Review: The Dø – Both Ways Open Jaws
19 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: A Mouthful, Both Ways Open Jaws, Dan Levy, Olivia Merilahti, Review, The 405, The Dø, Village Green
Artist: The Dø
Title: Both Ways Open Jaws
Label: Village Green
Review @ The 405
Score: 9/10
While Helsinki-born singer Olivia Merilahti and Paris multi-instrumentalist Dan Levy could so easily have sought to repeat their success with more of the same, they made the braver choice. Still as hooked on new and exciting sounds as before but also full of determination to make the best possible music, The Dø have spectacularly surpassed themselves with Both Ways Open Jaws – indeed, they have produced one of the most inventive, accomplished and engaging albums of the year.
Review: Jonathan Coulton – Artificial Heart
09 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Artificial Heart, Jocoserious, Jonathan Coulton, PopMatters, Portal, Review, Still Alive
Artist: Jonathan Coulton
Title: Artficial Heart
Label: Jocoserious
Review @ PopMatters
Score: 7/10
A few years ago after a show in Seattle, singer-songwriter and former computer programmer Jonathan Coulton was approached by two developers from multi-billion dollar videogame empire Valve Corporation. Agreeing to work with them on their new project, Coulton wrote “Still Alive”, the song which closed Valve’s 2007 puzzle game Portal. Featuring the vocals of a deranged artificial intelligence played by opera singer-turned-voice actress Ellen McLain, the piece drew on Coulton’s experience with geek culture and added millions of gamers to his expanding audience. Given the break of a lifetime, what is a self-described “internet superstar” to do next?
Review: Manic Street Preachers – National Treasures
02 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Columbia, Manic Street Preachers, National Treasures, Review, TLOBF
Artist: Manic Street Preachers
Title: National Treasures
Label: Columbia
Review @ The Line of Best Fit
Score: N/A
For a band that claimed they would never write a love song, Manic Street Preachers have inspired some strong emotions. For a band that also claimed they would record one album and break up, they have been doing so for 25 years, being met variously with adoration, derision, acclaim and scepticism. Having formed in South Wales in 1986 as four idealistic upstarts, the Manics became three elder statesmen of British rock, a cult force with international recognition and an uncommonly devoted fanbase.
Review: Shonen Knife – Osaka Ramones
02 Nov 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Good Charamel, Osaka Ramones, Review, Shonen Knife, The 405, The Ramones
Artist: Shonen Knife
Title: Osaka Ramones
Label: Good Charamel
Review @ The 405
Score: 9/10
Our often deep-seated cynicism about cover albums isn’t without justification. Routinely deployed by creatively exhausted bands to fulfil contractual obligations in the absence of new material, tribute records can be a dispiriting prospect. Then of course there’s the prospect of Japan’s premier punk outfit raiding the back catalogue of the Ramones…
Read the rest of the review at the 405
My interview with Naoko Yamano of Shonen Knife is coming soon
Review: Ane Brun – It All Starts With One
31 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Ane Brun, Balloon Ranger Recordings, It All Starts With One, PopMatters, Review
Artist: Ane Brun
Title: It All Starts With One
Label: Balloon Ranger
Review @ PopMatters
Score: 5/10
An idiosyncratic use of the English language, a seemingly impenetrable mystique, and songs that balance emotional expressiveness with a kind of northerly chill—when it comes to Scandinavian singer-songwriters, Ane Brun ticks many of the boxes. While in recent years contemporaries of hers like Robyn or Lykke Li have built increasingly successful pop careers on these foundations, Brun has always been different. More a serious chanteuse than a pop princess, she has nevertheless found a warm response in her native Norway.
Review: Peggy Sue – Acrobats (US Release)
28 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Acrobats, Brighton, Peggy Sue, PopMatters, Review, Wichita, Yep Roc
Artist: Peggy Sue
Title: Acrobats
Label: Yep Roc / Wichita
Review @ PopMatters
Score: 9/10
Acrobats is no Beatles for Sale, no abrupt admission by a sunny pop band that yes, love can be messy and complicated and fraught with difficulties. Instead, this tense and highly-charged album is part of the progression of a group that was once called Peggy Sue and the Pirates into a mature outfit increasingly in control of its own promising destiny.
Review: Catherine A.D. – Communion
28 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Catherine AD, Communion, Outsiderhood, Review, TLOBF
Artist: Catherine A.D.
Title: Communion
Label: Outsiderhood
Review @ The Line of Best Fit
Score: N/A
There has always been something knowingly superficial about Catherine Anne Davies. The fiery-haired Welsh pianist has cultivated so specific a persona that she alone carries the genre neologism “gothspel” and has made her name partly on a string-laden cover of Lady Gaga’s ‘Telephone’. Self-constrained to only piano, strings and vocals and recorded in a church in London’s Crouch End, it is no great surprise that her debut mini-album Communion is one of the most obviously contrived records of the year so far.
Review: Alessi’s Ark – Time Travel
05 Oct 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Alessi Laurent-Marke, Alessi's Ark, Bella Union, PopMatters, Review, Time Travel, US Release
Artist: Alessi’s Ark
Title: Time Travel
Label: Bella Union
Review @ PopMatters
Score: 6/10
At 16, Alessi Laurent-Marke left school in London to pursue a career in music and made a fateful promise to her parents – if she hadn’t found success within a year, she would admit defeat and return to education. At 17, her intense gigging and self-promotion had paid off, with her acoustic guitar playing and disarmingly breathy voice attracting attention to her gentle folk. Signed to a major, she was flown out to Omaha, Nebraska, and recorded a well-received debut with her dream producer, Mike Mogis of Bright Eyes. There are worse ways to start out.
Review: Richard Warren – The Wayfarer
22 Sep 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Laments, Review, Richard Warren, Spiritualized, The Wayfarer, TLOBF, TVT Records
Artist: Richard Warren
Title: The Wayfarer
Label: TVT
Review @ The Line of Best Fit
Score: N/A
At some point along the road, Richard Warren “got tired of lengthy, expensive studio trickery”, feeling that “life’s too short”. Even if this sounds like an unlikely sentiment coming from an experienced producer, a listen to Warren’s second album absolutely confirms that he spent very little time on smoothing over the sound. In fact, parts of The Wayfarer plumb sonic depths so murky that even its predecessor sounds like slick radio pop by comparison.
Read the rest of the review at The Line of Best Fit
Review: Mason Jennings – Minnesota
22 Sep 2011 Leave a Comment
in Record Reviews Tags: Hawaii, Mason Jennings, Minnesota, PopMatters, Review, Stats and Brackets
Artist: Mason Jennings
Title: Minnesota
Label: Stats and Brackets
Review @ PopMatters
Score: 5/10
A band like the Beatles were the exception, not the rule, as a group of extraordinary creatives who had the immense talent to put out thirteen superb albums in less than eight years. Conversely, Hawaii-born singer-songwriter Mason Jennings is among a comparatively small number of modern musicians whose bid to maintain an almost 1960s-esque work rate is arguably to the detriment of his records, Minnesota included.
