ALTER.NATION #119 (20trx 1h 15m)
Lost Horizons, François & the Atlas Mountains, Julien Baker, Black Nash, Altin Gün, Nightshift, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Cloud Nothings, Alice Cooper, Mouse on Mars, Adrian Younge, Menahan Street Band
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"H a l c y o n"
Lost Horizons - In Quiet Moments / Halcyon feat. Penelope Isles / Unravelling In Slow Motion feat. Ren Harvieu
When the duo of Simon Raymonde (Cocteau Twins) and Richard Thomas (Dif Juz) released Ojalá, their debut album as Lost Horizons, in late 2017, it marked a return to recording for both for the first time in 20 years. Motivated by a world in need of hope as well as a return to music-making, the 15-track set consisted of improvisation-based instrumentals that Raymonde (bass, guitar, keyboards, production) and Thomas (drums, additional keys and guitar) then passed along to collaborators, who were tasked with adding lyrics and vocals. They take the same approach three years later with the 16-song In Quiet Moments, this time with themes of death and rebirth suggested to the lyricists. (Raymonde's mother had died in the interim.)... In Quiet Moments begins with "Halcyon," featuring Penelope Isles. They're one of a handful of representatives here from Raymonde's Bella Union label, which also houses Lost Horizons. The song sets the mood with a haunting indie rock created with a low pitch range (established by bass guitar), ringing guitar tones, wistful chord colors, and ghostly, wordless vocals before the plaintive main melody even makes its entrance. At that point, the track remains atmospheric in nature -- as does the album -- with hard-to-discern lyrics, weeping guitar riffs, and a steady, middling tempo. The tone throughout In Quiet Moments tends toward an eerie, even foreboding poignance, if one with grooving rhythms and occasionally brighter arrangements... Ren Harvieu's "Unravelling in Slow Motion," which opts for a smoky, jazz lounge feel...
François & the Atlas Mountains - Banane Bleue / Par le passé / Tourne Autour
...Ironically, the sixth release by his longtime band is essentially another solo outing, this time in collaboration with Finnish synth pop producer Jaakko Eino Kalevi. Breezier and more playful than some of his recent releases, Banane Bleue (yes, that translates to Blue Banana in English) is also smaller in scale, with Marry often relying on borrowed instruments and makeshift recording spaces... Less busy than some of the group's mid-2010s albums, Banane Bleue opts for more minimal arrangements with softly pulsing synths, bright guitars, shimmering harmonies, and a surprising amount of pop hooks...
Julien Baker - Little Oblivions / Ringside / Favor
Julien Baker's third album, Little Oblivions, follows her first appearance on the Billboard 200 with 2017's Turn Out the Lights as well as a full-length collaboration with like-minded singer/songwriters Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus under the handle Boygenius. Giving the impression of being ready for bigger stages, Little Oblivions turns up the volume and expands arrangements, including notably adding a consistent rhythm section to her songs for the first time. Beyond mere "full-band arrangement," though, tracks like "Ringside" ... It's a sharp contrast to her sparse and brittle debut, though the music remains almost entirely self-made, with Baker performing all but an "additional instrumentation" credit from engineer Calvin Lauber and backing vocals by Dacus and Bridgers on one track ("Favor")... "How long do I have until I've spent up everyone's good will?" ("Favor") populate emo-adjacent songs about waning faith, drinking, depression, and doomed relationships. There are glimmers of gratitude alongside the masochistic ideation of entries including "Ringside," where she casts herself as her own opponent in the ring. That song also deviates from typically rising and falling, sine wave-shaped instrumentation patterns, opting instead of constantly churning accompaniment...
Black Nash - Black Nash / Love Underwater / Burn My Body Down
...melding the daydreamy funk of Unknown Mortal Orchestra's danciest moments with the damaged, lo-fi production of artists like Homeshake or Cleaners from Venus. Smith doesn't stay in one mode for long, though, even within the same song. Album standout "Love Underwater" begins as a sunny acoustic tune and grows increasingly psychedelic as surreal lyrics about dolphins and the C.I.A. and layers of wild guitar overdubs or distorted drums enter the mix. Smith's songwriting style nods to insular, curious talents like Emmit Rhodes or Alex Chilton, but he always dismantles his songs before they get too easily digestible...
On their second album, Gece, Altin Gün perfected their updated version of the Turkish psychedelia of the late '60s/early '70s. The group of musicians from Holland and Turkey gave familiar Turkish folk songs a gleaming upgrade that combined bouncy rhythms with soaring electric saz lines, heartfelt vocals, and an overall feel of psychedelic warmth that was at once comforting and thrillingly new. Not content to repeat themselves, the band altered the approach and sound on 2021's Yol in a couple important ways. Thanks to the global pandemic, they weren't able to work together in a studio and instead traded ideas over email and shared files... It's a little shocking the first time "Ordunun Dereleri" -- which has all the rain-streaked windshield melancholy of Chromatics...
Nightshift - Zöe / Outta Space / Power Cut
After an album that saw the Glasgow combo Nightshift diving deep into noisy, off-kilter post-punk, they return with something more tightly wound and sparse that separates them from other bands plying a similar trade. Due to restrictions on recording in studios, the group worked remotely on Zöe, laying down loops and adding parts piece by piece in their respective homes. Whatever might have been lost by subtracting the energy of people playing together in the same room is offset by the home-cooked care put into the construction of the songs. Each track feels like it was painstakingly assembled out of scraps of sound, sewn together seamlessly and in fascinating ways.... This may only be Nightshift's second album, but it feels like the work of a well-seasoned group who have perfected their approach and sound.
While in lockdown, the dudes in King Gizzard spent their time recording songs. No shock there since that's just about all they seem to do given the prodigious output. In fact, they made enough for two albums... but 2021's L.W. somehow succeeds in ways that K.G. didn't. Maybe it's simply that the band might have saved the better songs for this record. Almost everything here sounds like they are firing on all cylinders; whether it's the rambling road-trip rock of "East West Link," the funky clavinet jam "If Not Now, Then When?," boogie rock-adjacent "Ataraxia," or 100 mph psychedelic blowout "See Me," the band come across with more vigor and verve than they did on K.G. Even when they slow things down, like on the evil-sounding swamp rocker "O.N.E."...
Cloud Nothings - The Shadow I Remember / The Spirit Of / A Longer Moon
Since Attack on Memory, Cloud Nothings have more than proven themselves as a formidable rock band. However, there's always been something special about Dylan Baldi's pithy, poignant pop songs. While most of the group's albums featured at least one or two of these gems, The Shadow I Remember is the first to focus on this side of Baldi's music since Cloud Nothings moved out of his bedroom. Baldi and company also come full circle with the album's creation: they recorded it with Steve Albini at his Electrical Audio studio, where they made Attack. In their own way, The Shadow I Remember's compact, hooky outbursts are just as potent as the slow-burning epics on Cloud Nothings' other albums. They're so seasoned that they can shift from bouncy to crushing and back again in a blink on "The Spirit Of," ... "A Longer Moon" give the song an impressively cosmic sweep. By revisiting their past, Cloud Nothings find something new in it, as well as something timeless, and The Shadow I Remember is a full-throated, full-hearted triumph.
Melvins - Working With God / Negative No No
As the years turned into decades, grunge forecasters the Melvins became more and more mercurial in their overall concept of where the band began and ended... Los Melvins were an incarnation including founding Melvin King Buzzo, longtime mainstay Dale Crover, and original drummer Mike Dillard. Working with God reunites this lineup (also sometimes referred to as "Melvins 1983" due to Dillard and Buzzo's 1983 formation of the band) for an album that includes returns to the band's early, sludgy power as well as some of the goofy juvenilia and lighthearted freakery of their 2010s output... With nothing to prove and never having seemed too concerned about impressing anyone, the Melvins continue to take their wild-eyed chaos anywhere they choose -- Working with God goes to some places that are strange and unforeseen even for them.
Pioneers of heavy rock and masters of shock rock in the early '70s, whose titular lead singer became a successful solo artist.
Alice Cooper - Detroit Stories / Rock & Roll (Lou Reed - The Velvet Underground cover)
.On his 2019 EP Breadcrumbs, shock rock pioneer Alice Cooper paid tribute to his hometown of Detroit... Cooper's longtime producer Bob Erzin delivers the same thick, powerful sound he's achieved on many of Cooper's post-2000s albums, with booming heavy metal drums, walls of guitar, and Cooper's sinister vocals high in the mix... Detroit Stories is stuck in a confusing limbo somewhere between tribute to Detroit and another album of the kind of campy, theatrical, radio-geared hard rock Cooper has been turning in since Hey Stoopid...
Mouse on Mars - AAI / The Latent Space
On AAI, Mouse on Mars once again reinvent the tireless creativity that's driven them since the beginning of their career. After chopping up the vocals and performances of Bon Iver's Justin Vernon and the National's Bryce Dessner and abstracting them into electronic anonymity on their previous album Dimensional People, this time Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner take the opposite approach: They synthesize the soul of artificial intelligence and give it a voice... The narrative style Mouse on Mars flirted with on Dimensional People blossoms on AAI's fully formed world-building: On "The Latent Space," wild electro-acoustic polyrhythms and sprightly vocalizations evoke a virtual gestation that sets the stage for the AI's evolution over the course of the album...
Adrian Younge - The American Negro / Rotten Roses
The American Negro is an unapologetic critique, detailing the systemic and malevolent psychology that afflicts people of color. This project dissects the chemistry behind blind racism, using music as the medium to restore dignity and self-worth to my people. It should be evident that any examination of black music is an examination of the relationship between black and white America. This relationship has shaped the cultural evolution of the world and its negative roots run deep into our psyche. .. Vocals: Performed by Loren Oden, Chester Gregory and Sam Harmonix
Proud sons of the extended Daptone Records family (though they officially record for their sibling label Dunham Records), the Menahan Street Band often get lumped in with the neo-soul revival, largely thanks to their label associations and their work backing up powerhouse R&B vocalist Charles Bradley. However, while 2021's The Exciting Sounds of the Menahan Street Band sounds very soulful indeed, it doesn't often sound like soul music. On these 14 instrumental tracks, the band's music frequently plays like a collection of soundtrack pieces to forgotten movies and television shows of the '70s... and if you're looking for cool atmospheres for your home or automobile with a large percentage of vintage flair, this is an ideal aural backdrop, not to mention a showcase for some excellent instrumentalists with an appreciation of things past and present.
Lost Horizons, François & the Atlas Mountains, Julien Baker, Black Nash,Altin Gün, Nightshift, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Cloud Nothings, Alice Cooper, Mouse on Mars, Adrian Younge, Menahan Street Band
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