should have / would have liked to. It's a good song, whether it's a nu-country kind of thing, or a nu-soul kind of thing...

REVIEW | DANNY MICHEL | FEATHER, FUR & FIN

2008-07-28T20:23:00.000-07:00

1. THE NEW RUNT

I've long been of the opinion that E, the leader of the band Eels, is -and will eventually be recognized far and wide as- my generation's Paul McCartney. It's the invention in the tunes, the outright originality, and the way with a melody. Someone like Kelley Stoltz might be the more obvious heir to the throne, but Paul McCartney was an original, and my generation's Paul McCartney must too be an outright original.

That said, we will also need a Bob Dylan, and for that position I'd like to nominate Ted Leo, with his deft wordplay and distinct vocal style.

Eminem is the modern equivalent to Elvis Presley, simply by virtue of his taking black music and making it palpable for white audiences while maintaining it's inherent danger.

Danny Michel is a special kind of artist. He's unique and comfortable in his skin, he's adventurous and a distiller of ideas; he's unafraid to co-opt styles and mix them up into a new kind of vision, left of centre and out on a limb. It's likely that he'll manage a long, long, fruitful career, rich in musical invention but short on the kind of mass acceptance that he deserves, while less talented, beige hacks steal his thunder and his riches.

Danny Michel, it occurs to me, is my generation's Todd Rundgren.

2. TROUBLES RECONCILING

When I was in high school I had a teacher who always had chalk in awkward places. Chalk on his bum, chalk on his crotch. He was a good teacher -I imagine he still is- and his name was Mr. Michel. Mr. Michel knew I loved music and so did he, and we talked sometimes about bands we liked, and he told me about his brother's band, The Rhinos.

I bought The Rhinos' first album, Fly-Fishing in the Fountain of Youth, and was a little thrown by it. There were moments of brilliance -"Jackadandy Babbitt" is an undoubtedly great song, I don't care what anyone, even Danny Michel says, and I still really, really like "Psychedelic Bill & The Zanies of Sorrow"- but much of it was a bit unfocussed.

Years later I kind of got into a band called Starling, in which Mr. Michel's brother played guitar. They were pretty good but not great. They were catchy enough, but didn't have a lot to separate them from the pack.

When I first moved to Toronto a bunch of years ago I went to see Danny Michel play at a songwriter's circle at the old Ted's Wrecking Yard, and it was a truly revelatory experience. If you've never seen the man play live solo you won't understand, but it really is like nothing else. He uses loops and pedals to build tracks in front of the audience, exposing his tricks fully, and bringing everything together to create something fully formed right there in front of you. Andrew Bird does something similar with his violin, but it's not the same. I've seen them both live a couple of times, and Andrew Bird ain't got shit on Danny Michel.

I feel absolutely 100% comfortable saying that a solo Danny is firmly seated amongst the very best live performers I have ever seen in my life. With a band however, live and on disc, I've often found that that something special Danny possesses gets watered down. Songs that alone are delicate and charming sometimes get bogged down in pop rock posturing. It's a common problem with singer-songwriters, that when they back themselves with a band they become rock stars, and their triumphs become mired in unnecessary stuff. I guess it's a reaction to the solitary act of writing, that they long for the companionship of other musicians, but it's a difficult thing to integrate the one without losing the beauty of the other.

Nowhere has this been so devastating as on the Michel song "Perfect," which was, when I first got to know it, one of the most simple, beautiful examples of form reflecting content I'd ever heard: The arrangement was so simple and spare that when he sang "Nobody move, this is perfect," it froze you in your spot for fear you would be the one to destroy that delicate thing that all in the room were feeling. It was a stunning achievement...

With a full band, however, the song kicked up dirt. It became one of those rawk songs, in a hurry to get somewhere and at complete odds with itself. "So don't wait up, just rest your eyes, cause I can't rush this beautiful ride," sang Michel, while the song rushed along at it's own accelerated pace.

(That Danny recorded an almost solo version of the song for 2003's "Tales From the Invisible Man" that borrowed more from the full band arrangement than his solo rendering was baffling to me, and more than a bit of a disappointment.)

Danny's recorded output has always been a bit of a mixed bag. It's never bad, in fact it's always good, but it has only rarely captured that rarified Danny Michel quality. "Beautiful," "Toledo," "The Invisible Man," "Thunder in the Mountain," "Oh San Francisco," "Snowglobe," "Beautiful Nothing," "The Luckiest Man in the World," these songs were all hints at what the man was capable of doing. Ironically, Michel's first solo album, 2001's Fibsville, came closest to capturing the live Danny Michel experience on record.

Until 2004, that is.

3. SUCCESS! SUCCESS!

In 2004 Danny recorded Loving the Alien: Danny Michel Sing the Songs of David Bowie, which somehow freed him up to just do his thing in the studio. He found a way on that album to combine his desire for fuller arrangements with his natural touch with the spare, and his incredible skill with musical invention. In many ways, the artist who made this album sounds like a different one than made Fibsville and In the Belly of A Whale...

This guy was endlessly more comfortable with his gift, and more able to see the songs clearly; maybe that was because they weren't his, or maybe it was just a natural maturation of the man, who knows? But it was certainly an incredible development.

Also, we got to see arguably the first evidence of Danny's ability to combine genres seamlessly: The opener, "Young Americans," presents the pop tune as an almost bluegrass lullaby. It's a an incredible track, and one of the best covers ever committed to tape.

Since Loving the Alien, Danny's been, as they say in the sports world, in the zone.

In 2006 he released Valhalla, the first truly, completely brilliant Danny Michel. Forget flashes of brilliance, Valhalla burned bright from start to finish, with nary a misstep. Every song was different than the one before it, but the album was a perfect whole, with perfect flow. All of the little touches -the harmonies, the sound effects, the additional musicians- were perfect. They were necessary. For the first time Danny completely avoided dressing his songs up in other song's clothing and just let them all be who they were.

Now, in 2008, we are treated to Feather, Fur & Fin, Danny's first independent release in a couple years, and another all out smash.

4. FEATHER, FUR & FIN

The first track, the title song, sees Danny Michel channeling his inner Bruce Cobourn, painting the world's environmental woes as an almost war between man and nature, with the animals turning to Mother Nature for help. Man pushes into her territory and pushes, expanding his footprint until finally "She cried out A thousand days of hurricanes and floods! Her face ran with tears, the streets ran with blood."

Danny recently relocated from a house out in the woods to a place in Kitchener-Waterloo, I believe, because of the looming housing developments that were destroying the woods around his old place, and it's clear from the slight sneer in his voice, that if it ever came down to it, he'd be on the animal's side. It's an impassioned performance, and an impassioned song.

The arrangement is full and tasteful, it's angry and wistful, defiant and sad. The blasts of longtime Michel associate Rob Carli's baritone sax are imposing and a highlight of the song.

The delicate "Clear" is next, centered on incredible steel pedal turn by Bob Egan and featuring a really wonderful performance by drummer Gord Stevenson. The song is the point in a relationship when it all suddenly just feels right, and the doubts have dissolved. "Normally right now I'd be shaking, but I'm not even scared; Up until now I've been faking..." It's a moment that gets played in pop songs all the time, but it's normally presented as a moment of over-the-top bliss! Rapture! Michel captures it as it is: A feeling of calm. A deep breath. The moment is an absolute moment of normality: "And now you putter in the kitchen. The cat sleeps in puddles of sun. I count my stars and quit my bitching, cause I know we've just begun." When Carli's clarinet comes in to walk us out near the end, it's the embodiment of contentment. This is perhaps Michel's most perfect reflection of form and content since that old live solo version of "Perfect" years ago.

And then of course it all goes back to shit again.

Not musically, no, but thematically. "If God's On Your Side" sees Michel getting into politics once more, taking on those in the world who use religion as an excuse to go to war, which I suppose is everybody who's at war... It's hard at this point to write an anti-war tune without coming off as naive or even silly, but Michel very nearly does it. He effectively mixes broad statements and personal wishes to create something that's stirring, even, and is musically playful and sweet, with Rhodes organ, banjo and glockenspiel (My favorite detail is the repetition of "Come down, baby, come down baby" that comes in the final chorus.) The song walks the streets with it's hands in it's pockets, watching the world; it knows better, it's almost cocky. It's just waiting for you to come around.

The first couple of times I listened to the album I have to admit to being somewhat non-plussed by "Tell Sally." At just under four minutes, I thought maybe it relied a little to heavily on it's chorus, which in itself is maybe a bit too repetitive. The more I've listened though, the more it's seeped in and grabbed hold. I love the song now. In some ways it's a remarkably un-Danny Michel-sounding track, because it is so simple structurally, but he adds enough touches -the harmonies, the harmonica, the banjos- that it never gets boring. "I sat through the morning 'til the morning up and fled; I held up in my bunker, I held up in my head. (The fridge in here is empty and all the plants are dead.)" What Michel's done is given in to the melancholy of the words, and he's respected the sadness that comes with finding your loved one has been untrue. Like he did in "Clear" when he presented that moment of realization that ushers in love as a clarity, here he presents this realization of betrayal as what it is: Something that saps your strength, that ties you to your bed and eats up days and nights, that leaves you grasping for something you can control. What struck me initially as a throwaway, or laziness, is in fact another example of one of Michel's true gifts: Reflecting the content of the words in the arrangement of the music.

Things get back to interesting with "14 Masks of Danger," a slice of lite-reggae storytelling: A song by a white boy from Ontario, based in a Jamaican tradition and concerning a Mexican wrestling Battle to the Death. Rob Carli's baritone sax plays a starring role once again, as do Gord Stevenson's excellent drums. The song is almost seven minutes long, has but two short verses and one two-line chorus... Which means it spends a fair bit of time on atmosphere; luckily it never gets dull, due to the wonderful players, and the clever mash of styles.

Basing a pop song on a classical piece is nothing new: Billy Joel started it, I think... Alicia Keys did it. I feel like maybe Guns 'N' Roses probably did, too. ("Paradise City"? That's Bach, right?) And I'm sure there are three or four hundred speed metal songs that are essentially classical passages sped up to within an inch of their lives. Danny Michel contributes to the phenomenon with the centerpiece of Feather, Fur & Fin, "Motorcade," which was inspired by the slow movement of Schubert's Second Piano Trio. And it's awesome. It's wholly unselfconscious, mixing the beautiful classical piece with an Ennio Morricone-indebted bit of pop music as if they were peanut butter and jelly, and without ever sounding like Adult Oriented Radio pap.

The piano lends a legitimate air of gravitas to the proceedings, and when Michel sings "I will be the car, and all the bodyguards, I will be the silence in your eyes; I will be your aid, I will serenade: I will be your motorcade," it's really a very beautiful declaration.

"I'm'a Love You Anyway" is quite unlike anything else on the album, presenting Michel as some unholy cross between David Byrne's world-conscious pop rock and the over-the-top dance music of Kylie Minogue. And they're covering maybe an old Sam & Dave track. With The Tower of Power horn section. "I don't care what people say: I'm'a love you anyway," sings Michel, and when he does it sounds more like a warning or a battlecry than a declaration of love.

"Sweet Things" is an exercise in nostalgia: It namechecks an outdated mode of buying music -and remembers when you could pay for records with change- a Clash song, a Toots & The Maytals song, and a children's game all in the first verse, and then poses the question "Why can't I see the sweet things until they're all gone?" It remembers when the sky was sky blue and you could see stars in it, and it remembers listening to music on the radio, fighting the static in search of notes and voices...

Musically it harkens back to a simpler time as well. It's pretty straightforward, driven at top speed by acoustic guitars and mandolin; it's buttoned tight in the verses and it explodes into he choruses.

"Rye Whiskey & Wine" is a slow drink, a wistful tale of being the last one left in an abandoned town: "The chapel, the legion, and the Freemason hall; they left all the keys here: It's like I own them all."

(I do wonder this though: Danny plays guitar and sings with no other accompaniment on the track, and he produced the album by himself... So, when he strums his guitar and says at the beginning "This thing won't tune," to whom is he talking?)

"Rye Whiskey & Wine" sounds like a perfect down closer, and every time I listen I feel like it's the last song... But I'm glad it's not.

"On My Way" is one of my favorite Danny Michel tracks, period. It's a song about facing the unknown, and wishing that you could have just one thing familiar to take with you, and what better than love? "No guiding star, or setting sun; no satellite or trail of crumbs; if I'm lost, alone, afraid, promise I can take a little bit of your love on my way." It's got a full, twelve-string sound, and ringing notes; it's bouncy and fun, it's sad and hopeful. It's tight and ragged. It reminds me somewhat of Steve Earle on a good day, even though I'm not a massive Steve Earle fan, and I don't get the impression he writes much about his good days.

It's quietly brilliant, a nice end to an album that regularly approaches and sometimes achieves a more overt, bombastic, arrogant, in your face genius.

5. THE FUTURE OF DANNY MICHEL

It's hard to predict what's going to happen to Danny Michel's career... He certainly has the chops to break through and achieve, well... Hugeness. His catalogue is miles stronger and more interesting than more successful Canadian acts, like The Barenaked Ladies, Metric, or Ron Sexsmith... But maybe he's too interesting. Maybe he's too distinct. He's not as cut and dry radio-ready as some, and he's not built to fit neatly into any specific or foreseeable trend...

Of course, all of those things could also have been said about Todd Rundgren, and he's done alright.

There are worse things to be called than my generation's Runt... Just think of the guy who's my generation's Zamfir, Master of the Pan Flute.*

* Hint: It's Dave Matthews.

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I mentioned early on that Feather, Fir & Fin is the first indie release in a couple of years for Danny Michel, and as such I beg you not to download this album from Limewire, or any BitTorrent sites... Buy it. Please. Go to Soundscapes (on College) if you're in Toronto -although I had to go THREE times before they finally found their copies in the basement- or go to HERE if you can't get to the store for any reason... It's worth it.

REVIEW | HAYDEN | IN FIELD & TOWN

2008-07-12T17:03:00.000-07:00

1. THE EXCEPTION THAT PROVES THE RULE

Personally, I think that Hayden's debut album, 1995's Everything I Long For, is one of the best Canadian albums ever recorded. It is passionate, inventive, joyful, raw, profound, disturbing, sad, and pretty much anything else you could ask from any single album. Every song was a perfectly placed curveball.

It wasn't a folk album, but it really was, and it wasn't punk, but there was definitely something punky about it. It was a garage rock record with minimal rocking out but a lot of the garage. Along with bands like The Sebadoh and Pavement and other singer-songwriters such as the great Richard Buckner, Everything I Long For helped to usher in a new wave of D.I.Y. recordings that didn't care much about perfect pitch and missed notes, and didn't sand down the rough edges, but rather embraced them and moved them to the fore.

Hayden's debut album reinvented, rebranded folk music for a new generation. It made it human again.

After Everything I Long For, Hayden released an excellent E.P. called Pots and Pans that bristled with the same energy and inventiveness as that debut. And then something happened. Specifically, Hayden got mired in record company business. After the success of the first album the majors came calling as they do, and Hayden got jerked around and things slowed to a crawl. Three years after the debut came out he released his follow-up, The Closer I Get.

It was okay.

The songwriting was pretty good, and the performances were strong, but there was something different. It was settled. It felt resigned. It sat back and watched the world go by, instead of getting up in the world's face. That trademark whisper to a scream was missing, Hayden realizing he'd destroy his voice if he kept it up much longer.

I remember reading a review of the album at the time which quoted the lyrics from the song bullet, "I found a bullet outside my door, I think it's me it was intended for," and lamented that the bullet didn't find Hayden and put him and us both out of our miseries. A little overly harsh, but on the right track. There was certainly something whiny about the whole affair.

It was okay. It was essentially ignored.

Hayden was dropped or left the big leagues and recorded Skyscraper National Park, which was released independently in 2001 with an initial run of 100 copies packaged in handmade covers. Humble.

This third album was another step away from the punkish energy of the debut, but a step back up in the quality control department. But it found Hayden solidifying a new sound, on that combined almost California-style breeze pop a la The Eagles, with Neil Young's Harvest Moon era mope rock. It was a startling flip from his earlier work, but a positive one.

Three years later came Elk-Lake Serenade, which was, for the most part, more of the same that we heard on Skyscraper National Park: Solid songwriting, solid performances and the whatnot. A good album.

2. WAKE ME UP IN 2011; OR, IN FIELD & TOWZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Now, 2008, comes In Field & Town, at which there are to ways of looking:

1) Hayden's output is so slow, like molasses, that it's cool that he doesn't really, you know... Do anything new anymore, because we're not being bombarded with material. He's slipped into a groove. He does what he does, and he does it better than anyone else.

Or alternately:

2) Seriously, dude, if you're going to spend three or four years on each record experiment a bit for fuck's sake. Do something, anything, that differentiates your one album from your other. You've slipped into a rut, a deep rut, and at this point you're just wasting our time. Climb out now, or soon we're going to find you dead at the bottom clutching your acoustic guitar to your chest. Go sky-diving, drive over the speed limit, try heroin, buy a Zappa album. Anything.

3. THE SONGS

The problem here is that there is no inventiveness. The album is lazy, vocally and musically. Every song has Hayden singing identically to pretty much every other song, no higher, no deeper, no more impassioned, no less; occasionally he strains for a high note... Occasionally, as in "about once per track." In every song, the music is the same as Hayden's vocal melody, without any counter at pretty much any point.

The album kicks off with the title track, the funkiest thing Hayden's ever laid down. It's a propitious beginning, driving along on a repetitive bass line that flies in the face of the dour lyrics: "We're like spokes in the wheel of some bike in a field, or we're riding along through the streets before dawn, with no sense of what's right or wrong."

Lyrically, Hayden's always a bit of an anomaly; he writes character sketches that are almost uncomfortably personal in their detail, with deceptively poetic lyrics. He's mellowed out some, which is to be expected. His love songs aren't quite so zealous, and his tragic songs are more subtle. (Nothing here like the old man from "Skates," whose wife drowned in the river behind their house, so he buys a pair of ice skates, waits for the river to freeze over and travels up and down so he can find her...)

The jaunty "The Van Song" takes it's structure from the film Memento, building a relationship by going back a step with each reveal: "And on the bus before that they looked at us, some of them happy, some of them sad; some of them liked us and some of them not. And the day before that, that was the one we met..." It's a nice device, evoking the feeling of young, new love perfectly, and tonally the song is a nice, though minor, deviation from the rest of the disc, with Shaun Brodie's trumpet parts bringing a bit of extra life to the table.

"Did I Wake Up Beside You?" turns into a bit of a Neil Young-style wankfest with almost two and a half minutes remaining, the band (well, Howie Beck on drums and Hayden on everything else) droning on under a sloppy guitar solo that uses minimal notes. Fifteen or twenty seconds would have sufficed: Two and a half minutes -almost exactly half of the song's running time- is simply boring. Before it drops off into this unnecessary jam it's a great song, with the it-turns-out-prohetic line "We started out so nice, and we ended caught in the traps we thought were only set on our parents watch."

One of my issues with the album is the tone. The songs are basically all about a relationship in it's trouble stage, before the break-up, and so they all have a cloud above them, and even when Hayden does try to break out of the box with his arrangements or the instrumentation, the tricks become nothing more than bows slapped on a depressing package.

These aren't bad songs. But this is a mediocre album.

If I was to put my iTunes library on shuffle, I would be perfectly happy whenever one of these tracks popped up. But put them together, one after another, and what you have is what's generally called an unrelenting downer, which is fine, but an unrelenting downer that brings nothing new to the party is pointless.

4. WHAT IT BOILS DOWN TO

Hayden clearly has skills, but unfortunately he knows what they are too well, he knows where his comfort zone lies too well, and he's uninterested in breaking out of said zone. What he needs is someone to challenge him, to push him in new directions. He needs a muse. He needs an adventure. In the three or four years between now and when his next album comes out maybe he can discover some new depths, some heretofore unknown musical directions.

If you've never heard Hayden before, this is as good a place as any to start. If you're familiar with his work already, this album is filled with exactly the kinds of things you've heard before, and not much else. Which, depending on your expectations, is either a good thing or a bad one.

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Click HERE to hear the excellent title track.

REVIEW | WILL CURRIE & THE COUNTRY FRENCH | A GREAT STAGE

2008-06-22T18:44:00.000-07:00

1. STATING THE OBVIOUS

I don't know Will Currie, but I'd imagine that he's pretty used to being told that his music sounds like Ben Folds; not now-Ben Folds, adult songwriter, kinda dull Ben Folds, but Ben Folds Five Ben Folds. Ben Folds Five Ben Folds was one of histories most fun-while-still-being-touching-and-poignant songwriters. Whatever And Ever Amen is pretty much a perfect album, and one that every home should have in it's CD collection; clearly Currie has it, and has learned well at it's knee.

2. PURE POP FOR NOW PEOPLE

A Great Stage is a power pop album, and being the well-heeled genre that it is, any new power pop release will undoubtedly have many touchstones; what we have here is no exception: Folds is the most obvious one, but there's also some Replacements in there, The Raspberries, and to my ear a lot of The inBreds, which is only a good thing. This is all without mentioning previous piano-men, like Elton John and Billy Joel, and even the grandaddy of them all, Jerry Lee Lewis, all of whose shadows fall across these nine tracks. And while power pop has never been strictly about invention, it's history is rife with innovators, and from Cole Porter through Paul McCartney and Cheap Trick, and on to such modern day masters of the form as Kelley Stoltz and Tim Armstrong melody is all. Ben Folds knows that...

3. TRACK BY TRACK

Opener and title track "A Great Stage" is bit like a cross between Harry Nilsson's wonderful "Early in the Morning" and "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" by The Beatles, primarily Currie's voice bouncing along on a sweet, joyful little keyboard line. It's playful and pretty, the light handclaps barely noticeable but adding much to the tone of the song. "Typically, you play coy for a while," sings Currie, all the while playing coy himself. The song's a tease, a trailer for what's to come. It's the rest of the album whispered in your ear, having all of what the following songs have, but in a condensed form: The fun instrumentation, the catchy melody, the lose yet spot on performances. It's a fantastic start to the album, and luckily things only get better from there.

"Surprising Me" is the most Ben Folds Fivish of all of the tracks, but the similarities don't serve to place the song in an inferior light, instead showing that Will Currie's writing and The Country French's playing can stand up to and overcome any comparisons that can be thrown at them. "I'll take every step to make you feel holy; I've read every word of love, like they told me," sound like words to the listener. Being a piano-based rock band, there's an inherent sense of sophistication to the music, but when you add in Daniel MacPherson's fuzzed out bass the sophistication is tempered with a healthy dose of Fuckin' A, much in the same way Robert Sledge's bass lightened up Folds' songs.

"Centrefold" is a bit of Tin Pan Alley pop, featuring the line "When I look into your eyes I just get stoned," which I like a lot.

"Honest People" is something like a Joe Jackson song, propulsive and biting. A definite highlight.

The ghost of Randy Newman pops up a bit on "Maybe," musically though not vocally. Will Currie's voice is fantastic, smooth like glass and uncommonly evocative.

On "Mannin Veen" Amanda Currie's back-up vocals really make the song. It's a great one to begin with, but her little punctuations and supportive lines fill in the gaps with aplomb.

Arguably the best track on the album is "Friendly Fire," a workout for the band, very high energy with the insistent bass driving the song, and a truly fantastic organ solo. The chorus of Ooo's and the screeching guitar solo build the song up to a cacophonous finale. I've never seen these guys live, but I look forward to it, and when I do I imagine this as their last song. It has that feel, like "Rock and Roll All Night" or "I Want You to Want Me." This is the kind of song upon which a band could build a career, it's that good.

The nicely titled "Thunder Bay Coast Guard Radio" is a wall of sound, a floor-filler. It's got a bit less of the twists and turns that we find elsewhere, preferring to push through to the end without incident, but it's a good one nonetheless.

Just as the band condensed the album in the form of an introduction, so they do at the end with "A Grand Reprise." It's obviously a bit of a trifle, but a wonderful one. Where in the opener Currie sang "Typically, you play coy for a while," here he repeats but one line: "But then I realize it's just a game; typically I play along. Maybe I should sing a different song." It's clear though, that Will Currie & The Country French are anything but playing, and also that whatever they chose to play will be plenty fine.

This is a group of musicians with chops, lead by a songwriter with a rare knack for melody , all working together, weaving their talents together to create a whole that is quite simply stunning.

4. A BRIGHT FUTURE

Will Currie & The Country French are one of the first signings to Sloan's reborn Murderecords, and they help to make it a hell of a rebirth. There's no reason why this band shouldn't be a round for a long, long, long time, and though they may not light up the charts -Without question, in the past they would have had a chance, but today? No, they're too talented, too smart.- there's no reason they shouldn't be able to establish something unlikely for a bunch of knobs such as current charters Hedley: Longevity.

Will Currie is an artist, and though twenty years from now he may still be playing The Horseshoe and other dark and dingy clubs along the highway, he'll likely be playing to a packed house of rabid fans, and I'll be right up front, with my fist in the air singing along.

(On the flip side, Hedley will probably be headlining a nostalgia tour of casinos and county fairs...)

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Click HERE to see a live performance of "Surprising Me."

LIVE | LANGHORNE SLIM & THE WAR EAGLES | HORSESHOE TAVERN

2008-06-19T06:07:00.000-07:00

Langhorne Slim, Malachai DeLorenzo and Paul Defiglia, aka Langhorne Slim & The War Eagles. They played Toronto's Legendary Horseshoe Tavern June 18, 2008.

This band is good, and they clearly enjoy playing together... They made mistakes and laughed about them and they laughed at each other a lot. It's more fun when you get the impression the band is having fun, which these guys were. Most of all, you can really tell that The War Eagles get a big kick out of Slim.

Near the end of the show they started playing a new -and unfinished- song that Slim quickly messed up, but when he tried to skip it and move on to something they all knew, Malachai shouted out "Stop being a baby and play it," which they did, and it was great.

A couple of times Slim was left alone on-stage to perform solo, which was beautiful. He doesn't have one of those Jeff Buckley voices where you hear the first note and are blown away by how pure and perfect it is, but his voice is really incredible. It sneaks up on you a bit, cuffs you on the back of your head. His stage presence is undeniable; he's a captivating performer, kind of like had David Bowie been a busker.

I commented in my review of their album how great I thought Malachai DeLorenzo's drumming is, and live he's even more impressive. He really must be one of the very best drummers working today. (I've never seen someone beat the crap out of their kit so savagely with brushes.) But I was probably remiss in not also singling out Paul Defiglia's bass playing. He's amazing. He played this really bizarre bowed solo near the end of the show that seemed almost atonal at the start, but morphed into something really great and unique. Pretty haunting.

I know these guys play shows with The Avett Brothers pretty often, and I can't think of a double bill I'd rather see. That would be unbelievable.

OBITUARY | CLEM SNIDE | 1991-2007

2008-06-17T22:01:00.000-07:00

For sixteen or so years Clem Snide -named for a character in William S. Burroughs' Naked Lunch- were one of the greatest bands on Earth, whether you've heard of them or not. They played a brand of music that was pop, country, jazz, folk and a dozen other things all at once, while being none of them outright and it's own thing entirely. Over the course of five full-length albums and a couple of EPs, Clem Snide established a style, twitchily idiosyncratic and coolly smooth, that was quite unlike anything anyone else was doing anywhere, in any way.

Fronted by a man from Israel with the improbable name of Eef Barzelay -which sounds like he's named for a character in a William S. Burroughs novel- Clem Snide were based out of Texas. They started as a three-piece; their debut -1998's You Were A Diamond- contained barely any percussion whatsoever, instead floating along on Eef's guitar and vocals, Jeff Marshall's bass, and Jason Glasser's bowed strings... What drums there were were supplied by Eric Paull, who became a member of the band full-time in short order.

Clem Snide excelled at economizing, never crowding a song with unnecessary anything, band members sometimes sitting out multiple tracks on a single album. You imagine a sign hanging in the recording studio reading "All In Service to the Song."

Eef Barzelay's lyrics were esoteric and witty, erudite and simple; they were stripped down, like the music supporting them. His lyrics were skewed Norman Rockwell paintings: Just enough information to make you care, just enough melancholy to make you cry, just enough just enough just enough. His songs, almost always sung first person, were about details.

They were designed to make you stop paying attention to anything else that might be happening in the room.

Clem Snide's songs were like the nuanced, good-hearted little indie film that comes out of nowhere and wins all of the Oscars one year.

Whenever I bought a Clem Snide album I would listen to it immediately, many times in a row, and the second time through the songs felt already familiar, and sometimes with some songs they felt familiar the first time through. This is not because they sounded like anyone else -I've already been over that: They sound like no one else- but because they are songs that should have always existed. When Eef Barzelay wrote a song and Clem Snide recorded it they were not just inventing something, but filling a hole. And when I would listen to them I would think, and still do think when I listen to them, "I would be okay if all music by all bands sounded like Clem Snide."

Clem Snide, you will be missed.

Eef Barzelay has disbanded Clem Snide. He is about to release his second solo album. His first, Bitter Honey, was good. But it was half of a puzzle. The album, almost entirely Eef's nasaly voice and strummed guitar, was missing what the rest of Clem Snide brought to his songs, and in particular was the worse for the lack of Jason Glasser's bowed strings... I've heard tracks from his up-coming album, and I must say, things look bright. I won't say that Eef's best days are behind him yet, but whatever comes from the man in the future the songs he made with his Clem Snide co-horts will always occupy a special and rare place for me.

Here's a rundown of ten -err, eleven- songs you should know by Clem Snide. These aren't the band's ten -err, eleven- best, that would be an impossible list for me to make... But these are great songs all.

ACTION | Soft Spot | 2003

"Action" is one of Clem Snide's breaking-out-of-their-shell songs. It's an up-tempo barn burner, what the kids in the fifties would have termed a rave-up, but it makes room for personal details and sincerity:

"And if you're alone just pick up the phone it's me; I'll bring nothin' to eat, but I can tickle your feet 'til you smile."

And let's not over-look the quirk:

"Give me a shove and I'll fall in love, don't wait! 'Cause if a civil war buff can love a diamond in the rough that's great!"

"Action" is a great track that will get your blood boiling and feet stomping.

Click HERE to hear a pretty cool, though slightly less raucous live version of "Action."

ALL GREEN | Soft Spot | 2003

"All Green" is the first Clem Snide that I fell in love with. It's one of those rubber ball's of a pop song, bouncing bouncing bouncing, ringing guitars and jangly melody... The lyrics are simple and profound:

"I buried our love in the back yard; until it thaws we could play cards.

I know that it's hard when it's dark and cold, and all that you feel is yourself getting old.

But summer will come with Al Green and sweetened ice tea. Summer will come and be all green with the sweetness of thee.

So feed me a kiss chapped lips and all, and I'll bring back the tape of an empire's fall.

I'll tie a string around my finger so I don't forget not to get so tied up to the things that I regret."

Click HERE to listen to a very rough version of "All Green."

BEAUTIFUL | The Beautiful E.P. | 2003

Clem Snide's version of the Christina Aguilera hit is looser, more sincere and more melancholy than the original. Linda Perry, who wrote it, said when she heard this version that it's the way the song was meant to be played. That Eef Barzelay and company weren't splashed across the covers of men's mags all over the world, or dancing in their videos in short shorts also removed the sense of irony that accompanied Christina's take.

"I am beautiful, no matter what they say," takes on a whole new meaning when what people are saying isn't Holy fuck, what a crazy hot body...

Click HERE to see a live clip of Clem Snide's version of "Beautiful."

Clem Snide also does a stunning cover of Richie Valens' classic "Donna" on 2000's awesome Your Favorite Music. They slow it down to a crawl and wring out every single ounce of melancholy that is to be had. The "Oh, Donna" part becomes almost tragedy. Certainly one of the best covers ever.

DON'T BE AFRAID OF YOUR ANGER | The Ghost of Fashion | 2001

"Don't Be Afraid of Your Anger" starts out like the end of some seventies arena-rock jam, so much so that you expect glittery tinsel to fall from the ceiling, before switching to a country bounce. "Well, your tongue can get sharp, but it's soft in my mouth, and there's towels and ice we can use."

It plays with cacophony a touch intermittently, before returning to the bounciness, and reverting back to that seventies style jam sound near the end.

"So don't be afraid of your anger; I'll eat it with mustard and wine, and lick the blood off your lip and the bruise on your hip when this pillow fight gets out of hand."

FIND LOVE | Soft Spot | 2003

This is an example of Clem Snide's rare and singular gift: They were able to create songs that were concurrently driving and subtle, chilled and immediate, completely abstract and 100% logical.

"Wrestle bears, bring them to their knees; steal the honey from killer bees: Find love, and let it slip away."

It's a melancholy tune, lightly swinging, bouncing along, equal parts sad and hopeful, it's message cloudy and crystal clear.

"Don't be scared to connect the dots; dig for gold in parking lots: Find love, and give it all away."

Click HERE to watch a really wonderful video for "Find Love." Seriously, this is an incredible video.

Click HERE to listen to a really beautiful live acoustic rendering of the song. This is melodically very different than the album version. Still awesome though.

I CAN'T STAY HERE TONIGHT | You Were A Diamond | 1998

"I can't stay here tonight, there's buttons to sew, and lust to be made to seem tender; with a freshened up face and smile-bearing lips, I'll practice it locked in the bathroom."

It's a song that barely moves, like stifling heat slows the air.

"We can't stay here tonight, this waitress is tired of waging a war of attrition; so pay for the coffee, and we'll take it to go... You hold the cup while I'm driving."

It's glimpses of normalcy, the mundane. This song stops the room, with it's just-askew words, and Eef's slightly strained vocals, and the way it takes it's own time to get where it's going.

"I can't stay here tonight, there's blankets to fold, and love to make polished and silver; we'll store it away behind memories and glass, and we'll take it out when we get lonely."

It's just over four minutes long, but it contains more pathos and sadness than most novels or films.

NO ONE'S MORE HAPPY THAN YOU | The Ghost of Fashion | 2001

"No One's More Happy Than You" starts off sounding as though it's coming to an end, or sounds like the the theme to some fucked up back alley circus.

It's one of a couple of Clem Snide songs that takes aim at those people who love to wallow in themselves, who take pleasure in their own pain.

This here's a song for the emo kids.

"No one's more happy than you! Even the sky's feeling blue! You don't believe but its true! No ones more happy than you! A beautiful Hackensack night, two teenagers kiss and hold tight; the satellite swimming above is sending a message of love! But no one's more happy than you!"

The theme of the self-loathing teen pops up again in "End of Love" off of the album of the same name:

"Guess what? Your pain's been done to perfection by everyone."

MADE FOR TV MOVIE | End of Love | 2005

Clem Snide dipped into the well of pop culture often and to great effect, but they never said word one about Paris Hilton or the papparazzi; instead they sang about Enrique Inglesias' mole, and wrote this wonderful ode to Lucille Ball. "Made for TV Movie" touches occasionally upon humor, but in a few words it paints a touching and beautiful portrait of a woman who was an entertainer in public, but a true tortured soul at home.

"Well, I heard he used to beat her like she was a conga drum. They always slept in separate beds, but somehow they had a son. Their neighbors were vaudevillians, and the laughs came from a can. Even though the club was hoppin’, it was the pills that she was poppin’ that did her in."

He goes on to acknowledge that he may be wrong about the facts, but says "They would never make a movie if everything was great."

The song closes with a direct reference to I Love Lucy's most famous moment, turning it from a brilliant piece of slapstick to a life lesson fit for a Hallmark card:

"Because happiness is boring, it’s always black and white; the good times never last, and the chocolates move too fast for us all."

Click HERE to see a great live version of "Made for TV Movie."

My favorite Clem Snide pop culture reference comes in the song "Ancient Chinese Secret Blues," from The Ghost of Fashion. "Why did you open your mouth? This isn't the time or the place for my love's disgrace," sings Barzelay before opining over and over again towards the songs close: "Calgon take me away!" It's a reference that's from out of nowhere, but is perfectly placed.

THE CURSE OF GREAT BEAUTY | The Ghost of Fashion | 2001

Perhaps Clem Snide's loveliest songs, and one that features nothing so much as Eef Barzelay's awkward voice and some static. No percussion, no guitar, no violin or cello, no bass. It also happens to contain all of the hallmarks of Eef Barzelay's great lyricism in one song: The quirk, the sincerity, the beauty... I love the words to this song so much that I'm going to post all of the lyrics here:

"Your toothache, an ivory tower; so let down your long perfect legs; I'll untie the knots with my lips and my tongue and rub Ambisol into your hair. 'Cause those paper cuts kept you from writing a poem so epic and true about how you are cursed with a beauty so great; I'm sure that it's hard being you. So put down that book it's too serious. I'll undress you as I make a joke. But please try not to laugh as I swim in your flesh, just hold your breath 'til I finish."

A masterpiece.

HERE is a short (30-second) clip of "The Curse of Great Beauty."

THERE IS NOTHING | Soft Spot | 2003

Eef Barzelay, as skewed as he can be, isn't adverse to a little romantic indulgence, and though a lot of the time his romanticism is cloaked in quirkiness, sometimes it shines through clear and unencumbered:

"There is nothing in the world that I wouldn't do for you, 'cause there is nothing in this world if I can't share my love with you. So many people in the world, they don't realize; so many people in this world with troubled thought and angry eyes. All the riches of this world can't compare to your smile, and if only for a kiss I would walk a thousand miles."

It's a delicate song, the polar opposite to those overblown love songs on the radio, eschewing sincerity in favor of bombast.

WEIRD | End of Love | 2005

Like "No One's More Happy Than You" and "End of Love," "Weird" takes aim at Dashboard Confessional fans and their like, calling out those kids with their happiness in direct proportion to their pain.

"Well, you wrote me a poem and it didn't rhyme; you're not as strange as you act all the time."

Click HERE to listen to a pretty fucked up version of "Weird." This is not the version from the album; it's looser and more rocking, almost punkish. Clearly a fun live version.

POINT CONCEDED: CARROT TOP HE'S NOT

2008-06-16T07:58:00.000-07:00

I made the comment in a recent post that Ben Gibbard -he of Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service- was no genius. Actually, I went so far as to say that, in my opinion, he is closer to being the Carrot Top of rock music than a genius.

After a spirited debate with my friend Tricia Lahde I am prepared to concede that, based largely on a few songs he did with The Postal Service, Ben Gibbard is not akin Carrot Top.

He is the leader of a disgustingly over-rated indie band, and a contributor to another better-but-not-really-that-great electronic-indie outfit. But he is no Carrot Top.

Sorry Ben Gibbard.

Sorry Carrot Top?

NEW EVIDENCE JUST IN!!!

We at SNEAKY SUBMARINE have obtained further evidence that Ben Gibbard is NOT Carrot Top!!! If he was Carrot Top he'd look like this:

He's kind of a cross between -look for it- Angie Dickenson, Courtney Cox, Sylvester Stallone and Michael Jackson. I've never liked prop comics, and this is why.

REVIEW | LUKE DOUCET & THE WHITE FALCON | BLOOD'S TOO RICH

2008-06-10T19:22:00.000-07:00

1 OVERWHELMING UNDERWHELMINGNESS.

The first time I heard Luke Doucet was at the old Ted's Wrecking Yard. He was playing with his Vancouver-based band, Veal, a bizarrely tight punkish outfit that came onstage, played three songs and literally blew their amps and so had to stop playing. Those three songs were pretty brilliant though, brilliant enough to lead me to buy all of their albums off of the merch table on my way out.

Listening to the albums I recognized a couple of the songs -three of them anyway- but found the albums strangely weak and lifeless. No zip. No pop. Some decent songwriting, but otherwise...

In 2001 Doucet had relocated to Toronto and struck out on his own. He released Aloha, Manitoba, an incredibly written and performed album of character sketches and slices of life. For years Aloha, Manitoba maintained a spot in my music-listening rotation.

Three years later he released a fairly blah album of unreleased and live tracks called Outlaws... The arrogance of releasing an album of unreleased tracks after you've only put out one album notwithstanding, Outlaws was pretty lame. Two years later he put out Broken (and Other Rogue States) which was also not very good.

The common weakness on all of these albums wasn't the songwriting per se, nor the playing -Luke Doucet can play- but the production. Where Aloha, Manitoba sounded like the work of a hungry singer-songwriter with something to say, what's come since has sounded largely like the work of a producer, and quite frankly one that's not much more than just competent.

His albums sound clean and slick, everything fitting together seamlessly the way it should, I suppose... But he polishes the songs to within an inch of their lives, cutting out all of their edge with laser-like precision. He's produced a couple of decent but lifeless-sounding albums for NQ Arbuckle and one for his girlfriend-now-wife Melissa McClelland -who might just be the most beautiful woman on the Toronto music scene- that quite frankly is awful. What they all have in common is blandness.

The only real conclusion to come to when faced with all of this evidence is this:

Luke Doucet is not a particularly strong producer.

2 NOT RICH, BUT LUKE WARM.

2008, Doucet is back with Blood's Too Rich, his new album with his new band The White Falcon, which features his wife Melissa McClelland, who might just be the most beautiful woman on the Toronto music scene.

Will this be another slice of weak-kneed lifeless country rock, or a return to the days of wonder represented by Aloha, Manitoba?

I can't even fake cuteness here, nor hold off just laying it out in plain English:

This is not a very good album.

In fairness, it's not a very bad album either. It's worse: It's middling. It's wholly mediocre.

I wish it weren't. I wish Luke Doucet had redeemed himself, and reclaimed his place next to the likes of Danny Michel and Shannon Lyon as one of the bright lights in Canadian music, a songwriter of the first order. But he hasn't. He's merely reiterated that he managed to grab the golden ring on his first release, but has since dropped it and can't find it in the dark. He's proven that he can play and that his friends can as well, and he's proven that once you become a not very strong producer it's difficult to break out of being a not very strong producer.

The album kicks off with "Long-Haul Driver," one of those character sketches that was a highlight of Aloha, Manitoba, and which features such inane, idiotic lyrics I'm not even sure which to use here as an example. How about "My cargo's bound for Winnipeg by way of St. Paul. I'll be picking Brown-Eyed-Susans by the road as twilight falls. When I cross back into Canada, I may stop for a smoke; Yes, I know these things will kill me, but, my dear, so might the road." The song is clearly meant to come of as one of those Randy Newmanesque slices of life that illuminates the human condition using the mundane details we all share, but what it amounts to is a series of mundane details illuminating the utter lack of lyrical ability possessed by Luke Doucet.

Three tracks in the album features one of the most awful covers I've ever heard, in The White Falcon's take on The Cure's "The Lovecats." I never thought that "The Lovecats" was one of The Cure's better songs, but this version makes the original a Beatles song, a masterpiece. It's clunky and dull, and unmelodic. (I tend to think, too, that if you place a cover so close to the top of an album that maybe you know your own songs aren't quite up to snuff, which is certainly the case here. Unfortunately the cover thrown in here is actually worse than any of the originals, which is saying something.)

The Band's Rick Danko gets a tribute paid of sorts, with "The Day Rick Danko Died," which is a slice of the worst kind of blues, played by a group of white middle class Toronto musicians who sound like they learned the blues from listening to Johnny Lang albums. A 'Dedicated to Rick Danko' on the inside cover would have been a more fitting and tasteful tip of the hat... The lyrics to this song are so far beyond bad I'm not even going to quote from them.

Part of the problem here is that Luke Doucet seems so enamored with his own playing that he's unable to let the songs be songs, and is okay with them being beds for his noodling. It almost feels like he knows the compositions are undercooked, but thinks he can save them because he's just so darn talented, but with arrangements this dull and obvious, no amount of talent can lift them up.

The primary bright spot is the subdued "Motorbike," written with the excellent Mike Plume. It's a song that sits back and just is what it is, it's lyrics subtle and playful. It's got a guitar solo that goes on for a couple of bars too many, but compared to the mess that is the rest of the album that's a small complaint. The other stand-out is the title track, which plays very much like a Blue Rodeo song, with a JIm Cuddy-assisted sing-long chorus.

3 RECONSIDERATIONS.

Luke Doucet and Ryan Adams aren't oceans apart in style, both trading in countrified twang and both often failing, but there's a huge difference between the two: Ryan Adams, as bad as he can be sometimes, challenges himself over and over again. He throws in some new wave here and there, dabbles in punk, and even when rockin' the country stylings he plays with conventions, lyrically and musically. Luke Doucet challenges himself not at all. He constantly repaints and redresses what he's done before, rarely adding anything new to the pallet.

Ever since Aloha, Manitoba I've counted Luke Doucet among my favorite artists, despite his constant mediocrity in years since. I have no idea why I've done this, except that Aloha, Manitoba was that good. (For the record, I don't want Luke Doucet to just remake Aloha, Manitoba over and over again... In fact, part of the problem is that he hasn't come along any since he recorded that debut. I just want the man to do something, anything that doesn't make him sound like he's spinning his wheels in the mud of mediocrity... I want the man to challenge himself.) With Blood's Too Rich I'm going to have to finally reconsider that, finally accept that Luke Doucet has just let me down too many times and needs to be kicked to the curve.

I'm going to remove his name from my Favorite Music list on Facebook once an for all.

A once and future golden boy on the Canadian music landscape is an almost-was, officially.

__________________________________________________________

Click HERE to listen to the awful "The Day Rick Danko Died." But don't say I didn't warn you...

REVIEW | LANGHORNE SLIM & THE WAR EAGLES

2008-05-31T16:07:00.000-07:00

1 | The Set Up.

When I heard Langhorne Slim’s first full-length, When The Sun’s Gone Down, I was blown away. It’s a monster of an album; a quiet epic, along the lines of Van Morrison’s early shit, like Astral Weeks... It’s a monster of an album, along the lines of Johnny Cash At San Quentin. It’s the sound of something happening. I told everyone I knew about it, and everybody I knew inevitably said “Yeah? That good? What kind of music is it?”

That’s a loaded question.

It’s folk and country, of course, with the up-right bass thumping along and Langhorne’s slight drawl peppering his words, but for some reason I couldn’t help but say “It’s kind of punk,” and sometimes that even before I’d mention the music’s rootsy roots. It’s the shout-along choruses and accelerated tempos; it’s the ragged delivery, the D.I.Y. aesthetic. Langhorne Slim is a sight more punk than Sum 41 or latter-day Green Day... Hell, compared to them guys When The Sun’s Gone Down is Never Mind the Bollocks.

It’s punk like Tom Waits is punk, and if Tom Waits ain’t punk than who is?

2 | When the Sun Came Up...

After the release of the debut, Langhorne Slim jumped to the relative majors, signing with indie paradise V2 Records, home of The White Stripes. A label like V2 could do big things with an artist like Langhorne Slim. He holed himself and his band, The War Eagles, up in the studio, laying down the thirteen tracks that would make up his sophomore effort.

Then the phone rang and Langhorne Slim & The War Eagles were homeless. V2 had folded up it’s tent and gone home.

But a talent like Slim’s can’t be held down for long, and soon they found themselves on up and coming label Kemado, home of blog darling Melissa Nadler and the declared saviors of heavy metal (not nu metal) The Sword.

Thank God for Kemado.

3 | The Rebel Side.

The new album opens on a sombre note, with shaken sleigh-ride percussion and a bowed bass. It’s a subtle start to the disc, and though the song gets propulsive -it takes on an eighties new wave dance beat- it remains under the radar, comparatively. “If you want control, I’ll gladly give it all to you,” sings Slim; is this a new Slim, one content to lay back and let the others do the work? Not likely, clocking in at just over a minute and a half, opener “Spinning Compass,” starts as stated, and by the end has picked itself up, messed up it’s own hair and started to business, incorporating accordion, piano and that trademark call and response sing-along style. The song is a joyous declaration of purpose, a brushing off of the cobwebs: “Yeah, but I’ve been miserable, totally invisible, the glass was empty never full” sung with the conviction of one intent on never going back. There’s no zealot like a convert, and Langhorne Slim has been, apparently, converted.

Slim has a unique voice, high-pitched, slightly nasal, but clear and extremely controlled. He’s set apart from the majority of roots lead vocalists, who a) think that dropping pitch and missing notes adds authenticity to their act, or b) are so concerned with sounding pretty that they avoid feeling altogether. Langhorne needn’t worry about authenticity, and his music is wading knee-deep in beauty.

The fun continues on the spectacularly titled “The Rebel Side of Heaven,” which features an almost Dixieland trombone and tuba melody, that would bring a smile to Willie Nelson’s wrinkled face. (Willie was told that horns had no place on a country record. Vindication!)

“In Dallas we dug for gold; we couldn’t find China or Hell, so we just dug ourselves into the rebel side of Heaven.”

“I felt restless and I felt soft. I didn’t know anymore who I was ripping off,” sings Slim on first single, “Restless.” He needn’t be concerned; as far as I can tell, he’s all Langhorne Slim. “I just don’t know what it is to hold and have somebody lean on me.”

The man is a sentimental fool, and he does little to hide the fact. He walks a lyrical line between sincerity and adult-oriented drivel, but he does so with deftness, never quite slipping into that dark place. Bob Dylan walked that line, as did Johnny Cash, and Langhorne is firmly in their camp, and not in, you know... Joan Osbourne’s. He’s Prince, not Usher.

In the lovely “Colette,” he sings “Colette, I knew the second we met you’d go to my head. I took a breath and leapt into the atmosphere.”

But not all is sunshine and flowers. “I’m unhappy half the time, I’m told, and that’s so, I suppose,” he sings in the rambunctious “She’s Gone.” “On Hallowe’en I scare the shit out of the ghosts.”

The key is in the arrangements. He avoids at all costs the histrionics that might otherwise turn his poetry into bad theatre. The instrumentation is stripped down -guitar-bass-drums-vocals- tastefully augmented by organ and accordion and horns.

The production is especially stunning on “Colette,” with Langhorne giving his most relaxed vocal to date and the constant ring of the cymbals throughout the song... I’ve never heard anything quite like what they’ve done there with those cymbals, and it’s magical, truly. It’s one of those tiny things you notice in a song every once in a while that makes you think “There can be something new...” It’s so small, but so huge. And when the accordion sings the melody near the end they return the long-drained beauty to an instrument for too long employed strictly for the purposes of novelty.

You know what? I want to take a moment to recognize Malachi DeLorenzo, the drummer of the War Eagles. This guy can play, but he knows his place. He’s the backbone of the band, without question, but he is such because he doesn’t draw attention to himself. He does all in service to Slim’s songs, and he helps to lift them to an uncommon level. Hats off to you, Malachi.

Now, back to it.

The chorus of “Ooo-ooo-ooo” in “Hello Sunshine” shows that you needn’t slow things to a crawl and play in a minor key to be ethereal. Actually, there’s a ghostly quality to much of the album, not only in that it makes you constantly think They don’t make music like this anymore, but in the tone of it. It floats, it’s feet rarely touching the ground.

4 | CLOSE THE LIGHTS WHEN YOU LEAVE.

When the Sun’s Gone Down ends with a pean to loves past, “I Love to Dance,” and it is one of the most up-lifting, beautifully raucous songs ever to be put to tape. It’s the kind of thing Joe Cocker’s band, Mad Dogs & Englishmen, could have jammed on for days and never have grown tired of... Most importantly, it summed up the album perfectly, with it’s shifting time signatures and varied vocal approaches.

Langhorne Slim & The War Eagles presents a different approach to the art of the finale.

Where “I Love to Dance” left you at the bar at two o’clock in the morning on a Saturday Night, “Hummingbird” ends things at nine in the morning on Sunday; the newspaper is spread out before you and there’s a cup of coffee on the bedside table. “I’m dreaming of leaving my demons,” he sings, “and the first one I’m leaving is you.” On Saturday night you were surrounded by friends, but on Sunday morning you’re all alone.

“Hummingbird” sums up this album as well as “I Love to Dance” did When the Sun’s Gone Down. It’s quieter and more introspective, and it’s tasteful and smart.

It’s wonderful.

______________________________________________

To hear “Rebel Side of Heaven” click HERE.

Langhorne Slim is playing at Toronto's Legendary Horseshoe Tavern on June 18th, 2008

REVIEW | MOMOFUKU | ELVIS COSTELLO + THE IMPOSTERS

2008-05-30T20:39:00.000-07:00

1 | THE SHORT LIST.

The word genius gets tossed around like a frisbee in reviews of and discussions about music. Eminem is a genius, and so was Tupac Shakur; Win Butler from Arcade Fire is a genius; Bruce Springsteen is a genius; Ben Gibbard? Genius. Maybe not the genius that is Ryan Adams, but genius nonetheless... But let’s be honest and clear: None of those people are geniuses. None of them. Some have had moments of brilliance, but geniuses? Bruce touched on it all over Nebraska. Eminem hit upon genius in the final verse of “White America,” and in a few other places over the years. Arcade Fire have done some good, but they’re too indebted to David Byrne and Talking Heads to be considered anything close to genius in their own right. (David Byrne? Close, very close to genius...) Ben Gibbard is more the Carrot Top of Rock than he is it’s Stephen Hawking. Ryan Adams hasn’t exactly become a complete failure since his bright start, but he’s become something maybe much worse: Middling. By my count there are only four bonafide, genuine living geniuses in the world of pop music. The first is the cute Beatle, Sir Paul McCartney. Add to him Ray Davies of The Kinks... I think anyone of sane mind would have to concede Bob Dylan.

The forth, and perhaps most pronounced genius in the game is none other than Mr. Elvis Costello, the original angry young man.

2 | IT AIN’T EASY.

Being a genius has got to be hard work.

In his forties, when Elvis Costello decided to write classical music, he taught himself how to read and write musical notation.

He’s written jazz, blues, soul, country, and pop in about nine-hundred different styles, and he’s quite literally excelled at all of it at one time or another. Like McCartney, Costello’s had a couple of burn-outs (Kojak Variety, I’m looking at you) but the burn-outs have helped define him as much as the successes. And besides, you can’t be a genius without failing a few times, especially when the failures have been at the hands of experimentation and the furthering of one’s craft.

Rock is his bread and butter. It’s his house. It’s where he lives. He hasn’t had many failures when plugged into his amp and kicking out jams with his trusty co-horts. He’s had his periods of lesser marvels, but he’s never been less than interesting when dabbling in pop music.

3 | A (VERY) BRIEF HISTORY.

When he came onto the scene in 1977 he was heavily associated with the punk movement, despite not being punk, all because of his energy, and anger. He took the drive of The Ramones and mixed it up with the sounds of Motown and Buddy Holly... All of which are American, come to think of it, which is funny for one of the most quintessential of British songwriters...

He was the leader of The Angry Young Man movement, with Joe Jackson, Graham Parker and Marshall Crenshaw as his followers.

His debut, My Aim is True, is a true classic, causing quite the stir, not just for the music contained therein, but also for the album sleeves repeated proclamation that “ELVIS IS KING,” coming so shortly after the death of Elvis Presley as it did.

As he matured he became more of a craftsman. His music became more thoughtful, his incredible wordplay becoming even more incredible, taking a much more central position on his palette. He became more. He started out important, but became essential. It’s no overstatement to say that the landscape of modern pop music would look vastly different had there been no Elvis Costello, as much as had there been -God forbid- no Buddy Holly.

4 | LATTER DAYS.

For over a decade now, each new Costello rock album -now backed by the Imposters rather than his classic Attractions, though the two bands share a majority of members- has been greeted as a return to form for the now angry old man. The consistency of such claims borders on the absurd, though not because they are so overly boisterous in their insistence that he’s returned to form, but for the fact that Elvis Costello: The Rock Star has never really been out of form. As I said, there have been better albums and worser ones, but he’s never fallen to the depths of, say, 1980’s Bob Dylan...

It’s arguable that his 1995 release, Blood & Chocolate -featuring such gems as “Uncomplicated,” "I Hope You’re Happy Now,” "Battered Old Bird,” and “I Want You,” each of which much certainly be counted among the master’s best (and most embittered) compositions- is Costello’s best album period. Even later than that is the wonderful Brutal Youth, and the near perfect When I Was Cruel. Both albums added to a stunning catalogue songs that were every bit as everything as the man’s earliest songs: They were as angry, as eloquent, as magical, as soulful, as inventive, as well crafted as “Alison,” or “(The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes,” or “Pump It Up.”

And now comes Momofuku.

It’s being called a return to form. Costello is described as re-invigorated. It’s an album in the “classic Costello style,” whatever the hell that is.

5 | MOMOFUKU.

Here is something: It IS an album in the classic Costello style. Whatever the hell that is.

But, wait... Let’s jump back a bit.

5 | OUT OF RETIREMENT.

A couple of years -two?- ago Elvis Costello had quietly retired from recording his pop music. He was sick and tired of what came with promotion and dealing with record labels in general. In early 2008 he went into the studio to record some songs with Jenny Lewis, she of The Watson Twins fame.

Lewis, by some twist of fate, had drafted The Imposters’ rhythm section to play on some songs on her new album, and somehow or other Costello got roped into singing along with her on one of them. (These sessions also included drummer Pete Thomas’ daughter, Tennessee, she of the wonderful and awesome The Like.) This motley crew recorded that one track, and went on to record two other Elvis compostions for kicks, they had so much fun. Costello realized he didn’t really hate recording, bashed out a batch of new tunes and re-banded The Imposters -including Lewis and Tennessee- and hit the studio, laying down eight songs in six days, an uncharacteristically quick time frame for the man.

It shows.

Now...

6 | MOMOFUKU.

Momfuku is a quick-sounding record. (By the way, record is the right word here... Initially the album’s been released solely on vinyl. “The way God meant it,” says Costello. With the record you get a code for a free digital download of all the songs...) It’s not speedy, no, but it is ragged. And not ragged in a Neil Young kind of way, so that it sounds like he just might not have cared enough to get it right. (Sometimes I picture Neil Young in the studio saying “Whatever. Good enough. We’ll just call it aesthetic.”)

It kicks off with the killer “No Hiding Place, and the assertion “In the not very distant future when everything will be free, there won't be any cute secrets let alone any novelty.” Immediately you’ll notice that our hero is in fine voice, and the band is in insanely fine form, sounding like a bunch of twenty year olds in their parent’s garage, albeit incredibly talented twenty-year olds. The song is all ringing chords and insistent drums, a fine vocal floating wistfully above on a cloud of maybe insolence. “Two lovers rocking up and down, in an elevator; 15 minutes later they'll make a killing in the market. They knew how to work it on that closed circuit. My, my, it's a terrible disgrace! You'll find these days that there's no hiding place!”

Costello’s always been a songwriter it’s best to listen to with a lyric sheet spread out in front of you, and Momofuku is no exception to this. It’s rife with daft... Err, deft... wordplay, both beautiful and frightening. On the borderline-samba, “Harry Worth,” he sings of a newlywed couple he “met on their wedding night, their faces all flushed with their pledges lite.” He wants to tell them “It’s not very far from tears to mirth,” and that “there are not many moments that can capture your breath,” but he just can’t bring himself to do so. Lyrically, Costello has found a softer touch this time out, sprinkling a touch of -dare I say it?- gentleness amongst the bitterness. In the second half of “Harry Worth” he revisits his wedded couple and sings “Five years have passed. I happened along. He says ‘Do you hear that noise? Well, that once was our song.’ I looked in her eyes and saw barely a spark. He laughed too loud and then drank until dark.” Where in the past this might have been delivered with a touch of serves-’em-right in his voice, here it’s downright pitying, and with a pang of regret for not having spoken up all those years earlier.

In “Flutter and Wow,” he declares “I can’t believe that this is happening! You make the motor in me flutter and wow.” It’s the kind of unbridled lovey sentiment that’s generally only shown itself in Costello’s songs for soundtracks, but it’s a welcome addition to the palette.

“My Three Sons,” is like Costello’s “Cats In the Cradle.” “Deep in the night I turn cold and sick, but I only curse arithmetic. I bless the day that you came to be, with everything that is left in me.” In the hands of James Taylor or James Blunt the words would be typical and insufferable pap, but by Costello they take on an air of he-wouldn’t-say-it-if-it-wasn’t-so. It’s a true moment that brings into sharp focus his gift as a writer, but also his -and our- mortality. “Just see what I’ve become: The humbled father of my three sons.”

NOTE: Costello does in fact have three sons; one with his first wife Cait O’Riordan, and twins with jazz singer Diana Krall.

“American Gangster Time” is the most early-Costello sounding thing he’s done since he was, well, early-Costello. “It’s a drag saluting that starry rag,” he sings, that classic vitriole; the lyric isn’t sung with a sneer though, but almost sweetly. A spoonful of sugar... Thank God I’m not American is the subtext.

As “Stella Hurt” kicks in you might be forgiven for thinking you’d accidentally tripped into a Husker Du album; with it’s crunchy, distorted guitars, the song is menacing. “The gutter’s full of suicides,” he sings of the city. “Don’t bring me down!” It’s more raw and musically vicious than anything I can remember him doing before, and it sounds not silly at all. So many of the old guard record songs like this for the wrong reasons. I saw the third-tier early-80’s punk band Ugly Ducklings play a reunion a couple of years ago. They had their guitars cranked and distorted and they hit the right chords, and the punk sneer was in tact and all... But they seemed quite frankly like old men playing kid’s music. Elvis Costello does not. Maybe it’s owing to the fact that he and his Imposters are just undoubtedly a better band technically, but part of it surely must be that they still have so much to offer. They’re not retreading anything, even when you might think they are. They’re always discovering and rediscovering, and they don’t add shit to songs to make them sound cooler or to fit in. If there’s distortion it’s because it’s what the song demands.

“Mr. Feathers” is Costello doing McCartney by way of Tom Waits. It’s a skewed “Eleanor Rigby,” as though a song with the lyric “wearing the face that she keeps in a jar by the door” needs any more skewing... “She passed him out in the street; he suddenly seems so frail, as her fast heart beats. She should kick him anyway.”

The album closes with the joyous "Go Away," one of the most purely fun songs Costello has in his arsenal, with a bitter chorus -"Go away, go away, why don't you go away? Why don't you come back, baby? Why won't you go away?"- that could be a little poke at his own bitter rep. The back-up vocals by Jenny Lewis sound like they could be by the ladies from B-52's, which is a good thing. Its a great thing.

For my money, the only slight misstep -and slight it is- is the arrangement of “Drum and Bone,” which sounds too reserved next to the rest of the disc and against it’s own better judgment. It’s all low-end and acoustic guitar, sounding like it wants to rock out and get jiggy, but never being given the opportunity. The song itself is fine, a slice of semi-blues, but the performing of it is maybe a bit of a missed opportunity.

The album is essentially a road map of Costello’s pop career, touching on and matching all he’s done before. He’s never outshone by his legacy. He’s paying tribute to it and doing so in the best way possible: By adding to it. He’s not going gracefully, or settling in the way, in my opinion, Bob Dylan has, as good as Dylan’s writing remains.

Elvis Costello isn’t prepared or built to become a museum piece. Thankfully.

ARTICLE | THE WELCOME RETURN OF HARMONY TROWBRIDGE

2008-05-20T17:51:00.001-07:00

1 | HARMONY TROWBRIDGE IS MY FRIEND.

For years she’s been one of the very brightest lights in the Toronto independent music scene, a maverick songbird, a wise and clever bringer of truth and musical wonder. She’s a rare thing: A chick singer without Tori Amos pretension or Ani DiFranco bullshit attitude and quirk. Nor does she sound like Jewel. She’s not one of the army of Feist-a-likes that seem to be taking over the industry, though the two share a similar timbre; Feist, quite frankly, doesn’t have the range of voice, nor the personality of my friend Harmony Trowbridge.

The roots of Harmony’s music are in the soil tilled previously by the likes of Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson, Harry Nilsson, Leonard Cohen and Eva Cassidy. I’ve long wanted her to do a cover of Melanie’s “Brand New Key,” but I always forget to ask her. She’s more esoteric than it seems is palatable for singer-songwriters these days. There’s something of the mighty Randy Newman about her. She refuses to spell things out for you, and tells stories that kind of sound like they might be stories, though they leave you unsure of the narrative. She’s Shel Silverstein, had Shel Silverstein been a hippy chick from Canada’s West coast. She’s theatrical, but not precious. She’s fun, but not twee. She’s intelligent, but it’s not what she is, if you get my drift.

She’s Canadian, so she’s got a little Gordon Lightfoot in her music. (Thankfully, though, she has no Stompin’ Tom.)

2 | BABY MAMA.

Just over a year ago Harmony Trowbridge had an adorable little baby named Kai. Kai is significant not just because he’s new life, and curious, and ADORABLE, but most importantly because he’s responsible for Harmony taking over one full year off from performing live in public, and for that I’m not sure I’ll ever fully forgive him.

3 | THIS ONE’S FOR THE CHICKENS.

This past Saturday Harmony organized a benefit for the American animal rights activists, The Farm Sanctuary, which rescues animals from farms that treat said animals with something less than decency, and relocates them to wonderful places where they are cared for and played with and treated with respect. It’s a wonderful cause and a fitting backdrop for the return of Harmony Trowbridge to the live stage.

4 | “IT’S BEEN A LONG TIME SINCE I ROCK & ROLLED.”

For her soundcheck she played -at my request- a cover of the great Leonard Cohen song “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Good-bye.” I like Leonard Cohen’s poetry and I love some of his music, but often I prefer other people doing his songs to hearing him do them himself, the greatest example of which is Jeff Buckley’s cover of “Hallelujah,” which is pretty much the high water mark for cover songs period. Harm (her friends call her that sometimes...) covers “Hey...” with a similar attack, acknowledging that with Cohen’s music, it’s really not about the music at all, but the words, all the while kicking up the melodic centre a few notches in a way you think Leonard would have if he could have, but he just couldn’t because he sings like a butcher.

When she got into her set proper -backed by a cellist and a drummer, fittingly using brushes- she introduced a slew of new tunes highlighted by the wonderful “Trawling,” which is very much in the Kris Kristofferson vein, and “Covers Up,” both of which show that Harmony is maybe inching ever closer to a more traditional song structure complete with defined choruses... And said traditional structure agrees with her idiosyncratic style more than you may have suspected.

Opener “West Coast Girls” is an unabashed pop song, and a good one at that.

It’s tempting to call this change in her writing style “maturation,” but Harmony’s always been an uncommonly developed songwriter. Possibly though it represents a new-found comfort with her gift, a realization that she needn’t try and separate herself (consciously or not) from the pack with quirky progressions and hooks so subtle you hardly realized you’ve bitten. There’s nothing so wonderful as a pop song -I’ll take Paul McCartney over John Lennon any day of the week- and it’s pretty exciting to witness a songwriter discovering her inner-Macca. And while she might not be embracing her gift with the zest of an Emmitt Rhodes or, say, Kelley Stoltz, she’s got a sweet ear and a lovely voice and quite a way with a set of chords.