Super Desserts - Barefoot in the Disenchanted Forest

The Super Desserts’ new album is called Barefoot in the Disenchanted Forest, and it features song titles like “Still Unable to Speak...Claude Somehow Manages to Express His Opinion to a Pack of Wild Cougars, Who Are Surprisingly Supportive.” The CD also comes in a colorfully decorated 7-inch sleeve accompanied by a handmade, photocopied booklet full of collages, animals, people with animals’ heads and some hilarious liner notes.

All of this should tell you this ambitious, eccentric band has a predilection for the fantastical, along with lots of twee cuteness—hand claps, ukulele, banjo, glockenspiel, etc. Featuring Eve Searls (of Bird and Flower), Justin Riley (of Terribly Empty Pockets) and other local vets and newbies, the band is only made stronger by the full roster of capable musicians, rather than being weighed down. And while there’s a whole lot going on throughout the album, there are also moments of quiet, restrained beauty, like the guitar melody on “Steve Attends the Martian Funeral.…”

It’s not just a clever name. The Super Desserts are super sweet, but not like those nasty orange peanut-shaped candies that leave you feeling sick to your stomach. More like awesome fair food that leaves you fat and happy.

Catch the Super Desserts at the Treehouse Feb. 7 with Two Cow Garage, Ghost Shirt and Tree of Fern.

mp3: Super Desserts - On the Way to the Hospital, Claude is Riding on the Back Wheel of a Backward Jeep While Clara and Her Half-Brother are Riding on the Mystical Motorbike with the Three-Legged Unicorn (aka "Funeral")

(Also at The Other Paper)

Welcome to the Welcome Wagon

Sufjan Stevens is woefully behind on that whole 50-albums-about-50-states project he started a few years ago. He covered Michigan in 2003 and Illinois in ’05, but since then all we’ve heard, other than a Christmas box set (which I recommend--’tis the season!), was 2006’s Illinois outtakes, The Avalanche.

I, for one, have been getting impatient for more Sufjan, and now, finally, I have something to sate my need for Soof. No, there’s still no new release, but the Stevens-produced debut from the Welcome Wagon is a more-than-capable stand in ’till then.

The husband-wife team of Vito and Monique Aiuto form the band’s core, and like Stevens, much of the Aiutos’ music is biblically anchored, though more overtly in this case. Given Vito’s day job as pastor of a Presbyterian church in Williamsburg, Brooklyn (remember “Vito’s Ordination Song” on Michigan?), it’s not surprising. A few of the songs on Welcome to the Welcome Wagon are reworked versions of old spirituals, and the album cover and jacket are filled with dated, Precious Moments-evoking images. It’s purposefully campy and perhaps a bit ironic, but you get the feeling the couple is also sincere when the cover says, “May it help to comfort and sustain you.”

In the liner notes--written by Stevens, of course--he describes the Welcome Wagon as gospel music that is “refreshingly plain,” explaining that “it doesn’t impose its religious pitch on the listener with hyped up garnishes of sound; it merely conveys the deepest of convictions with the deadpan verdict of a surgeon.”

That’s pretty accurate. The Welcome Wagon manages to write gospel music that preaches without preachiness. Part of that’s the unadorned way in which the couple sings: Vito sounds astoundingly similar to Sufjan, and Monique’s voice is so childlike and dryly sweet that disliking it is akin to punching a puppy. The record’s charming, homespun vibe also plays a part in the band’s lack of pretense. The last song ends with Monique admitting, “Um, I screwed up twice.”

Old spirituals aren’t the only revamped source material here. The Auitos try their hand at the Smiths’ “Half a Person” and the Velvet Underground’s “Jesus,” and Daniel Smith (of Danielson) gets the songwriting credit for “Sold! To the Nice Rich Man.” It’s not surprisingly the most springy, near-danceable track.

Stevens’s fingerprints are all over the album, which makes sense, as he produced, recorded, engineered and mixed it, not to mention added vocals, banjo, bass, guitar, drums and on and on--more instruments than Vito and Monique combined. And in typical Sufjan fashion, some of the arrangements are overly ambitious (“I Am a Stranger”) and threaten to topple the “refreshingly plain” songs. But others, like the woozy marching-band romp of “You Made My Day,” are perfect.

So yes, it’s an album to tide you over till the next Sufjan Stevens outing, but it’s more than that, too. For me, that realization crystallized on the songs Vito wrote himself, like “American Legion.” At times it’s just Vito and a simple acoustic guitar recounting a somber memory. “If I’d been there I’d surely have stayed with you/ If I’d been there I’d surely have prayed for you, I want you to know,” he sings. It’s one of several moments where I realized this pastor and his wife are something special, with or without their friend with the funny first name.

Welcome to the Welcome Wagon is out Dec. 9 on Asthmatic Kitty Records.

mp3: The Welcome Wagon - Sold! To the Nice Rich Man

Battleground

So there's this big election tomorrow, and apparently Ohio has some significance in it. Here's a few of my favorite recent and semi-recent Ohio songs that should sound a lot nicer than the talking heads tomorrow night, if you find yourself needing a break from the chatter. (And if you like the Low Anthem track, I highly recommend picking up a copy of their new one, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin.)

mp3: The Low Anthem - To Ohio
mp3: Damien Jurado - Ohio
mp3: Lambchop - Ohio
mp3: Sun Kil Moon - Carry Me Ohio

Gentleman Auction House at The Futurist

I'll continue my pimping of underrated St. Louis band Gentleman Auction House by referring you to The Futurist, where they're hosting live mp3s of a recent WOXY Lounge Act. All the songs are keepers.

Gentleman Auction House, Yea Big + Kid Static, Bookmobile - High Five

Gentleman Auction House can’t seem to catch a break in Columbus. In June, the last time the St. Louis band came through, only a tiny handful of folks came out to the High Five. Last Thursday more people showed up at the same venue, but this time the band was plagued by sound problems all night.

Lead singer Eric Enger attempted to lead the seven-piece through “ABCDEFGraveyard,” a stomper of a tune the band likes to start off with, but Enger’s mic was cutting in and out throughout the song, so they had to stop and let the sound guy come back up and sort things out while the house music played again. Talk about a vibe killer.

It didn’t get much better on “Call it Casual,” but once “We Used to Dream About Bridges” kicked in, the band shook off the sound issues and started playing with the intensity they’re known for. And probably a little anger, too.

Enger’s Conor Oberst-ish voice led the bouncing band through indie pop anthems that pound their way into you. Anyone who wasn’t at least tapping a foot to the beat must have been a robot. And with everyone in the band shouting along to the songs, whether they had a mic or not, the performance felt like one big sing-along.

Before Gentleman Auction House took the stage, Michael Jackson was blaring through the speakers, and it was actually a fitting intro. There’s a reason GAH likes to throw in “R&B” when describing itself--some songs are all about the groove. “I Sleep in a Bed of Scissor Arms” is some of the most danceable indie rock you’ll hear this year.

The insistent snare of “The Book of Matches” anchored the last song of the set as floor toms flew off the stage and everyone screamed out their aggression for a night that could have been so much more. “We won’t stay down long,” Enger sang, and I believed him.

Preceding Gentleman Auction House was Yea Big + Kid Static, a Chicago rap duo I was completely unfamiliar with but thoroughly entertained by. Kid Static was a black dude in jeans and a T-shirt, and Yea Big was a red-haired white guy in yellow running shorts, a headband and socks pulled up to the tops of his ankles. An unlikely pair, to say the least.

The duo, which relied on a Macbook for the beats, started the set by stretching. Not I-just-woke-up stretching. These guys made sure to hit every muscle group. It was odd and a little awkward, but obviously tongue-in-cheek, and it made the next song all the more impressive when the two busted out their rhymes while making the stage look like a trampoline. Dance routines in the middle of songs were common, and to intro another tune the pair literally ran around the room yelling. With energy like that, even bearded hipsters and indie kids were getting down.

The acoustics of the High Five suck (wall of windows: nice-looking, bad for sound), so it was hard to discern a lot of Yea Big + Kid Static’s words, but what I did hear I liked. Some of it had dark overtones, but most of it was really playful, especially one about Mega Man (the Nintendo character) and another called “Eatchyo Samwich”--probably my favorite of the night.

Bookmobile’s set suffered from the bouncy acoustics, too, and a bad mix. Columbus’s ever-present man on the scene Sean Gardner (MeltyMelty, Kyle Sowashes, Winter Makes Sailors) was hard to hear above the guitar, but I still enjoyed his tunes. And his goofy dancing. Gardner’s the type of singer who sounds good even (or maybe especially?) when he’s off-key and often reminds me of David Bazan in that way. I liked the spastic guitar with choppy leads, too. So despite the sound issues, Bookmobile made a good impression. With all Gardner has going on, I don’t know if he considers this band a side project or not. But I say don’t relegate it to the sidelines.

mp3: Gentleman Auction House - I Sleep in a Bed of Scissor Arms
mp3: Yea Big + Kid Static - Eatchyo Samwich

Swell Season live

For those of you who caught the Swell Season show at the Palace Theatre last week and want to relive it, or if you just like the Swell Season and want to hear a good performance, PlayedLastNight.com has the full show as a .zip download here for $9.95, and the quality is pretty darn good. Worth the $10, in my book.

Here's a little taste--one of my favorites of the new songs the Once couple played called "I Have Loved You Wrong."

mp3: The Swell Season - I Have Loved You Wrong

Blitzen Trapper - Furr

Furr is Blitzen Trapper’s first release for Sub Pop, a label that has begun to reshape its sound into something pretty and pastoral, especially when you consider this is the label that released Nirvana’s Bleach and Mudhoney’s self-titled debut a little less than 20 years ago.

In its roster now are bands like Fleet Foxes, Band of Horses, Iron & Wine, Grand Archives and Loney, Dear. So it should come as no surprise that Furr is significantly less skronky than last year’s Wild Mountain Nation, a loose, lo-fi affair that harkened as much to Pavement as it did to alt.country and Deliverance-style banjo pickin’.

Still self-recorded by Blitzen’s singer/songwriter/producer, Eric Earley, Furr’s edges are more rounded. Even the songs with a runaway-train-falling-off-the-tracks approach (“Love U,” “Fire + Fast Bullets”) feel quieter and more restrained. And in between touring, Earley must have been listening to a lot of Dylan, because that troubadour’s influence can be felt all over this record—lyrically, melodically and even in Earley’s intonation.

For a band like Blitzen Trapper, it’s dangerous to “mature,” especially when what made Wild Mountain Nation so fun was its carefree, all-over-the-map aesthetic. But fortunately, maturity suits this Portland band, and the cohesion of Furr more than makes up for any real or perceived lack of spontaneity.

The title track is the keystone of the album, a warm folk song featuring only Earley’s voice and guitar (and a little harmonica) that revels in the band’s less noisy, more melodic new direction. Earley starts the song as a 17-year-old who wanders into the woods, hears the howling of a wolf and decides to join the pack: “So from the cliffs and highest hill we would gladly get our fill/Howling endlessly and shrilly at the dawn/ And I lost the taste for judging right from wrong/ For my flesh had turn to fur.”

The second verse finds the narrator on his 23rd birthday, the day he meets a girl similarly wandering in the woods and settles down on a farm with her to raise children. The fur has become skin again, and the narrator is now in a world “I confess I do not know.”

It’s a superbly written song, one I’ve listened to over and over. It works as a metaphor for all the various ways a man goes off to sow his wild oats (going to college, not going to college, starting a band, etc.), then eventually settles down. But the transition is never easy. It’s hard to shake that yearning for the freedom of the prodigal years. Still, Earley advises, “If you’re gonna get made, don’t be afraid of what you’ve learned.”

“Lady on the Water” and “Not Your Lover” are similarly mellow, the latter using a rickety old piano that found a place on several tunes, mostly to their betterment.

Blitzen Trapper hasn’t completely forgotten its past. Opener “Sleepytime in the Western World” melds old and new Blitzen, and “War on Machines” reminds me a lot of “Wild Mountain Nation,” not a bad thing. The band has found a way to refine and hone without becoming boring.

Furr is an album that with each listen may have you reconfiguring your top 20 list of 2008. And then your top 15. And your top 10.

mp3: Blitzen Trapper - Furr

(also at The Other Paper)

Bodies of Water w/ Port O'Brien and Tulsa - Skully's

It’s a testament to the ever-expanding canopy of indie rock that Bodies of Water can nestle comfortably next to several other similar groups. In a game of Connect 4, the band would be your winning token on top of Akron/Family, Arcade Fire and Danielson Famile—groups that feel more like micro-communities that happen to play music rather than mere bands. If you’re into that, Bodies of Water is your bread and butter.

And yet, on Monday night at Skully’s, the Los Angeles band revealed over and over again what keeps it from being just another commune of rockers.

It all came to a head on “Gold, Tan, Peach, and Grey,” the exceptionally strong opening track off the band’s latest, A Certain Feeling. It was one of the set’s standouts, too, and I’m pretty sure it’s the only eschatological prog-rock gospel anthem I’ve ever heard.

In it, the husband-and-wife team of David and Meredith Metcalf led the band through visions of the end days, starting softly, then building boisterously as the world melds into the song title’s colors. “Sever the silver cord/And break the golden bowl/And let us return to dust/And be at last made whole,” David Metcalf sang in near-cabaret tones, describing a new world without “talk of where or when” or “feelings of vague rapport.”

Meredith Metcalf dominated the end of the number singing from behind the keys, her beanpole frame bouncing madly to let the notes escape. She’s something to hear and behold, a tiny woman with an outrageously big range that often reaches into operatic territory.

“Only You” found the band slow and overcast (yet still captivating), but the vast majority of the songs revealed the band’s skill at crafting irony-absent compositions with distinct and often surprising movements. “Water Here” completely changed moods halfway through, abruptly jumping from a sing-along tribal song to something much funkier with a driving, contagious beat. David Metcalf’s impressive versatility on guitar was just as essential as the drums on multi-movement tunes like these. He’s a deceivingly great guitarist.

Between tunes, the band expressed its disappointment that White Castle is one of Columbus’s best examples of “regional food.” I was equally disappointed that the band neglected to include “Under the Pines” in its set, but “These Are the Eyes” made for a great closer, with the Metcalfs and company chanting “Nature forgave but I cannot forget” with increasing speed and ending with a bang. Not a whimper.

The intriguingly named Van Pierszalowski, the barefoot singer for the previous act, Port O’Brien, aptly described his group as an “Alaskan country-rock band.” In a different world, Pierszalowski could have fronted an early ’90s grunge band (“Tree Bones” sounded a whole lot like a Nirvana Unplugged tune), but in this world he leads his merry band of musicians through Neil Young-tinged soundscapes with lots of nautical references—presumably from his prior experience as an Alaskan fisherman.

The band picked up on the small crowd (Skully’s feels cavernous on a slow night) and seemed to be playing mostly to itself and cracking inside jokes, but it didn’t detract too much. Port O’Brien could give the Black Crowes a few lessons in jamming, too: Several songs broke out of acoustic mode and into instrumental breakdowns with frenetic, creative leads and rhythms. The tunes didn’t have as much power as Bodies of Water’s, but the band wasn’t a bad precursor nonetheless.

Tulsa opened the night, and the Boston trio reminded me of reverb-heavy rockers like Band of Horses, (early) My Morning Jacket and even Fleet Foxes, but forgoing a crystalline sound for a dirtier, more vintage vibe. Like label mate Dr. Dog, the band has a love for classic rock and pop.

The singer looked strikingly young, so I’ll be curious to see how he develops the band’s sound beyond something that right now doesn’t deserve too much more than a cursory mention. But a song like “Mass” shows the potential is there.

mp3: Bodies of Water - Under the Pines
mp3: Port O'Brien - I Woke Up Today
mp3: Tulsa - Mass

Dr. Dog - Fate

With the release of Fate, the members of Dr. Dog have put themselves in a tricky position, ripe for pooh-poohing from the bloodthirsty gatekeepers of irony who are ready to pounce in their rolled-jean capris. See, Fate is the Philly fivesome’s third straight album of unabashedly catchy ’60s pop that harkens back to a certain moppy-haired foursome from that era, complete with la la las and na na nas.

In 2005, Dr. Dog’s Easy Beat was a lo-fi, ramshackle affair; last year’s We All Belong was a bit more polished, and Fate’s production is as slick as singer/guitarist Scott McMicken’s unwashed locks. But other than that, the song remains the same. It’s that point in a band’s career where others have felt the need for reinvention—time to deconstruct that pop and rip it apart like Yankee Hotel Foxtrot-era Wilco, or infuse it with off-the-wall influences à la My Morning Jacket’s recent adventures.

But Dr. Dog has done nothing of the sort, and bully for them, I say. Deconstruction and reinvention isn’t a requirement, and shouldn’t be viewed as so. Why concoct something newfangled when the current recipe is tried and true?

Fate’s songs contemplate American malaise, as McMicken and fellow vocalist Toby Leaman tackle issues of action and inaction. “Army of Ancients” claims said army could arise and tear every nation apart, “and I’d still be sitting there counting my cards, wondering when will it start.” The chorus asks, “How did the fox get the raven to crow?” (followed by an “Oh yeah” that can only be described as Lennon-esque).

“The Ark” asks the question in a more direct way: “What does it mean to be here?” “Well I know because I can, and I will,” Dr. Dog answers, taking the easy route by implying the psychedelic-throwback maxim “Be Here Now.” But that bit of lyrical vapidity, which can also be found in a couple of other tracks, rarely overshadows the band’s knack for melody.

Carrying that melody on “The Old Days” is a saloon piano that fits right in with the album’s old-timey packaging, which will appeal to those who still like the tangible aspects of a record. The cover image is a quilted scene, and the insert is styled like a turn-of-the-century newspaper, each headline a song title with lyrics below.

As much as I’ve enjoyed the album, I’ll concede that Dr. Dog has planted its roots firmly in a sound and era that may not allow Fate’s songs to have endless staying power. But they sure do make for good sing-alongs. As the band advises on the opening track, “The Breeze,” if you feel like you’re stuck in time, just “put that needle to the groove, and sing.”

A Dr. Dog show scheduled for Tuesday at the Basement has been canceled, but the band is scheduled to perform for CD101’s Summerfest on Aug. 23 at the LC.
(From The Other Paper)

mp3: Dr. Dog - The Old Days

The Hold Steady - Stay Positive

It’s a pretty safe bet that an album by the Hold Steady will revolve around a few things: alcohol, drugs, sex and God. The formula is as old as rock ’n roll itself, but bandleader Craig Finn has done it better than most by weaving vivid tales of teen and twentysomething debauchery. And despite the new album’s title, Stay Positive is of the same mold.

People like to call the Hold Steady “bar rock,” whatever that means. Bar rock or not, the band excels at using classic rock archetypes and yes, Springsteen, to forge fist-pumping anthems soaked with beer and distortion. Since 2005’s Separation Sunday and the band’s breakthrough Boys and Girls in America in ’06, Franz Nicolay’s keyboard work has also become integral to the sound.

Boys and Girls captured the band in a more streamlined state, and Stay Positive takes that further with even more emphasis on production and some additional elements. You’ll notice a harpsichord on “One for the Cutters,” a talk-box solo on “Joke About Jamaica,” synth on “Navy Sheets,” etc. There’s even some guest vocals from the Drive-By Truckers’ Patterson Hood and Lucero’s Ben Nichols.

But the Hold Steady is a reflection of Finn first and foremost, his craggy voice talk-singing with almost audible spittle. In “One for the Cutters,” Finn tells the story of a girl who liked to party with townies when the regular crowd wasn’t around. They seemed pretty similar to her other friends, at least up until the night of the stabbing.

“Constructive Summer” and “Sequestered in Memphis” are classic Hold Steady rousers, while “Lord I’m Discouraged” is the album’s stand-out ballad--a piano-driven tune with a narrator who’s justifiably concerned about the “excuses and half truths and fortified wine” coming from a woman who won’t ever be his. “The sutures and bruises are none of my business,” he says, but “this guy from the north side comes down to visit. His visits they only take five or six minutes.”

The album as a whole sends decidedly mixed messages, though. “We gotta stay positive,” Finn says on the title track, and that glass-half-full mentality stems from the leadoff track’s assertion that “We are our only saviors.” Yet on the very next song, and for most of the rest of the album, we see story after story--told in squirmy, veracious detail--about humanity’s pitfalls. We have slave-like addictions to all the likely suspects. We sacrifice pieces of ourselves while trying unsuccessfully to fit in. We take advantage of other people. Sometimes we even kill each other. And we are our saviors? That’s supposed to make us stay positive?

Finn himself admits the glaring inconsistency in that title track again: “It’s one thing to start it with a positive jam, and it’s another thing to see it on through.”

A discrepant philosophy, though, is just another aspect of the human struggle, and embodying that plight is what the Hold Steady does best. After all, it wouldn’t be a Hold Steady album if Finn actually saw all that positivity through to the end. It’s his heartbreaking grasp of depravity that keeps us coming back.

mp3: The Hold Steady - One for the Cutters

Highway 62 Love Songs

I caught Tim Easton's show at Rumba Cafe Saturday night. He didn't disappoint. A full review will be coming shortly.

He also was selling a new "dirty boot bootleg" CD, complete with stapled construction-paper sleeve, titled "Highway 62 Love Songs." I put on the disc today, and it's anything but dirty--14 tracks of intimate, nicely recorded Easton songs, most of which are new. In the words of a McDonald's ad campaign, I'm lovin' it.

A couple tracks for your enjoyment:

mp3: Tim Easton - Two of Us
mp3: Tim Easton - Beat the Band

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

Titles - Bernie's, 7/13

The Titles show at Bernie’s on Sunday night was really disappointing, but that had nothing to do with Titles. The New Haven, Connecticut band played a great set--at least from the four songs I caught. The evening was a disjointed affair, and for some reason Titles got stuck playing the first slot.

Singer/guitarist Brad Amorosino was a good sport about it, and he led the band barefoot through a mix of diverse but accessible indie-pop songs with scraped vocals. Of the ones I caught, the tunes had some jazzy beats and country influences--especially “No Love,” a super-catchy song with some really nice pedal steel that can be found on the band’s impressive new album, Up With the Sun, on Safety Meeting Records (mp3s below).

Lead guitarist Matt Wilson, a more recent addition to the band, was a pleasure to watch and led the band through some tight jams in a style that reminded me of Nels Cline’s Sky Blue Sky Wilco contributions. It all ended too soon. Hopefully Titles will come back through Columbus on the next jaunt.

E for Explosion came up next, a late addition to the bill that really should have been relegated to the opening slot. The project is fronted by Jamison Covington of disbanded emo rockers JamisonParker. Explosion’s overdone songs were filled with big, empty choruses that would be the perfect soundtrack to the latest poorly written teen movie. One such example of a lyric repeated ad nauseum: “When you’re close to me, I’m in heaven.” I think the band is aiming for Taking Back Sunday meets Angels & Airwaves, or something like that.

Unfortunately for the band (but fortunately for me), the worthless sound man left during their set while the PA made a horrible, loud buzzing sound, so the bassist threw a hissy fit and they stopped after three songs. I overheard the drummer telling a fan, “We were about to play this beautiful song, and the PA was just going eeeeehhhhhh.” Who knows, maybe they were, but from what I heard, E for Explosion has a long way to go before they fall into the “beautiful” category.

Taking the stage next was local act TV Eye, a baby-faced trio (plus an inconsequential and slightly annoying tambourine player) led by the the singer/guitarist’s slurry garage-rock vocals and dirty, blues-based Telecaster riffs--heavy on the treble. The throwback songs were perfectly serviceable, but didn’t bowl me over.

At the end of the set, the drummer threw one of his sticks and said, “We used to play here a lot. It sucks now.” It seemed to be a sentiment shared by most of the musicians that night.

Winter Makes Sailors, a solo project from Columbusite Sean Gardener (The Kyle Sowashes, Melty Melty), closed the night. Accompanying Gardener was a group of musicians he said he’d never played with before, including a drummer, a guy playing atmospheric slide stuff and violin, another guy switching between keys, synth and trumpet (maybe vibraphone?) and a guest acoustic bassist.

Gardener was self-deprecating from the get-go, and it’s true his band was obviously unrehearsed. And the slide guy was way too loud. But the simple folk songs were nice, with creative arrangements, if a little rough around the edges. I also liked having the stage lit only by a single lamp.

Winter Makes Sailors and fellow locals Moon High would be a good fit for another show. But after this night, I’d relocate to somewhere other than Bernie’s.

mp3: Titles - No Love
mp3: Titles - Bloody Nose

Gentleman Auction House - High Five, 6/19

The original plan last Thursday night was to see Headlights at Cafe Bourbon St. But because of the ongoing renovations/ownership changes/legal stalemate/whatever at Bobo, the show was moved to the High Five to be combined with Gentleman Auction House, which sounded like a good idea. Then Headlights canceled completely, and I had to decide if it was worth covering only Gentleman Auction House, a band out of St. Louis on Emergency Umbrella Records (also home to local up-and-comer Sinkane).

I decided to go, and in one sense, it probably wasn’t the best call journalistically because the place was mostly empty (apparently word got around quickly that Headlights canceled). But in another sense, it was the exact right call because this band was absolutely terrific, putting on one of the best performances I’ve seen this year. Had I not gone, I never would have known about this fantastic band, and you, dear reader, wouldn’t either.

Gentleman Auction House’s seven members just barely squeezed onto the stage, and judging by their exuberance, you would have thought they were playing to a packed house. The two drummers pounded their simple, propulsive beats in unison as keyboard, guitar, trumpet, xylophone, synth and one more floor tom (for good measure) fell in line around the beat. It was as if the musicians couldn’t contain the energy in the songs and had to let it all out, if not with an instrument than by dancing or flailing. How refreshing to see a band that realizes it’s OK to love what you’re doing and show it.

GAH is best described generally as indie pop, but there’s an insatiable fire behind it. Think of the pop sensibilities of a less-precious Belle and Sebastian, the bombast of Arcade Fire and the eccentricities of Danielson all rolled into one. It could very well be the sound of your new favorite band.

Taking center stage was singer/songwriter/guitarist Eric Enger, whose voice is like a thicker, less tortured Conor Oberst. Others joined in on the vocals when a raucous chorus was needed, but ebullient keyboardist Kiley Lewis’s backing contributions were the most complementary and crucial--almost as crucial as her phrenetic, perma-grin dancing. It all got me excited and energized, which is quite a feat for 12:45 on a Thursday night when the headliner canceled.

“ABCDEFGraveyard” kicked off the set, a hand-clap anthem with an irresistible start-stop beat and some cowbell. “The Book of Matches,” also the title of the band’s recently released EP, found most of the band frantically shouting the damn-the-man chorus: “We’re shot like cannonballs off a mountaintop into oceans of our history, and we won’t stay down.” “New Moon” revealed Enger at his most desperate, pleading, “If you don’t think you can love me just be kind with the proof/ ‘Cuz I got a delicate heart and I’m under a new moon.” Uber-intellectual indie rockers take note: It’s OK to wear your heart on your sleeve every now and then.

It’s hard to pick a favorite among the infectious tunes; I just felt privileged to be one of the few in attendance for what felt like a private concert. Gentleman Auction House is supposedly coming back to town before too long, and the band’s full-length, Alphabet Graveyard, hits shelves July 22. I’ll be paying close attention to these guys in the coming months. You should too.

mp3: Gentleman Auction House - The Book of Matches

Weezer - The Red Album

By this point, Weezer leader Rivers Cuomo should know that self-titling a record and slapping a solid color behind a photo of his band won’t bring black the Blue Album’s 1994 glory days, when songs like “Buddy Holly” and “Undone--The Sweater Song” pushed the band to the top of modern-rock radio as all the neo-grunge peddlers watched in envy.

He tried it with the Green Album in 2001, a valiant effort with some stand-out tracks (“Photograph,” “Hash Pipe”), but still not a classic on the level of ‘ole Blue. And now we’ve got the Red Album, the cover of which reveals a mustachioed Cuomo in a cowboy hat and big belt buckle alongside his bandmates. Despite the earnest expression on his face, it’s gotta be a joke, because the whole album is downright goofy. Cuomo’s obviously trying to have as much fun as possible with his music, a laudable goal. But the result is a lot like that cover image of Cuomo--both awesome and awful. And you can almost divide the awesome from the awful right down the middle of the 10-track record. Weezer showcases its knack for writing breezy, hooky songs on only the first four tracks, making the album as top heavy as a toddler.

The first single, “Pork and Beans,” is Weezer at its best, playful and consciously catchy, musically mixing the quirkiness “El Scorcho” with the big, power-pop guitars of “No One Else.” There’s a reason Cuomo sings, “Everyone likes to dance to a happy song/ with a catchy chorus and beat so they can sing along.” And the chorus--“I’ma do the things that I wanna do/ I ain’t got a thing to prove to you”--brazenly shakes off all the critics who lambasted the band’s last album, Make Believe. “Troublemaker” cops a riff from Pinkerton’s “The Good Life” and transforms it into another classic, and “The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)” reveals how promiscuous Cuomo has become with genres. It incorporates rap, old-school metal, emo, a monk-like chorus and more. Excessive? Certainly, but I dare you not to like it.

“Heart Songs” is a laundry list of artists and songs that have inspired Cuomo over the years. The fact that he calls them “heart songs” is the biggest drawback to the track, conjuring up the title of a mix tape a coifed teen would nervously give to his doe-eyed sweetheart on One Tree Hill. But again, it’s impossible to dislike, and kudos to Cuomo for admitting that artists like Gordon Lightfoot and Quiet Riot are part of his musical history. (Take note, songwriters who claim they were listening to Captain Beefheart and Philip Glass in second grade.)

Then the hammer drops. The album goes from songs that are kinda fun to have stuck in your head to songs that will hopefully slip away immediately, because if they do stick it will make commercial jingles seem like a nice alternative. “Everybody Get Dangerous” centers around an overly familiar guitar riff and a chorus of “Everybody get dangerous, boo yah.” It reminds me of horribly trite songs I used to hear every weekend from so many Philadelphia bar bands--repetitive and unimaginative. “Dreamin’” features some of the cheesiest lyrics I’ve heard in quite a while. Over the sound of birds chirping, we hear about bluebirds in the meadows, bees in the air, goslings in the river and angels in the heavens. It wouldn’t be out of place on a Celine Dion song.

And gone are the days when Cuomo would fine his bandmates for various infractions. The band dynamics seem to be a lot better these days, with Cuomo even letting the other dudes write and sing. I’m glad they’re all getting along now, but guitarist Brian Bell’s “Thought I Knew” and drummer Pat Wilson’s “Automatic” are dreadfully out of place, and the choice to let bassist Scott Shriner sing “Cold Dark World” destroyed an already below-average song.

Yes, it’s unreasonable and unfair to expect Blue Album songs from every Weezer release, but those little splices of greatness at the beginning make the bad tunes all the more disappointing. Maybe it’s that bushy mustache that’s throwing Cuomo off. I vote for a neck beard on the next album.

mp3: Weezer - The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)

Leviathan Bound

Matador is offering up another track for free from Shearwater's Rook. Download "Leviathan Bound" here.

Southeast Engine

After releasing its third album on Misra Records last October, Athens, Ohio group Southeast Engine has finally been deemed worthy of a review by Pitchfork. Better late than never, I guess. A Wheel Within a Wheel, the title of which is a biblical reference to a trippy vision in Ezekiel, is absolutely stellar--probably one of the most overlooked albums in 2007. I still have no qualms about including it in my top five from last year.

Fortunately for the arty, alt.-country indie rockers, P-fork gave it a respectable 7.1. What's the difference between 7 and 7.1 you ask? Nothing. Still, love 'em or hate 'em, Pitchfork can make or break a band, and I hope they end up making this one. I particularly like this description in the review: "A Wheel Within a Wheel is more complex than the average Christian rock tract. The Biblical/religious imagery running throughout the disc doesn't tip the group's hand so much as provide the album a fruitful thematic framework as Remnant shouts into the abyss in search of answers."

For a better review, though, Paste's Andy Whitman wrote about the band a while back here (scroll down to Dec. 15).

Here in Ohio, you can catch Southeast Engine at the Nelsonville Art & Music Festival, along with the Avett Brothers, Akron/Family, Moviola, O'Death, Justin Townes Earle and others, May 16-18.

mp3: Southeast Engine - Oh God, Let Me Back In

The Weepies - Hideaway

On the cover of The Weepies’ last album, Say I Am You, were two little white songbirds gazing at each other. The husband-wife duo’s first record, Happiness, had a line drawing of salt and pepper shakers on the cover. Most of the songs on the albums fit the art--cute folk-pop ditties like “Gotta Have You,” Take it from Me” and “All That I Want” embraced that early honeymoon stage of relationship bliss.

Since Say I Am You came out in 2006, Deb Talan and Steve Tannen have been busy--touring behind an unexpectedly successful album, plugging their pleasant tunes onto TV shows and Old Navy or JC Penney commercials, and having a baby. Apparently all these life changes have taken a toll on the couple.

The cover of The Weepies’ newest, Hideaway, shows a lone whale hiding from stars beneath the ocean. And those birds? They’re not quite the same. In “Little Bird,” Talan asks her feathered friend to “Brush your gray wings on my head/Say what you said, say it again/They tell me I’m crazy/But you told me I’m golden.” The minor, descending guitar riff, mournful strings, subtle ambient noises and layered vocals add some gravity to the matter.

It’s not too surprising that this record would be more somber. After all, there’s only one direction to go after titling a debut album Happiness. Still, this is only in comparison to The Weepies’ previous material. There’s nothing edgy here, and even the forlorn songs sound pretty amid the milky production and voices perfectly suited for the inventive harmonies. Talan, who’s a little chipmunky, takes the lead on most songs, and Tannen chimes in often to fill out the simpatico sound.

A review in Paste a couple of years ago described Say I Am You as “Sunday-morning songs for the coffee-and-New York Times set,” and that still holds true. In some ways, Hideaway is well-suited as a background album. It doesn’t require any active listening as the pop melodies come and go smoothly and sweetly. If you’re not into passive listening, that can be one of the Weepies’ few faults (along with going a bit overboard on background vocal tracks).

But unlike most palatable pop, Hideaway (and the rest of The Weepies’ catalog) doesn’t go stale with repetition. (Trust me; my wife plays them constantly.) Songs like “Antarctica” and the title track will likely burrow themselves into your brain for days. Unlike the hopeful “Stars” off the last album, “Hideaway” is a glass-half-empty take on the celestial bodies: “Even the stars sometimes fade to gray/Even the stars hideaway.” “Antarctica” continues the theme of isolation as Talan refers to the continent as “my only living relative.” And yet, both songs are still whimsical enough to soundtrack a bright spring day, despite the morose lyrical overtones.

The album ends on a more uplifting note with “All This Beauty.” The song revels in beauty so intense “you might have to close your eyes and slowly open wide,” proving that there’s light behind everything The Weepies do. In fact, even that whale on the cover--the one lingering alone in a sea of blue--has a smile on his face.

Hideaway is out now on Nettwerk.

mp3: The Weepies - Hideaway

Derek Webb with Sandra McCracken

Back in 2006, when In Rainbows was merely a twinkle in Thom Yorke’s lazy eye, Derek Webb released his third solo album, Mockingbird, for free. The album had a more typical release in late 2005, but starting the following September, Webb began giving the album away on the Free Derek Webb website in exchange for a downloader’s name, email, zip code and the e-mail of five friends. More than 80,000 people downloaded the album.

It’s a tactic that fits the progressive persona of Webb, an evangelical Christian who began his career with Christian radio faves Caedmon’s Call and has been putting out surprising solo releases since 2003. Webb has described himself as an artist who occupies “a niche within a niche within a niche.” At his show Friday night--which was a benefit concert for Project Compassion, an organization that provides assistance to Central Ohioans with HIV and AIDS--that proved to be true.

Evangelicals tend to label Webb as a dastardly liberal, and liberals find him too evangelical; the mainstream Christian market shies away from his not-so-subtle criticisms of the church and the government, while mainstream radio thinks he’s too Christian (after all, this show took place at New Life Church in Gahanna). Folkies and indie rockers also haven’t let him into the club as they have contemporaries like Sufjan Stevens or David Bazan of Pedro the Lion.

Webb kicked off the show as a backup musician for opener Sandra McCracken, who also happens to be his wife. The Nashville couple created a nice, off-the-cuff mood for her set of originals, as well as some tunes they co-wrote off the home-recorded Ampersand EP that was released last week. McCracken has a lovely, pure voice that resonates live better than on record, where she sometimes slides into adult-contemporary land. It’s nothing brazenly new, but she has folk pop nailed--“Grey’s Anatomy” noticed and picked up one of her older songs, “Ten Thousand Angels,” recently. The Dylan cover “If Not For You” rang especially true.

The highlight, though, was Webb’s solo set, thanks to his scratchy-at-the-summit vocals, folky hooks and biting lyrics. And while Webb does tread a starkly different path from those in the mainstream Christian music industry, it would be a mistake to characterize him as someone who’s not “preachy.” Each song has a message, a very clear one. But he takes cues from protest folk singers as opposed to sentimental schlocks you’re likely to hear on The River.

Take the sarcasm-laden “New Law” off Mockingbird: “Don’t teach me about politics and government, just tell me who to vote for/ Don’t teach me about truth and beauty, just label my music/…I don’t wanna know if the answers aren’t easy, so just bring it down from the mountain to me/ I want a new law.” Or the politically charged “A King & A Kingdom”: “There are two great lies that I’ve heard: ‘The day you eat of the fruit of that tree, you will not surely die,’ and that Jesus Christ was a white, middle-class Republican.”

It’s a rare breath of fresh air for an artist who sings about faith to push the envelope and make some people squirm. Webb said jokingly that his goal is to eventually alienate everybody--his next album will focus on race and sexuality. Apparently he’s still palatable enough, though, because “Grey’s Anatomy” picked up one of his songs, too: “Name,” off of last year’s more electric The Ringing Bell, was recently played over a lengthy montage of fornicating doctors. “It’s as close to a hit as I’ve ever had, or probably ever will have,” he said.

That may or may not be true. Webb’s acoustic rendition of “I Wanna Marry You All Over Again” was funny, quirky and catchy--a good recipe for a love-song crossover hit. But in the off chance it becomes a top download on iTunes, don’t be surprised if he just starts giving it away.

(More slightly out-of-focus pics with bad lighting here.)

mp3: Derek Webb - Mockingbird

Times New Viking, Psychedelic Horseshit - Cafe Bourbon St., 3-22-08

Recently I was listening to Psychedelic Horseshit through headphones, and halfway through the song there was no sound coming through the right earbud. Normally, this would cause me to check my headphone connection to see if the jack had become partially unplugged. But I didn’t. I just assumed it was purposeful, and I didn’t realize it was a faulty connection until the next song started.

The fact that I didn’t check is telling. Horseshit’s sound is messiness to the max, the exact opposite of a headphone album. On the band’s Siltbreeze full-length, Magic Flowers Droned, and on Columbus Discount Records seven-inch Who Let the Dogs Out, it’s as if every instrument, including singer Matt Whitehurst’s voice, was dragged across sandpaper before being recorded in low fidelity. Every song is scratched and scraped, a jumbled muddle of fuzzy guitars, synth organ and brittle drums.

At Cafe Bourbon St. on Saturday night, it was the same story. But what makes the band compelling, along with headliners and fellow shitgazers Times New Viking, is that cloaked underneath that scarred exterior and disaffected aesthetic are pop tunes.

One of the best examples is Horseshit’s “Bad Vibrations,” a song the Bourbon St. crowd chanted along to as Whitehurst spewed the refrain with a snarl: “I’m picking up bad vibrations everywhere that I go. I’m picking up bad vibrations from everyone that I know.” It’s a purposeful reference to the Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations,” a clever way of revealing the band’s intentions for taking simple pop songs and deconstructing them almost to the point of obliteration, but still leaving that scrap of a hook that you may just barely decipher once, but with a little patience and willingness to damage your eardrums, will begin to reveal itself more and more.

A fair amount of the band’s short set felt improvised, as bassist and kindred spirit Kevin DeBroux--also the sole static member of Pink Reason--followed Whitehurst’s lead and occasionally banged some notes on a Korg that teetered on top of a stack of milk crates. Drummer Rich Johnston held the beat (usually) on a stripped-down kit that featured a cardboard box with a cinder block inside instead of a bass drum, as is his custom. Not surprisingly, it was barely audible. Johnston also stuck a mic inside a saxophone at the end of the set and squealed for a bit too long.

Times New Viking is like Psychedelic Horseshit’s older brother, a band in the same fuzzy vein, but with more of a pop sensibility and a record on super-indie label Matador. The show was a sort of homecoming for TNV, playing its home-base venue after weeks on the road. The place was full for Horseshit, but it was absolutely packed to bursting capacity for Times New Viking. The entire front section of the bar turned into a giant mosh pit that had frightened girlfriends retreating back to the safe zone.

“We are not Vampire Weekend,” drummer/singer Adam Elliott announced as the band took the stage, just in case there was any confusion with the other blogosphere buzz band. TNV sounded at home at Cafe Bobo, keeping its set loose and its chemistry tight while favoring mostly older songs, including one the band hadn’t played since 2005. I’ve come to love Rip It Off, so I was a bit disappointed with the lack of newer material, but the fervor of the band’s performance mostly made up for it. On vocals and keys, Beth Murphy looked and sounded entirely more comfortable than she did at the recent Wexner Center show. The trio are bonified Columbus rock stars, and it showed.

There’s a reason some people prefer the term “shit-pop” over “shitgaze” when describing Times New Viking’s sound. “Devo and Wine,” “Teenage Lust!” and “DROP-OUT” were perfect examples of crowd sing-alongs that easily get lodged in your head for days.

Yuppies from Omaha screamed with an intensity I haven’t seen in a while, but it wasn’t contagious. The trio mostly took turns screaming, and I’m pretty sure the guitarist’s voice hadn’t changed yet, so these guys will have plenty of time to refine their sound. There’s plenty of potential and passion there, but I’d like to see them develop some tunes that are a bit less predictable.

I never caught the name of the second band on the bill, but it didn’t matter because it sounded like a high school band playing Against Me covers. Openers RTFO Bandwagon were obviously unrehearsed, with at least two false starts, an inordinately out-of-tune guitar and Horseshit’s borrowed drummer, who seemed perpetually lost. But despite all that, the band was the most impressive of the openers, playing jittery, catchy tunes with playful yet earnest vocals. With some more practice, this band’s art pop could take off. The sheepish-looking tambourine player probably isn’t needed, though.

More photos here.

mp3: Psychedelic Horseshit - New Wave Hippies