Tag: music reviews

The New Pornographers – Brill Bruisers

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c0c1c6baRating: ★★★½☆

When it comes to indie rock super groups, you really can’t beat the likes of The New Pornographers. Making music together since 1999, this Canadian band consists of the best of the best, each of which have their own successful career be it alone or with another band. There’s Carl “A.C” Newman, Dan Bejar, Neko Case, and Kathryn Calder, just to name off a few, but let’s be honest: you should probably know who this band is as they’ve been around for longer than a decade and Brill Bruisers makes for their sixth full length release. Though it is sixth in a line of solid releases, by no means does it feel trite or banal—The New Pornographers have managed to do it once again.

With a band that is a culmination of so many great individual artists, I’m always flummoxed as to how this group can create a cohesive sound for their group. Sure, different artists take the lead on a track-to-track basis, incorporating their own styles, but Brill Bruisers manages to come together fairly easily. From opening title track to the last and glittering “You Tell Me Where,” the group hits their stride multiple times and gives you some great tunes.

I think it partially depends on which lead vocalist you like the best that will leads you to your favorite numbers. There’s Newman’s opening “Brill Bruisers,” which kicks the album off en medias res with the groups shimmery indie rock; the percussion is essentially all cymbal, the guitars’ blend in with the mix, synthesizers wander around through the song and the vocals of Newman lead you fearlessly through these airy walls of sound. Of course, he’s not alone, you get a lot of gang vocals singing back up through the whole song, which gives it an even lighter, poppier feeling. Later on you get Bejar’s unmistakable warbling vocals up to bat on “War On The East Coast,” which happens to be my favorite track on the record. The track seemingly makes comment on today’s general feeling of chaos and disarray—“look what we’re living in.” While the track rages on in full fury of to a build at the end, the choral hook has Bejar crooning “Oh, I don’t care, I don’t care,” making you want to scream right along with him, even if the sentiment is apathy, it’s still relatable. However, it’s not just the tracks with an outright lead vocal that will get you falling for them. On the contrary, “Fantasy Fools,” has a shared lead vocal that elbows its way into your list of highlights as well.

Though there’s a lot to love on Brill Bruisers, for me the album doesn’t go above and beyond to give you a sound that you want to sing to the world about. Sure, you’ll come back and jam with this group of lovable indie-poppers now and again, but there’s just a little bit missing from this release to push it to the next level.

Geoffrey O’Connor – Fan Fiction

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homepage_large.1b99a5d7Rating: ★★½☆☆

When front men, or women, step aside from their group efforts to strike out on their own, I always fear that the effort will be, well, too self-indulgent. Geoffrey O’Connor, of the Crayon Fields, created a record of his own back in 2011, when he broke out a bit from his guitar and moved into the synth pop side of things. Fan Fiction is another trip into the world of danceable beats and narratives that take place or belong in a nightclub.

Nightclub beats may be one thing, but it’s a whole different animal to be able to go back and forth from dance floor to the other parts of your life. While we all like to shake it, I have to have a little bit of substance to accompany my dance tunes and set them apart from all the rest. The general sound on Fan Fiction is interesting—something along the lines of a mix between Cut Copy and the vocal quality reminiscent of Owen Pallett. It’s synth dance pop with 80’s flair; the presence of the electric guitar through the whole thing adds a neat little element that sets it apart from other takes on this genre. However, there really isn’t a whole lot of variety from track to track that add up to something other than a collection of songs that all sound somewhat similar to each other.

Though my main issue with this album is its lone dimension, there are still some pretty fun tracks that you can groove to. Take “Jacqueline” and “Another Time,” for two great examples of this—both of these tunes are dance floor ready. “Jacqueline,” kicks open with some drum machine, synth riffs and what sounds like a hint of crisp guitar riffs. The beat pumps through the song, and the lead vocals take on a quality that resembles the pulsating electronic sounds as he wonders after the title character now that he knows nothing about her. While the song doesn’t really build to anything in the end, it’s no doubt catchy and will have you lamenting “Jacqueline” along with O’Connor and the feminine vocals that join him for the choral hook. Similar in interest is “Another Time,” where the rhythm is picked up and the lyrics twist around in little endless loops of tongue twisters while instrumentation sounds like scattering fragments of synth that go on forever in the background.

Overall though these few really detailed and stick out tracks weren’t enough to pull me into the rest of the album. I was left feeling a little bored with Fan Fiction and longing for a little more substance.

 

Comet Gain – Paperback Ghosts

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CometGainPaperbackGhosts_535_535_c1Rating: ★★★½☆

I’ll admit it, I’m a little late to be jumping on the Comet Gain fan express, as they’ve been making records for the past 22 years and I am just now becoming acquainted with David Feck and company and their epic jangly indie pop tunes. I say epic because though they specialize in the jingly-jangly guitar that is textbook for indie pop, Feck brings in this heavy element of poetic narratives that pervades all of the tracks and brings it to a whole new level of detail. Paperback Ghosts is an exploration into love lost and the nostalgia that seems to haunt long after its disappearance.

It would be easy to dismiss this record as just jangly indie pop, when in reality it’s that and so much more. Yea, there are tracks that do this genre more than justice, like second up on the album “Sad Love and Other Short Stories” which begins with familiar angular electric and backing acoustic guitars while Feck spins tales of morose love tales, musing “what’s the saddest love of all?” and then offering his interpretation of what could be the answer to this question. His lyrics are quick and witty, giving you vivid images alongside the jangle pop. The words and vocals are mixed as equals to the instrumentation, making it clear where exactly your attention and focus should be. To finish it off you get some string arrangements that coat everything in a nostalgic bath as the song comes to its close. They give you quality jangle with other layers and textures that push it beyond.

While they give you solid tunes like the aforementioned track, Comet Gain also brings you the blues a bit, or some heavier tracks. On these numbers, the band digs in, and the guitars get a bit fuzzier and the synths more prominent. “(All The) Avenue Girls” brings in some female vocals and the old fashion organ-esque synthesizer that runs through the whole tune, and for some of the rest of the album gives it a timeless flair. End number “Confessions Of A Daydream,” is another example of this bluesy tinge, complete with gritty guitars and Feck’s vocals straying the furthest from where we first met him at the beginning of the album. We get the image of a disheveled frontman instead of a put together poet, but the imperfections of the song make it an interesting twist to finish the album.

Paperback Ghosts is an adamant testament to the talent of this man and the musicians that have accompanied him through the years to keep putting out relevant records of indie pop. It takes a lot to stay current, but Feck doesn’t seem too preoccupied at all with keeping up with the times, rather more with doing his own thing. It’s worked for 22 years and it has worked once again this time around; beautiful songwriting abounds and you have yourself a collection of deep tunes to spin around your office or house and really sink into. Let’s just say Comet Gain has made a fan out of me.

Literature – Chorus

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litRating: ★★★★☆

Back in 2012, Literature should have made your radar with Arab Spring, their debut LP that ATH Records helped put out. If somehow you managed to miss that gem of a first record, not to worry, the four gents are back to give you another opportunity to fall in love with their jangly guitar centric rock music. One listen and you’ll be devoid of excuses not to be smitten with Chorus and this band.

At the risk of sounding cheesy, I’m going to liken this album to those instances in your life, or in the movies when everything around slows for a second in a moment of golden enlightenment. For the twenty-nine minutes that Chorus lasts you are swept away in a fury of glittering and shimmering tunes. Each song has a pearlescent quality to it—the guitar licks ripple and glide with each other in endless loops while the percussion is like the foam on the edge of the waves of synth as they crash in. The album on a whole has the golden vibe, but there are also some extra special standouts that will have you instantly wanting to replay them over again.

A few of these songs that have got me especially hooked are back-to-back middle of the album stunners “Court/Date” and “New Jacket.” The first of these two songs starts with an infectious guitar riff that peels right through the center stage, then you have Nathan Cardaci’s voice that comes in deep and rich, but gets pushed to its peak as his voice weaves in and out of the instrumentation. The drums never stop, constantly simmering and then breaking into this epic deep rolling builds during the choral hook. Before you know it you’re on to “New Jacket,” which is less power from the start and more of a tune that builds at its end. There are still the glitter guitars from the start and Cardaci’s breathy hazed vocals, but the guitars feel passive until the song grows and grows to the last minute of the track. Really, I had a hard time critiquing and describing these two tracks as they are so infectious that I would start to play them and have the phenomenon of getting lost jamming.

Thirty minutes comes and goes, but like the movie montages, it’s somehow the apt amount of time for everything to happen; Literature don’t overstay their golden moment. Despite the vast majority of the tracks bordering on spastically fast, the speed of this record works perfectly with the music they have created. Yes, the record is brief, catchy and straightforward, but frankly I feel like the music scene these days could use more records like this to get lost in.

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