That caveat aside, I’ll come right out and say this: one of the best albums of the past year or so is Strict Joy by indie-folk group The Swell Season. The group’s Oscar-winning songwriting duo of Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova may have started their rise to renown as actors in the movie Once, in addition to performing most of the movie’s soundtrack, but their most recent album expands on their sound in marvelous ways. The sheer quality of the songwriting and performances on Strict Joy proves beyond a shadow of doubt that the success of Once and its soundtrack was much more than a fluke or Hollywood-induced trend. Hansard and Irglova - assisted by a full lineup of other musicians, some migrating from Hansard’s previous band, The Frames - are incredibly talented musicians, and possess a musical chemistry that, if there’s any justice in the world, people will be writing about and admiring for years and years to come.
It’s fairly clear that Hansard is calling most of the musical shots on Strict Joy (of the album’s twelve songs, all but two feature Hansard on lead vocals and primary songwriting credits), which is fine by me, because his writing and delivery are unfailingly excellent. His lyrics are simple and accessible but not watered-down, and the arrangements are varied enough from one song to another to keep the listener interested throughout the album’s runtime. Bluesy opener “Low Rising” is an immediate highlight, as well as “The Verb,” “High Horses,” “In These Arms,” and “The Rain,” to name a few. Hearing Hansard perform these songs is akin to reading an earnest, heartfelt letter from an old friend - he aims right for the melancholic sweet spot and scores a bull’s-eye almost every time. Irglova’s offerings are much more subdued, but don’t detract from the album in any way - if anything, they serve as a welcome break from Hansard’s methodology. “I Have Loved You Wrong” in particular is fantastic - the bassline and faint drumbeat combine with Irglova’s just-above-a-whisper vocals to wash over you and make you feel just a little bit more at peace with the universe than you did before. Well, maybe nothing that extreme, but hyperbole notwithstanding, it’s a truly excellent song, and yet another highlight on a very good album. Strict Joy is the kind of listening experience that doesn’t come around often enough. It’s the kind of record that absorbs you from the second you hit Play to the last note. The songs are the kind of songs that inspire you to pick up a guitar and write your own. It’s music that’s personal enough to feel intimate, while remaining accessible enough for just about anyone to relate to and be moved by. It isn’t quite perfect - Irglova’s other featured song “Fantasy Man” and the final two tracks don’t quite reach the sublime level of most of the rest of the record - but it’s damn close. And if nothing else, it sure was enough to melt the heart of this metal-hardened blogger. Enthusiastically recommended.
Rating: 4.5/5
Standout Tracks:
“Low Rising”
“I Have Loved You Wrong”
“High Horses”
“The Rain”
Release Date: October 27, 2009
Well, the answer isn’t quite a simple yes or no, but The Great Misdirect is a hell of an album, no matter what you compare it to. One of the key differences between this album and Colors is that each song is a more-or-less independent piece of music, instead of being separate-but-connected parts to an overall whole. This isn’t a bad thing at all - it gives each of the six tracks their own identity and makes for an even more varied listening experience. And while the album does engage in its share of genre-jumping, it seems like the band has reined in some of their more bizarre musical impulses this time around. Nothing as out-of-left-field as the infamous hoe-down pops up this time - the most head-turning passage is probably the intro to “Fossil Genera - A Feed From Cloud Mountain,” which features out-of-tune circus-piano chords and Mike Patton-esque, vaguely creepy “la-la” vocals. It’s certainly disorienting enough, however, especially coming out of the pulverizing ending of the previous track, “Disease, Injury, Madness.” None of this is to say that these songs are any less schizophrenic and meandering in nature than you’d expect from the band. Their digressions are just a little less weird, that’s all. If any sort of influence rears its head often enough to be considered a theme, it’s that of straightforward, headbanging groove rock riffs: the aforementioned “Disease, Injury, Madness” and epic album closer “Swim To The Moon” both feature lengthy instrumental sections in which the band gets a chance to stretch out and jam on a musical idea, explore it, play some solos over it, and move on to the next one. Some of these passages hearken back to the old-school metal and prog-rock that the members of the band were raised on, such as the fantastic, restrained-yet-relentlessly-building solo section of “Obfuscation;” others, however, show a bit more contemporary influence, such as the industrial programming in a particular section of “Fossil Genera.” Even though they’ve dialed back on the eccentricity, this stuff isn’t boring by a long shot. (To drive the point home, just listen to the two shortest tracks on the album: the jazz-influenced opener “Mirrors” and the late-album acoustic ballad “Desert Of Song.” Not only are they the farthest the band strays from their core sound on this album, they’re two of the best songs here, and the band sounds just as confident and self-assured playing this material as they do blast-beating away with all their might.)
Despite the slight changes in musical color and influence, however, this is mostly the same BTBAM we know and love from the last few records, and the material here packs no less punch. Fans of the breakneck technical metal that has run through the band’s entire career should find a lot to enjoy - perhaps even more than on Colors. Those who listen to the band for the sake of highly virtuosic playing will definitely not be disappointed - these guys continue to step up their game without fail in terms of playing ability and compositional audacity with every release, and this one is no exception. And those hoping for something as huge and epic-sounding as their last couple albums should be more than satisfied by this one - “Fossil Genera” and “Swim To The Moon” in particular both feature two of the most sweeping, grandiose ending passages in the band’s catalogue, or anyone else’s, for that matter. The Great Misdirect will eternally be compared to Colors, and that’s a shame, because it’s just as solid an album. While it might not be quite as risky or cohesive as its predecessor, it delivers all the important goods one would expect from a band of BTBAM’s caliber, and that makes for an intensely enjoyable listen. Just remember to buckle your seatbelts - it’ll be one hell of a ride.
Rating: 4.5/5
Standout Tracks:
“Swim To The Moon”
“Obfuscation”
“Fossil Genera - A Feed From Cloud Mountain”
Release Date: October 27, 2009
The biggest problem I have with Dear Agony is how sterile it sounds. The guitar tone in particular seems flat and utterly devoid of any inflection, personality, or really any indication that it was tracked by an actual human being rather than programmed in Pro Tools. It’s like every bit of signal-compression and noise-reduction in the studio’s arsenal was thrown at the guitar tracks - maybe in an effort to make things sound more precise and less messy - and the end result is something that sounds so mechanical and computerized that it barely even sounds like a guitar anymore. The vocal tracks are just as bad, utilizing a liberal amount of auto-tune and, moreover, simply recorded with a minimal amount of variation in delivery and tone. This is especially disappointing since Burnley’s voice, with all its quirks and smirk-to-scream attitude, was always one of the band’s defining characteristics. Here, his voice seems blander than it ever has. Only a couple songs on the album (such as “Lights Out” and opener “Fade Away”) hint at the old Breaking Benjamin, with particularly heavy guitar riffs and a bit of Burnley’s old vocal personality peeking through. Most of the album’s other tracks, though, are generic and uninspired to a really depressing extent - and the suffocating amount of studio sheen applied to everything only hurts matters more. Really, what all this means for the whole package is that everything is processed and over-produced to the extent that it all sounds almost robotic, and as a result, the final product is boring, homogenized, and predictable - in other words, the farthest thing possible from the satisfying experience a rock album should be. Maybe all this production work was an effort to compensate for a lack of inspired songwriting, but no matter how hard they try to dress it up, there’s no making up for the lack of quality material here. Sure, there are guitars, drums, a bass track in there somewhere, and vaguely angry vocals, but without good songs to play, it’s still no fun to listen to. It’s like ordering a New York strip and receiving a big slab of bologna. Yeah, it’s technically still meat, but it’s nowhere near as good.
Rating: 1.5/5
Standout Tracks:
“Lights Out”
“Fade Away”
Release Date: September 29, 2009
Of course, the $64 question is: after toning down the experimentation, just what kind of sound did Thrice settle on? The answer is a little hard to place. It’s a credit to the band, don’t get me wrong; they’ve carved out such an effective niche that it seems like they’re a genre unto themselves sometimes. But the prevailing sound on Beggars tends towards rootsy yet heavy alternative rock with occasional hints of the band’s post-hardcore past. “Talking Through Glass” and “At The Last” are the album’s fastest, heaviest tracks, and it’s here that their past musical tendencies peek through the most. On the other hand, the album’s slower, more expansive songs (such as “Circles” and “The Great Exchange”) contain the kind of atmosphere and sonic experimentation exemplified on releases like Vheissu and The Alchemy Index (particularly the latter’s Water disc). But the band seems to strike its best grooves on the mid-tempo songs, like album opener “All The World Is Mad” and “In Exile.” It’s clear that the majority of the material here was based around the results of four guys in a room jamming out, rather than any lofty, cerebral concept like the one behind The Alchemy Index.
All four of those guys turned in great performances for Beggars, but the one that stands out the most by far is that of vocalist/lyricist/guitarist Dustin Kensrue. Thrice has always been known for featuring Kensrue’s great lyrics (or at least I’ve always loved his work, and I doubt I’m in the minority here), and on Beggars, he turns in some of his best work yet. Kensrue has become a master at fitting his lyrics perfectly to the cadence of the song; barely a word on the whole record seems rhythmically awkward or out-of-place. His sense of meter is almost Shakespearian. And yet his words carry true emotion and meaning behind them - just look at “The Weight” and “Wood And Wire” for examples of Kensrue’s incredibly poignant lyrical work. His vocal delivery has taken leaps and bounds as well: he’s clearly taken a lot of the bluesy influence of the band’s recent work to heart (not to mention his acoustic solo record, Please Come Home), evidenced by his soulful, husky inflection on a lot of the material here. Of course, on the heavier tunes, his raspy hardcore bark comes back for a bit; by and large, though, it seems that Kensrue has evolved into nearly a full-fledged blues crooner. Which works surprisingly well with the music backing him up; the four-piece has clearly developed into a well-oiled machine that’s comfortable with playing a very wide range of music, and Beggars displays just enough of that versatility to prove that there’s still a whole lot of uncharted territory left to hear Thrice explore. And I, for one, can’t wait to hear what they decide to do next.
Rating: 4/5
Standout Tracks:
“The Weight”
“In Exile”
“Wood And Wire”
“The Great Exchange”
Release Date: September 14, 2009
So I went on a road trip last week. It should go without saying that it was one of the most enjoyable things I've done in quite a while - I mean, who doesn't love a good road trip? Of course, I had the chance to do all kinds of fun stuff: I got to hang out with lots of old friends from school, I made some new friends and forged some very strong bonds with people I had previously only known a little, I got to see some amazing live music, I had some time to walk around and explore a city (Louisville, KY) I had never been to . . . but none of those things really have anything to do with what Relative Pitch is about (except maybe the live music part, but I'm saving that for a potential future post).
One thing that goes hand-in-hand with a road trip, though, and that I enjoyed getting a chance to do almost as much as all the things listed above, is simply the act of driving and listening to music. Rocking out behind the wheel of an automobile is something everyone enjoys at least every once in a while, and doing it for an extended period of time is something I look forward to every time I schedule a vacation for myself - cramped legs, sore neck, and high gas prices be damned. Even if you're not on a big road trip, it's still exhilarating - whether you're cruising around town at 30mph with the windows down or setting the cruise control for 75 and barreling down the interstate, the sheer act of movement combines with the energy of what you're listening to and really gives you a rush, if you're doing it right.
Of course, you can't play just anything to get this effect - you have to make sure you have the right tunes for driving. Just like anything involving musical taste, this is vastly different for any given human being. What gives one person that adrenaline rush of combined music and momentum may very well bore or annoy the next person. So, with that caveat in mind, here's a breakdown of my favorite road music and why I love it:
- Instrumental, very guitar-driven progressive rock/metal. Being a guitarist myself, this kind of stuff is always fun to listen to (whether or not it's over-the-top enough to be lumped into the "shred guitar" category), and the energy behind the virtuosic playing is what makes it really satisfying to crank up in the car. Sometimes the urge to play air guitar interferes with the need to steer, but this hasn't resulted in any accidents yet. Examples: John Petrucci - Jaws Of Life; Scale The Summit - The Great Plains
- Catchy, melodic alternative rock/indie rock. Ideally, the best of this stuff combines an energetic, driving instrumental factor with great vocal melodies and good lyrical work - making it perfect to sing along to. This is great for getting weird looks from other drivers. Examples: Silversun Pickups - There's No Secrets This Year; The Airborne Toxic Event - Sometime Around Midnight
- Heavy - and I do mean heavy - metal. For similar reasons to the first genre mentioned, but instead of technical proficiency (or, in many cases, in addition to it), the driveability comes from sheer heaviness. Detuned guitar riffs, double-bass drumming, screamy/growly vocals (as long as they're performed with some degree of talent) . . . there's nothing like headbanging behind the wheel to a great metal band. Examples: Lamb Of God - Contractor; Opeth - Ghost Of Perdition
- Relatively ambient, mood-inducing music. Let's face it, sometimes you're not in the mood for headbanding or sing-alongs; on a rainy or cloudy morning, something more subdued will make your drive just as enjoyable. All kinds of genres fit the bill here, from trip-hop to post-rock - the most important factor is the vibe it sets. (Of course, you have to be careful here - you don't want to put in anything so chilled-out that you fall asleep at the wheel.) Examples: Massive Attack - Everywhen; Explosions In The Sky - It's Natural To Be Afraid
Naturally, this is an incredibly subjective list, so your ideal driving music might be completely different than mine. Therefore, you are hereby encouraged to leave a comment with the type of tunes that make your commute all the more enjoyable. Whether it aligns with my tunes perfectly or stands as a polar opposite to my picks, I'm looking forward to seeing what other people like to crank up behind the wheel. Post away!
The trouble is, Porcupine Tree have never made particularly grandiose music. It’s not that the music isn’t complex enough, or that it doesn’t carry the emotional weight of the band’s peers’ output - on the contrary, Porcupine Tree’s music tends to be some of the most moving material you’re likely to find in the genre. However, the mood prevalent in most of the band’s music tends to swing between downcast, shoegazing melancholy and biting, acidic outbursts of vitriol, neither of which lend themselves to the epic-sounding Overtures and Grand Finales that bands along the lines of Dream Theater have trademarked. Steven Wilson doesn’t have an operatic bone in his body, which makes his songwriting refreshingly free of bombast. So it really shouldn’t be that surprising that, hot off the heels of recording his first solo album, Insurgentes (you can read my review of that one here), Wilson penned a fifty-five-minute-long suite that covers much of the same emotional territory as his previous releases. That’s not to say The Incident isn’t musically adventurous; between the 14 tracks the title-suite is split up into (henceforth referred to by their individual track names; only in prog-rock does something as simple as naming songs become this complicated), a lot of stylistic ground is covered. “The Incident” and “Circle Of Manias,” for instance, are some of the heaviest material the band has recorded to date. On the other hand, “The Yellow Windows Of The Evening Train” and the suite’s conclusion “I Drive The Hearse” are positively tranquil. The best material in the piece seems to rest comfortably between these extremes: “The Blind House” is a high-energy rocker that charges along mostly in 5/4, while “Time Flies” is almost an epic-within-an-epic, stretching out for nearly twelve minutes of acoustic verses, a chorus featuring some of Wilson’s best vocals yet, and a suitably indulgent guitar solo. The problem is pacing: the placement of something as somber as “I Drive The Hearse” at the end of an epic composition such as this is a big part of why the whole piece doesn’t sit as well as it should; it seems that something so ambitious deserves to go out with a bang, not a whimper. It’s great music when taken at face value, though - Wilson knows how to take a melody or a lyric and twist it, knife-like, right into your heart. It simply seems anticlimactic as part of the bigger picture.
It’s definitely worth noting that The Incident also includes a second disc of material that wasn’t composed as part of the suite (confined to the CD release’s first disc). They’re not b-sides, though - the four songs on the second disc are high-quality Porcupine Tree in their own right, especially the atmospheric “Flicker” and the bitter but somehow smirking “Remember Me Lover”. In a way, the quality of the songs on the second disc further underline the weaknesses of the first. Porcupine Tree seems much more comfortable writing music that’s self-contained into reasonably-sized capsules. Even the specific sections of the first disc that stand out seem to work better when viewed as their own individual songs instead of being forced into a larger concept. Who knows - maybe if the band had focused on developing all the ideas contained in The Incident as their own separate songs instead of pigeon-holing them in as sections of an epic, some of the shorter, almost interlude-like pieces (such as “Great Expectations,” “Kneel And Disconnect,” and “Your Unpleasant Family”) would have been fleshed out further into much more satisfying individual compositions. Food for thought. Really, though, Porcupine Tree is an incredibly talented band, and a lot of the music contained in The Incident is some of the best they’ve released. Their music is just more powerful when delivered on a slightly-smaller scale than the standard prog-rock epic. Maybe in their case, “less is more” really is advice to be followed.
Rating: 3.5/5
Standout Tracks:
“Time Flies”
“Remember Me Lover”
“The Blind House”
“Flicker”
Release Date: September 14, 2009
The album starts off with the fairly straightforward “Uprising,” a classic Muse track which serves as a cover for the amount of grandiose musical statements to come later. The simple guitar-bass-drums-vocals approach to this first track (notwithstanding a few requisite synth fills - after all, this is Muse we’re talking about) is a somewhat deceptive way to kick off the album - after this point, the band starts pulling out one over-the-top idea after another, resulting in tracks as wide-ranging as the Depeche-Mode-influenced dance grooves found in “Undisclosed Desires” and the rock-opera-worthy, Queen-worshipping “United States Of Eurasia (+Collateral Damage),” the latter complete with full orchestral accompaniment. Many of these ideas work, especially when the band indulges its classical side: the album ends with a three-track piece titled “Exogenesis: Symphony” which also features an orchestra, and makes for a very satisfying conclusion to all the craziness and genre-jumping. In fact, the “Exogenesis” suite is so good that much of the rest of the album seems just okay by comparison. The scattershot approach to genre and influence works against the band here; many of these tracks, while enjoyable on their own, simply can’t stand up next to one another and create a viable whole. One of the other main drawbacks of the album is that, when the band simplifies their approach as on “Uprising” and a few other tracks, they seem to go on autopilot, as if their creative energy was expended on the more out-there tracks. Overall, though, The Resistance is a good album, and what it lacks in cohesiveness is almost made up for by how much fun it is to listen to. Only a band with the confidence of knowing they’re one of the biggest acts in the world would dare create music this bombastic and over-the-top; if they focus their confidence on a more unified vision, they may yet create another truly fantastic album. Until then, though, The Resistance should be enough to tide their new-found legions of screaming fans over.
Rating: 3/5
Standout Tracks:
“Exogenesis: Symphony” (Parts 1-3)
“United States Of Eurasia (+Collateral Damage)”
“Undisclosed Desires”
Release Date: September 14, 2009
