Southeast Engine - From the Forest to the Sea

Adam Remnant is a tortured soul. The singer of Athens, Ohio, band Southeast Engine revealed that on 2007’s A Wheel Within a Wheel, and he’s done it again on From the Forest to the Sea. The proof is in his tattered, tremulous voice, but it’s in his lyrics even more.

As on Wheel, Remnant vents his frustration through a spiritual lens, one that doesn’t have even a hint of a rose-colored tint. The record is chock full of Biblical allusions and allegory and probably other applicable words that begin with “a,” but the religiosity is never oppressive. It’s the fabric Remnant uses to reveal his shortcomings. He shows us a world that is broken and full of evil, and he wants everyone to know he’s the worst offender.

The album opens with three-part suite “The Forest,” which finds the anti-hero emerging from a wedding ceremony (possibly doubling as a funeral) and heading into the woods. “I said I wouldn’t do no evil, but evil’s just what I’ve done,” Remnant admits, and by part II there’s already talk of “broken vows.” Gorgeous piano eventually crescendos in part III. “Here I am now rising!” he exclaims, but the heavenly ascent is cut short when an outstretched arm from above turns him away.

The rest of the record mixes similar imagery with real-life details while the black cloud of an extramarital affair hangs menacingly over most songs, many of which bleed into the other; From the Forest to the Sea flows like a rolling landscape from beginning to end.

In “Black Gold,” Remnant can’t even talk about the pitfalls of the coal industry without relating it to a mistress--“Every time that she’s ignored she knocks louder on your door.” Noah’s great flood also shows up, churning and battering Remnant further. But he again makes it clear he’s no Christ type: “I can’t be walking on water when my shadow weighs a ton.”

Southeast Engine elicits fewer early Wilco comparisons these days. Still, amid the saloon piano, carnival organs and crunchy guitars, that malleable “Americana” signifier still seems to fit. And as with most concept albums, this record isn’t immediately accessible. It takes a few spins to let the metanarrative sink in. And while there aren’t many traditional song structures here, they’re still singable and become progressively addictive.

There’s a little sliver of light on the last song of the album, “From the Roots of the Mountains to Your Holy Temple.” As Remnant/the protagonist’s life is coming to an end at the bottom of the sea, his blood will become oil, greedy men will find him and “it’ll be up and out through the tunnel to rise into the sky.” It’s redemption in a sense, but a mucky one, because while we know that he’s headed toward the temple, Remnant never tells us if that outstretched arm brings him into the fold this time around. Spiritually, his journey isn’t over, and that bodes well for Southeast Engine musically. To steal a slogan, Remnant’s pain is our gain.

Southeast Engine’s Columbus release show is tonight at the Treehouse with the Kyle Sowashes, the Coke Dares and Frontier Ruckus.

mp3: Southeast Engine - Black Gold

(Also at The Other Paper.)

Alina Simone - Everyone is Crying Out to Me, Beware

It seems like an odd choice for an artist to release a sophomore album of cover material, especially someone looking to build on some debut-album buzz. But that’s what Alina Simone decided to do with her new one, Everyone is Crying Out to Me, Beware, a nine-song record of songs by Soviet-era songwriter Yanka Dyagileva.

For Simone, though, it’s not too much of a stretch. She was born in the Ukraine, then spent most of her youth in Massachusetts, graduating from art school in Boston before heading to Austin where she spent some time busking. She eventually graduated to clubs and bars in New York, releasing her debut album, Placelessness, last year. Her summer tour will bring her to Columbus Wednesday for a free show at Surly Girl with the Black Swans’ Jerry DeCicca.

Simone has also spent a lot of time in Siberia, where she first became acquainted with the music of Dyagileva, a folk singer with punk leanings (drawn from peer Egor Letov) who reached cult status in Russia only after her supposed suicide in 1991 at the age of 24. (Think Americans’ fascination with similarly tortured soul Nick Drake, but probably on a larger scale.)

Last year, the Durham Arts Council in North Carolina awarded Simone a grant to record some of Dyagileva’s tunes. Because of Simone’s history, Placelessness had a vaguely Russian feel, but this is taken to the obvious extreme on Beware, as everything is sung entirely in Russian. There’s also a spontaneous, somewhat lo-fi vibe on the album as Simone and her producer attempted to capture a feeling similar to Dyagileva’s original tapes.

Out of mental laziness and a previous unfamiliarity with Dyagileva, I admit I wasn’t initially excited about listening repeatedly to a Russian album. But to my surprise, I’ve begun enjoying Beware more than Placelessness, which probably caters more to fans of PJ Harvey and Bjork while this record eschews vocal histrionics for a more restrained but no less aroused approach.

The ramshackle nylon-stringed acoustic and occasional electric guitars, plus simple, organic-sounding horn and string arrangements, add a brooding backdrop to Simone’s renderings. Unless you speak Russian, chances are you’ll be clueless as to what she’s saying, but that shouldn’t stop you from understanding what she’s talking about. The glowering songs aptly convey Dyagileva’s restlessness and anger.

On “From Great Knowledge,“ Simone significantly slows the tempo from Dyagileva’s original to give full weight to the dark, desperate lyrics (translated): “From great knowledge comes only sorrow/ From a reckless mind, only ditches and moats/ From a beautiful soul, only scabs and lice/ From universal love, only mugs in blood.” A moaning cello adds gravity to the matter.

Perhaps the best description of these songs is the title of third track, “My Sadness is Luminous.” Simone’s reworking of the tunes communicates a distinct despair, but she also successfully seizes the palpable glow of Dyagileva’s music that still attracts followers like moths to lamplight.

mp3: Alina Simone - Beware