So iTunes has a radio feature now, and it’s not like any other radio I’ve ever heard. For one, they actually play great music. Secondarily, they solve the problem of “established vs. undiscovered” by letting the listener pick which they want (fancy that). Finally, it sounds like the curation is done by people– if it’s not, the algorithims are finely tuned to produce much better effects than “similar instruments, similar rhythms,” like Pandora does.
For example, in just over an hour of listening to a station I made based off Gregory Alan Isakov, I heard of four new bands that I am totally into:
1. The Family Crest, which sounds like a more textured version of IC faves Typhoon. This video right here has under 7500 plays, which is firmly under-the-radar. (Although they have been in Paste, so they are moving on up.)
2. Bronze Radio Return, who I probably should have known about. (At least I know now!) Sounds like Paul Simon fronting Mumford and Sons. (This is a huge compliment.)
3. The Rocketboys, who have slipped through the cracks of my music knowledge in their 8-year history:
4. Amy Stroup has apparently been featured on various TV shows that I don’t watch, so that’s how I didn’t catch the memo.
Yeah. All that in one hour. I’m totally sold on iTunes radio.
The emergence of Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago was an incredibly important event for folk. Although the water had been getting murky for years (decades?), that heavily stylized album broke the dam that separated indie-pop and folk. Now we have Mumford and Sons and The Lumineers and Phillip Phillips and we don’t even think twice about it. My thesis here is that we can’t have “Babel” hollered through your radio without Justin Vernon mournfully ruminating over Emma. What that means for indie-pop and folk as individual genres is complex and interesting. One tiny element is that trad-folk/Americana (which is what we now have to call the stuff that most people who aren’t ethnomusicologists used to call “folk”) has received a boost from the indie-folk scene. Sunny Jim Brown playing the traditional “Darling Corey” may not have been of any interest to people who liked Belle and Sebastian in the early 2000s. Now it seems like the two are near to kindred spirits.
Which is all to say that even if Sunny Jim Brown’s Sweet Virginia EP features primarily guitar and banjo in a very traditional idiom, it’s still a blast from the imagined past. Brown’s earthy baritone imbues passion equally over the aforementioned traditional, the gorgeous original “Black Gold,” and No Use For A Name cover “Pacific Standard Time.” It hardly matters that one was written in time immemorial, one in 2007/2008, and one probably in 2012/2013. This is a testament to Sunny Jim Brown’s vision: these tunes could be disparate and disjointed, but instead they’re coherent and wonderful. “Black Gold” is the sort of fingerpicked guitar line that I got into this business to hear more of, and the world-weary vocals give the song even more to love. “Lonesome” and “Sweet Virginia” are strummers that sway excellently. You want honest, raw, and beautiful? Here you go.
These tunes feel as real and raw as For Emma ever did, and maybe as real and raw as folk did before that. What does that mean for folk in general? Well, probably that what is good never dies, it just gets pushed to the top in different amounts at different times. Culture is weird like that. Maybe in 10 years the folk moment will be over and we’ll be on to something else. What does that mean for this particular EP? That you should go listen to it right now. Start with “Black Gold,” and impress your Tallest Man on Earth-loving self.
I gushed over Filbert’s Chronographic earlier this year because of its humble attitude toward music and lyrics. Cold Country‘s Missing the Muse EP reminds me of Filbert, because band leader Sean McConnell’s high tenor sounds like Daniel Gutierrez’s and the folky arrangements have an earnest, plaintive feel. The chamber-folk on Missing the Muse has a ragged, woodsy edge that sets it apart from pristine soundscapes like Bon Iver and well-produced hoedowns like Babel, although the album doesn’t stray far enough to alienate fans of those works.
The climactic finish of opener “What It Takes” features a fuzzed-out electric guitar dueling with a smooth harmonica, rumbling drums, glockenspiel, and distorted bass. The cavernous rumbling of the percussion keeps it from turning into a garage-rock tune and instead places it as an expansive, dramatic folk track. Even with the tune played out on a large screen, the tune feels intimate. That’s the primary tension in each of Missing the Muse‘s five tracks: the titular tune features an excellent guitar solo but carries a very personal sense of sadness; “My Bird of Paradise” is built on Fleet Foxes’ gentle guitar and harmonized vocals and also features a bass riff. The big arrangements never give way to an impersonal front and protect against being too hopelessly introspective. It’s a pretty impressive feat.
If you’re a fan of chamber-folk arrangements, then Cold Country’s Missing the Muse is required listening. These aren’t Mumford and Sons stomp-alongs, and they aren’t trying to be. The tensions that McConnell plays with are perfectly enough for fascinating listening, thank you very much.
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The great thing about EPs is that there’s no reason that all of the songs can’t be excellent. When working with 10-15 songs, there’s bound to be something that doesn’t appeal to someone, but three songs can be crafted to near-perfection. And so it goes with Matt Carter’s Daylight EP: the tunes are expertly written, arranged, performed and recorded. Carter applies to the Ray LaMontagne school of singer/songwriters: the more romance can be piled into one tune, the better. “For You” introduces Carter’s lithe voice, with just a touch of LaMontagne grit, over gentle acoustic guitar, delicate piano, upright bass, and swooning violins. It is as gorgeous as you might imagine.
Carter doesn’t let up with “From a Payphone Stall” or the title track: both frame Carter’s vocal melodies in arrangements that have as little to do with dissonance as possible. These are beautiful, carefully constructed tunes: instead of coming off smarmy or James Blunt-ish, they are delivered with assurance and confidence. Carter knows what his strengths are, and he plays to them perfectly here, creating memorably gorgeous songs. I’m looking forward to much more from Matt Carter, as he has put a lot of skill on display here in just over 10 minutes.
So I didn’t post much in June, so all of the June singles are getting posted now. This means that instead of one mix, there are two: a loud one and a quiet one. I’ll start today with the loud one.
June/July: Loud
1. “Strange Thing” – DL Rossi. Pedro the Lion has left few followers in the emotive alt-rock space, but DL Rossi is a welcome addition to the space. He also brings in Bazan’s qualms with Christianity, although Rossi seems to hold fast to the tenets of the faith while contending with some practices of Christianity. Also, he has a Mumford-ian penchant for dramatic f-bombing.
2. “Glaciers” – The Trouble Starts. Daniel G. Harmann has completed his transition from bedroom indie-pop hero to rock band by dropping his name off the front of the group. Here’s a roiling, churning example of the newly-christened group’s output. Foo Fighters’ fans will approve.
3. “All the Lights in New York” – Autumn Owls. The fractured folk of Autumn Owls casts its foggy, urban, streetlight glow on you. You smile uncertainly, and step forward into the gloom.
4. “We Are the Dreamers” – The Stargazer Lilies. Shoegazer Lilies, maybe, plus some Portishead dread and staccato stomp. Overall, a very different dream than Teen Daze’s chillwave dreaming. But still quite engaging!
5. “Be Someone” – Post War Years. The Postal Service + Passion Pit = Post War Years. Clicky, hooky, fun, and now with 100% more xylophone!
6. “Cut Free” – The Alibis. Yo, this ’90s-style Brit-pop track is all about the excellent bass player. I look forward to more fascinating work from this band.
7. “Bystander” – Shotgun No Blitz. Shotgun No Blitz might be the best possible pop-punk name, calling up youthful games, playful but aggressive contact, friendly agreement, and speed. And the spread offense, which I just like.
8. “We’re the Kids” – Parade of Lights. New formula for massive single: use the word kids, employ that specific synth noise, and crank the bass. MONEY.
One of the most arresting pitches I’ve heard in a long while was from the songwriter of Filbert, who announced in his e-mail that “My only hope is to run out of free downloads on our Bandcamp!” Well, Daniel Gutierrez, I hope that I can help you meet that goal. Chronographic is a high-quality album that deserves all that and more.
I introduced Filbert to a group of my friends under the tag “Modest Mouse + Jeffrey Lewis + backpack rap + Bon Iver = Filbert,” and I’m standing by that assessment for this review. The core of Filbert’s sound is a dreary acoustic strum not all that different than Bon Iver’s cabin output, but the sound takes a hard left with what’s layered on top of it. Gutierrez has a humble, mumbly voice very similar to the vastly underrated Jeffrey Lewis, but he uses it to announce earnest musings on the often-ignored, normal bits of life (a la backpack rap) instead of Lewis’ surreal scenes. The final identifier (Modest Mouse) comes along in the arrangements, which skew toward the meandering and wandering–similar to the quieter moments of Good News for People Who Love Bad News.
It’s an absolutely glorious, riveting amalgam. Gutierrez and co. hold attention not through electrifying riffs or overtly clever turns of phrase, but through intricate, intimate tunes. Gutierrez includes several long clips of children talking to him and playing music as intros and outros, which give the whole album a distinctly “bedroom project of thoughtful, loving dad in his spare time” air. With folk’s recent self-importance in the era of Mumford and Sons saying big and important things to big and important audiences, it’s quite refreshing to hear an album that’s not targeted at the masses, but the Mrs. This one isn’t a world-conquering statement or important announcement, which paradoxically makes it both of those things. It’s not like slacker chic, where we’re celebrating largely unceremonious things; instead, it’s those guys who kept doing what they loved finally getting their due.
Songs like “Headphones” and “Breath” show that there are indeed some musical chops at play beyond the humble lyrics. The former builds to a desperate, striking conclusion via a slow but persistent crescendo; the latter creates a tune off a memorable guitar line and a surprisingly complex percussive section (complete with essential tambourine). “Breath” ties that commendable arrangement to a perfectly matched lyric set about weariness: “My legs won’t let me get out of the shower / … I just want to let the water hit me for a little while longer.” Yo, if we haven’t all been there, right?
There’s only seven songs in the unassuming Chronographic, and those small aims are part of the charm. It’s a mesmerizing, enveloping release that draws its power from the fact that it’s not trying to be a rock star move. This is not an indictment of the band’s effort: the arrangements are great (check the inventive “Race Cars and Chocolate”), performances are spot-on, and the production quality is immaculate. It’s just that the unpretentious, non-ironic vibe of the tracks really shines. Here’s to all those who do their thing without fuss or concern for what others think. Here’s to celebrating that. Here’s to Chronographic, which is definitely on my short list for end of year lists.
It only takes one listen of Little Chief‘s Somewhere Near the River to know that something special is going on here. The Arkansas folk quintet takes the sonic palette that has become stock-in-trade for the genre and softens the percussive edge that Mumford and Sons’ influence has imported. This means that the banjo doesn’t sound like it’s hammering on your brain, the drummer gets to use more tasteful and complex arrangements than “more kick drum,” and vocalist Matt Cooper doesn’t bellow. Instead, he turns his soft tenor voice toward Ray LaMontagne-style emoting, making his overall vocal performances somewhat akin to Kris Orlowski‘s.
Cooper’s voice is not the icing on the cake, but the element around which all things center. The arrangements point toward the lyrics and the vocal melodies without turning into wallpaper, which is a tough feat indeed. The cello goes a long way to strike this balance: it’s hard to not listen for the beautiful tones of that instrument, but it’s also pulled back enough in the mix that a clear signal is sent. That tension sounds like it would be a problem, but it’s really a benefit. The engineer that recorded this knew exactly what he was doing in maximizing this band’s skills and tastes.
The fact that the very young band knows its skills and tastes on their debut EP is equally impressive. It’s easy to want to go for bombast when you’ve just discovered your voice, but they restrain themselves beautifully. Instead of creating stadium-rockers, they’ve created headphone bobbers and car-trip wonderers: these are tunes of travel and geography, gently unfurling against the best possible backdrop. The title track incorporates a choir that actually sings, not just hollers. I love hollering, for real, but it’s still startling and pleasant to hear actual choral contributions. “Hiding and Seeking” is the high point, as it shows how they can be engaging, even electrifying, without being bombastic. The stuttering rhythms from the cello blend with guys hollering “hey” (can’t avoid it, y’all) and a dreamy guy/girl duet in the chorus to produce a shiver-inducing moment.
It’s astonishing that Somewhere Near the River is a debut, as the subtlety and refinement in the songwriting chops would indicate a group with much more recording experience. This band has a bright future that I will be tracking closely. If you’re sick of the overwrought theatricality that currently dominates folk, Little Chief is a pleasant, earnest antidote.
10. Elephant Micah – Louder Than Thou. Gentle and repetitive slowcore folk can be absolutely emotively crushing in the right hands, and Elephant Micah owns those hands.
9. Mumford and Sons – Babel. How do you beat a sophomore slump? Make the same album over again, with all the great stuff still intact. Haters gonna hate.
7. The Mountain Goats – Transcendental Youth. Turning its back on the morose portraits that characterized All Eternals Deck, TY was a verifiable romp through the psyches of doomed characters fighting that good fight to stay alive. The addition of horns and enthusiasm worked wonders for Darnielle’s mojo.
6. Challenger – The World is Too Much For Me. Beautiful synth-pop that was equal parts trembling and exultation. Dancy moods and undeniable melodies met a sense of late-night, modern-society dread in a masterful combination. Quite an astonishing debut.
5. The Menzingers – On the Impossible Past. This tightly constructed album is one of the heaviest lyrical statements I’ve ever heard in a punk album, taking on the past and Americanism in a profound way. Their prowess of gruff pop-punk continues, leaving an album that won’t let go of your throat in its wake.
4. Cobalt and the Hired Guns – Everybody Wins. It doesn’t get more enthusiastic than Cobalt. This pop-punk/indie-pop mashup resulted in some of the best “shout-it-out” tunes of the year, while showing that you can indeed still make gold with just three chords, enthusiasm, and a solid lyric. Oh, and horns. Lots of horns.
3. Jenny and Tyler – Open Your Doors. The only artist to appear on 2011’s list and this list, Jenny and Tyler followed up their turbulent, commanding Faint Not with a gentle release looking expectantly toward peace. Its highest moments were revelatory.
2. Come On Pilgrim! – Come On Pilgrim!. Josh Caress and co. lovingly made an expansive, powerful collection of tunes that spanned the wide breadth of modern folk. Leaning heavily on rumbling, low-end arrangements, this was everything that I expected it to be from the first moment longtime solo artist Caress announced he was putting together a band.
1. Jonas Friddle & The Majority – Synco Pony and Belle De Louisville. You should never release a double album as your debut, unless you’ve really got the goods to back it up with. Friddle’s folk explosion is worth every second, as he deftly explores just about every nook and cranny of modern folk, from revivalist antique appropriation to protest songs to modern love songs. The immaculate arrangements would sell it, if his lithe voice hadn’t already given it away. Amazing stuff.
When you know the rules, even the decisions you make to break them are made in relation to the rules. Sometimes this results in Jackson Pollock, but mostly it results in field homogenization that takes the mysterious x factor called “genius” to transcend. But if you never knew the rules to begin with, all bets are off–anything can happen.
Sfumato‘s These Things Between… is the folky embodiment of the latter phenomenon. Singer/songwriter Daithí Ó hÉignigh is “essentially a drummer” who decided to write and arrange a complex folk album. As a result, these 11 songs feature all sorts of sounds, rhythms and arrangements that I didn’t expect. I listened to this album for far longer than I usually do when writing a review, because it took a long time for me to figure out what was happening.
Because the homogenization of a field doesn’t just affect what musicians write, it affects how listeners hear. People are in love with Babel because it pulls off all the pop-folk moves perfectly; These Things Between… is a difficult listen for someone conditioned to hear music in that way. Even though the signifiers of folk are present (strummed acoustic guitar, pensive moods, emotive voice), what is a gospel choir doing in “Ostia”? “Mo ghrá” is in Gaelic? “Fly to Me” features a calliope-style organ; “Pound” accentuates unusual rhythms. This is a brain-expander, and goodness knows I need it after the musical candy that is Mumford and Sons, Avett Brothers and The Mountain Goats all releasing albums within weeks of each other.
After an eclectic start, the center of the album is a bit more standard. “The Past” incorporates bass guitar and organ drone in familiar patterns (Decemberists!), while “Song to Myself” shows off a wheezing saxophone in a style similar to Bon Iver’s Colin Stetson. By the end of the album, the unusual arrangements have returned: the title track is a heavily rhythmic tune that relies on conga drums, an unrecognizable instrument and Celtic-inspired strings. Still, the closer is solo acoustic track “I Was Hoping You Might…,” which reminded me of Damien Jurado in its starkness.
These Things Between… is perfectly titled, as its songs walk down the line between familiarity and otherness. There are detours to both sides, but overall it exists in a space that will challenge your conventional listening habits. If you’re into something a little outside your (and my) Mumfordy comfort zone, Sfumato should be one place to check out.
In an age of disruption, it is profoundly comforting to see someone doggedly carrying on a torch that so many want to decry, digitize or destroy altogether. Everything from digital streaming to high gas prices makes it hard to be a craftsman of song right now, but David Ramirez doesn’t care. He’s a rambling troubadour who has looked for redemption in a bar stool, but instead found it in God and women. He loves traveling the country, until he misses family, friends and women. These are timeworn, careworn themes, and Ramirez treats them with dignity by falling right into the stream and carving his own niche in the flow.
Ramirez undeniably has heard, learned from and played with a ton of other singer/songwriters, and he shows no intentions of being experimental in any regard. But that’s what it means to be a part of a craft: Ramirez saw and heard, and now says so that others can hear. Are these songs beautiful? Undeniably, incredibly so. They come invested with a depth of history that resonates through Ramirez’s weary yet confident voice. You can hear it in the steady strum, and in the turns of phrase. Many have been here, and many will come after. And the mark in time that is Apologies will add into the chorus of songs and albums that someone (hopefully someones) in the next generation of songwriters will be influenced by. Ramirez himself muses on learning in the opening lines of the album:
“Well I never paid attention when I was a young boy
To the great instructions from the ones that came before me
Now that I’m older I long to pay attention
But it doesn’t seem like anyone is saying much of anything”
Opener “Chapter II” is one of the highlights of the album; a self-aware rumination that culminates in the poignant claim, “Well I’ve been holding on so long it seems, That what I’m holding has been holding me.” Voice and earthy acoustic guitar form the basis of the tune, just as they form the basis of the rest of the songs on the album. Contributions from a full band fill out some tunes (“An Introduction,” “Dancing and Vodka,” “Mighty Fine”), while banjo, piano, and harmonica make occasional solo appearances. But the heart of this album is Ramirez’s baritone and six-string, which is why standout tracks “Goodbye” and “Find the Light” rely on those two elements.
All eleven tracks on Apologies are keepers; there’s not a clunker in the batch. The highs are very high, and the lows are pretty high too. It’s definitely on the consideration list for Top Ten of the year, because the songs just resonate with a deep part of me that wants traditions to live on. We can have new traditions (I’m stoked for M&S’ and the Avetts’ new albums, just like everyone else), but there’s a rare joy in hearing something that could have been written 50 years ago being turned out now. I hope that we will be able to hear some fantastic songwriter 50 years from now who knows the value of considering the past in the process of creating weighty tunes. Because that’s what David Ramirez has done here: written strong tunes that could go on to be learned, loved and covered. Bravo.
Back when I was a humongous pop-punk fan just getting into acoustic music, I never thought I’d be able to distinguish between alt-country and folk. At some point before I heard Don DiLego‘s music, I figured that distinction out–even if it’s still difficult for me to fully explain. It’s more than the occasional pedal steel and full-band instrumentation that sets DiLego’s music in this category or that; he approaches the whole Western & Atlantic EP with a mature, well-developed gravitas in the melodies and lyrics. “Chicago” is a song about love with a minimum of sap, while “Television Sun” is about “what’s worth fighting for.” “Lonely Couples” is a stark tune that reminds me of Chris Mills’ work, while closer “Carry On” is a powerful tune that impressively never goes for the big hook and remains dignified in its quiet existence.
These tunes are incredibly strong, especially when considering the impromptu sessions that predicated them (you can read the story here). This one unfolds more of its beauty with each subsequent listen. If you’re down for thoughtful lyrics and disarmingly poignant melodies that resist emotive pandering, then Western & Atlantic needs to be in your corner.
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The Damn Choir‘s You’re My Secret Called Fire features almost everything I want from an indie-folk band: distinctive yet melodic vocals, full arrangements, confident songwriting, spot-on performances and powerful control of mood. The band strips its sound clear of Mumford and Sons’ grandiose veneer, the cinematic production values of Grizzly Bear, and slow’n’sad tendencies that many songwriters put forth to produce a raw, vital sound. It’s a beautiful, poignant, passionate album–musically. However, as you might expect from a band that doesn’t think twice about putting the word “Damn” in its name, the lyrics are incredibly raw. They’re not vulgar or profane, but “I wish I was Noah, I would watch the world drown” and “I watch the pain in your eyes before you finally drown” (from “Noah”) are representative samples. Let’s just say religion and ex-girlfriends are not high on the list of The Damn Choir’s favorite things. If you can get past that, there’s gold in these hills. (I’d go for “Grace” and “Ghost.”) If those sentiments rub you the wrong way, go for one of the other two albums in this post.
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Heyward Howkins’ The Hale and the Hearty is something altogether different from the two albums above. Although it could be filed in a loose interpretation of “indie-folk,” Howkins’ songwriting vision is far outside the traditional folk style (i.e the You Can Play These Songs With Chords school, as the not-folkies in Death Cab for Cutie noted). Howkins’ complex, intricate songwriting is full of twists and turns. There are more sudden stops and starts here than in a math-rock album. The melodies are less structured and singalong, more stream-of-consciousness and meandering. This creates an album that is an experience not easily translated into mixtape fodder. Not that “Waist High and Dry” doesn’t have beautiful moments that could definitely fit between Fleet Foxes and Josh Ritter; it just also has unusual rhythms and arrangements that would make it a weird fit at the same time. The song is 2:55 long.
Again, Howkins’ album is just as beautiful as the other two on this post: it simply gets there in a vastly different way. If you’re into music that makes you think more than it makes you sing, this one’s for you. You’ll still hum the tunes; but they’ll be hums punctuated by unexpected drum riffs (“The Raucous Calls of Morning”), unusual horns (“Cocaine Bill”) and tempo changes (everywhere) that keep your brain on point. Great, great stuff.
