ALTER.NATION #91
Norah Jones, Jehnny Beth, Maserati, Built to Spill, Daniel Johnston, Sammy Brue, Dougie Poole, Bibio, Kahil El'zabar, Kurt Rosenwinkel, GoGo Penguin, Boney James, Noveller
weekly favtraX
1 4 - 0 6 - 2 0 2 0
"Hurts to Be Alone"
Norah Jones - Pick Me Up Off the Floor / Hurts to Be Alone
Once she came to the end of the promotional cycle for 2016's Day Breaks, Norah Jones decided to challenge herself by recording a series of swift sessions with a rotating cast of collaborators. The intention was to release the results quickly, issuing them as a digital single at a time, and Jones followed through on this plan, releasing a new song every few months throughout 2018. These tunes were rounded up on 2019's Begin Again, but that wasn't the end of the project. Jones cut a number of songs during these sessions that were unreleased but not forgotten by the singer/songwriter. She kept listening to the rough mixes, eventually coming to the conclusion that these tracks would make a strong album of their own accord. Pick Me Up Off the Floor proves her instincts were correct...
Jehnny Beth - To Love Is to Live / Flower
Arriving four years after Adore Life, Jehnny Beth's solo debut, To Love Is to Live, is exactly the kind of work expected from an envelope-pushing, multidisciplinary artist like Savages' frontwoman, yet it still manages to surprise. In Beth's eyes, living and loving aren't supposed to be easy -- it's the struggle and risk involved that makes both of them worthwhile. She never lets herself, or her listeners, get too comfortable on To Love Is to Live...
Maserati - Enter the Mirror / Wallwalker
....Enter the Mirror evokes the real and fantasy crises of the '80s as well as the 2020s, and Maserati's vocoder-heavy robot rock sounds sleeker and feels more ominous than it has in some time. .. "Wallwalker" boasts riffs and solos big enough to fill a stadium before it effortlessly shifts gears and hits the dancefloor. Familiar yet unpredictable moments like these make Enter the Mirror a confident, dynamic celebration of Maserati's 20th year of reimagining the future of decades past with 20/20 hindsight.
Built to Spill Plays the Songs of Daniel Johnston / Impossible Love
As with other talented but troubled artists such as Syd Barrett, Brian Wilson, and Roky Erickson, Daniel Johnston fights a daily battle with the chronic mental illness that has plagued him nearly his entire life.
In 2017, Built to Spill had the honor of serving as backing band for Daniel Johnston for two shows, and during rehearsals they decided to record a handful of their favorite songs to share with friends. The shows turned out well and a couple years later the trio of vocalist/guitarist Doug Martsch, bassist Jason Albertini, and drummer Steve Gere reconvened to work a little more on the songs to get them ready to be released. Ernest Jenning Recording Co. did the honors, and the finished product is a reverent tribute fitting to Johnston and of a piece with the group's best work...
Sammy Brue - Crash Test Kid / Skatepark Doomsday Blues
Singer, songwriter, and guitarist Sammy Brue wowed folk and Americana fans with his stylish 2017 debut, I Am Nice, which just happened to coincide with his 15th year on the planet. Three years older but still technically unable to legally set foot in some of the venues his job requires of him, Brue returns with Crash Test Kid, a bolder and decidedly more age-appropriate collection of songs that straddle the nexus between precocious troubadour and emotionally exhausted 18-year-old...
Dougie Poole - The Freelancer's Blues / Vaping on the Job
Practically every piece on Dougie Poole in some way points to the eccentricity of his work and his unlikely alliance to country music, with the word "weird" popping up as often as not. And in a very real way, the consensus is right -- Dougie Poole's music IS pretty weird, with its wobbly sounding keyboards attempting to mimic the sound of the pedal steel guitar, and the clanky-sounding rhythm programs, along with his sorta-funny, sorta-not lyrics about lost love, the trials of ordinary life, and recreational drugs. That said, if Poole feels a kindred spirit with classic country music, he comes by it honestly. Poole's songs demonstrate a very real compassion and understanding for the ordinary workaday people who populate country music and its audience, and while there are some truly bent angles in his work, he doesn't look down on his characters.
Bibio - Sleep on the Wing / A Couple Swim
The folky side of Bibio's music is always lovely, whether Stephen Wilkinson submerges it in blunted beats and decaying tape ambiance on Vignetting the Compost or lets the sun shine on it, as he did on Ribbons. Sleep on the Wing is a companion to that gorgeous 2019 album, and though it has a smaller scope, it's just as winning...
Kahil El'zabar - Kahil El'zabar's Spirit Groove / In the Spirit
Spirit Groove features El'Zabar in the company of saxophonist and longtime collaborator David Murray, bassist Emma Dayhuff, and pianist/keyboardist Justin Dillard on synth, organ, and piano. This outing shines a light on the accessibility and vision of El'Zabar's abundant creativity. Whether playing kalimba, drum kit, congas, shakers, vibes, or singing, he is in pursuit of the ancient universal groove, and its twin manifestations as spiritual and aesthetic entities in the contemporary world... "In the Spirit" is spiritual soul-jazz at its best; where Roy Ayers, Leon Thomas, Les McCann, Eddie Harris, and Joe Lee Wilson all mingle with Booker Little and Pharoah Sanders in riff-centric and obsessively assonant modal jazz. It stirs emotionally as poignant questions emerge from the mix about our attentiveness while affirming the spiritual truth of rhythm.
Kurt Rosenwinkel - Angels Around / Simple #2
-...Joining him are Italian bassist Dario Deidda and drummer Gregory Hutchinson. Both Deidda and Hutchinson bring a wealth of experience to the session. Deidda has played with such Italian luminaries as singer Fiorella Mannoia and trumpeter Enrico Rava, and his warm, robust sound brings to mind contemporaries like Christian McBride and veterans like Dave Holland. Similarly, Hutchinson has been a first-call player for decades, and his roiling, textured style is the perfect foil for Rosenwinkel's sparkling, far-eyed improvisational lines... and dive with red-eyed focus into the funky, Larry Coryell-esque original "Simple #2."...
GoGo Penguin - GoGo Penguin / Atomised
...Always in motion, shifting constantly between repetition, rhythms, and improvisation, this is a group clearly influenced by Philip Glass' early minimalist, cyclical recordings. That said, they absorbed them simultaneously with devotion for techno, drum'n'bass, post-bop, post-rock, and electric jazz. The group's self-titled fifth album underscores the accuracy of these influences alongside new musical directions.
The best verb to describe the music found here is "propelled." It doesn't rely on grooves so much as energetic trio conversation: the space behind Chris Illingworth's suspended, alternately hovering and biting piano lines is framed by the rich, woody tone of Nick Blacka's upright bass playing and the skittering, forceful, breakbeat-driven drumming of Rob Turner... First single "Atomised" is introduced with rolling breaks juxtaposed with Illingworth's hypnotic piano lines. Blacka offers the changes through each minimally evolving cycle. When the pianist moves afield, it's with cascading chords that eventually drop out to allow Turner's kit a snare groove that pushes the tune toward lithe, mutant, almost unbearably beautiful funk...
Boney James - Solid / Solid
“A solid relationship is when someone has your back and will stand by your side no matter what,” explains Boney James about the title of his new CD. “Solid is a word that has a few meanings, but this one really resonated with me and became the theme of the record.”
Sometimes, inspiration is slow in coming, evasive and stubborn. Other times, if an artist is very fortunate, it simply flows, the music practically writing itself. That’s how Solid, the latest release from Boney James came to be. “This record really flowed at an unusually quick pace,” Boney says. “There was a lot of positive energy in making this music. Solid is a very upbeat record. As I was writing them, these songs put a smile on my face.”
Noveller - Arrow / Pattern Recognition
...Arrow continues that record's expanded approach to composition and finds Lipstate's filmic sounds at their most intense. The album was the first Noveller set since Lipstate relocated from her longtime home in Brooklyn to Los Angeles. There's a sense of both discovery and disruption in these songs, reflecting the unknown factors of a cross-country move...
Norah Jones, Jehnny Beth, Maserati, Built to Spill, Daniel Johnston, Sammy Brue, Dougie Poole, Bibio, Kahil El'zabar, Kurt Rosenwinkel, GoGo Penguin, Boney James, Noveller
