ALTER.NATION #68
Whyte Horses, Chrysta Bell, Kiwi Jr, Mac Miller, Mura Masa, Algiers, Of Montreal, Dirty Projectors, ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead, G. Love & Special Sauce, Bombay Bicycle Club, OOIOO, Oval
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ALTER.NATION #68 on DEEZER
Whyte Horses - Hard Times / Bang Bang [My Baby Shot Me Down] (feat. Chrysta Bell)
Over the course of two albums, Dom Thomas and his Whyte Horses collective made a name for themselves as master mixers of vintage sounds derived from swinging French ye-ye, swirling psychedelia, strutting big-city soul, snappy garage rock, and hooky kitchen sink pop. It's a little bit of theft, a little bit of borrowing too, but Thomas and his merry gang reassemble the pieces in ways that make clear they are adding great dollops of their own vision to the music. Hard Times does away with any trainspotting and lays their influences on the table with a selection of covers that range from familiar (Cher's "Bang Bang [My Baby Shot Me Down],"...
Kiwi Jr. - Football Money / Salary Man
With their long-labored debut Football Money, Canadian indie quartet Kiwi Jr. continue a long lineage of a very specific brand of smart, ennui-riddled pop. Lyrically, the songs are overstuffed with observational references to confused post-college flailing and small town boredom, while the music follows the same wistful jangly catchiness that grew more snotty and surreal as it was passed down from Felt to Pavement to Parquet Courts. At the core of each catchy, upbeat tune is one of vocalist Jeremy Gaudet's depraved narratives, jam packed with psychedelic references ranging from childhood memories of a stabbing in a church to Brian Jones' swimming pool... "Salary Man" sways with a woozy dreaminess borrowed from Orange Juice as Gaudet paints lyrical pictures of uncharged cell phones and drunk businessmen sleeping it off on public benches in suits and polished shoes. This slide show of bizarre imagery is guided by airy 12-string acoustic guitar that melts into fuzzy distorted leads...
Mac Miller - Circles / Complicated
On September 7, 2018, just a month after the release of his critically acclaimed fifth album, Swimming, Pittsburgh rapper Mac Miller died from an accidental drug overdose. His struggles were no secret, but there was a glimmer of hope on Swimming that hinted that better days might be around the corner. While those possibilities were unfortunately lost with his passing, Miller did manage to record extra material that ended up on the posthumous set Circles. Intended as a companion piece to Swimming (i.e. "swimming in circles"), the album was completed by producer Jon Brion (Fiona Apple, Kanye West), who maintained the laid-back vibe and introspective mood of its predecessor... On "Complicated," he languidly raps that he's "way too young to be gettin' old" atop shiny synths, later wondering "Why does everyone need me to stay?"
Mura Masa - R.Y.C. / Raw Youth Collage
The title of Mura Masa's second album, R.Y.C., stands for Raw Youth Collage, and its contents zero in on all of the messy, uncertain feelings that come with young adulthood. Not quite as long or guest-heavy as the producer's 2017 major-label debut, the album feels much more personal and introspective, with lyrics directly addressing confusion and alienation. First track "Raw Youth Collage" features a sequence of barely connected thoughts ("I don't know who I'm supposed to be," "All my friends have changed," "I can't see past the screen") over chiming guitars and floating, atmospheric synths...
Algiers - There Is No Year / Losing Is Ours
There Is No Year, the third album by Atlanta-based Algiers, was co-produced by Randall Dunn and Ben Greenberg. It further extends the reach of their previous outings while offering a more strategically articulated, disciplined musicality without sacrificing their core sound or blunting their emotional impact. In a scalding gumbo of post-punk mania, mutant gospel, shambolic blues, and ravaged funk and soul, they add more grimy electronic and industrial elements to their attack... On "Losing Is Ours," Lee Tesche's squalling, acid-drenched blues guitar meets dissonant synth, harsh noise, and Ryan Mahan's processional piano as Fisher's vocal soars above it all... These tight, explosive songs combine a refined poetic lyric approach in songwriting and arranging that's every bit as urgent as the album's two predecessors, yet it's so emotionally charged, it leaves the listener breathless and exhausted, as well as compelled and excited.
Of Montreal - Ur Fun / Deliberate Self-harm Ha Ha
2018's White Is Relic/Irrealis Mood took direct inspiration from the extended remixes of pop hits that were prevalent in the 1980s, and two years later, Ur Fun narrows in on catchier, singles-minded fare. A set that doesn't break for ballads, it was, as has become typical for Barnes, inspired by his personal life, which settled into a steady relationship following divorce. In fact, his partner, Christina Schneider (aka Locate S,1)... Taken together, infectious rhythms, smart lyrics, and effervescent chorus hooks that deliver throughout Ur Fun make it more than a mere amusement.
Dirty Projectors - Sing the Melody (Live at Power Station) / I Feel Energy
...That’s the appeal of Sing the Melody, a new live-in-studio album released unceremoniously last week as part of Domino’s Documents series. Last November, near the tail end of months spent touring, the Projectors went into Manhattan’s Power Station to play highlights from their gleeful full-band comeback Lamp Lit Prose and a few gems from their back catalog. None of these songs are radically reinvented, but at a minimum they’re rendered with an impressive urgency...
...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead - X: The Godless Void and Other Stories / Don't Look Down
X: The Godless Void and Other Stories appeared at a timely point in ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead's career. It arrived six years after the release of 2014's IX, during which time Conrad Keely returned from Cambodia to the band's home base of Austin, Texas, and also coincided with their 25th anniversary. It makes sense, then, that their tenth album finds them taking stock... They've grown into their reflective side over the years, and they've rarely sounded as relatable, or affecting, as they do here. This is particularly true of the brilliant "Don't Look Down," a look back that isn't so much a wish to return to the past as a realization of just how big the gulf between then and now is. With its gently surging melody and incisive lyrics ("I have another set of eyes/that I use to disguise/the part of me that died/I have another set of lives/I use to describe/The part that's still alive"), it immediately makes itself known as one of the band's finest songs...
G. Love & Special Sauce - The Juice / Fix Your Face
Now that they're over a quarter-century into their career, it's time to come to terms with a simple fact: G. Love & Special Sauce are no longer youthful upstarts, they're veterans. Fittingly, their 2020 album The Juice is the kind of record that could only be made by musicians who've been around the block a time or two. It's not that The Juice is the work of untrammeled virtuosos -- it is most decidedly a vibe record -- but rather that it's an album that's casually confident that also happens to have an offhand sense of community...
Bombay Bicycle Club - Everything Else Has Gone Wrong / Everything Else Has Gone Wrong
If the question of whether a rock band can really get better with age is still up for debate, Bombay Bicycle Club make the best possible case. Coming off a three-year hiatus, the London quartet return with their fifth studio-album, 2020's Everything Else Has Gone Wrong. The album arrives six years after the equally inspired So Long, See You Tomorrow and finds the group in a deeply ruminative mindset, looking back at their over ten-year career and grappling with getting older, experiencing renewed artistic inspiration, and moving forward in a world that seems beset by conflict, tragedy, and unrest...
OOIOO - Nijimusi / jibun
...It might come as a surprise that nijimusi was recorded mainly using a conventional rock ensemble of two guitars, bass, and drums. OOIOO viewed their instruments simply as “objects that make sounds”, and took a primitive and basic approach to creating the music. The drum tones fluctuate powerfully through the air, while sounding as if they are being observed under a microscope. Bass notes and electronic bursts are so dense that they sound like they’ve been vacuum-sealed. The arrangement of the tones seem to be almost ancient, transcending the notion of a musical ensemble, suggesting the connectivity and oneness that is inherent in all living creatures...
Oval - Scis / Oxagon
Oval's 2016 full-length Popp was a startling, exciting reinvention for the long-running electronic project. While best known for helping to pioneer the glitch aesthetic during the 1990s by creating oddly soothing pieces that incorporated the sounds of skipping compact discs, Oval has continually evolved and explored different approaches over the years, from the electro-acoustic miniatures of 2010's O to the vocal collaborations of 2013's Calidostópia! (recorded during a ten-day studio session in Brazil). Popp was a whole new ball game, with a much heavier focus on songwriting, and a newfound embrace of sonic maximalism... "Oxagon" assembles clinking and splashing sounds into a chiming melody enhanced by strings and pianos, sort of resembling an Oval version of the post-Brainfeeder school of production. Just as vibrant and full of wonder as Popp, Scis is another imaginative, unpredictable world of sound.
Whyte Horses, Chrysta Bell, Kiwi Jr, Mac Miller, Mura Masa, Algiers, Of Montreal, Dirty Projectors, ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead, G. Love & Special Sauce, Bombay Bicycle Club, OOIOO, Oval
