The Stranger

The 36 Best Music Shows in Seattle This Week: June 10-16, 2019

Kim Selling — Sun, 09 Jun 2019 16:00:00 -0700

The Stranger's music critics' picks for the week. by Kim Selling

This week, our music critics have picked everything from Father John Misty to Patty Griffin to Hoop. Follow the links below for ticket links and music clips for all of their picks, and find even more shows on our complete music calendar. Plus, check out our arts' critics' picks for the 50 best things to do this week.

Found something you like and don't want to forget about it later? Click "Save Event" on any of the linked events below to add it to your own private list.

In the Spotlight: Hannah Kendall
Seattle Symphony presents the US premiere of The Spark Catchers, a luminescent number from British (and millennial!!) composer Hannah Kendall. The composition conveys such a strong sense of narrative and action-adventure drama that it could be the soundtrack to a lost scene from Star Wars. The piece, commissioned by the BBC, has been getting good reviews. “Confident,” says Classical Source. "Rhythmically incisive," says the Guardian. Stick around after the show to check out the symphony's new innovative space, and also to talk shop about chamber music with Kendall. RICH SMITH

ROCK/POP

Cowboy Junkies
The first time I ever heard Cowboy Junkies was on a dirty, beer-stained couch at the radio station I used to help run in college. My friend and I were supposed to be studying, but we ended up just lying around listening to music. She put on their cover of Velvet Underground’s “Sweet Jane,” which seemed to fit every mood I could ever have at 21—melancholy, meditative, cautious, ready to yield to the good things in life. Like the rest of the band’s work. Cowboy Junkies are now celebrating 30 years together as a band. Cheers to that.JASMYNE KEIMIG

The Cult
Punters love the Cult, and they rightly should expect this night to be filled with the Brit band’s rock swaggery. That said, their popularity always surprises me. Back in the 1980s, even with lots of radio play, they were almost immediately dumped into the also-rans file as their pop ascension was stymied by a first single riff in “Love Removal Machine” seemingly copped from the Stones’ “Start Me Up,” and then by the arrival of GnR. That was then, though, ’cause now it’s easy to hear how they evolved from new romantics into heshers who, on balance, are way better than most other ’80s hair bands. MIKE NIPPER

TUESDAY CLASSICAL

In the Spotlight: Bolcom, Jolley, Poteat & Hausmann
Seattle supports a pretty robust scene of local symphonic composers. Seattle Symphony has plucked out a few of the major players—William Bolcom, Jérémy Jolley, Ben Hausmann, and Angelique Poteat—and given them the room for the night. Bolcom's piece is a fun ragtime jam, Poteat's Ripples of Possibilities features meditative and warbly clarinets that break into madness, Hausmann's Sonnet for Eternal Loveliness is just sort of pleasant and at its best occasionally sounds like Vince Guaraldi's A Charlie Brown Christmas, and Jolley's (contro-)clessidra I & IV combines electronic instruments with regular ones and basically sounds like it looks. RICH SMITH

ROCK/POP

Connan Mockasin, Molly Lewis
Lovable, experimental, "fake jazz" genius Connan Mockasin writes funny, sweet, psychedelic pop and lounge songs about romantic yearning ("Forever Dolphin Love"), magic ("Faking Jazz Together"), and the real-life encumbrances of modern sexuality ("Charlotte’s Thong"). Both his production style—he recorded his second album Carmel in a Tokyo hotel room—and his subject material speak to a deep internal world, spritzed with humor. Mockasin’s Jassbusters was one of my favorite records of last year, and the Genius page which sought to log the lyrics of "Charlotte’s Thong" is a piece of art. Who among us can say what happened to Charlotte’s thong? SUZETTE SMITH

Father John Misty, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, Jade Bird
Father John Misty is a perfectly perfunctory performer. When I saw him at Sub Pop’s 30th Anniversary Party last summer, he hit every note, every dance move, every guitar strum exactly as he should. But it was still hard to connect with him behind those shades. It was like he was performing in his sleep. Well, what do performers owe their audiences, anyway? FJM released the pretty good God’s Favorite Customer last June, which was a decidedly less preachy effort than his third album, 2017’s Pure Comedy. God’s Favorite Customer found FJM just as down, just as out, just as witty, just as self-centered as he’s ever been—like we like him. JASMYNE KEIMIG

NPR Music's Tiny Desk Contest on the Road
Join KEXP and NPR Music staff for live performances by 2019 Tiny Desk Contest winner and Alaskan singer-songwriter Quinn Christopherson (who, endearingly, didn't own his own guitar until after he received the indie honor) and additional guests.

TUESDAY-WEDNESDAY BLUES/COUNTRY/FOLK

Rickie Lee Jones
Rickie Lee Jones sang “Sympathy for the Devil” (prerecorded) as I read how Trump’s (first) travel ban got definitively thumped by the courts: That night, her manifestation of pure evil/ego—toting its crimes in a failing rasp, a boast its only potency—left me reduced to a toothless pile of wrinkles camped out by the shitter in Joe’s Bar & Grill. Madeleine Peyroux gives us a healthy, sensible Billie Holiday—bit of a creak, but sweetness at the bottom in each note. Her “Desperados Under the Eaves” turns melancholy with elegance, a move that angers “alcoholic purists” out there on YouTube—but I say some people fade (alcoholically) with melancholy elegance. Wrong. Horrible. But sometimes people disappear (slowly) into air-conditioner hum. ANDREW HAMLIN

WEDNESDAY BLUES/COUNTRY/FOLK

SOAK., Fenne Lily
Northern Ireland's Bridie Monds-Watson, who plays indie-folk as SOAK., will come through town on the heels of her introspective 14-track sophomore album, Grim Town. She'll be joined by Fenne Lily.

CLASSICAL

Rain City Symphony Spring Concert
In their annual springtime concert, Rain City Symphony will perform orchestral works by Paul Dukas, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Jules Massenet.

EXPERIMENTAL/NOISE

The Art Gray Noizz Quintet, the Tom Price Desert Classic
Any band boasting former members of Lubricated Goat and Live Skull will get my attention. So it’s pleasing to report that the Art Gray Noizz Quintet live up to expectations. The Brooklyn brutes’ recent “A Call to You”/“Won't Say It to My Face” single pummels, whooshes, and oscillates like Hawkwind on a tequila bender. It’s pugilistic rock with gravel-voiced singing that aspires to space, but it’s too busy kicking your ass to achieve stellar liftoff. (Key detail: The drummer's name is Bloody Rich.) And that resultant friction is what makes the music so compelling. DAVE SEGAL

JAZZ

Moveable Mirror: Rudresh Mahanthappa, Eric Revis, Dave King
Rudresh Mahanthappa is an American saxophonist who combines the Carnatic music of his Southern Indian heritage with jazz, funk, hip-hop, and other Western genres. He brings a hybridized vigor to these styles, blowing magniloquent gusts of high-energy virtuosity, his mad fluency reminiscent of Sonny Rollins. So it's not surprising that Mahanthappa and his Moveable Mirror trio with drummer Dave King (the Bad Plus) and bassist Eric Revis will interpret Rollins’s 1958 Blue Note LP, A Night at the Village Vanguard, as well as his own galvanizing and spiritual compositions. Mahanthappa has played with Jack DeJohnette, Vijay Iyer, and Steve Lehman, among others, so you know he's the real deal. This is destined to be one of the best Jazz Alley bookings of 2019. DAVE SEGAL

ROCK/POP

Nick Murphy
Now performing under his given name after years as Chet Faker, Nick Murphy has a new album out. And boy is he ready to tour supporting it. Run Fast Sleep Naked wasn’t as warmly received as the stuff under his now-retired moniker. Chet Faker was a bit more bedroomy. Chet Faker was an Australian dude trying his hand at both soul and electronica. Chet Faker covered “No Diggity.” This new non-Chet era of Murphy’s career often finds him singing over an orchestra with a strange, faux Americana earnestness about him. In any case, go forth and cross your fingers he’ll hit you with some “Birthday Card” at his live performance. JASMYNE KEIMIG

THURSDAY ROCK/POP

Rob Thomas, Abby Anderson
Relive the most earnest moments and deeply alt sounds of the '90s and '00s with slick Matchbox 20 frontman Rob Thomas and opener Abby Anderson on their Chip Tooth tour.

THURSDAY-SUNDAY BLUES/COUNTRY/FOLK

John Mayall Band with Carolyn Wonderland, Greg Rzab and Jay Davenport
I know lots of folks like to deride any and all strictly blues aspects of ROCK. Y'all, I understand, it didn't take long after blues relocated to the city then went hippie for things to turn a little stock-sounding and "bar" band-ish, but John Mayall was an early groundbreaker (pun intended). He is a piece in the puzzle of our rock 'n' roll history. In fact, HUNDREDS (okay, not hundreds, but a handful) of them who’d become rock GODS passed through his group, the Bluesbreakers: Eric Clapton, Peter Green, Mick Taylor, Mark Almond, and Harvey Mandel! And all the while, Mayall held true to his singular, narrow vision: Play them blues and play 'em RIGHT! Now, he's 84 years old and still going strong! MIKE NIPPER

FRIDAY FUNK/REGGAE

Eldridge Gravy & the Court Supreme, Black Cherry Crush, High Pulp
High Pulp have been building a low-key buzz for a minute—but for no good reason, I hadn't listened to them until this month. My bad. The Seattle 10-piece generate complicated, feel-great instrumentals that should please fans of early Santana, folks into expansive funk and fusion, and jam-band aficionados. High Pulp’s party music inspires communal, celebratory sensations without the sweaty-handed corniness that often accompanies this approach. A couple of listens to their 2018 album Bad Juice will convince you they’re one of the most interesting acts in town. It makes perfect sense that High Pulp are opening for fellow big-band party-starters Eldridge Gravy. DAVE SEGAL

The Heavy
You know the Heavy from their 2006 single “How You Like Me Now?” Even though it only peaked at No. 122 on the Billboard 200, that track was tapped everywhere—commercials (Kia Sorento SUV), films and trailers and closing credits (The Transporter Refueled, Horrible Bosses, The Fighter), video games (Borderlands 2, Forza Horizon 2), TV shows (Community, Suits), TV theme songs (Intentional Talk on MLB Network), and sporting events (it’s Radim Vrbata’s personalized goal song, and it plays whenever he scores during Vancouver Canucks home games). The UK group hasn’t strayed far from making hard-ass-shaking rock heavily dosed with crunchy funk and neo-soul, and they land in town behind their fifth and latest album full of it, Sons. LEILANI POLK

ROCK/POP

Gretchen Grimm, Solitaire, Abbey Blackwell, The Zig Zag Lady
Four women from local bands will go solo: The Zig Zag Lady Sound Experience (Erica Miller of Casual Hex and Big Bite) Gretchen Grimm (of Chastity Belt and Woo Girls), Abbey Blackwell, and Solitaire (Candace Harter of Darto).

Mudhoney, The Fucking Eagles, The Drove
When I think about Mudhoney, I always think about Citizen Dick. Matt Dillon’s fictional band in the 1992 grunge rom-com Singles parodies the Mudhoney hit “Touch Me I’m Sick” with a song called “Touch Me I’m Dick.” There’s a reason Cameron Crowe chose that song to poke fun at: Mudhoney are Sub Pop’s flagship band, and that 1988 single remains a fiery, headbanging classic. And so does the band. While so many groups associated with that six-letter G word have gone the way of Dillon’s long locks, Mudhoney have continued to shred with sinister distortion, Mark Arm’s piercing vocal howl, and plenty of feedback that never diminishes with each new album. Unlike Crowe’s film, Mudhoney aren’t a charmingly dorky time capsule—they’re a band that’s remained effortlessly cool and still totally rocks. ROBIN EDWARDS

Summer Cannibals, Blushh, Dreamdecay
Here's Sean Nelson with an endorsement: "There's no delicate way to say it: Summer Cannibals fucking rule. They play with the punishing urgency of young Superchunk, songs full of power and abandon but also set alight by excellent pop instincts and shrewd songwriting. Their third album, Full of It, has been a mainstay since its 2016 release, and their live shows are exciting in a way rock bands often don't even bother aspiring to anymore. Too bad for those losers." See them after opening sets from Shab Ferdowsi's fuzzy pop project Blushh and local punks Dreamdecay.

W Music Spotlight: La Fonda
Join local indie dream-pop sextet La Fonda for some dreamy jams full of '60s "surf-esque" guitars and swoony synths.

FRIDAY-SATURDAY ELECTRONIC

Paradiso Festival
Paradiso is the PNW's premier festival of WUB-WUB-WUB, colloquially known as brostep, also called EDM, which is short for "electronic dance music" (you're welcome, grandpa). Headliners include Benny Benassi, Alison Wonderland, Kaskade, Elephante, and Skrillex. Trust that glow sticks will be wielded, hearts broken, and vape pens smoked.

SATURDAY BLUES/COUNTRY/FOLK

Patty Griffin
Chances are you've already heard the music of Patty Griffin. Her songs have been recorded by Emmylou Harris, Willie Nelson, Dixie Chicks, even Bette Midler. But you haven't really, truly experienced Griffin until you hear her perform her own stellar originals. And her fifth album, Children Running Through, is a perfect place to start, showcasing a voice as strong and versatile as her compositional chops. Griffin waxes jazzy on the opening "You'll Remember," lets loose with a fiery blues/gospel number on "Up the Mountain (MLK Song)"—which no less a personage, the King of Rock 'n' Soul Solomon Burke, recently cut, too—and whips through the kiss-off ditty "Getting Ready" with hell-raising fervor. She's every bit as gifted as any of her A-list patrons, and deserves just as much public recognition. KURT B. REIGHLEY

Massive Monkees Day
Massive Monkees Day is a true Seattle institution that is both entertaining and drenched in positivity. The focal point of this breakdancing holiday arranged by Seattle’s legendary B-boy/B-girl crew Massive Monkees is the Pro Breaking Tour–sanctioned battle royale, which this year has moved to the Showbox. The world-class dancers (who will be traveling from all over North America, Asia, and Europe to compete) and the DJs who accompany them create an impressive musical/athletic spectacle, and the familial vibe that has helped to keep the breaking community intact runs strong throughout. TODD HAMM

JAZZ

Seattle Repertory Jazz Orchestra—Ray Charles: I Can't Stop Lovin' You
Witness the massive legacy of Ray Charles with this performance by the Seattle Repertory Jazz Orchestra of Charles classics and rare big band scores played on the road by the Ray Charles Orchestra.

METAL/PUNK

Yungblud, Saint PHNX
If I were walking down the street in 2007 and someone was blasting Yungblud’s “Loner” out of their car, I wouldn’t have batted an eye. The artist otherwise known as Dominic Harrison sounds so ska-meets-suburban-brat-from-the-UK that he almost transcends time. And before you ask, yes, Yungblud does love Arctic Monkeys. Despite the rather exhausting image he puts out, Yungblud fancies himself a socially conscious singer. A cut off his latest studio album, 21st Century, called “Machine Gun (F**k the NRA)” is a comment on his feelings about gun culture in the US. He swings mainstream pop as well, appearing on “11 Minutes” alongside trashy pop mainstay Halsey and Travis Barker (?). Yungblud is supported by Glaswegian fraternal pop duo Saint PHNX. JASMYNE KEIMIG

ROCK/POP

The Middle Ages, Seablite, Neutrals
While my “editorial focus” IS on tonight’s kick-ass bill, I gotta holler: If you ain’t been down to Southgate Roller Rink yet, turn up early and get an hour of skating in. Cool? Okay, I can't simplify headliner Seablite's SOUND by calling them anything obvious, ’cause they play a kind of melodic, thickly atmospheric sweetness framed by delicate paisley-pop nods and sideswiped by a slight shoegaze fixation. Um, they’re just cool—so, kids, dose accordingly. Also kicking up dust tonight will be local punks Middle Ages and, from Oakland, Neutrals, a smart UK-style punk group. MIKE NIPPER

SUNDAY BLUES/COUNTRY/FOLK

Indigo Girls, Sera Cahoone
Amy Ray and Emily Saliers are still Indigo Girls (the band's approaching 34!) and still folk-rockin'. They'll perform on the bucolic north meadow of the Woodland Park Zoo as a part of the annual summer concert series, ZooTunes.

CLASSICAL

Kishi Bashi, Takenobu
The fourth and latest album from Kaoru Ishibashi (professionally known as Kishi Bashi) is bright, poignant, heartfelt, and infused with a sense of hope, even during its more melancholy moments. From the breezy, acoustic-guitar-picked opening of "Penny Rabbit and Summer Bear" with its Harry Nilsson "Everybody's Talkin'" feel, to the sweeping symphonics and forlorn beauty of "Summer of '42," to the twangy fiddle-rousing banjo-plucked closer "Annie, Heart Thief of the Sea," Omoiyari is a stunner that remains uplifting despite its bleak inspiration: the WWII internment of Japanese Americans. Omoiyari is a bit of a departure from Kishi Bashi's previous efforts, folkier while conversely more finely composed and orchestrated. Instead of mostly producing the entire album himself, the Berklee-trained musician (who sings and plays violin primarily, but also guitar and keys) brought on a band (including frequent collaborator Tall Tall Trees on bass and banjo) and some chamber players to back him up. It's also more political, though the parallels between what happened then versus what's happening now are examined more deeply and thoroughly in accompanying documentary Omoiyari: A Songfilm by Kishi Bashi, due out sometime next year. LEILANI POLK

Steve Hackman's Harder, Better, Faster, Stravinsky
Composer and producer Steve Hackman will lay out the full spectrum of Stravinsky to Kanye in this pop-classical mash-up concert that matches composers with chart-toppers.

Mama's Thirsty: A Queer Lady Hangout Pride Edition!
For this installment of a series highlighting womxn- and queer-fronted music acts in Seattle, hosted by Caela Bailey as always, enjoy a live set by Guayaba with burlesque by "2018 Queen of Oregon" Nox Falls, lap dances by "the gorgeous Kiki and friends," and DJ sets by PepTalk.

JAZZ

ROCK/POP

Duff McKagan, Shooter Jennings
Ex-Guns N' Roses bassist and beloved PNW resident Duff McKagan will hit the stage with his backing band alongside a support set by Shooter Jennings.

Hoop, Fell Runner, Baby Jessica
Former Stranger contributor Robin Edwards wrote: "When I first saw Hoop, all that kept running through my head was a constant stream of 'Wow, I love this band.' Caitlin Roberts, Leena Joshi, and Pamela Santiago trade off singing on the dreamiest friendship-bracelet pop songs, full of tender harmonies and magical guitar lines and introspective lyrics that tug gently on my most sensitive heartstrings." Tonight, they'll perform with LA-based experimental rockers Fell Runner and local rock trio Baby Jessica.

SOUL/R&B

Stephanie Anne Johnson & The Highdogs, The Junebugs
Tacoma-bred R&B/soul artist Stephanie Anne Johnson (who was featured on the 2013 season of The Voice) will be backed by her band and welcomed with an opening set from down-tempo indie rockers Junebugs.

Learning to Love Boy George, the Most Frustrating Queer Pop Icon of All Time

Kurt B. Reighley — Wed, 10 Aug 2016 04:00:00 -0700

Learning to Love Boy George, the Most Frustrating Queer Pop Icon of All Time by Kurt B. Reighley

Like many teenage males in my small Virginia town, I initially had a problem with Boy George. But, true to form, my particular problem was... different.

I didn't scoff at George because he looked or acted "too gay." On the contrary, he wasn't gay enough.

Kissing to Be Clever took me by surprise. Staring up from my local record store's new releases bin, George's plaited hair and exaggerated makeup prompted me to briefly mistake Culture Club's debut for a new release by art rocker Lene Lovich.

I showed the purple-and-yellow album cover to my friend Sebastian. "When did Brooke Shields make a record?" he asked.

The idea of Culture Club, with its mix of people (black, white, Jewish, Irish Catholic) and influences (reggae, calypso, soul), sounded revolutionary. Drummer Jon Moss had played with the Damned and Adam and the Ants, and George boasted ties to former Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren.

Alas, Kissing to Be Clever underwhelmed. But Boy George's eye-popping maquillage and androgynous attire inspired me. As the gender bender's fame increased, so did my fashion risks. On one occasion, I rolled into first period geometry wearing most of my costume from The Mikado.

More than just a pretty face, George gave great interviews, too. Razor-witted yet rarely bitchy, he preached love, tolerance, and acceptance. Even Joan Rivers liked him! Humor had already saved me from many scrapes, and Culture Club's international popularity signaled that my skills could help carry me to international renown.

But time and again, one message remained conspicuous in its absence: George's glistening lips never formed the words "I'm gay." Instead, he told us that he'd loved men and women, nonstop work precluded romance, and he preferred a nice cup of tea to sex any day.

I wanted more. Selfish, I admit. I'd come out of the closet to my friends and immediate family after a heated discussion with Sebastian about our gym class locker buddies. Through theater and music, I met supportive LGBTQ adults who helped me accept who I was. But my parents warned that my disclosure would ruin my life.

To my amazement, jocks began to back off when I challenged their queer-baiting antics in front of classmates. The violence and cruelty that'd characterized my first two years of high school dropped off once I said, "I'm gay." Life got better. Why the hell couldn't Boy George do it, too?

Culture Club sold millions of records worldwide. George even made the cover of Newsweek, and I have no doubt such unprecedented visibility helped many closeted or questioning kids find their own identities. I wanted him to stop dodging the topic and help me prove my parents wrong. In a world with almost no openly gay role models, George's silence felt like confirmation that my voice didn't matter, either.

George wasn't the sole offender in the 1980s, just the most popular. Marc Almond (Soft Cell), Neil Tennant (Pet Shop Boys), and George Michael (Wham!) also danced around the question. Morrissey dithered on about celibacy while slapping pictures of male nudes and Truman Capote on Smiths album sleeves.

In 1984, Culture Club won best new artist at the Grammy Awards. "Thanks, America, you've got style, you've got taste, and you know a good drag queen when you see one," winked George. Ah, the pithy quip, lingua franca of gay men everywhere. Boy George calling himself a "drag queen" spoke volumes to me, but it breezed right past Mom and Dad.

These were troubling times for LGBTQ music lovers seeking community leaders. "I had and have nothing against camp, but there are times like these when it is simply inappropriate and even dishonest," writes John Gill in his 1995 anthology Queer Noises. "At a time when gay men were beginning to die in the thousands, did we really want to perpetuate outdated marginal images which only enabled homophobes to disempower queers even more?"

Like Gill, I felt more affinity for openly queer trio Bronski Beat, but Culture Club wielded far greater influence. I continued to pray they would eventually prove as edgy as I'd first imagined. Occasionally they came close; the Motown stomp and wailing harmonica of "Church of the Poison Mind" still thrills. But whatever hopes remained that the quartet might bloom into Generation Benetton's answer to the Clash withered once "The War Song" unfurled in billows of "It's a Small World" sentimentality and padded-shoulder cynicism.

Admiring Boy George grew easier after Culture Club collapsed amid his drug troubles. The determination of certain judges, politicians, and media outlets to make an example of the singer infuriated me. It still does. Every time I see that 2006 photo of him picking up trash as part of his community service for a false burglary report, it stings like those anonymous taunts of "faggot" from passing pickup trucks back in my sleepy hometown.

His initial solo recordings still played it safe. His 1987 cover of Bread's "Everything I Own" resurrected "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me," a pleasant reggae groove buoying up its lyrical vulnerability. But who could blame him? People may root for the underdog, but when it comes down to crunch time, we prefer to be on the winning side. "Everything" went number one in the UK.

Finally, as the message that Silence = Death spread, George raised his voice for LGBTQ rights. His 1988 club track "No Clause 28" decried UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher and the amendment she'd introduced to prohibit local governments from the promotion of homosexuality as normal, healthy behavior. Topical lyrics limited the song's impact on audiences beyond Great Britain, but finicky faggots like me nevertheless cheered George's dance-floor activism.

The solo successes continued. He started his own record label, More Protein, and embarked on a side hustle as a DJ. He'd started his career in the clubs and seemed rejuvenated by his return. In 1991, under the moniker Jesus Loves You, he released the superlative "Bow Down Mister," which incorporated gospel and "Hare Krishna" into a slow-burning house cut. Even amid patchwork albums, fans could unearth gems like "I Specialize in Loneliness" and the frothy "Girlfriend."

Then came his finest hour: "The Crying Game." George's bittersweet voice, Pet Shop Boys production, and lush strings, all in service of a bruised Brenda Lee classic. Voilà! The ideal theme song for a film where a straight man falls for a transgender woman. The subsequent disclosure of George's tempestuous sexual relationship with Moss throughout Culture Club's heyday added more layers of meaning to his most poignant performance.

Though he still seems reliant on the same sources of income as many of his early MTV contemporaries (reality TV, nostalgia tours), Boy George's legacy feels more vibrant than most of his peers'. Credit a generation of younger artists, including John Grant, that didn't hold him to the same grudging standards of conduct as I did.

In 2004, Anohni invited George to sing "You Are My Sister" on Antony and the Johnsons' I Am a Bird Now. She recalled hours spent gazing at the same record cover that'd flummoxed Sebastian and me 33 years before: "George was really the first reflection I saw of myself in the world. I saw him and thought, 'Okay, that's what we do when we're like this: We become singers.'"

George has done a mostly admirable job easing into the role of elder statesman, writing two entertaining memoirs and a successful West End musical (Taboo) about his roots in London's New Romantic club scene. Well-chosen covers of Iggy Pop, Lou Reed, and Yoko Ono have aligned him with the musical groundbreakers who came before him.

Best of all, he's still making music. Mark ("Uptown Funk") Ronson featured George on his 2010 Record Collection. In 2013, the singer startled fans with This Is What I Do, his first studio album of original material in 18 years. His register has dropped lower, the rasp in his throat transformed from finest sandpaper to jagged gravel. Like Billie Holiday's circa Lady in Satin and Marianne Faithfull's from Broken English forward, George's voice has been imbued with hard-edged wisdom by decades of ups and downs.

Silence isn't the only thing that omits queer voices from the narrative. Ageism within our own communities erases us, too. Boy George turned 55 this year, an age so many men of my generation—friends who taught me to feel proud when I proclaimed "I'm gay"—never lived to see. The world needs smart, mouthy, middle-aged queers.

So if George elects to join the cast of Celebrity Apprentice or periodically trot out the oldies with Culture Club, I won't complain. Release new music. Give more interviews. Just keep making noise. I may not always agree with everything Boy George says—or chooses not to say—but thank goodness he still has a microphone.

Showers of Love

Kurt B. Reighley — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 04:00:00 -0700

The Raincoats Envelop Seattle for the First Time Ever by Kurt B. Reighley

A glow of love for the Raincoats radiates all over the Pacific Northwest—and it's so bright, it's likely visible from outer space. Kurt Cobain, Calvin Johnson, Tobi Vail, and Kathleen Hanna all championed the innovative all-female percussive post-punk combo long before they were invited to perform at MoMA and All Tomorrow's Parties. Still, they have never played Seattle before, and that's outrageous. Our region's fertile scene may not have spawned them—the late 1970s UK punk explosion gets credit for that—but were it not for the impact of grunge, indie rock, and riot grrrl, the Raincoats probably wouldn't be touring in 2012.

In the liner notes to Nirvana's 1992 rarities comp Incesticide, Cobain documents his quest to score the Raincoats' out-of-print debut LP during a London visit. That odyssey led him to guitarist Ana da Silva, who dutifully sent him a copy. The giddy fanboy swooned: "It made me happier than playing in front of thousands of people each night, rock-god idolization from fans, music-industry plankton kissing my ass, and the millions of dollars I made last year. It was one of the few really important things that I've been blessed with since becoming an untouchable boy genius."

"We were very delighted and charmed to know that Kurt Cobain seemed to like us the way he did," demurs bassist Gina Birch. "That was a very great thing." In 1993, the band's three original albums—The Raincoats (1979), Odyshape (1981), and Moving (1984)—were reissued by Geffen subsidiary DGC. The vinyl-only Fairytales comp soon followed on Portland's Tim/Kerr Records. An invitation to support Nirvana on a 1994 UK tour prompted the dormant band to reconvene. Although Cobain's death mooted those gigs, the Raincoats forged ahead. For their fourth album, 1996's Looking in the Shadows, they welcomed a new drummer; Heather Dunn, of K Records faves Tiger Trap, came recommended by Kim Gordon and Bikini Kill's Tobi Vail.

Vocal support from 1990s rebel girls helped the Raincoats get their groove back in a figurative sense, too. "We felt really inspired by listening to those bands and going out to see some of them," says da Silva. "That was when we started playing again." The Raincoats were a pioneering group with a DIY aesthetic, a defiantly democratic ensemble that rejected narrowly conscripted roles for women in rock. Now Bikini Kill were telling kids to seek out their back catalog.

Love for the Raincoats persists in our region today. "I remember buying a Raincoats CD when I was in high school," says Hannah Blilie of Gossip, who released a split single with the Raincoats in 2009. Their rough-hewn overhaul of the Kinks' "Lola" immediately impressed her. "The vocals were mind- blowing, the harmonies and the toughness of their delivery. I especially liked how the lyrics sounded being sung by women. It seemed to turn the gender-bending theme of that song into an even more exciting, dangerous, queer, and punk expression."

Dangerous indeed. "It was a bit like jumping off a cliff at the time," says Birch, apropos of the early years. Not only was the group self-taught, molding their aesthetic while still learning how to play, role models were nearly nonexistent. Nevertheless, the Slits and Patti Smith had lit a fire under them. "It was amazing that you felt like you needed permission to have a go at it. It was still terrifying and hard to do, but strangely, up until that point, it wasn't even something that we'd really considered. You might think, 'Why not?' But girls just didn't do that kind of thing."

Yet the Raincoats' forays into uncharted territory are precisely what made them so exciting. Vicky Aspinall's violin playing prompted some reviewers to draw parallels to the Velvet Underground, but ultimately the Raincoats sounded like no other. Their second album, Odyshape, remains one of the most vital—and least "rock"—records to come out of punk's heyday, featuring African percussion instruments including kalimba and balaphone. While former Slits member Palmolive had kept time on The Raincoats, Odyshape found Aspinall, Birch, and da Silva working without a fixed drummer. They expanded their sound by inviting peers such as Charles Hayward (This Heat) and Robert Wyatt (Soft Machine) to play along in the studio.

Recently, Birch interviewed Wyatt for a Raincoats documentary she's making. "He was talking about records he liked to listen to, records that were recorded live, old jazz records. He said the breath was on the record, life was on the record." Odyshape embodies that organic, spontaneous feeling, too. "It captured something in real time, not mediated by too much technology."

"Odyshape is a post-punk masterpiece," says Blilie. She applauds the Raincoats' atypical approach to rhythm and the incorporation of timbres from other cultures. "I was really into the off-kilter and almost tribal sound of their drumming and percussion. That was a huge influence on the work I did with my [previous] band Shoplifting."

By the time the Raincoats released Moving, Birch thought punk had run its course. "I'd believed in this idea of change and some kind of revolution so much, and then it just became New Romantics and pirates. It felt like it was over, and I wasn't sure why I'd gotten so worked up about it in the first place." A decade later, artists from our neck of the woods reminded her why. "When the riot grrrl thing happened, it felt like air had been breathed back into our lungs."

The Hardest-Working Man You've Never Heard Of

Kurt B. Reighley — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 04:00:00 -0700

Dennis Coffey Has Made a Life by Staying Out of the Limelight by Kurt B. Reighley

You may not recognize the name Dennis Coffey, but he's on your iPod. As a session musician in the late '60s and early '70s heyday of Motor City soul, the guitarist played on classics including Honey Cone's "Want Ads," Freda Payne's "Band of Gold," and "I Want You" by Marvin Gaye. His innovative sounds are an integral part of nearly all the Temptations' funky latter-day hits: "Cloud Nine," "Ball of Confusion," "Psychedelic Shack." In the annals of sampling, he's right up there with James Brown, popping up on tracks by Eric B. & Rakim, LL Cool J, Public Enemy, DJ Shadow, Moby, Deee-Lite, and Rage Against the Machine. Then there's his catalog as a solo artist, which includes the 1971 top 10 instrumental "Scorpio," the soundtrack to the 1974 blaxploitation classic Black Belt Jones, and his 2010 self-titled comeback LP for prestigious UK imprint Strut Records.

True, Coffey was featured in Standing in the Shadows of Motown, the 2002 documentary about the label's in-house band, the Funk Brothers (which he joined in 1967), but that hardly makes him a household name. Musicians' musicians like Coffey resemble great Hollywood character actors more than big box-office draws. Middle America might not know who they are, but they have the acclaim of their peers, steady employment, and the freedom to move between a variety of projects without attracting undue attention.

In Coffey's case, this has yielded a résumé far more diversified than his status as a funk and soul legend might suggest. Having grown up emulating the country licks of Chet Atkins and Hank Williams, he cut his first record backing rockabilly musician Vic Gallon when he was only 15. "I had to get someone else to drive me to the session," he recalls, laughing. "But the guy paid me, and I thought, 'How cool is this? I get paid to make records now!'" While working on Dennis Coffey, he was drafted to record with infamous blues singer Andre Williams. He's even talking about a classical project with Father Eduard Perrone, the man responsible for preserving the legacy of Detroit composer and conductor Paul Paray.

Much of that stylistic flexibility hinges on Coffey's ability to innovate on the fly. When he was working for Motown, Hot Wax, and other seminal Detroit labels, players were supposed to lay down four sides per session. "We were introduced to a new song once an hour, and expected to come up with new sounds for each." Producers like Norman Whitfield regularly asked Coffey what unusual effects and pedals he had in his bag of tricks; he generated the hornlike timbres that grace the intro of the Undisputed Truth's 1971 number-three hit "Smiling Faces Sometimes" by using a curious gadget outfitted with organ stops. On his solo records, he would arrange guitar parts to sound like a brass section and put vocal ensembles through guitar effects.

Years of playing well with others and being open to new ideas, plus a back catalog to die for, helped Coffey avoid the pitfalls that plague many veteran artists who attempt to update their sound. Dennis Coffey hews close to his roots, mixing funky originals in the classic Coffey mold with new readings of songs he first cut with Wilson Pickett, Funkadelic, and Detroit cult hero Rodriguez. For the latter tracks, he tapped guest vocalists who clearly appreciated the nature of the project—Mayer Hawthorne, Mick Collins of the Dirtbombs, Lisa Kekaula of the BellRays—rather than a bunch of veteran alt-rockers or American Idol contestants. (The recent Outer Galaxies: Dennis Coffey Re-worked EP reflects that homegrown sensibility, too, emphasizing remixes by Michigan natives like Recloose, Ectomorph, and Dabrye.) His band and management team may include longtime associates of Eminem and Kid Rock, but that's because Coffey stays active in the Detroit scene, it's not a desperate bid to reach a younger demographic.

And "active" is the key word there. Despite all that studio experience, playing live has always been crucial for Coffey. "You can stay at home and woodshed all you like, but if you're going to make records with any hope of selling your music, you have to get in front of an audience." Even though he turns 71 this November, he has no intention of retiring soon—or resorting to a Branson, Missouri–style "greatest hits" show. "I don't want to be a nostalgia act," he says. "I'm out there doing what I do, and having fun, and that's what I'm supposed to be doing."

From Right Here to Infinity

Kurt B. Reighley — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 04:00:00 -0700

Thousands' Intimate Constructions Find a Worldwide Audience by Kurt B. Reighley

Thousands are best appreciated up close and personal—and that's how the Seattle duo likes it. Everything Kristian Garrard and Luke Bergman do hinges on intimacy: their hazy harmonies, intertwined guitars, and affinity for unplugged house shows. They sent their debut album, The Sound of Everything, to some reviewers with complimentary headphones. Even the chords Garrard favors when composing the band's acoustic reveries reflect that affinity for proximity.

"When I was first shown what a diminished chord was, it blew my mind," the 28-year-old recalls. The notion of notes spaced tighter than in traditional major or minor formations spurred his creativity. "I would find two of the most unrelated chords, and then spend hours figuring out how to connect them through a melody. That was the goal of my whole songwriting approach, trying to make weird changes sound good."

Judging from The Sound of Everything and the rapt attention the pair commanded during a February residency at the Sunset, Garrard has succeeded. "MTSES III" and the effervescent "Must Be Born Again" unfurl like strands of DNA, melodies twisting together into one-of-a-kind structures informed by the curious order of the natural world more than rote rules of Western harmony. Assonance and cadence shape his lyrics as much as rhyme scheme, imparting the words with a lilting, off-the-cuff character.

With very rare exceptions—a flute on "Love Won't Come," droning harmonium on the title tune—the Thousands sound consists of just two voices and two guitars. Separating Garrard and Bergman's individual contributions, however, seems as futile as unraveling that double helix. "We try to arrange the parts so that they're woven into each other," confirms Garrard. "Sometimes on the recordings you can't tell who's playing what."

Bergman is an imposing guy, but his harmonies are remarkably delicate, crossing over Gerrard's vocal leads or hovering just a half step or two away, as in the final passages of "Everything Turned Upside Down." In a loud rock band like X, such frisson heightens tension and builds excitement; for Thousands, who favor hushed dynamics, this tight formation feels more relaxed, like a shadow that cannot be divided from the entity that casts it.

The duo's ease together was reinforced by living in the same University District group house for three years. It was here, at the behest of friends who wanted to hear more, that Thousands first tried making a DIY record. It didn't go smoothly. "There were always doors slamming or people walking around. And the music is so quiet, there needs to be dead silence," says Bergman. The solution? They took the material—which is already ripe with images of rolling hills, mossy trees, frost, and fog—out to the country, recording in the woods of the Oregon Coast, an old house in Columbia County, and the silo of an abandoned farm in the historic hamlet of Thorp, Washington.

Playing in unconventional settings was already part of the Thousands narrative. Most early performances took place at house shows and similarly tight-knit affairs. A last-minute spot supporting Fleet Foxes at Columbia City Theater earlier this month put them in front of their biggest crowd yet: 300 patrons. "I was majorly apprehensive about starting to amplify ourselves," admits Bergman about graduating to larger audiences. Creating the same effect in a busy bar as in a friend's kitchen proved daunting, but practicing with a PA—plus a genial stage presence that never feels precious—has smoothed the transition.

The small social circle that was Thousands' earliest boosters, and pushed them to record, also led to their label deal. "The album wasn't intended to be a big international release," says Garrard. "We did a little pressing of it, just for our friends. Then Skye [Skjelset] from Fleet Foxes got really into us, and he was burning CDs and giving them to everyone he could." One of those recipients was former Cocteau Twins bassist Simon Raymonde, who promptly signed them to his Bella Union imprint.

Even as The Sound of Everything reaches listeners worldwide, Thousands have started their next album. The new songs revolve around a true historical tale about two of Garrard's female ancestors who settled on Vancouver Island's Clayoquot Sound in the early 20th century, and a gentleman who lived across the inlet (in a small wooden castle!), who adored these sisters so much that he'd serenade them by playing his cornet in the treetops. It's a fantastic story that bodes well for Thousands' future: Even if his ambitions are modest, Garrard seems genetically predisposed to connecting powerfully with admirers more than a few feet away.

The Queen of Pain

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 04:00:00 -0800

John Grant Turns a Lifetime of Shitty Days into Musical Gold by Kurt B. Reighley

John Grant is having a shitty day. Shortly before our interview, the man of his dreams—the one who inspired at least four songs on Grant's solo debut, Queen of Denmark—told him their troubled relationship was unequivocally finished. "It's been ongoing," he admits. "But yesterday he was like, 'Adios, forever.'"

Talk about rotten timing: British music glossy MOJO just anointed Queen of Denmark its number one album of the year. This fall, Grant, the former frontman for Denver combo the Czars, toured Europe supporting Wilco. He performed on the UK TV show Later with Jools Holland alongside Grinderman. "Nick Cave just came up to me, looking like a million bucks in his suit, and said, 'Hi, I'm Nick.'" Grant was awestruck.

Such joys are still new. Despite its pleasing surfaces, particularly the singer's mellifluous baritone and arrangements reminiscent of 1970s soft rock, Queen of Denmark was forged by a lifetime of shitty days. The 42-year-old spent years growing up gay in a repressively religious home ("Jesus Hates Faggots"), being bullied by classmates ("Sigourney Weaver"), and wallowing in substance abuse.

Lyrical panache distinguishes Grant from other doleful troubadours. "Marz," a gently psychedelic ditty, is peppered with names of sweet-shop confections. The jaunty "Silver Platter Club" recalls Harry Nilsson, as Grant skewers a friend's athletic prowess and good genes. This fan of monster movies, roller coasters, and ABBA tempers his dark tales with whimsy, a trademark he credits to his foreign-language studies, "because you express yourself like a child for the first couple of years when you're learning a new language."

He also cites a less conventional inspiration: operatic new-wave icon Nina Hagen, particularly her 1982 album NunSexMonkRock, which he snuck into his bedroom at great peril. "I would love to be able to scream and growl like Nina Hagen, but that shit doesn't come out of me. What comes out of me is this smooth, Karen Carpenter–type voice. So in order for me to express myself the way NunSexMonkRock made me feel, I do it with the lyrics."

Grant wasn't as adept at expressing his feelings in the Czars. More often, he drowned them. The singer/pianist founded the band in 1994, after six years of living in Germany. During the same period, he also came out of the closet, his mother died, and the taste for beer he'd developed overseas metastasized. "Then I started adding Jägermeister, because just beer was too slow." Cocaine allowed him to party till dawn. Artificial courage bulldozed his natural shyness, and reckless sexual escapades ensued.

"I'd already been told that making a choice for that [gay] lifestyle would only end in hell," he rationalized, so why not go whole hog? By the time he sought medical help to get clean in 2003, he'd erupted in a full-body rash. "I thought it was nerves, anxiety." Guess again: syphilis. "It was at such an advanced stage that they brought in all the student doctors to look at me." That was a shitty day.

Even with support from former Cocteau Twins bassist Simon Raymonde and his Bella Union label, the Czars disintegrated in 2004. By then, Grant was in New York, staying sober, waiting tables, and studying to be a Russian medical interpreter. He played some shows and released a covers album with an ad hoc lineup of the Czars. Halfhearted solo gigs followed. A regular paycheck translating "irritable bowel syndrome" into Russian was looking mighty good.

While Grant was ready to give up on music, some musicians weren't ready to give up on him, specifically Denton, Texas, band Midlake, with whom he'd toured. They offered to spearhead his solo album, to supply accompaniment and free studio time. "They adored who I was, they loved the weirdness of me," he marvels. Over a pair of four-month stints in 2008 and 2009, Midlake cut their own record, The Courage of Others, in tandem with Grant's Queen of Denmark.

In the middle of making his record, Grant met the man who made him feel happier than he ever imagined: the guy he's still singing about on tour. Although he doesn't relish rehashing those emotions in public right now, his romantic disappointment will probably make for a great show. "That's one of the ways that I really nail it," he concludes. "I'm going to be feeling it, and people really connect with that."

A Big, Gay Roundtable

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 04:00:00 -0700

A Big Gay Roundtable with Torche, Abe Vigoda, and TAAS by Kurt B. Reighley

Long before he ever joined a band, Steve Brooks was a rock star. At age 9, he dressed up for Halloween as Pat Benatar. The photo still hangs on his refrigerator: A fourth-grader

dolled up in pointy-toed boots, stockings, mini-skirt, cropped sweatshirt à la Flashdance, and a wig tied up in a scarf.

"I thought it was going to be funny," says Brooks, 34. His peers didn't get the joke. "I went to a party, and everyone called me a fag and laughed at me." He shrugged it off and had fun, and recounting the memory today, the singer-guitarist for Torche sounds amused, not bitter.

Like most of his South Florida friends, Brooks grew up listening to thrash and death metal. Out of high school, he formed Floor, his first group. Yet making music didn't allow him to vent all his feelings, and the next time Brooks challenged conventional gender roles, it wasn't as lighthearted as that youthful Halloween.

"When I was about 18 or 19, I figured out, 'Man, this isn't a phase,'" he recalls. "And I was pretty angry. 'Why is this me?'" A teacher at his high school had been stabbed repeatedly after being seen exiting a gay bar. Brooks's secret nagged at him. "I didn't talk about it with anybody. Eventually, I went to a shrink, just to try and feel comfortable about being gay."

"It was a different time than it is now," emphasizes Brooks, who lives in Atlanta today. And he's right. Since the early '90s, the landscape has changed. You're a gay or lesbian rock musician? Big deal. Artists like Bob Mould, Melissa Etheridge, and Judas Priest's Rob Halford came out of the closet unscathed. Riot grrrl and homocore made the punk community safer for dykes and fags than ever.

But what about gay members of bands that don't speak directly to a queer sensibility or engage in lifestyle marketing—especially groups that make intense, heavy music and play to primarily young male fans? There are more of these individuals than you might guess. OTEP have rocked Ozzfest repeatedly, but do crowds realize that the nu-metal band is fronted by a lesbian?

Consider openly gay musicians like Brooks, guitarist Juan Velazquez, 22, of Abe Vigoda, and Brian Cook, 31, bassist for These Arms Are Snakes (and occasional Stranger contributor). What are their lives like? With both Torche and Abe Vigoda playing Seattle this week, it seemed a perfect opportunity to ask.

These bands don't sound identical, but they could easily share a bill. Torche have been described as stoner or sludge metal, and the majestic melodies and savvy dynamics on their second album, Meanderthal, should appeal to fans of Sunn O))), Jesu, and the Melvins. Skeleton, the latest from No Age contemporaries Abe Vigoda, might be the product of a young Sonic Youth after a night of too many mai tais and repeated spins of Martin Denny's Exotica LP. The ferocity of the Snakes' shows and records betrays their roots in hardcore punk and metal, but also belies the complexity of their sonic palette.

Mainstream gay media overlooks these bands. Conversely, music journalists rarely talk about their sexual preferences. Brooks estimates "less than 10 percent" of Torche buffs know he's homosexual; before a recent European tour, one well-meaning supporter e-mailed Brooks to tell him how hot Swedish chicks are. If fans hear someone in Abe Vigoda is gay, Velazquez says they often guess singer Michael Vidal. "People make the assumption, because he is a soft-spoken, nice guy. And sometimes, I'm not. I can be pretty abrasive."

* * *

The original premise for this story was to meet in person for beers and a bull session on Halloween. But then Cook went and queered the deal—pun intended—with six weeks of European touring. Which is unfortunate, and a little ironic, since one thing the guys all revealed is that they most often get to socialize with like-minded homo music geeks while on the road.

Both Torche and TAAS have toured with Isis, who have a gay tour manager. That covert camaraderie can make for funny moments, says Cook. "Some nights, I would be watching our merchandise, and he would be watching theirs. Isis's line was all big, bearded dudes with tattoos, which is totally my type." The fans queuing for Cook's booth were "waifish guys, with messy hair, in tight T-shirts and girl jeans. And Isis's tour manager would just look over and go, 'Man, your fans are so hot.' We'd have both sold a lot more merch if we'd switched!"

Velazquez has plenty of gay friends at home in Los Angeles. "But they don't go to the Smell all the time or hang out at shows." And that schism makes life awkward. "Music is my primary interest, and that's where I feel most comfortable," he says. On Abe Vigoda's last pass through Washington, D.C., he hit it off with Ruffian Records proprietor Hugh McElroy, formerly of Dischord band Black Eyes. "I had no idea anybody in that band was gay." They hung out till the wee small hours, just talking about music, dating, and being queer in the rock scene.

All three of these gents came of age with either little access to, or no interest in, mainstream gay culture. Velazquez grew up Mexican and Catholic in Chino, California; Cook lived in Hawaii until 1992 and was raised "in a very religious household."

"When I was younger, I stayed away from gay people," admits Brooks. "I was kind of homophobic." Although his musical tastes have expanded over the years, he still abhors dance music, a genre promoted heavily to and within mainstream gay culture. "About the gayest I'll get is the Smiths," he says.

While early punk gave rise to beloved queer icons like Gary Floyd (the Dicks) and Phranc, other big acts—Bad Brains, Fear—intimidated fans with open homophobia. Even in progressive music scenes, Cook says a "locker-room" mentality emerges when you get a bunch of guys together. He still hears other musicians toss around terms like "gay" and "fag," although, when confronted, most scramble to apologize.

Consequently, it still sometimes comes as a surprise when these guys' straight colleagues are nonplussed by their sexual orientation. On Abe Vigoda's last tour, Velazquez brought some back issues of BUTT, the Dutch magazine that mixes blunt profiles of queer creative types with intimate photos of dudes who've never even considered body waxing. When reading material became scarce in the van, the others investigated Velazquez's stash. The upshot? The whole band are now pressing their publicist to get them a BUTT feature.

* * *

Much as they cherish music, none of these fellas demands that potential friends or lovers be a "perfect match" when it comes to the stereo. Far from it. Cook says his partner of 10 years "doesn't really like music"—and what he does enjoy tends towards mainstream fare. "It actually works out well. Especially dealing with punk and hardcore stuff, where there is so much ridiculous politics involved. To have someone who, every once in a while, says, 'That is so stupid and I don't get it.'" Cook smiles. "I'm sure Mariah Carey wouldn't obsess about whether her record was distributed by Dutch East as opposed to Caroline."

Brooks's former longtime boyfriend enjoyed many artists he loathed: Erasure, Pet Shop Boys. "The only thing we agreed on in his car was Donna Summer." The guitarist shook his head when his other half "would tell his friends, 'Steve's band sounds like Rage Against the Machine.'" But when they played a local gig? "He'd be at the show, with this giant smile on his face. He was so excited. And so supportive, too."

Does another artist's sexuality influence their own listening? Velazquez and Cook are both more likely to investigate an act with gay or lesbian members; Brooks doesn't give a rat's ass. Yet all three praise Limpwrist, the queer hardcore band fronted by out Latino singer Martin Sorrondeguy. Ditto Bob Mould. "Hüsker Dü changed my life," says Brooks. "That was a huge influence on me."

Curiously, as passionate as they are about what they do, none of our test subjects feels his sexual preference plays a significant role in his group's music. "We're not a political band," says Velazquez. Though he admires outspoken '90s acts like Huggy Bear, neither he nor Abe Vigoda have an agenda to promote. "If things come off that way, indirectly, that's not a big deal. But I wouldn't be trying to push any sort of message."

"My sexuality really has nothing to do with the music," insists Brooks. He pauses. "Although when I get up there, in front of the crowd, and start humping my guitar, that's totally sexual."

* * *

One more point of intersection these men all share: Although each resides in a city with a big, progressive GLBT community, none of their groups has even been asked to play a gay pride rally. And they'd all be happy to.

"Hell yeah!" concludes Brooks. "Although I would probably laugh my ass off, because I could see us being back-to-back with some house DJ, and everyone running for their lives, covering their ears." Regardless, the offer stands. Maybe the next time you see these three bands lumped together, it will be on a flier for just such an event. Brooks may not have done drag since he was 9, but he's still secure enough to stand out from the pack—if anyone cares to notice.

Tortellini, Potato Salad, and Whale Meat

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 04:00:00 -0700

Dissecting Musical Polymath Nico Muhly by Kurt B. Reighley

The dissection unit of high-school biology is an adolescent rite of passage, even for those who don't participate: Some kids opt to cut class rather than frogs; others call in PETA. But not composer Nico Muhly. "My lab partner and I made short work of LaShawnda, our fetal pig," he remembers. Muhly, 26, scoffs at the notion that he might have been squeamish: "What kind of show do you think I'm running here?"

At first glance, a very respectable, highbrow one. The New England native has genuine cred with the tuxedoes-and-tiaras set. He holds a master's in music from Juilliard, where his instructors included John Corigliano, winner of the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for Music. He has written works for the Boston Pops, the American Ballet Theatre, and the Chicago Symphony MusicNOW. Prestigious institutions including the BBC, Carnegie Hall, and the Whitney Museum have hosted premieres of his pieces.

But appearances are deceptive. Scrape below the surface, and one discovers an individual fascinated with taking things apart and reassembling them in unorthodox ways. One of Muhly's recent works, the oceanic sound collage "Wonders," uses a bowl of whale meat for percussion. His closet houses Comme des Garçons deconstructed shirts and a series of smocks "recycled from 'authentic French workers garments.'" On his blog, he raves about the repurposed tapestries and chairs of sculptor Louise Bourgeois. His favorite bedtime reading as a child was David Macaulay's The Way Things Work, a vividly illustrated book that demystifies machines large and small.

Consequently, Muhly attracts other artists who rend conventions asunder; his résumé lists credits more familiar to folks who get their music tips from Pitchfork rather than season- ticket subscription brochures. Björk has utilized his gifts—as a pianist, arranger, and conductor—on her last three albums. Ditto the National, Bonnie "Prince" Billy, Teitur, and Rufus Wainwright. "Keep in Touch," from Muhly's 2006 debut, Speaks Volumes, was written with its distinctive singer, Antony, as much in mind as the violist who solicited the piece.

Incongruous? Not to Muhly. "I remember when my mom and I lived in Italy," he recalls. "I went to Italian public school, and my friends could not get over the fact that we didn't eat hot dogs and hamburgers at home. The idea that my mother could navigate tortellini totally rocked their world. Other times, Mom would make a potato salad, and that was totally fine, too. We never felt like we were doing fusion or Tex-Mex, we were just living our lives."

He arrived at his musical style via similarly crossed paths. He discovered underground sounds slowly, while studying English Lit at Columbia. "This kid I knew said, 'Hey, you like music—check out this bizarre, noisy CD my friend sent me from Japan.'" A Sugarcubes fan tipped him off to Björk. Gradually, his sonic world expanded. "But it didn't all jell until later," he stresses. "It's like evolution: Not all giraffes got longer necks in the same year."

So don't ask Muhly to stick a pin labeled "You Are Here" apropos of his place in modern music. He prefers to locate his work via his stylistic points of origin: pre-Baroque English composers of church music, and classical minimalists like Philip Glass (for whom he has edited, scored, and conducted myriad projects) and Steve Reich; he discusses the merits of the latest Rihanna single ("her voice is totally crazy") with the same relish as John Adams's orchestral piece "Short Ride in a Fast Machine."

"I feel like I have a lot of fun access," he adds of his ability to move between worlds. "At this point, people aren't in my grill about my decisions." Last year, he even wrote the score for the horror movie Joshua.

Despite that curious credit, Nico Muhly is hardly l'enfant terrible, cutting up sacred cows like he did poor LaShawnda. His creative process is intense. He starts by brainstorming wildly, culling from disparate sources and inspirations. Then he meticulously reassembles select bits to his specifications. Whether the results evoke Frankenstein's monster or an heirloom patchwork quilt is beside the point; either way, his music is striking.

As scattershot as his processes may seem, he does not eschew structure. Even his most disorienting pieces are carefully scored. He just sifts through tons of ideas before he gets to that stage; when composing the percussion piece "Pillaging Music," he created far more content than the piece required, then stripped parts away, sometimes with jarring results. "The idea is you're left with these husks of music," he explains.

His new album, Mothertongue, slices, stretches, and stratifies language and the human voice. "The Only Tune," featuring folk musician Sam Amidon, explodes a woodsy murder ballad. At first, the lyric is splintered, Amidon teasing out words one at a time. But as his banjo comes in, the singer finds a center of gravity, and a more traditional song, some mystic Appalachian air, takes shape... only to disintegrate and regenerate in other configurations, as wind and rain mingle with piano and viola.

"The Only Tune" features on the program for the 802 Tour, on which Muhly, Amidon, and Thomas Barlett of Doveman perform selections from their individual repertory in various permutations. Like most things in Muhly's universe, these shows are neither fish nor fowl, recital nor rock concert. Being out of the concert hall, he says, is a thrilling prospect.

"In classical music, when you do a show, you prepare for months and months, and know everything way in advance," he observes. "Whereas on a tour, a tire blows out and all of the sudden your date is canceled." Well, that might be an exaggeration: The industrious youngster who memorized The Way Things Work can undoubtedly change a tire... or just patch the damaged one with pigskin.

Roamers, Not Roma

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 04:00:00 -0700

A Hawk and a Hacksaw's Nomadic Folk by Kurt B. Reighley

A Hawk and a Hacksaw perform on street corners, for fun and spare change, all around the globe. You'll find them plying this trade throughout Spain, Hungary, and Romania. Their vibrant music, heavy on strains of accordion and violin, reflects a variety of cultures, particularly folk traditions of Eastern Europe.

Just don't call them "Gypsies."

"We are not a Gypsy band," emphasizes founder Jeremy Barnes. "Gypsy music is music played by Gypsies, and the sound of Gypsy music depends on where they live." And Barnes and his partner, violinist Heather Trost, don't meet the basic criteria. "Neither of us is Roma."

Still, there are parallels. The tangled roots of the Gypsies begin in the Indian subcontinent, roughly a thousand years ago, then progress through ancient Persia, Armenia, and on to Western Europe. Since leaving home at age 18, Barnes has resided in France, England, Poland, Hungary, and throughout the U.S., including Denver, Chicago, New York, Athens, and Albuquerque.

For the last year and a half, the band have called Budapest home. They even shared co-billing with Hungarian quartet Hun Hangár Ensemble on their fourth album, released last year, which downplayed original compositions in favor of traditional Balkan melodies. "I had to take everything I had learned from working in a Western musical project and forget it," says Barnes.

Like the true Gypsies, Barnes's musical aesthetic has evolved as a consequence of his nomadic existence. Only, his early epiphanies were conducted in a tour van, not a caravan. "In 1996, I began playing with Neutral Milk Hotel," says Barnes, who contributed drums and organ to the seminal In the Aeroplane over the Sea. "On tour we used to listen to Bulgarian women's choirs. I had never heard anything like it."

A year later, he was living in Chicago's Ukrainian Village, south of Wicker Park. It was there, in a thrift store, that he discovered a used LP by Dumitru Farca¸s. "The cover was so nice. Dumitru is in a field with his instrument, cuddling a baby goat." The instrument turned out to be a tárogató, a reed instrument similar to the clarinet and saxophone, and the goat lover one of its leading virtuosos.

"I put the record on and was completely blown away," he says. "From then on, Romanian music became an obsession for me."

A decade later, the multi-instrumentalist would find himself making The Way the Wind Blows, the third AHAAH full-length, in a remote Moldovan village, assisted by Balkan brass ensemble Fanfare Ciocarlia. Critics praised the disc, anointing it "irreverent world music for punks," "first-class folk," and—here comes that word again—"bittersweet Gypsy-soul."

Such eclectic labeling is a dilemma shared by another close colleague of AHAAH, Zach Condon of Beirut. Both Barnes and Trost performed on Beirut's 2006 breakout Gulag Orkestar, and Condon returned the favor by playing trumpet on The Way the Wind Blows. Yet, Barnes dispels lazy comparisons between the two groups, as well as with other rock acts dipping into Eastern European musical traditions: DeVotchKa, Barbez, Gogol Bordello. "To my ear, DeVotchKa's folk elements seem to be more Western European, a mixture of Italian folk music with a heavy dose of Coldplay," he observes. "Beirut also seems more French to me."

He is equally articulate about why North American listeners seem increasingly fascinated by such acts of late. In Barnes's opinion, many fundamentals of Balkan and Eastern European music—"like playing songs in asymmetrical rhythms such as five, seven, and eleven, and using Turkish and Oriental ornaments in the melodies"—sound fresh and unconventional to Westerners weaned on pop music's square time signatures and major/minor tonality. And as a veteran percussionist, he says, "I love the absence of a traditional drum set."

Barnes has also, remarkably, made playing accordion seem cool. Or at least enjoyable. "Sometimes younger American people, even emo kids, see us and then come up and say things like, 'My grandpa used to play accordion and it was so nice to hear it again.'"

The instrument boasts less esoteric charms, too. It allows an individual to play melody, chords, and bass lines simultaneously. It also fits easily into an airplane overhead compartment, and, weighing around 15 pounds, is easy to carry. "When busking, it is always important to be able to run if needed," Barnes admits. Hey, you don't have to be a Gypsy to get hassled by the law.

Add It Up

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 04:00:00 -0700

Ratatat Add It Up by Kurt B. Reighley

1 + 1 = 2. Hopefully, we all learned that in preschool. Bands—real bands, rock bands—have more than two members. Four or five... maybe three in a pinch. But not just two. We've all learned that from reruns of The Monkees, royalty squabbles between the Smiths, and the buzz over every reunion tour. Nobody needs a textbook to recognize that Page and Plant doing MTV Unplugged does not equal Led Zeppelin. Crown Heights, New York, duo Ratatat—multi-instrumentalists Mike Stroud and Evan "E*Vax" Mast—have spent the last few years wriggling around this logic, with varying degrees of success.

"We're not the most professional outfit," admits Stroud today, apropos of their tour preparation. "We don't rent out a studio and get onstage or anything. We're pretty laid-back."

In the beginning, that easygoing attitude showed. The stripped-down grooves and surging fuzz guitar of their 2004 eponymous debut sounded good on the dance floor, but the band struggled to sustain interest live, where their mellow-bordering-on-static performances—no seam-splitting choreography or mind-blowing special effects, just two dudes playing their instruments—did little to enhance the material.

But Ratatat quickly adapted. The writing of their second album, the markedly improved Classics, was informed by what did—and didn't—get live audiences pumped up. With its more defined sense of melody, Classics also confirmed what their self-released remixes of hiphop tracks by Jay-Z and Kanye West hinted at: Their slinky sound packed more punch when anchored by a focal point.

With their latest album, LP3, the duo continue to explore new ways of making an impact. From fluid Spanish guitar licks on "Mi Viejo," to the courtly, A Clockwork Orange–style synths prancing through "Dura," the album's 13 tracks support Stroud's assertion that even though they work sans vocalists, they definitely hear voices. "I like to think of the guitar parts as singing, like listening to the backups on a James Brown track will give me ideas."

For LP3, the two had a lot more to draw from than the odd funk classic. Recording at Old Soul Studios in Catskill, New York—which they discovered while producing tracks for White Flight's second album, White Ark—they were inspired by its vast arsenal of vintage instruments, particularly keyboards: grand piano, Wurlitzer organ, mellotron. Just two guys, but with near-limitless possibilities.

"If you got an idea, there were so many options," says Stroud. "That made a huge difference. It seemed refreshing to sit down at an unfamiliar instrument, like a harpsichord. The keys are so small, and it feels funny playing it. It's a different frame of mind. And that gave me new ideas."

One timbre that pops up repeatedly on LP3 might seem more at home on a Carter Family platter: the autoharp. "Evan bought one just before we went into the studio, and we tried it out the first night there." Initially, they worried the folksy instrument sounded too celestial, like cherubim and seraphim were fluttering overhead—"everything sounded very... heavenly"—but they soon found ways to make it work. The zing of its humble strings fits right in on "Shiller," though that cut's overall mood is more Alan Parsons than Appalachian, and even finds an unlikely home on "Falcon Jab," a talkbox-enhanced party jam à la Daft Punk.

The duo also decided to go easy on the programmed beats and implement more live percussion. Stroud purchased some inexpensive tablas from an Indian store near his Brooklyn home. Finger cymbals and a friction drum, a weird hybrid somewhere between a bowed string instrument and traditional thump-thump percussion, helped generate the Mouse on Mars–goes-Bollywood groove of "Mirando."

Then there's the zarb (also known as a tonbak), a Persian music staple. "It's an Iranian drum," says Stroud. Ratatat were turned on to the instrument via an album by the Chemirani Trio, a father and two sons who have helped elevate the zarb's international profile. "It is a simple instrument, just a drum, but they get hundreds of sounds from it. We listened to their music a bunch, and just freaked out... so Evan got a zarb."

Don't be fooled by the exotic percussion; Ratatat have not veered into world-music jam-band territory. The new tracks are admirably succinct, averaging around three and a half minutes. "I have no interest in playing droning dance music," says Stroud. "Unless it's some genius piece of classical music, it's a little rude to presume people want to hear a 10-minute instrumental. I like melodies. I like songs."

But did the duo stick to the lessons learned with Classics? In other words, with so many toys used in the studio, will LP3 lend itself any better to live performance? "Not really, actually," admits Stroud. "Maybe at the end of the day, you'd listen to a song and think, 'Oh, I can play that live.' But while writing, that didn't even occur to me."

"There are so many sounds we can't really re-create, without being in the actual studio," he concludes. He sounds nonplussed. "We've always had that problem with our band. It's nothing new. We'll figure something out." As on previous tours, a third person will be tagging along to play organ and other instruments. And although the zarb may stay home, Stroud says, "We're definitely going to bring out the autoharp." Fingers crossed, it will all add up.

Welcome to Spokane

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 04:00:00 -0700

DJ/Producer James Pants by Kurt B. Reighley

Spokane is a town of mystery and wonder. Former home of crooner Bing Crosby; site of the ecofriendly 1974 World's Fair; scene of Washington state representative Richard Curtis's recent misadventures with that seedy-looking rent boy, some ladies' lingerie, and a stethoscope.But these highlights only scratch the surface. The jewel of the Inland Northwest is more than a pit stop between Seattle and Missoula. And if you drop by Baby Bar—a living-room-sized drinking hole where daredevil Evel Knievel liked to unwind—on the right night, local DJ and producer James Pants might point you toward some of the other regional attractions. Heck, were he not so busy promoting his new Stones Throw album, Welcome, he could serve on the city board of commerce.

"There is this thrift store, called Drop Your Drawers, run by this aging hippie, that blows my mind every time," he starts in. Stuffed beavers, silk kimonos, empty turtle shells, and battered harmoniums fight for display space. "It's all the weirdest stuff, and almost nothing over $10." In the nearby Russian neighborhood, old-world toffee and hard candy is cheap and plentiful. And over in Riverfront Park stands the majestic garbage-eating goat, a remnant of Expo '74. "It's this big, metal, satanic-looking statue," Pants explains. "You push a button, and the goat sucks up your trash."

Against this curious backdrop of second-hand pelts, exotic sweets, and inventive waste-management solutions, Pants's musical aesthetic makes perfect sense. Throughout its 16 tracks, Welcome celebrates vintage styles and unconventional recycling. Dubbed "fresh beat," his grooves incorporate '80s R&B, electro-boogie, early hiphop, underground disco, and more. For a dude weaned on his parents' Whitney Houston LPs ("I remember jamming out to 'My Name Is Not Susan' a lot") and the Footloose soundtrack, Pants has made significant strides.

The playful punk-funk of "My Girl" sounds like legendary NYC sister act ESG jamming in a video arcade. "We're Through" takes an elastic bass riff à la the Emotions' "Best of My Love," and slides it over some shuffling beats and clanging cowbell, yielding a grubby, midtempo dance track reminiscent of the Balihu Records bedroom productions of Daniel Wang. Vocals are barked, grumbled, or processed to resemble robots... anything but sung. Rough edges abound, yet warm synthesizer textures lend a neon-suffused air of urban sophistication.

Not bad for jams generated on a load of second-hand crap. "I have a pretty meager setup," Pants confesses. "I record on a computer from 1998. I have some random old synthesizers, and a lot of '70s and '80s drum machines... things that just turned up here in Spokane. All my gear is failing, some only works half the time, but I feel like I get pretty good sounds out of it." Friends have offered to teach him ProTools; he remains disinterested.

High-school jazz band was the cornerstone of his brief formal education. "I can really only play the drums," he demurs, although he generated almost all the sounds on Welcome single-handedly. "I make it sound like I can play other instruments, but I can't. All of the music I make could really be played by a kindergartener. By themselves."

Vintage musical instruments aren't the only items Pants picks up secondhand. He has also amassed a vast library of used vinyl, with an emphasis on the platters that other people pass up. "I only buy cheap records," he says. "Originally, I was purchasing a lot of '80s R&B and '60s psych, but eventually, those things got expensive." Now he concentrates on the cheapest fare possible. "The next revolution is always in the dollar bins, because that is the stuff nobody is looking for." Lately, he has even taken to snapping up homemade-looking demo cassette tapes, and transferring them to his computer.

This fascination with cultural castoffs, combined with an attempt to shake off the stress of a day job managing 401K plans, gave birth to his earlier 2008 release, a mix CD titled Ice Castles: The Coming of a New Age. The mix fuses square fare like Tangerine Dream, exotica vet Dick Hyman, and even jazz fusion giants Weather Report into a mesmerizing yet soothing sonic trip. Despite the title, no Peruvian flutes, treated harp solos, or cameos by Yanni made the cut. "I hate all that," Pants grimaces. "I only like the really strange stuff, that technically probably isn't even New Age."

Cheap rent and a penchant for making his own fun keep Pants in Spokane. But the city's biggest selling point is how uncool it remains compared to most cities, including other towns he's called home, like Austin, Texas, and Richmond, Virginia. "Spokane is a weird place. It's a magnet for strange people. One of those cities that looks pretty downtrodden—and it is—but within that you'll find strange pockets that wouldn't exist in other metropolitan areas."

Of course, this overlooked urban fantasyland has its downsides, too. Like a paucity of late-night eats. "It's all just fast food and a burrito stand," Pants laments. But if his career in music falls flat, he has a foolproof backup plan. "I was in Chicago recently, and there was a guy out on a bike at 3:00 a.m. selling tamales. I had to buy a dozen. So I was thinking of opening up my own mobile tamale cart." And when they finish eating, customers can go feed the discarded corn husks to that darn goat.

Interrogation

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 15 May 2008 04:00:00 -0700

Q&A with Alison Mosshart of the Kills by Kurt B. Reighley

Your new record, Midnight Boom, sounds peppier, more upbeat. Does this reflect a sea change in your lives or just a conscious musical decision?

We had a brilliant time making the record. We didn't feel any stress. We didn't care when it got finished or how long it was going to take. We were laughing all the time, and you can hear that.

Sometimes when a band tries to change tack artistically, they psych themselves out, but you avoided that.

The only thing we really wanted was to make a modern record. We love old bands, old gear, old recording methods, old everything. For the first time, we said, "Let's try and fit into modern times and see what happens." It was interesting. Working on a computer was quite a painful process. We didn't like it and probably won't do it again. But in the end, we were happy to see that no matter what we did, it still sounded like the Kills.

You and guitarist Jamie "Hotel" Hince originally worked by exchanging tapes via mail, because you lived in Florida and he was in England. But you relocated to the UK in 2001. How were you impacted by culture shock?

I moved there and thought everybody lived in squats, hovels basically, with strangers—because that's what I was doing. I figured out how to deal with people from all over the world, speaking different languages, under the same roof. In a year and a half, I lived with 49 different people. I had no idea how things worked over there. Everything I was used to was different. But I'd spent my whole life in bands and touring—all I ever wanted to do was play music—so that made it all bearable.

The 1968 documentary Pizza Pizza Daddy-O, depicting black Los Angeles schoolgirls performing playground chants and clapping songs, has been mentioned in connection with the new songs. What turned you guys on to it?

We made this rule in the studio to not listen to any music while we were writing. Somehow that turned into "let's watch documentaries" and reading a lot. What I thought was interesting about [Pizza Pizza] was how kids' songs and fairy tales are so dark. When you're watching that playground footage of those girls, they're singing about domestic violence and alcoholism. At 7 years old! But [the movie] wasn't a direct inspiration; it was more of a historical reference, like where blues music came from, where minimalist music came from. How you can have something very complete and strong, with just hand claps and singing.

Were you big into jump rope and clapping games as a little girl?

No, I was really quiet. I didn't socialize with other kids that much, so I never got into the playground games. I was too shy for any of that. I mostly just watched. I drew pictures all the time.

Great photos are all over your album sleeves and website. You collect cameras, yes?

We don't collect them on purpose, but we just accidentally buy them. Every time we see one we think is cool, we buy it and try it out. We've been taking photos forever. That's just something we do during the day, especially on the road. It's fascinating, driving around and seeing different places, different countries, and we want to capture it, to draw and write about it. It's a way of remembering where you've been.

How do you feel about cell-phone shutterbugs?

If I were to meet my favorite band outside of a venue, the very last thing I would ever do is take out my phone for a picture. I would have brought my best camera. A picture on a camera phone would never satisfy me, so I don't get it. But that's just modern times. Everything becomes more and more throwaway, yet those pictures have turned into strange, precious little possessions for people.

Tell us something Jamie does, a habit or ritual that never ceases to delight you.

Every single night, when he's trying to figure out what to wear onstage, he asks the exact same thing: "Do you think I'm gonna be too hot in this?" And every night, I don't know the answer. I don't know what the temperature is out there! It's adorable. There are a million things like that. We've been hanging out with each other for 10 years. We know every little tiny detail, inside and out. He never stops making me laugh; he cracks me up all day long.

Your band is named the Kills, your debut album was Keep on Your Mean Side, and your music sounds pretty edgy. Are you two confrontational?

We're both really even-keeled, nice people who are reasonable and work very hard. But there is quite a lot of fire behind all that; if someone pisses us off, or says the wrong thing, we're not going to sit there.

Your recent single "Cheap and Cheerful" opens with you hacking very loudly. How much do you smoke?

Oh, I don't know... it depends. I don't smoke as much as I used to. But that's because of all these smoking bans everywhere. I just don't get the chance.

The Kills play Thurs May 15, Neumo's, 8 pm, $12, 21+.

Album Review

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 01 May 2008 04:00:00 -0700

Russian Circles' Station by Kurt B. Reighley

If Chicago instrumental combo Russian Circles founded a school, their curriculum would ditch the "three Rs"—who needs language arts when your discipline forgoes words?—in favor of a trio of Gs: geography, geometry, and geology. Studied closely, their music revolves around exploring diverse terrain, measuring spatial relations, and stratifying layers. And, yes, Russian Circles rock: at times, quite hard.

On their second full-length, drummer Dave Turncrantz and guitarist Mike Sullivan are joined by Brian Cook (Botch, These Arms Are Snakes) on bass, with Matt Bayles (Mastodon, Minus the Bear) handling production. Randomly sample a segment of any of the six tracks, and a listener could be forgiven for thinking Station was the work of myriad bands. But no, the skittish percussion fills, headbanging bursts of staccato guitar shredding, unsettling dissonances, and extended ambient passages were all crafted by the same players. (The bowed bass and organ drones on "Versus," however, come courtesy of Past Lives' Morgan Henderson and Bayles, respectively.)

What holds everything together, across 43 minutes that seem shorter, is judicious overlapping pitched somewhere between tectonic plate movement and a rapid-fire game of Tetris. Russian Circles don't deal in verses, choruses, and bridges in the traditional sense, instead building songs around succinct melodic cells, elongated textural passages, and mathematical counter- point displays. On the opening "Campaign," repeated guitar figures ripple over sustained notes, like an edgier update of Eno and Fripp's seminal collaborations. The core components of each track are sometimes embarrassingly simple—during one chunk of "Station," Cook plays the same bass note past the point of mind-numbing and straight on till mesmerizing—yet their array changes so quickly and fluidly that boredom is never a concern; this is stoner music with ADD appeal.

Architect

Gymnast

Mariner

Bagman

Bending the Rules

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 04:00:00 -0800

Baby Dee's Erratic Mythology by Kurt B. Reighley

Music has rules. From voice leading in Western harmony to the entry requirements for American Idol, the authorities tell us certain guidelines must be followed. Such is the way forward. Not so for Baby Dee. In her storied life, this multi-instrumentalist and songwriter has progressed erratically, backward, sideways.

With her new album, Safe Inside the Day, she returns to square one—the Cleveland home where she grew up—while landing in a better place. Dee's sublime earlier work frequently felt rarified, gentle. Now she boldly pulls a full face-plant into her messy childhood. Blues, bawdy songs, medieval dances, and snippets of Irish airs elbow each other across the parlor. In her expressive contralto, the fiftysomething singer huffs and snarls like a cartoon pirate on "The Earlie King," a twisted nod to her father's affection for the Franz Schubert lieder "Erlkönig." With its interlaced accordion and banjo licks, "The Dance of Diminishing Possibilities" draws inspiration from the day Dee's neighbors demolished an upright piano.

But Safe is not strict autobiography. It is mythology, its grotesque subjects rooted in fantasy. Tales like the slow, spectral "Fresh Out of Candles" elevate fiction over facts. "This album is emotionally far more complex than anything I've ever done," admits Dee. "And much more easily misunderstood. But they're compelling lies—that have to be told."

Initially, Dee resisted exorcising these songs. When Matt Sweeney and Will Oldham solicited Dee for a record for Drag City, her impulse was to rework older selections. But the new songs would not stay silent. "I didn't want to bring this dark thing into the world. But Will talked me into it."

Oldham and Sweeney relieved their star of many essential responsibilities, recruiting players from Chavez, Current 93, Antony and the Johnsons, and even Andrew WK on bass. Most tough calls—"including the ones made to prevent me from doing stupid things that would've fucked it all up"—were left to her producers. Not unusual for a prefab pop icon, but for an independent artist who previously played and produced everything herself, a sharp change of tack.

Will Safe make this jocular oddball a celebrity? Unlikely. But Dee is veering closer to the mainstream. Later this spring, she plays five London dates supporting two-time UK chart topper Marc Almond. A ditty by her frequent costar, art-punk chanteuse Little Annie, currently features in a popular Levi's commercial. Longtime colleague Antony (she played harp on his 1998 debut) even won the 2005 Mercury Prize.

Dee didn't always move in such rarefied circles. An adolescent in the heyday of Hendrix and the Who, she preferred monks to the Monkees (although she admits a fondness for Johnny Cash). "My life used to be a series of obsessions, and Gregorian music was a big one." In 1972, she relocated to New York, where she remained for three decades. When her professor in conducting realized this pupil would never willingly wave a baton over anything composed after the 16th century, he urged Dee to pursue church music instead.

For the next 10 years, Dee served as musical director for a large South Bronx congregation. Initially, it seemed an ill fit—"it gave me the heebie-jeebies to picture myself as this nerdy organist"—but when she learned the choir loft loomed 40 feet over the pews, she was sold. "I adore being up high!"

Teetering in the skies is a recurring motif in Baby Dee's life; at various points, she worked climbing and felling trees, and performed on an oversized tricycle. She also drove a cab, moonlighted as a sideshow attraction... and began life as a boy. All footnotes that she frets might eclipse her musical accomplishments.

"Every once in a while, I get a review that just talks about Baby Dee as this woman who writes these songs, and completely leaves out all that baggage," she sighs. "And it feels like the dogs have stopped humping my legs and I can walk normally now."

Such respites come more frequently now, such as last December, during a gig at Joe's Pub. The backing band included not only Sweeney and Andrew WK, but also Dirty Three drummer Jim White. "Looking around the stage, there were all these guys, regular guys, and they're there for me. No big deal. They're my friends, and we're playing music. It was lovely. As a kid growing up, or even in the 1990s, when I was riding around on that tricycle, I wouldn't have imagined the world to be that serendipitous."

Lord of the Strings

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Putting in OT with Owen Pallett by Kurt B. Reighley

Nobody deserves to inherit the title of Hardest Working Man in Show Business more than Owen Pallett, aka Final Fantasy. Pallett has toured constantly since the 2006 release of his second full-length, He Poos Clouds. Performing solo, with just vocals and looped violin, he captivated a packed Paramount Theatre waiting to see Bloc Party last March. Clouds even won the Polaris Music Prize, Canada's equivalent of the Mercury. So why have so few people heard of Final Fantasy?

Probably because they're too busy listening to his myriad other projects. In the last five years, Pallett has performed with, or orchestrated music for, Arcade Fire, the Hidden Cameras, and Great Lake Swimmers; his latest arranging credit is The Flying Club Cup by Beirut. The 28-year-old has also remixed tracks for Stars and Grizzly Bear, and sings on the most recent album by electronic producer Montag.

Such a jam-packed schedule can preclude focusing on new Final Fantasy material. One particularly daunting gig—Pallett won't say what it was because he never completed it—derailed almost all other activity this summer. "I would work on it for three or four hours, and then I'd just throw up my hands, and read or play Nintendo for the rest of the day," Pallett recalls. "Now I'm really behind on my lyrics," he admits. "But it's hard to sit down and noodle, and tease out ideas, when you know there's something else you should be doing."

Yet Pallett doesn't regard these outside engagements as separate from the Final Fantasy catalog. "I think about it like I'm an artist," he explains. "I really take pride in my arrangements. I consider that to be as important as my solo work, and beneficial to it, too."

For instance, one upshot of the Beirut job was recruiting Zach Condon and other band members to play on the next Final Fantasy release. Due out November 20, the 7-inch, "Hey Dad" (X in Tomlab's limited-edition Alphabet Series), ripples with effervescent woodwinds and strings, suggesting a leaner, livelier, and more successful take on the fusion of classical minimalism and arty pop that Philip Glass attempted on his 1986 album Songs from Liquid Days.

Beirut also contribute to Pallett's next EP, Spectrum 14th Century, recorded as a prelude to his third album, Heartland. This bite-sized teaser lays groundwork for the subsequent full-length, with its ambitious story arc set in an imaginary realm called Spectrum.

"I thought a lot about Star Wars, and how, in the first trilogy, there is this incredible history that George Lucas created, and yet these things are only alluded to," he says. "They talk about Alderaan before it gets blown up, but they don't show what it looks like. Contrast that with the second trilogy, where they explained everything, how the Force works, all of it."

Thus, to ensure that Heartland is cozy like The Hobbit rather than sprawling like The Lord of the Rings, Pallett composed a series of folk songs establishing the mythology of Spectrum for the 14th Century EP. "We recorded the music outside, as if they were found recordings," he says. "Although, so far, it's not sounding as awesome as actual field recordings from Thailand."

Pallett is aware that getting too twisted in knots inventing indigenous music for a fictional culture could seem a pretentious undertaking. "I always think it's really hilarious when you have a classical composer who says, 'This particular piece is influenced by Greek folk music,' and then you listen to it and it just sounds like Ravel," he says.

In between 14th Century and Heartland, fans can expect a second Final Fantasy EP, comprising covers by Toronto songwriter Alex Lukashevsky—an equally idiosyncratic artist, with a sound Pallett describes as Louis Prima crossed with Stravinsky's score for the 1918 ballet Histoire du Soldat ("A Soldier's Tale"). This material, some of which ("Horsetail Feathers") has already made its way into Final Fantasy live sets, allows Pallett to show off his newest toy, a Yamaha CP70B electro-acoustic grand piano.

Let's recap: By the end of 2008, Final Fantasy plans to release a non-LP 45, two unrelated EPs, and an album set in a made-up universe. Plus, Pallett has more arranging commitments. Does he ever sleep? Yes. "It's funny, but I actually think I'm kind of lazy," he says. God help us if he ever becomes industrious; the public will never catch up.

Outside In

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Patrick Wolf by Kurt B. Reighley

Patrick Wolf's third album, The Magic Position, bursts with songs as polychromatic as a Pantone wheel. Wolf's figure is trim, his dark eyes and sharp cheekbones eminently photogenic; British fashion line Burberry recruited him to model for their fall 2007 campaign. He boasts a captivating backstory—child prodigy, teenage runaway—and radiates is-he-or-isn't-he? sexuality. Like Britain's other skinny, postgay pinup boys (Mika, Jake Shears), Wolf might appear to have just sprung out of a comic strip, but his vibrant music doesn't just slap a fresh face on time-tested pop formulas.

Wolf has issued three daunting full-lengths informed by British folk idioms, classical violin, and early 20th-century electronic composers; he namechecks Berio and Boulez, not Marc Bolan. MySpace buzz? That's nothing: Leigh Bowery's shocktastic '90s band Minty numbered among his earliest patrons. From busking with an accordion on the Thames-spanning Hungerford Bridge, he advanced to studying composition at Trinity College.

Surveying the cover of The Magic Position, it's tempting to poke fun at the 24-year-old. Dressed in scarlet knee pants, floppy locks dyed to match, he poses on a carousel, straddling a miniature donkey. Precious? Perhaps. But once the garrulous baritone opens up, it becomes apparent that, as with prime David Bowie and Kate Bush, Wolf approaches extramusical elements—videos, live performances, promotional photos—as components of an integrated aesthetic. His eye-popping threads weren't chosen by a stylist, they were dictated by the music.

Just as modulation from minor to major key in classical music traditionally signals emotional uplift, Wolf aspired to progress past the darkness of his previous albums, Lycanthropy (2004) and Wind in the Wires (2005), with The Magic Position.

"I had this abstract template of ideas that led me through: Technicolor music, very high fidelity, no messiness, no noisiness," Wolf says. "Music that was clean and pure, and that reflected the feeling of joy, so you don't feel sad or sorrowful. There are no dirty emotions there."

The 13 originals bubble with chirruping woodwinds and bright, ascending keyboard runs. The rhythms pack the percussive wallop of a toddler banging on an overturned plastic bucket. The eeriness of earlier work is not banished entirely (check out the sudden apparition of Marianne Faithfull on "Magpie"), but it is applied very sparingly.

While writing and recording, Wolf cocooned himself in a physical space that nurtured this mindset. "In my studio, I always try to set up the surroundings of making that record, in the same way that I might take the steps to make a music video afterward—translate the musical to the visual," he says.

Had House & Garden dropped in while Wolf made The Magic Position, they would have discovered surroundings pitched somewhere between an amusement park and a gingerbread house. "Everything in the bedroom was gingham," Wolf says. The lighthearted mood didn't stop at the furnishings, either. "I listened to a lot of German children's music, glockenspiels with little childlike voices on top." The 1952 Danny Kaye cinema fairy tale Hans Christian Andersen was also a staple. "That inspired a lot of the emotion on this record."

When he first toured to promote the album, the change of tack startled fans in small British hamlets expecting his dark, romantic leanings of yore. "I wore this dinosaur-goes-to-the-disco outfit, with padded spikes like a stegosaurus," he recalls. "I just wanted to drink a bottle of Baileys, and cheer people up with some great pop music."

Once The Magic Position hit North America in May, however, Wolf started receiving warmer receptions—particularly in our backyard. "The Sasquatch! Festival, actually, was the first time those songs saw a bit of daylight, and people got to experience them in a more traditionally happy, optimistic way—not just in some dark nightclub," he says. "It was sunshine and a bit of cider, happiness and community."

With autumn underway, Wolf predicts current dates will be less exuberant. "I'm a very seasonal creature, so there is a bit of a slip down the pessimistic ladder," he says. "But hopefully in a good way." And when he returns home to complete work on his next record, it will be to appropriate décor.

"The album I'm making now is a dark, messy turmoil," he says. "My studio is a mess of wires, torn fabrics, and dirty curtains. It's gone from Disneyland to a haunted house."

editor@thestranger.com

A Work in Progress

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 04:00:00 -0700

The Music of Sarah Rudinoff by Kurt B. Reighley

First, forget everything you know about Sarah Rudinoff. If you're an ordinary Seattle music fan, that should be easy. Aside from a brief slot supporting Miranda July at Neumo's in May, Rudinoff's forays into familiar rock stomping grounds have been few.

For members of the theater community, the task is tougher. The recipient of the 2004 Stranger Genius Award for theater, the actress has won raves for her flawless timing, and signature blend of bravura and vulnerability. Then there's her singing voice, which benefits from both of the aforementioned assets, as well as its distinctive low register and sheer oomph. Time and again—in Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the Leiber and Stoller revue Smokey Joe's Cafe—she's proven her versatile musical chops, fusing elements of rock, blues, and jazz. For her 2006 Theatre Off Jackson cabaret, Last Year's Kisses, she put her indelible stamp on material associated with Jeff Buckley, the Gits, Roberta Flack, even Sonny and Cher. Most recently, Seattle Magazine found its way to Rudinoff, crowing in its 2007 Music Portfolio that "her big brassy vocals sound like they were soaked in Jack Daniels." Cliché, sure, but her inclusion alongside jazz great Ernestine Anderson as one of "Two Women with Pipes to Die For" reflects the growing interest in Rudinoff's vocal talents.

Now, after years of finding herself in other people's songs, Rudinoff has begun searching for songs in herself. Words and music by Sarah Rudinoff, written and performed with collaborator Gretta Harley.

"I never had a band before," admits Rudinoff. "Hedwig was my first experience playing with a real rock band, not theater people who kind of play music." Last Year's Kisses, which featured pianist/guitarist Harley as musical director, Gina Mainwal (Sweet 75) on drums, and Nancy Wharton (Walkabouts, Laura Veirs) on bass and cello, further stoked Rudinoff's desire to make music outside her usual beat.

The final push came when she sang at the closing of the Mirabeau Room last fall. "That show was magical for me," she says. "I woke up the next morning and cried for two hours."

"You do theater, and people like it and they get something from it," she continues. But compared to the feedback of a live club audience? Ha. "Music is so direct and emotional." That September night, well-wishers—both speechless and babbling—got up in her face; the next day, e-mail continued flowing in. Voilà, the light-bulb moment! "Why haven't I pursued this?" she mused. "I have to figure out a way to make music primary for me. Period."

Sean Nelson—singer, songwriter, Stranger alumnus, and Rudinoff fan—saw the Mirabeau gig and talked with her immediately afterward. The obstacle she faced, as he saw it, wasn't her reputation but her repertoire: material from Hedwig and other covers.

"That sort of thing is what all her friends already expect from her, the Sarah shtick," Nelson says. "She's plainly bored with filling that expectation, so my thought was, why not confound it?"

So what if her cachet at On the Boards doesn't immediately translate to the Crocodile? "Rather than being discouraged by that, she should be emboldened," Nelson adds. "She doesn't have to be the theater version of herself. She can create a new version." Music offers a chance of a rebirth of sorts for Rudinoff. To accomplish it, original songs are essential.

The actress is innately musical. She frequently bursts into song to illustrate her points, and discusses Joni Mitchell with the same reverence and ardor adolescent boys devote to sex. But she can't read music and has no background in theory. Which is where Harley—a veteran of local bands including Maxi Badd, Danger Gens, and Eyefulls—complements her. Versatile on piano and guitar and boasting a degree in composition from Cornish, the dark-haired rocker has proven an ideal foil. In addition to Mitchell, their musical points of intersection include Pixies, Prince, and Frank Zappa.

The duo spent this summer woodshedding and hammering ideas into finished songs. At Harley's insistence, and despite hectic schedules, they met two or three times a week. "Even if it was just for an hour," says Harley. "[Writing] was constantly on our minds that way."

So far, they have a handful of finished works. Their rate of progress varies, depending on whose perspective you get.

"The first time we got together, Sarah said, 'Here are some lyrics,'" remembers Harley. Rudinoff sang a chunk of a melody, and she elaborated on it. "I sat down at the piano, and an hour later, we had about half of a song, with chords and harmonies. And Sarah said, 'God, songwriting takes a long time.' After an hour. I thought we were kicking ass!"

They are. After performing the show-stopping "Just Every Fisher's Folly" as part of the You're on the List program at Bumbershoot a few weeks ago, Rudinoff was once again deluged by e-mails and text messages of encouragement.

Nelson caught an earlier airing of one of the Rudinoff/Harley songs at the Miranda July appearance, and was similarly impressed. "Though she was plainly super-nervous, it went great," he says. "There was a lot of her in [the song]: very frank, very coarse, but very tender. And the audience ate it up. It seemed to bode well for the future."

The future includes making a demo, and, more importantly, nailing down a band moniker. "As far as that is concerned, the big thing is defining myself outside of my name," Rudinoff says. "We're going to play throughout the winter and spring under whatever name we come up with and we're going to create our own thing." She is confident that people will find the music, regardless of billing. "There will be some who've already seen my shows that have had music in them, and there will be new people," she says.

Another audience to learn—and unlearn—all about Sarah Rudinoff.

New Soul vs. Old

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Soul Music Lineup by Kurt B. Reighley

Inspecting the final lineup for Bumbershoot 2007, a favorite staple seems to be missing: a notable soul artist. Over the years, the festival has hosted several of the genre's heavyweights, including Solomon Burke and the godfather himself, James Brown. Mavis Staples and Bettye LaVette threw down killer sets in 2005 and 2006, respectively.

This year? Nada. If you want to see a living legend over Labor Day Weekend, you'll have to catch Stevie Wonder at the Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery. But that doesn't mean Bumbershoot 2007 lacks soul; it's just a newer shade.

For starters, there's Joss Stone. At just 16 years old, she cut her 2003 debut, The Soul Sessions, under the supervision of Betty Wright (1972's "Clean Up Woman"). The album included accomplished readings of songs popularized by soul greats Carla Thomas, Aretha Franklin, and the Isley Brothers. Since then, this English rose has shared stages with the likes of Brown, Wonder, Staples, and even Patti LaBelle.

But can a skinny white chick from across the pond truly sing soul? Producers Jerry Wexler, Arif Mardin, and Tom Dowd of Atlantic Records certainly thought so. And not only did they captain Dusty Springfield's seminal 1969 Dusty in Memphis, the same team worked with "To Sir, with Love" singer Lulu in Muscle Shoals. (You can hear the wee Scottish lassie tearing up "Feelin' Alright" on Rhino's recent What It Is! Funky Soul and Rare Grooves box set.) Short answer: Yes, she can.

Ryan Shaw isn't a lifelong veteran either, but he knows how to play the part. Literally. One of his early gigs was performing chestnuts such as "My Girl" at New York City's Motown Cafe. Like Stone, his debut album, This Is Ryan Shaw, is packed with vintage gems by Wilson Pickett, Bobby Womack, and Jackie Wilson. The 26-year-old artist and his producers took pains, however, to eschew obvious choices.

"We went through hundreds and hundreds of songs," recalled Shaw earlier this year. "Every time I would go over to record, they would sit me down and play anywhere from between 20 to 30 more songs. And I only recorded the ones that made me smile."

That kind of gut reaction is at the heart of how Toussaint, vocalist for Soulive, defines soul music. "Without trying to sound clichéd, soul really is something that comes from within. It's beautiful because it's uplifting. [The song] can be about some of the worst things you see, the drudgery of society, and yet you still feel uplifted when you hear Curtis Mayfield singing 'Freddy's Dead'... and he's explaining the life of a junkie!"

Even though the New York ensemble is primarily associated with the jam-band scene, they impressed Concord Records enough that the label just issued the group's latest, No Place Like Soul, on the reactivated Stax imprint. Thus far, the youngsters seem to have lived up to that venerable label's reputation. After a recent Stax 50th-anniversary gig in Memphis, Dave Porter (of Sam & Dave) and William Bell lined up to offer kudos. "William Bell, the singer of 'Forgot to Be a Lover,' one of the baddest tunes of all time, was feeling us? That meant everything to me," says Toussaint.

Soul might make allowances for age or pigmentation, but faith—of some variety—seems to be a prerequisite. Both Shaw and Toussaint grew up singing in the church. "To make not just music with soul, but music with lots of soul, you have to have some kind of spiritual base," concurs Wendell Holmes, singer and guitarist for the Holmes Brothers. "It doesn't have to be Christianity."

"When you look into your own being, you realize you are not an entity unto yourself," continues the 63-year-old. "Experiences change from day to day, and that will make your inner being grow, which in turns makes the music grow. And that comes out, through the guitar, the keyboard, and your mouth."

After 30 years of performing together, the Holmes Brothers would seem to be the closest thing to a veteran soul act at Bumbershoot 2007. Except, ironically, Wendell doesn't think the tag fits. Not exactly.

"All music is soul music," he concludes. "Because it comes from the soul. Even though I am a blues/gospel artist, I also appreciate opera and classical. That is soul music, too. If it comes the heart, from real-life experiences, then it is soul."

Album Reviews

Barbara Mitchell — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Architecture in Helsinki, Caribou, and New Pornographers by Barbara Mitchell

IMPERIAL TEEN

The Hair the TV the Baby & the Band

(Merge)

In the half-decade since the last Imperial Teen album, the band's four comrades have been running a hair salon, scoring television, raising a baby, and fronting another band (Will Schwartz's electro-pop project Hey Willpower). Hence the name of their new album, The Hair the TV the Baby & the Band.

Despite—or perhaps because of—the extended break, the album is an exhilarating blast of pop perfection. These music veterans are as effervescent and excited as ever. Like their color-coordinated stage wear, Imperial Teen's music has always been a triumph of sophisticated simplicity, and that's here in spades. From bratty, buoyant songs such as "Everything" and "One Two," to the sultry strains of "Shim Sham," and the retro-cool of "Fallen Idol," you can still get a contact high from the band's obvious chemistry and the joy they take in making beautiful music together.

It's refreshing to know that 11 years after releasing their debut—and in spite of the hair, the television scores, a growing family, and another band that could have split them apart—Imperial Teen haven't skipped a beat. BARBARA MITCHELL

THE NEW

PORNOGRAPHERS

Challengers

(Matador)

1/2

The New Pornographers: Two talented yet disparate composers, four vocalists, at least half a dozen band members, and a comprehensive breadth of pop smarts that makes the combined faculty and student body of Berklee College of Music look like a cage of chart-reading monkeys. With so many balls in play, you'd expect the them to get hopelessly entangled, like some oversized Muppet spider, dancing furiously to an ever-accelerating accompaniment. Yet,miraculously, the Pornos twist and whirl, from start to finish, with nary a misstep on Challengers.

In terms of instrumentation, the Canadian supergroup's fourth full-length is their most ambitious to date. The melancholy closer, "The Spirit of Giving" (one of three songs by Destroyer's Dan Bejar; the remainder spring from the mind of A. C. Newman), features harp, French horn, and accordion. On "Adventures in Solitude," the conjoined vocals of Newman and Kathryn Calder croon "we thought we lost you" over and over, banjo and mandolin notes hovering around them like chipper summer insects.

Continuing the progression of 2005's Twin Cinema, the 12 new tracks further expand the group's stylistic repertoire. There are still glimpses of their bristling power pop of yore, particularly on the art school twist "All the Things That Go to Make Heaven and Earth." Yet the program also encompasses a six-and-a-half-minute epic that features some of Newman's niftiest lyrics ("You are not the first to wake up/to learn your lines before you have the part"), a ditty driven primarily by tremolo guitar ("Failsafe"), and the desolate "Go Places," tenderly sung by Neko Case. Forget what those initial numbers look like; it all adds up magnificently. KURT B. REIGHLEY

JUNIOR SENIOR

Hey Hey My My Yo Yo

(Rykodisc)

1/2

Wasn't the whole idea behind Junior Senior just instant gratification? Jesper Mortensen (Junior) and Jeppe Laursen's (Senior) shameless concoctions—big, ripe hooks; immediately ingratiating party chants; and beats intended to move everything from house parties to stadiums—weren't exactly a gradual-appreciation sort of proposition. So it's curious that the Danish duo's second album has taken two full years to come out in the U.S. Maybe 2003's D-D-Don't Don't Stop the Beat so perfectly concentrated the dozens of prior pop thrills it recalled, either directly ("C'mon" is a direct steal from "Mony Mony") or merely in drive-by manner (the falsetto "oooh"s of "Rhythm Bandits" is straight from the Beatles' version of "Twist and Shout"), that most Americans probably figured they'd heard everything they needed to. Or maybe it just didn't sell enough records to make a label want to scramble for the follow-up.

But Hey Hey My My Yo Yo ought to be a big hit with people who adored D-D-Don't: It's occasionally cloying (the milky vocal harmonies in the background of "I Like Music" and "No No Nos" evoke wayward Care Bears) and doesn't peak as high as the debut, but it's more consistent overall. They still proudly steal from all over the place, not least themselves: "Take My Time" is reminiscent of the D-D-Don't hit "Move Your Feet" with more electro-R&B glide, while "We R the Handclaps" suggests a lot of quality time spent with the KC and the Sunshine Band catalog. When Mortensen and Laursen chant on "Hip Hopallula," "There's too much good stuff out there to ignore," they could be talking about themselves. MICHAELANGELO MATOS

CARIBOU

Andorra

(Merge)

1/2

Hey, everybody, did you hear? It's the 40th anniversary of the Summer of Love! Besides boomer-age magazine publishers and the nostalgia industry (right, same thing), who fucking cares? Actually, from the sound of his fourth album—the first two recorded as Manitoba—Dan Snaith, now known as Caribou, does. Boy, does he ever: From the gloriously wussy folk-rock vocal harmonies to the flutes hidden behind feedback to the glowing-gold haze hanging over every song (this album sounds the way overexposed film stock looks), Andorra evokes bygone psychedelia as aptly as any recent album.

Snaith's music isn't merely a throwback, though. Caribou expands to a full band live, but his albums are done alone with a laptop. You'd hardly guess it listening to "Sandy," with its concentric-circular guitar picking and drums that sound like the Byrds' Michael Clarke leaning on the toms. You might also figure any chorus that goes, "Sometimes in her eyes I see forever/I can't believe what we've found/I know in time we'll be together/And now our love will make this sound," would have to come from a lighter-headed, lysergic past. Instead, Snaith's dazed, undermixed vocals give them a modern wink.

Musical detail is everything with psychedelia, and Snaith piles on the little touches: the pinging synths bouncing around "After Hours" and the electric keyboards and cello underpinning "She's the One" (sung by Jeremy Greenspan). But Snaith flattens it all into a beguiling 2-D matte finish, so that what hits you first is the sound in full. The whole dazzles; the parts sort themselves out later. MICHAELANGELO MATOS

ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI

Places Like This

(Polyvinyl)

1/2

Places Like This is the work of a leaner and meaner Architecture in Helsinki. The band have sloughed off former members Isobel Knowles and Tara Shackell to become a sextet, and they've separated geographically, with main singer/songwriter Cameron Bird migrating to Brooklyn while the rest of the band remain in their native Melbourne. They've ditched the geeky instrumentation charts that appeared on their old album sleeves for bright illustrations by Will Sweeney, although they've lost little of the actual instrumentation—there's still plenty of conga, trombone, synthesizer, and the like.

Unfortunately, they have lost some of the trembling enthusiasm that made In Case We Die such an unexpected triumph. Bird's winningly timid and breathy vocals have become more of a strained, blustery growl. And where that album's instrumental bombast was complemented by a kind of scrappy rush and held together by sweet, sentimental melodies, this new album's bursts of fanfare and funk are disjointed, those endearing melodies largely replaced by gaudy, unsatisfying hooks.

There are exceptions that find Bird and crew (especially sometimes vocalist Kellie Sutherland) still sounding as wide-eyed and gleeful as ever. Lead single "Heart It Races," with its layers of stoned background vocals and steel drums, is playful and catchy. "Like It or Not" is a charmer full of cute keyboard bounces, shaky acoustic guitar, cheery trombone, and absurd vocals. And Sutherland's singing on "Nothing's Wrong" hits the same sweet spot as In Case We Die's "Wishbone." These tracks all recall Architecture's best work, but they're stranded amid relative duds such as "Feather in a Baseball Cap," "Debbie," and "Same Old Innocence." Places Like This is a merely good record with some great songs. As the sequel to the brilliant In Case We Die, it's a disappointment. ERIC GRANDY

Finn Crisp Ahk-mak Wasa Ritz

Album Reviews

Brandon Ivers — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Album Reviews: Dizzee Rascal, the Polyphonic Spree, and More by Brandon Ivers

DIZZEE RASCAL

Maths and English

(XL)

1/2

Dizzee Rascal's marble-mouthed twitch may have defined UK grime five years ago, but these days, dude is off on something completely different. The departure isn't exactly a surprise—Dizzee outgrew grime as quickly as he helped consolidate it—but Maths and English veers into so many different places, the only genre Dizzee belongs to now is that stuff where, uh... people talk over beats.

The drum-n-bass-rooted Shy FX collab "Da Feelin" reveals a great part of Dizzee's continued brilliance. On one hand, the track is 100 percent summertime hula-hoop shit, yet beneath it all, Dizzee's rapping is still permeated by forced-smile dread. He can chat about ladies, happiness, and traveling around the world all he wants, but Dizzee's swagger, just like his voice, always teeters on breaking.

It's only when Dizzee confronts his paranoia head-on that he sounds incapable of fucking up. The album single, "Sirens," is a crushing Judgment Night flashback—sludgy guitar riffage slams against 80 layers of beats while Dizzee stands over the mess like he's some kind of Robocop. When he finally "takes it back to that old-school shit" midway through, the riff fills out into a full-on mosh that makes '88-era rap-metal sound absolutely ancient.

The only missteps on the album occur when Dizzee starts asking rhetorical questions. The potential dream pairing with UGK on "Where Da G's?" boils down to an awkward British/Yankee relay—the differing styles polarize the beat, making for a crude mashup instead of a celebration of differences. Elsewhere, Lily Allen's gangster-themed chorus on "Wanna Be" just wasn't a good idea to begin with. But a couple clunkers on an album with this much variation is to be expected, and Maths and English once again proves Dizzee Rascal is one of the greatest rappers alive, regardless of continent. BRANDON IVERS

NOMO

New Tones

(Ubiquity)

NOMO are bringing on Afrobeat's third wave. After arising from Nigeria in the early '70s, Afrobeat has steadily gained stature in almost-popular consciousness over the last 10 or so years. Biographies and documentaries introduce Fela Kuti's illustrious, scandalous rein as Afrobeat's progenitor, DJ nights dedicated to the form convert clubgoers to its relentlessly grinding rhythms, and Fela's son Femi, as well as bands like Antibalas and Albino!, carry on the legacy with reverence. NOMO arrive at a critical juncture, then, when Afrobeat is understood enough to veer onto less traveled byways, to permit less slavish iterations to evolve. (Telling, though, that every review of any modern Afrobeat album inevitably raises Fela's ghost. Some people still just don't know.)

NOMO aren't a huge departure from the Afrobeat template—the sizzling rhythmic pulse, the depth-charge bass lines, the torrential horn section, the on-the-one funk all weigh in heavily. What the eight-man Chicago ensemble offer on their second album is an intangible but definite youthfulness, a literally electrified detachment from the forebears that's thrilling and cheeky.

When New Tones kicks off with a buzzing, electric thumb piano reminiscent of Konono No. 1, it's the band claiming their independence from the get-go, but doing so in the grungiest, funkiest, most sonically appropriate way. Where many second-wave Afrobeat bands appropriate salsa accentuation and instrumentation, NOMO retain their bristling Afro-Anglo electro-funk through and through. Songs have shorter run times than the usual, epic Afrobeat unraveling, so melodies are kicked up quickly, insistently, and occasionally beautifully. "New Song" offers one such nugget, a horn line vaguely reminiscent of tenderhearted indie-pop hookery; it's backed up by hand claps and a kinky organ solo, marrying rhythm to melody in ecstatic union. Moods shift with tempos, but they're consistently upbeat, even in the slower-shuffling tunes.

Unlike most Afrobeat records (and reviews), there's no Felaphilic name-dropping in the song titles or album credits to prove authenticity. NOMO are their own beast. Their roar will make you shake, in the best possible way. JONATHAN ZWICKEL

NOMO play the Tractor Fri June 29, 9 pm, $10.

THE POLYPHONIC SPREE

The Fragile Army

(TVT/Good Records)

1/2

With their new image—black uniforms adorned with red first-aid crosses, hearts, and medals (think My Chemical Romance meets a gothic Danielson Famile)—the Polyphonic Spree have taken some big steps away from the euphoric gospel choir/comet-loving cult fashion they boasted in the beginning of their career. The flowing robes and bright colors are gone. Now they are, as the title of the new records suggests, an army—The Fragile Army—and they're preparing for war.

On previous albums, the Spree's "sections" were consistently bright and optimistic, layered with thick orchestral explosions that were untainted by any looming shadows. But The Fragile Army reveals new layers of angst.

"Section 27 (Mental Cabaret)" is frenzied and psychotic, while "Section 30 (Watch Us Explode [Justify])" begins with a playful fantasyland orchestra before a surprising blast of distortion and some well-placed piano turn it into a swirling tunnel of paranoia. The track settles down into the slow and defeated "Section 31 (Overblow Your Nest)" where Tim DeLaughter sings, "Complicated heart of mine/With wings of love/Nowhere to fly."

They're not always battling, though. On tracks like "Section 32 (The Championship)" and "Section 22 (Running Away)," there are still fluttering flutes, shiny horns, and lyrics dripping with eye-glazing optimism—"I feel so excited and delighted today/'Cause you decided to be in my life."

They're still serving up plenty of sugary-sweet Kool-Aid, but it's beginning to exhibit a slightly suspicious aftertaste. In another two or three records, it could be Nikes and purple sheets for everyone. MEGAN SELING

VARIOUS ARTISTS

Disco Deutschland Disco: Disco, Funk & Philly Anthems from Germany 1975—1980

(Marina)

1/2

DIMITRI FROM PARIS

Cocktail Disco

(BBE)

1/2

The 99-cent bins of the world are lousy with disco vinyl. And buried among all those discarded Donna Summer and Village People platters, unknown treasures await. But uncovering them is such a chore. Anyone who has sifted through cheap secondhand records even fleetingly knows the horrors of grubby fingers, and that musty smell that permeates aging sleeves. Ugh. It's the antithesis of glamour. And isn't feeling fabulous what disco is all about? Better to rely on experts instead.

Stefan Kassel—mastermind behind the über-groovy The In-Kraut comps of vintage German pop, rock, and soul—turns his ear to classic club sounds on Disco Deutschland Disco. Although Germany exerted considerable influence on American disco, via the contributions of Giorgio Moroder, Kraftwerk, et al., the fatherland seems equally smitten with TSOP ("the sound of Philadelphia") circa the same era. "You've Got the Power" by Su Kramer and "Wieder Zusammen" from Marianne Rosenberg both foxtrot onto the floor, brass and strings in full flourish. If you prefer divas with more panache, skip straight to "Fashion Pack (Studio 54)," where model-cum-rock-star Amanda Lear growls and purrs with a cultured ferocity that makes Grace Jones sound crass.

Even genre connoisseurs will only recognize a few names here. U.S. hitmakers Silver Convention ("Fly Robin Fly") and Moroder protégés Munich Machine both feature tracks inspired by train travel; the relentless bass drum and tooting whistles of the latter's "Get on the Funk Train" recall prime Prelude sides like Musique's "In the Bush." And even schlock purveyor James Last, assisted by top-notch L.A. session players, delivers a credible jazz-funk performance on "I Can't Move No Mountain."

On his new double-CD, French disco evangelist Dimitri from Paris celebrates what he calls "cocktail disco"—tracks ripe with fruity orchestration, delirious vocals, and Latin touches. In lieu of original material, many selections appropriate jazz and Broadway standards... for that soupçon of added class; the Gershwins' "Summertime" gets a silky makeover by the Blue Velvets, the Ritchie Family prance through "Frenesi," and Astrud Gilberto reheats her signature ditty, "The Girl from Ipanema," complete with vibraphone solo.

Amid the tinsel and stardust, two unknowns shine especially bright. "Never Too Late" showcases Ms Victoria Barnes, whose clipped delivery has the perfectly practiced pizzazz of a three-shows-nightly cruise-ship entertainer. Then there's "Take Me with You" by Ralfi Pagan, a performer of indeterminate gender, questionable command of English, and razzmatazz to rival Richard Simmons. If all 22 selections were as giddy as these two, Dimitri's party would last until sunrise; as is, the pink champagne and Bolivian marching powder will probably run out before the middle of disc two. KURT B. REIGHLEY

Jonestown

HeavenÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s Gate

Waco

Mars Hill

Album Reviews

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 04:00:00 -0700

John Doe, Sky Cries Mary, Art Brut, the Horrors by Kurt B. Reighley

JOHN DOE

A Year in the Wilderness

(Yep Roc)

At 53, L.A. punk veteran John Doe remains a ruggedly handsome devil. Sensitive, too, judging from the candor of his lyrics—he can admit when he's wrong. But love never seems to work out: Out of 12 selections on his seventh solo album, 10 deal with romance gone awry. (Of the remaining two, one is the 20 seconds of piano and organ that open the disc, while the murderous antihero of "The Meanest Man in the World" simply has no heart at all.)

Yet Doe works his subject matter with the precision and power of an Olympic athlete. On "Lean Out Yr Window" and "A Little More Time," he drives home his heartache by vividly depicting happier times. "Big Moon" finds him postponing the inevitable comedown, wooing his intended with drinks, hand holding, stargazing on a rooftop. He plays the angles sonically, too. Much the way savvy classic country musicians made the most of juxtaposing fast and slow tempos within album sides, Doe divvies the program between soft, introspective numbers ("The Bridge") and incendiary rockers ("Hotel Ghost").

Lovelorn or not, Doe is in fine company. Listeners conditioned by years of hearing his vocal harmonies with X and the Knitters will delight in "The Golden State," one of three numbers on which rootsy Canadian singer Kathleen Edwards proves an ideal foil, complementing his mix of rock swagger and country sincerity. Aimee Mann and Jill Sobule also share the microphone on one number apiece, and the top-notch band includes guitar hero Dave Alvin, with special kudos going to the versatile keyboard work of Jamie Muhoberac. Perhaps the lone wolf is just another role for the part-time actor to adopt, but on Wilderness, he plays it with consummate conviction. KURT B. REIGHLEY

John Doe plays the Tractor Tavern on Sat June 16, 9:30 pm, $15 adv/$18 DOS.

SKY CRIES MARY

Small Town

(Hoodooh Music)

After reuniting four years ago, Sky Cries Mary—the band once almost as well-known for their theatrical, costumed live shows as their uniquely psychedelic, tribal-gothic sound—have returned with a new album that might convert former detractors. On Small Town, bombast has given way to a sleeker, softer, and more organic feel, and although the band are now scattered across the country, this is their most cohesive album since 1993's This Timeless Turning.

From the opening moments of the title track, it's apparent that things have changed. Roderick Romero's singing has never sounded gentler or better, creating new dimensions in the band's presentation. His and wife/covocalist Anisa Romero's voices work together to gorgeous effect on more acoustic numbers like "Hovering," "Travel Light," and the sparse and haunting "Missing." "You Are" is the band's most overtly poppy offering to date. "I'm Always Home" finds the band successfully dabbling with trip-hop.

Fans of the band's past work won't be shocked or disappointed. Gliding rockers "Rainfall" and "Five Train" and the beautiful "Find a Way" return to territory more reminiscent of earlier work—"Land of All" actually manages to feel like a hybrid between old favorites "Elephant Song" and "Don't Forget the Sky," with Roderick's Burroughs-esque narrative complemented by Anisa's soaring choruses. Beautifully different from former work without being a radical departure, Small Town is an exciting new chapter in a band that have once again found joy in making music together. BARBARA MITCHELL

Sky Cries Mary play Neumo's on Fri June 15, 8 pm, $12 adv, 21+.

ART BRUT

It's a Bit Complicated

(Downtown Records)

1/2

"I'm ignoring my grown-up problems/As I've got no idea how to solve them," rhapsodizes Eddie Argos on "I Will Survive." And, indeed, Art Brut's sophomore album is resonant rawk for the shiftless postadolescent in his early 20s. It's pithy hooks and waggishly insecure spiels, though some things don't need to be solved for the south London quintet. This album—especially highlights such as rave-up "Direct Hit" and ranting "Nag Nag Nag Nag"—replicates the immediacy and endearing awkwardness of the band's bratty, celebratory 2005 debut, Bang Bang Rock & Roll.

In Art Brut songs, the narrator is a scraggy fellow lusting for more vice in his life. To use a pubescent pursuit as analogy, you could say he's leaped from the Saturday-morning capers of Batman to the stark noir of The Dark Knight Returns. He needs grit, base thrills, but he prefers them in a comforting format. So forming a forthright garage band is like donning his rumpled, cigarette-smoke-permeated cape. It's reality and escapism, defiant and anxious.

But the life of Art Brut's narrator is a bit more complicated now. He's had some women, even if he's unsure how to fulfill them (as confessed on "People in Love," "Jealous Guy"). He works through being crushed out, and then spit out, with cheeky cadences and spiny guitar riffs, spouting 11 antsy tracks that are pouty like Elastica and winsomely stunted like Jonathan Richman, wry like the Fall while charmingly sloppy like the Hold Steady. It's like your favorite mix tape and a comic book full of suggestively ripped spandex and ass kicking. And maybe a pint or three. TONY WARE

THE HORRORS

Strange House

(Stolen Transmission)

A vivid allusion to Jack the Ripper, mocking tributes to evil seductresses, and inspired Misfits knockoffs populate the Horrors' debut, Strange House. Like so many overhyped UK buzz bastards (see Klaxons, Fujiya & Miyagi, et al.), the album's not as bad as you want it to be, and not as good as it should be. Nevertheless, the bad-trippy antics, emphasized by a gory Chris Cunningham video clip for lead single "Sheena Is a Parasite" (starring Samantha Morton!), make for an amusing journey into dark, stylized theatrics worthy of the Kills and Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

As an artistic form, horror plays on our imaginations, generating a mixture of nervous (and sometimes unabashed) laughter and genuine fear. Admirably, the Horrors tap into those sensations with ease, even if their songwriting abilities add up to something less than a masterpiece. It's not hard to poke fun at lead singer Faris Rotter's yelps, but his voice fits against a vicious psychobilly attack. Screeching guitar lines and dark, stomping bass make for an unstable and pungent atmosphere.

Still, precious few tracks stand out on Strange House. "Sheena Is a Parasite" is covered with drum fills that burst out like blisters. On a cover of Screaming Lord Sutch's "Jack the Ripper," Rotter starts with a ragged crawl and then revs up into a flurry of vocal punches that hit like an amphetamine jolt: "I see him in my dreams, oh no/Jack the Ripper!" Scary stuff. Really. MOSI REEVES

The Horrors play the Crocodile on Wed June 20, 8 pm, $10 adv/$12 DOS.

The Kid

The Commitment

Skipping Towards Gomorrah

Savage Love

I'd Love to Turn You On to Dusty Springfield

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 24 May 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Dusty Springfield by Kurt B. Reighley

By the time Dusty Springfield decamped to Tennessee to cut her 1969 masterpiece Dusty in Memphis, both the artist and her destination were proven hit factories. The bewigged British singer had racked up smashes on both sides of the Atlantic, displaying breadth and intuition with the ersatz Wall of Sound romp "I Only Want to Be with You," the sophisticated "The Look of Love," and the widescreen grandeur of "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me."

Springfield loved American R&B. Via her recurring role on the show Ready Steady Go, she introduced Motown acts to UK TV audiences. She cited Baby Washington, the underrated R&B performer, as her favorite singer. And she knew the gospel-infused "Memphis sound," as epitomized by labels like Stax Records, had been pivotal to the success of others she revered: Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin.

Working in the American South might have seemed overly ambitious. The harder sounds typically associated with the region were not the best setting for Springfield; she could do many things, but she was not a shouter. No worries. The players surrounding her for the Memphis sessions—rhythm section the Memphis Cats, backing vocalists the Sweet Inspirations, and producers Jerry Wexler, Tom Down, and Arif Mardin—proved capable of taking the grooves in any number of directions.

And Springfield had a flair for picking top-quality material. The songwriting credits on Dusty in Memphis include such heavyweights as Bacharach & David, Goffin & King, Mann & Weil, and Randy Newman. Yet the tunes she selected from these proven vets were hardly standard Top 40 fare; teens might have dug the bittersweet desperation of "Just One Smile," but the playful come-ons and sunny carnality of "Just a Little Lovin'" and "Breakfast in Bed" were definitely meant for adults.

Springfield was already an emotionally charged performer. Now, she laid herself bare; several introductions were stark, almost unaccompanied. She transitioned from the sultry "Son of a Preacher Man" to the unsettling intimations of madness in "Windmills of Your Mind" as if moving through such disparate sentiments over one disc were as instinctive as strolling barefoot across a summer lawn.

It was that ease that ultimately ensured the triumph of In Memphis (aesthetically, that is; commercially it flopped, stalling at number 99 on U.S. charts). Springfield simply did what she did best, in harmony with new surroundings. She never tried to pass herself off as a native... and thus proved as much a natural-born soul musician as any of the black Americans she admired.

She Was a Big Freak

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 10 May 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Betty Davis Gets Some Shine from Light in the Attic by Kurt B. Reighley

Great inventors rarely go unpunished. Galileo got thumped by the Inquisition. Nikola Tesla was practically written out of history by his rival, Thomas Edison. And until Seattle imprint Light in the Attic saw fit to reissue her music, Betty Davis languished in obscurity. Luckily, deluxe new editions of her early '70s releases Betty Davis and They Say I'm Different finally promise to introduce Davis to audiences beyond the rare-groove set.

Davis was an original in every regard. On the cover of her first album, she rocks over-the-knee, silver lamé boots; her look for the Different sleeve is Funkadelic-goes-to–Paradise Island, complete with javelins. Musically, she fused funk, rock, soul, and blues. Her singing can hardly be called pretty, but it was a force to reckon with. Lyrically, songs like "If I'm in Luck I Might Get Picked Up" and "Don't Call Her No Tramp" surpass then-conventional notions of sexual equality, while "Anti-Love Song" and "He Was a Big Freak" explicitly put male paramours in their place.

"In terms of point of view, and expressing ideas of identity and sexuality, these were really interesting lyrics," says Oliver Wang, who contributes extensive liner notes to the two reissues. "It wasn't what you would find someone like [James Brown lieutenants] Lyn Collins or Marva Whitney singing about."

"She was this force of personality, writing all her own songs, and eventually producing her own albums," Wang continues. "She's this fascinating aberration. She wasn't the mouthpiece for a male producer or songwriter, but an independent black female artist in the early 1970s."

Even before she cut albums, she was an inventor. Born Betty Mabry, the former fashion model earned her famous surname during a brief marriage to Miles Davis in the late '60s. He was her first big experiment. She introduced him to new music—Sly & the Family Stone, Jimi Hendrix—and a new tailor.

Although Miles is dismissive of Betty in his autobiography, her contributions did not go unrecognized. "The people around [Miles]—Herbie Hancock, Carlos Santana—will be the first ones to say, 'Yo, that whole Bitches Brew phase? That was Betty,'" confirms Wang.

Davis had already made inroads before she cut her debut LP, writing songs for the Chambers Brothers and the Commodores and recording two pop singles. But the difference between those early efforts and Betty Davis is night and day. "Someone who might have heard of Betty Mabry at that point, and then listened to her on that first album, would have been like, 'Oh my God, is this the same person?'" says Wang.

On Betty Davis, her sidemen and producer included members of Santana, Sly & the Family Stone, and Graham Central Station, plus Journey guitarist Neal Schon. Sylvester and the Pointer Sisters sang back-ups. On her second album, she assumed even more control, hiring a new band and overseeing production herself.

Yet Betty Davis, the unfettered wild woman, was also an invention. She ran in social circles with Hendrix, Eric Clapton, and Marc Bolan, but is remembered by colleagues as a quiet individual who shied away from drugs and booze. "But in the studio and onstage, music really transformed her," says Wang.

Davis made one more album, Nasty Gal, released in 1975. After two different follow-ups were shelved, she retired. In part, theorizes Wang, she was a victim of her own independence. Because she sought to control every facet of her own career, she eschewed outside management. "She wanted to knock down the gates herself. But that's really hard for any artist to do, let alone a black female artist."

Nor was time on her side. Just a few years after Davis withdrew, musicians like Nona Hendryx and Grace Jones were completely overhauling notions of how black women should sound, look, and act. "If [Betty] had waited five years, and come out during the punk era, she would have killed it," insists Wang. Only now does the world finally seem ready for Davis. Whether they are aware of her work or not, pop stars like Kelis and Macy Gray embody the same fiery spirit she pioneered.

And maybe Davis—who lives quietly in Pennsylvania today—is ready for the world. "I have heard talk that she might get back into making music again, which I think would be great," Wang says. "Who knows if that is going to happen or not, but if she is even just entertaining the idea, that is really exciting news."

We Love Life

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 26 Apr 2007 04:00:00 -0700

It's in Our Best Interest if Jarvis Cocker Writes Songs by Kurt B. Reighley

At many points in Jarvis Cocker's career, nobody could have blamed him for throwing in the towel. Hell, nobody might even have noticed. His band Pulp struggled just to maintain cult status for their first decade and a half. Even John Peel, who gave the Sheffield ensemble an early break in 1981, recording them for his influential BBC radio show, didn't bother inviting Pulp back for 12 years. And he was a fan.

So it comes as little surprise when Cocker, 43, admits he entertained notions of quitting. "I'd been thinking about just stopping music altogether and concentrating on being a responsible and useful member of society," he says from his Paris home.

The twist is, the singer entertained those thoughts just a couple of years ago, before starting work on his solo debut, simply entitled Jarvis. Luckily, he quickly disavowed becoming an ordinary civilian. "I realized that was impossible for me," he confesses drily.

By that point, the gangly, bespectacled Cocker had become one of England's most unlikely pop stars. In 1995, Pulp hit number two with the anthem "Common People." Rife with songs about furtive sex and other misadventures, their chart-topping fifth album, Different Class, won the coveted Mercury Music Prize. A year later, Cocker made tabloid headlines after interrupting Michael Jackson's performance at the 1996 Brit Awards.

But then things got tough. "The final two Pulp albums took quite a long time to write and finish," he says. "And I thought, 'If it has turned into such a long, drawn-out process, maybe you should just stop. You've said what you want to say; why force it?'" Cocker had married and was about to relocate to France. Shortly before the 2002 singles collection Hits was released, Pulp officially went on indefinite hiatus.

Jarvis, the record, sounds like the logical progression from latter-day Pulp, retaining Cocker's biting wit, memorable croon, and flair for skewed melodrama. "People say they can tell it's me, because they recognize the voice, but they know it's something different as well." The album may not sound too shocking to fans, but regardless, Cocker had take several detours before he felt comfortable making it.

First came Relaxed Muscle, an ersatz electroclash outing with pal Jason Buckle. Wearing a skeleton suit and face paint, Cocker masqueraded as Darren Spooner, a flop nightclub entertainer and failed husband and parent driven to making crap techno. "Thinking about marriage and fatherhood, the terrifying prospect of being a responsible adult, made me invent this character who was the opposite of that."

Relaxed Muscle didn't last long, but its influence did. Since pretending to be Spooner indefinitely was bound to land him in a loony bin, Cocker "realized I had to absorb, or balance, that dark side, within myself." Several compositions that eventually surfaced on Jarvis, particularly "I Will Kill Again," address the necessity of acknowledging negative impulses.

But before that could happen, Cocker had to write songs. Any songs. He was feeling creatively exhausted when the invitation to contribute to Nancy Sinatra's Morrissey-endorsed 2004 comeback album arrived. He came up with "Don't Let Him Waste Your Time" and "Baby's Coming Back to Me," both of which he eventually reclaimed on Jarvis. "Realizing that I still could write songs—and that I still kind of enjoyed it—was an important step to take."

Yet after penning a few catchy melodies laced with minimal lyrical bile, Cocker's "dark side" resurfaced, ushering forth "Running the World." Originally, the singer considered this vitriolic attack on class disparity as an opening salvo. Worried it would prompt listeners to brand Jarvis his "angry, political album," he eventually relegated "Running" to hidden-track status, but its job was done.

"That song made me realize that trying to write about stuff that seems a bit inappropriate is an important part of what I did," he says. It was a mentality not dissimilar from the one that had inspired him to form Pulp in 1978. "I do tend to write conventionally structured songs, with verses and choruses and middle eights, but then using that as a kind of Trojan horse, to smuggle in something not quite right."

The last, and oddest, piece in the progression came in 2005, when Cocker wrote and performed three songs in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, as part of an imaginary band at a school mixer. To minimize outside interference, Cocker and his cohorts (including Jonny Greenwood and Phil Selway from Radiohead) banged out the tunes as quickly as possible. "I found that a much more pleasant way of making a record," he says. Not only did he retain his mental and physical health, but the arrangements and performances felt fresher. Consequently, Jarvis was recorded in under two weeks.

After earning accolades upon its November 2006 release overseas, Jarvis generated enough interest Stateside to score domestic release, and garner Cocker spots at Coachella and on Letterman. While he is pleased with the album's reception, don't be surprised if he takes another five years before the next one.

Album Reviews

Brendan Kiley — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 04:00:00 -0700

Reviewed: Modeselektor, Amy Winehouse, Cornelius, and Slender Means by Brendan Kiley

AMY WINEHOUSE

Back to Black

(Republic)

Amy Winehouse is the new siren of tragedy and Back to Black is her song. The album is inviting—her voice is warm, her songs (which she writes) are soulful but rhythmic enough to be catchy, and her backing band is awesome, with good horn and string lines and that deep, baritone sax that'll pucker your asshole. It's the kind of thing you want to listen to in a car on a summer day, cruising the strip with the windows down. But as you linger in the album, it darkens like a purple stain. The hit single is a battle cry for defiant drunks: "They's tryin' to make me go to rehab but I won't go, go, go... I'd rather be at home with Ray/I ain't got 17 days. There's nothing you can teach me that I can't learn from Mr. Hathaway." ("Ray" being Mr. Charles and "Mr. Hathaway" being Donny.) And it goes down from there: empty bottles, broken hearts.

The opening lines of the title track—"He left no time to regret/Kept his dick wet/With his same-old safe bet"—are sung with a round, luscious soulfulness while her backing band beats out a piano-drum-horn line straight from a '60s girl-group hit. The sweet pop references plus the raw ache of her voice equals an intoxicating cocktail of innocence and experience.

Then she says, "I'm an ugly dickhead drunk, I am." Like Edith Piaf and Billie Holiday before her, Amy Winehouse is our queen of damage du jour. We love her sins and we love that she's not ashamed.

And yes, I've seen the YouTube video of her drunkenly howling out her half of a "Beat It" duet (never missing a note nor a beat, mind you) and it's fucking marvelous—unless you like your soul music from blow-dried bobbleheads like Charlotte Church. BRENDAN KILEY

MODESELEKTOR

Boogybytes Vol. 3

(BPitch Control)

Endorsed on Boogybytes' opener by an ornery Henry Rollins as nonmusical, drug-addled "fuckheads," Germany's Modeselektor make shitty rave music threatening again. Just ignore the corny title; it must be one of those three-times-over ironic things (see: white jeans, Cop Rock reruns). Besides, this is one of the few recent mixes that successfully rides that precarious line between boring genre allegiance and spazzy nerd programming.

At 25 songs, the track list is short by today's mix standards, yet genres seamlessly flip from wonky jelly-doughnut bass lines to dubstep to funboy minimal without sounding like a techno variety show. Instead of shuffling through an endless array of big hooks, Modeselektor's mixing capitalizes on the similarities of each style—drums programmed off the grid, big farty bass, and synth arpeggios that bleep out ring-tone melodies. In other words, Boogybytes is music by and for fuckheads. Most of the tracks featured here are hits only in the most relative of terms—Burial's murky monster jam "Southern Comfort" was heard by 11 people outside of music-critic circles. Even the stuff with potential crossover appeal, like Spank Rock's "Rick Rubin," will be remembered as that one song by the Spank Boyz about the bearded guy.

But that fuckhead mentality makes Boogybytes a vital commodity for the nonzealot. Electronic music lost a lot of momentum when it shifted toward microgenres with subtle differences. By moving away from those purist impulses, Modeselektor make the argument that things have changed. Hopefully, people are still listening. BRANDON IVERS

SLENDER MEANS

Rock & Roll Machine

(Esoterik Musik)

1/2

In 2005, Slender Means' debut release, Neon & Ruin, put a spark in the city's vibrant indie-rock heart. The band's shining keyboards, luminous and catchy guitars, and crisp, gentle drumming came together in some of the prettiest, most dynamic pop songs heard in a while. The bow on the perfect little package, though, was singer Josh Dawson's voice; with a strong and soaring range, Dawson is a modern-day crooner with the ability to melt hearts in just a few words.

The opening track on the band's new EP, Rock & Roll Machine—their first release since Neon & Ruin—is more bitter than their romantic material of days past. The intro guitar in "Fade Out" boasts a bratty swagger, and the keys, while catchy, are also laced with an eerie attitude—it has a sort of Wilco-meets-'60s-beach-party feel. And instead of hitting us with his heart-stopping vocals, Dawson snaps "Got no job, cause I need to be free/you can't stop this rock and roll machine." Ultimately, the song is about someone who's in this music thing for the long haul—it's as "fuck you, I'm doing what I want" as the band's ever been.

"Ship Wrecked" and "Foreign Legion," the two following tracks, return to more familiar territory. The fluid but familiar songwriting relies on Dawson's vocals to carry it beyond the land of unremarkable. But you know what? It works just fine. MEGAN SELING

Slender Means play with Rocky Votolato at Neumo's Fri April 20, 8 pm, $12 DOS, all ages.

CORNELIUS

Sensuous

(Everloving)

Keigo Oyamada, aka Cornelius, appropriated his alias from Planet of the Apes. But the Japanese recording artist doesn't aspire to live in another world. Instead, he condenses the sensations that constantly bombard us in this one into stunning aural collages on his third U.S. studio release.

The 12-song set dawns with the title track, a delicate mix of bells, wind chimes, and acoustic guitar that blossoms in subtle complexity; the effect recalls accelerated film footage of flowers blooming. At the end of the selection, Cornelius deliberately plays lower and lower on the guitar, and the ear becomes increasingly conscious not of the notes or tones, but the physical sensation of strings being plucked, and wood resonating from vibrations. The sounds become tactile.

Similar flights of synesthesia pop up throughout the program, echoing the influential experiments of Miles Davis, Neu!, and Eno's Music for Films. The delicately layered vocals of "Breezin'" trigger the same olfactory hints of fresh-cut grass and spring flowers manifested in the finest work of the Free Design; choppy guitars and crisp drums toast "Fit Song" into a delicate wafer cookie.

Cornelius also subverts established conventions at a purely musical level. The reptilian funk of "Beep It" incorporates escalating synthesizer stabs that hint at, yet deftly sidestep, techno clichés, while "Sleep Warm" translates a song from Sinatra's 1958 concept LP Only the Lonely into a wafting electrical cloud of harp, xylophone, and processed vocals. By integrating these different approaches, the producer creates a sonic odyssey that stimulates all the senses, without resorting to gimmicks like a fur jewel box or instructing fans to lick the CD face. KURT B. REIGHLEY

Cornelius play with Honeycut at El Corazón Tues April 24, 9 pm,$16 adv/$18 DOS, all ages.

Mauve

Taupe

Puce

Ecru

Mind the Bollocks

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 04:00:00 -0700

EMP's Pop Conference: Don't Be Afraid by Kurt B. Reighley

Of course hipsters hate the EMP Pop Conference. A balding middle-aged dork glancing at his note cards can't do justice to "Ace of Spades" the way Motörhead intended. And just imagine if the subject is Gordon Lightfoot's lost masterpiece.

But music and academia can coexist. And just as cranking the volume makes a song rock harder, the more the eggheads turn up their absurd combo of Lemmy and higher learning, the better. Thank heavens for the Pop Conference's over-the-top academic pop.

Music safeguarded me through the hell of high school. Singing the Buzzcocks' "I Believe" at a senior talent show, banging my fist on the stage while wailing "there is no love in this world anymore," ranks among my fondest memories. So when I finally escaped suburbia, what did I pursue as my college major? Music.

Bad call. Think nothing can drain the drama out of Beethoven? Try listening to his Ninth Symphony in a freezing-cold lecture hall, then being instructed to accurately notate certain chords you just heard on a sheet of staff paper. At eight in the morning.

Yet a funny thing happened after graduation. The two seemingly contradictory skills sets I had developed—the ability to condense complex works of art into painstakingly footnoted term papers and my knack for extolling the virtues of any UK recording artist with an asymmetrical haircut—dovetailed. I never planned on writing about music professionally, but after I used the word "timbre" while mouthing off about Siouxsie Sioux from behind an NYC deli counter, a magazine editor offered me a gig. I have never looked back. Reviewing free records and concerts sure as hell beats coming home stinking of mayonnaise.

When the EMP Pop Conference began in 2002, I imagined a tiny cadre of recluses splitting hairs over an anointed canon of artists and albums. In 2005, the first year I extensively participated, what I initially encountered was even worse. I moderated a panel featuring something called "Girl on Girl: Bio-Queens, Fat Femmes, and the Re-radicalizing of the Gender Fuck." The title was its high point. Sorry, but I don't care if you're discussing Julie Andrews in Victor/Victoria or the merits of Sylvester versus RuPaul. It takes an especially cloistered nerd to ferry the glittery realm of cross-dressing straight to Yawnsville.

But later that same weekend, jazz critic Nate Chinen blew me away at "Do Ya Think I'm Savvy? Rockers, Crooners, and the Hijacking of the Great American Songbook." His informative survey was accompanied by a nonstop soundtrack, tightly choreographed to sync up perfectly with his banter. It worked because not only was his subject well researched, but he communicated his excitement like a rock band would: cranked up.

Ultimately, that carefully calibrated mix of razzle-dazzle AND inspired research is what makes or breaks a presentation at the Pop Conference. All the esoteric citations in the world are no substitute for the raw excitement of seeing a grown man like Yeti publisher Mike McGonigal gushing unapologetically about the glory of Electric Light Orchestra's Out of the Blue before his peers. The wise participant leaves the PowerPoint in the meeting room, allows the subject matter room to breathe, and relies on hand gestures, moxie, and communal enthusiasm to carry the day.

And if they don't, and that discussion of the Bush Tetras or dancehall turns out to be a snooze? Nobody is forcing you to stay. That's the real beauty of the Pop Conference: There is no quiz at the end.

For a complete list of events, go to www.emplive.org/education/index.asp?categoryID=26

Head of the Class

The EMP Pop Conference gathers some of the sharpest minds in music criticism (as well as our own Charles Mudede) together for a brain-busting weekend of theories, research, and poetics on popular music. It's sort of a fantasy realm where nerddom and fandom are the same thing, and for the first time in its six years, it's free to the public. There's an impossible amount of information to digest, but here are some picks to get you started. ERIC GRANDY

Jonathan Lethem

"Collapsing Distance: The Love-Song of the Wanna-Be, or, The Fannish Auteur"

Keynote Address

Thurs April 19, 7—9 pm.

In his novel The Fortress of Solitude, Jonathan Lethem captures the conflicted feeling of fandom—a combination of longing and distance—in a protagonist who loves but can't fully be part of the world of black, '70s, protohiphop Brooklyn that he grows up in. Lethem kicks off this year's conference with a meditation on the disappearance of that distance between artists, critics, and fans.

Sasha Frere-Jones

"What's the 911?"

Panel: Year Zeroes

Fri April 20, 9—10:45 am.

The New Yorker's Sasha Frere-Jones can get as esoteric and referential as you'd like, but his greatest talent is his ability to express big ideas about music—any music—in a way that's smart, informed, and refreshingly plain. Here, he examines R&B's chart-topping hegemony in the wake of 9/11, the seeming inability of pop music to address such a massively historic event, and the end of R&B history.

Simon Reynolds

"Just 4 U London: Place and Race in British Dance Culture from Rave to Grime"

Panel: Urban Dance Squads

Fri April 20, 2:15—4 pm.

Londoner by way of New York Simon Reynolds is the author of Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978–84 and Generation Ecstasy: Into the World of Techno and Rave Culture. Reynolds is a gifted musical academic whose inventive ideas are matched by alarmingly thorough research. In this presentation, he'll explore the relationship between London and dance music, and the ways in which music is both defined by and independent of its geography.

Michaelangelo Matos

"A Matter of Trustafarians: Behind the Bob Marley Poster on the Dorm Room Wall"

Panel: Iconography

Fri April 20, 2:15—4 pm.

Michaelangelo Matos deconstructs that old college-campus cliché—the Bob Marley poster on the dorm room wall—in an effort to understand the motivations of the "trustafarian" and the significance of the Marley affectation. Matos is an astute observer of both cultural trends and musical meaning, and he might be the one to finally get to the bottom of this.

Dominique Leone

"What You Hear Is Never What They Heard, and What You Get Is Never What They Had"

Panel: Futurisms

Fri April 20, 4:15—6 pm.

Pitchforker Dominique Leone will explore an odd irony of digital music distribution and internet-based criticism: a "relativity effect" in which the rapid dissemination and digestion of new music eliminates the possibility for shared cultural/musical moments and events, making it impossible, despite all the information out there, to ever "be 'on top' of 'what's happening.'" As a writer for Pitchfork, the premier site of accelerated music criticism on the web, Leone is unquestionably qualified for the task.

Steven Shaviro

"Take Me Back: Ghostface's Ghosts"

Panel: Time Travelling with the Wu-Tang

Sat April 21, 9—10:45 am.

Steven Shaviro, the DeRoy professor of English at Wayne State University, will get into the "hauntology" of soul samples in Ghostface Killah's music. Ghostface has stated that '70s soul is his favorite music because it's what his parents were listening to when he was conceived. Shaviro will explore how samples of that music in Ghostface's songs act like ghosts of an inaccessible time.

Jeff Chang

"1969—1973: The Birth of the

Bronx Break"

Panel: Breaks in Time: Rethinking

Hip-Hop Roots

Sat April 21, 4:15—6 pm.

Jeff Chang is the author of the indispensable cultural history of hiphop Can't Stop Won't Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation. Here, he'll dig into the record crates of the DJs that defined hiphop's early sound and trace the histories of the records therein with the lofty hope of uncovering a "unified theory of the breakbeat." Whether he finds one or not, this should be a fun discussion.

Louvin, an Elevator

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 04:00:00 -0700

The Country-Music Drug of Choice by Kurt B. Reighley

In 2001, the Louvin Brothers were inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame. But Charlie Louvin, the surviving half of the famous vocal duo (older brother Ira passed away in 1965), doesn't act like a museum piece. "I'll be 80 years old this July," he says, chuckling. "I've got people in my band that are 25, and I can run their butts into the ground."

Although his current, self-titled album features remakes of Louvin Brothers classics rather than hip contemporary material (à la Johnny Cash or Loretta Lynn), the logic behind it was shrewd and sound. The owner of his label told Louvin that if he revisited the songs that made him and Ira famous, accompanied by a coterie of special guests, he could score airplay on college stations. And radio spins would generate gigs beyond the nostalgia circuit.

"That interested me a lot," says Louvin. "Because I believe that in this business, you should always strive to bring your music to new people." Toward that end, he performed at SXSW last month, and is appearing at the Bonnaroo Festival in June, too.

A breathtaking list of performers—including Elvis Costello, Jeff Tweedy, George Jones, Will Oldham, and members of Bright Eyes, Lambchop, and Super-chunk—costar on Charlie Louvin. For many, it was a chance to return a favor; the Louvin Brothers have long been a country music gateway drug of choice among rockers, particularly in the California scene of the '70s. Gram Parsons recorded their favorites "The Christian Life" and "Cash on the Barrelhead," and Emmylou Harris's first charting single was a 1975 version of "If I Could Only Win Your Love."

"Our songs have been around for 60 years, and they're doing better right now than when Ira and I were doing them in person," says Louvin. But their appeal can be tricky to pinpoint. The height of the Louvins' success, from their 1955 breakthrough "When I Stop Dreaming" till their 1962 swan song "Must You Throw Dirt in My Face," coincided with a rapidly changing postwar society. Even as technological advances from stereophonic sound to oral contraceptives were made, Americans lived in fear of nuclear war and flying saucers. The brothers' high, keening harmonies mirrored the eerie, otherworldly tenor of the era.

Charlie attributes the enduring appeal of their catalog to a more basic element. "There is a lot of morality in our music," he says. "The devil didn't stand much of a chance in our songs." Having started as a gospel act, the Louvin Brothers sang stories that often weighed the fleeting rewards of this life against the eternal ones of the hereafter.

Not that their records were the sole province of the righteous. Their most-requested song, the Nick Cave–approved "Knoxville Girl," is a brutal murder ballad. "It is a gruesome song," Louvin concedes, before illuminating a single word in the second verse (the victim is described as having "roving" eyes) that hints at the motive for her killing.

Although Charlie is credited on their originals, Ira did the bulk of the composing. "I wish that I had the gift that my brother had with writing," he says. "I could give him a title—which I did, quite often—and he could write a song as quick as he could write a postcard to Mom."

"But the songs didn't do him any good," sighs Louvin, referring to the drinking problem that would end their joint career. Although the 1960 concept album Satan Is Real featured "The Drunkard's Doom" and the Carter Family classic "The Kneeling Drunkard's Plea," Ira's worsening alcoholism was a key factor in their 1963 split. "We all know right from wrong," adds Charlie. "But what you know and what you do are two completely different things."

By the time his older brother died in a car accident, Charlie had already scored his first solo hit, 1964's "I Don't Love You Anymore." "I didn't want to be a solo artist, by any means, but [singing] was all I knew how to do, so I had to give it my best shot."

And he intends to keep slugging away. "I'm blessed with good health, and I've been given a chance to do this," Louvin concludes. "If I don't try, it just means I'm lazy... and I am not lazy. So I'm going to go out there and give 'em hell.

editor@thestranger.com

Corrosion of Conformity

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 08 Feb 2007 04:00:00 -0800

Jesse Sykes & the Sweet Hereafter Redefine Pop by Kurt B. Reighley

It takes moxie to call your album Like, Love, Lust & the Open Halls of the Soul. All those short, succinct words, a growing snowball of open-ended associations hurtling down the slope. Yet it suits the third full-length from Jesse Sykes & the Sweet Hereafter perfectly. Because even more so than its predecessors, Reckless Burning (2002) and Oh, My Girl (2004), this 12-song set feels like an exercise in quantum physics or stage magic; how so much content can fit in such small spaces is a wonder.

"These songs have a little more of a pop song structure than a lot of the older ones, which were a little more pastoral and ambiguous," remarks Jesse Sykes. "Those songs have a real beauty, too, and I love them. But these ones, when you take away some of the bells and whistles, they still hold together as songs."

When Sykes calls her work pop, she is referring primarily to architecture, not the building materials. Take the song "You Might Walk Away," with its simple verse-chorus, verse-chorus construction. "That, to me, is a pop song. The only difference is that the lyrics aren't about a walk in the sun on the beach. It's more about the corrosion of the human heart." Sykes's definition of a "pop song" has about as much in common with MTV fare as Larry Clark's Kids does with a "teen comedy."

The Seattle band haven't ditched their distinctive arrangements, far from it. Like a good Neptunes production, if you break these cuts down to their core components, the songs seem even stranger. "The Air Is Thin" starts small, then swells to accommodate mariachi brass and a majestic massed chorus. Even a spare number like the opener, "Eisenhower Moon," with its base timbres of harmonica and acoustic guitar, can suddenly change pallor with the introduction of a swath of ethereal backing vocals.

Yet the most impressive thing about the Sweet Hereafter is how the players reconcile the increasingly concise sensibility of Sykes's songs with a love for the endangered species called the guitar solo. "Hard Not to Believe" twists around a measured, six-syllable lyrical peg and a spindly melody. Suddenly, like a boat emerging from a narrow tributary into the open sea, it gives way to a virtuoso turn by guitarist Phil Wandscher.

"I'm kind of a classic-rock freak," he admits. Lately, he's been spending a lot of time with Live at the Fillmore East, the 2006 collection of 1970 concert recordings by Neil Young and Crazy Horse. "I just love all that shit. Nowadays, everybody is so afraid to put a guitar solo in a song, or just jam and rock out."

"Dungen ain't afraid of it," Jesse interjects.

For that matter, neither is she. "I consider his solos like songs within songs, countermelodies," Sykes continues. (Wandscher is credited as cowriter on four tracks.) "They aren't just solos for the sake of soloing, they actually go somewhere. And they are pretty intricate arrangements. I've always had to throw away the notion that something is going to just be a three-minute pop song, because Phil's side of the story definitely has to be told."

"The solos were worked out, but there's a lot of improvisation, too," adds bassist Bill Herzog. "I played parts that I've never played since. A lot of stuff is spontaneous."

Surprisingly, so are the backing vocals. Sykes expresses wonder that her bandmates toss off flourishes like the Beach Boys–style coda of "How Will We Know?" "They have to make their voices sound almost like characters... these strange, angelic creatures who have to blend with my voice, which change throughout the record."

That vocal balance has altered of late, too. Longtime string player Anne Marie Ruljancich recently departed. Fortunately, new drummer Eric Eagle is blessed with good pipes, filling any holes in the choir. But the smaller lineup still feels a bit odd to the remaining players. "It's fun to be at a new level—we have definitely progressed and gotten better—yet be a smaller band than we were two years ago. But it's kind of cool, too," says Herzog. And it seems to fit the mood of the times. Now, more than ever, Jesse Sykes & the Sweet Hereafter are making listeners feel more, while playing less.

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 04:00:00 -0800

Preview of the Avett Brothers Show by Kurt B. Reighley

Plug the search term "Avett Brothers" into YouTube, and a ton of live footage of the North Carolina string trio comes up: A sweet yet rough stab at "Kind of in Love" that quickly blossoms into an audience sing-along; a rollicking run through "Denouncing November Blue." But if you're trawling for samples from their as-yet-untitled fourth studio album... well, don't expect much. The goods have been kept under wraps while the band—harmonizing brothers Scott and Seth Avett, plus upright bassist Bob Crawford—refine their latest batch of songs.

According to Scott, in concert the group has intentionally refrained from playing the majority of the songs slated for the follow-up to their 2006 smash Four Thieves Gone. "I'm okay with the fact that people record things live and that they get around quickly," he says. But nowadays, the band prefers to wait until recording a new tune before they add it to the set. "Because otherwise, if anybody is at your show, that song will be on YouTube next week."

Still, fans who turn up to see the guys headline the Tractor on Friday, January 19, can look forward to hearing other fresh selections, culled from their recent EP The Gleam in the repertoire. But folks who have pigeonholed the Avetts because of their fiery live shows and Ramones-meets–Bill Monroe reputation may be startled by this six-song detour. Featuring shadowy selections like "Sanguine," The Gleam is a much quieter affair, cut by just Scott and Seth, with minimal instrumentation; a bit of banjo, a little harmonica, but primarily low-key vocals and acoustic guitar.

Scott claims the hushed character of The Gleam isn't really indicative of the next album's sound, but their decision to do something markedly different is. For the first time since the siblings made the leap from punk to bluegrass, back in 2000, the record they're just wrapping up was made in a relatively big studio. And they took advantage of the amenities.

"We had access to a lot of instruments. If we wanted to put a Hammond B3 organ or a xylophone on a track, we would fish one out and learn how to play it well enough to do it. That's something I've always wanted to do, and heard in the songs, but we were limited. This time, we were kind of wide open on it. And that immediately comes through, just as far as how many layers we could put in each of the songs."

The group also drew on the lessons it learned from cutting four demos with legendary producer Joel Dorn (Roberta Flack, the Allman Brothers Band) back in early 2006. "He taught us a lot, and we approached this new recording with that knowledge. Joel really made us work. Sometimes, if you want to get things just right, you have to do 15 takes." So you didn't get to sample all the songs as works-in-progress on the web. Big deal. Sometimes a little spit and polish—and patience—yields greater rewards.

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 04 Jan 2007 04:00:00 -0800

Korby Lenker and the Barbed Wire Cutters by Kurt B. Reighley

Some folks' motto come January 1 is "out with the old, in with the new." But not Korby Lenker; he prefers a mix. "I'm basically kind of old-fashioned," he confesses. "I'd rather read a Russian classic than the latest bestseller." Even as he rolls into 2007 with fresh projects—and possibly a change of address—Seattle's fastest-rising country artist is also returning to his roots: On Saturday, January 6, he is reuniting with Bellingham bluegrass quintet the Barbed Wire Cutters for a long overdue Seattle gig at the Tractor Tavern.

Although the group—which also includes Bruce Shaw (mandolin), Chris Glass (fiddle and vocals), Andrew Simmons (bass and vocals), and Kevin Fazio (banjo)—played together in Bellingham about six months ago, the singer-guitarist estimates it's been over a year since their last Emerald City appearance. Why the holdup?

"People moved out of town. People got married. It became a little more difficult to make rehearsals," says Lenker. Of course, there were also the myriad obligations that came with promoting his 2006 solo release, King of Hearts. "Probably more than anything, it was me being busy," he admits. "And people being mad at me. Well, quietly annoyed. But a quick couple of pints cleared all that up."

After the hiatus, Lenker says spirits are running high. "The last time we played together, we hadn't done it in a long while either. But there was just that instant magic that I remembered. It is so nice to play with musicians of this caliber. The rest of the guys, I mean. I just smile pretty and try to sing in tune, but they can really pick."

Could this show mean the band are finally making a follow-up to their 2003 release Full Moon to Rise? Yes and no. "We haven't begun putting together material for another record, but that can change fast," says Lenker. "I know there will be another Barbed Wire Cutters album. I don't know if it will be in the next six months, but it might be in the next year."

Meanwhile, Lenker has been working on the follow-up to King of Hearts in both Seattle and Nashville. Last year, he started dividing his time between the two ("I kind of have dual citizenship"), and is considering spending even more time in Music City in 2007.

"Nashville is really a career town, and I'm going to be writing songs for the rest of my life. That's all I want to do, hang out with songwriters and have the opportunity to be creative. It's also a highly competitive environment, which is good for somebody who has been sitting in a small town for six years."

He'll be traveling overseas, too, promoting the UK release of King of Hearts. But no matter where his mail is forwarded, Lenker promises he'll spend plenty of time in the Pacific Northwest. Right now, he has a lot of options—just the way he likes it. "Why have one iron in the fire when you can have four?"

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Regretting Jessica Simpson, but Not the Dixie Chicks by Kurt B. Reighley

Regrets? Oh please. If my true feelings about this past year were a painting, they'd make Munch's The Scream look like one of Margaret Keane's big-eyed waifs by comparison.

In February, I hounded Willie Nelson, angling to interview him about his digital single, "Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other," for a gay and lesbian newsmagazine. Just before our chat commenced, my editor asked me to "go easy" on music queries, and shoot for more gossip. Consequently, I wasted one of my favorite artist's time with questions about acting alongside Dyan Cannon in Honeysuckle Rose, and Jessica Simpson's IQ. Kill me now.

Speaking of the former Mrs. Lachey, who booked her to perform—and bomb—during the Dolly Parton segment of the Kennedy Center Honors? Jessica Simpson is the antithesis of Parton. Beneath her golden locks, Dolly has always lived by her wits and talent—no matter how plunging her neckline—while Simpson has yet to display a modicum of either. Please tell me some numbskull was fired over that blunder.

I still can't believe the Meat Purveyors broke up. I keep praying I'll wake up and it will all be just a terrible dream, and it will really be Big & Rich who split.

Finally visiting Nashville, Tennessee, was one of my 2006 highlights. But during my visit to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, I got yellow-belly fever when one disgruntled patron loudly booed a video clip of the Dixie Chicks. I should've told her to jam a sock in it, but feared I was outnumbered at a Music City tourist destination. Would that I'd shown one vertebra of Natalie Maines's spine at that moment.

Of course, I might have been more inclined to stand up for the Chicks if their album Taking the Long Way had sounded as awesome as the video for its first single looked. "Not Ready to Make Nice" came off like Marilyn Manson directing a community theater production of Our Town. But the disc itself, with its all-star contributors (Sheryl Crow? John Mayer?), was too slick and nondescript, the last complaint I thought I'd ever level at a Rick Rubin production.

Seattle is a kick-ass town for roots music. Alas, many of the best venues for it are in Ballard, Georgetown, and other far-flung neighborhoods. My sincerest apologies to every great act I missed at the Tractor, Little Red Hen, or Jules Maes because I was reluctant to sit on a Metro bus for 45 minutes, or shell out 15 bucks on cab fare, just to get to the gig. Not to sound like every other writer at this rag, but for Christ's sake, why doesn't this city offer better public-transportation options?

And to whoever stole my time machine, please return it immediately so I can fast-forward through the next couple months. Both Rosie Thomas and Jesse Sykes and the Sweet Hereafter have amazing new records in the can, and Seattle audiences shouldn't have to wait another minute to hear them.

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Record collector Joe Bussard by Kurt B. Reighley

Seeing Joe Bussard in a motion picture—on one of those newfangled DVDs, no less—is an odd anachronism. Like those TV commercials where grizzled Vikings go out searching for 21st century day jobs, only funnier. Much funnier.

Desperate Man Blues: Discovering the Roots of American Music follows the story of this music lover, based in Frederick, Maryland, who has spent the last 50-plus years amassing the nation's foremost private collection of 78 rpm records. He has over 25,000 of them, neatly filed in his basement. This isn't just a hobby; it's his way of life, his mission. "I would say that about 70–80 percent of the records I have collected would have been destroyed if I hadn't got them when I did," he says.

Bussard began collecting records when he became obsessed with Jimmie Rodgers as a kid. Unlike most vinyl junkies, though, he doesn't spend his time digging through used record bins or bidding on eBay auctions. In the film, Bussard shows Australian filmmaker Edward Gillan and his crew his technique: Following up on tips, he climbs in his truck, drives to remote locations in deepest rural America, knocks on doors, and asks, "Do you have any old records?"

Blues, gospel, hillbilly, jazz, and bluegrass... these are Bussard's specialties. "America's real music," he says. In his estimation, the best stuff was made in the '20s and '30s. Back then, players from every geographical region had their own distinctive style. Traveling hours by jalopy to play a Saturday-night barn dance was a big deal; now musicians send digital sound files all around the globe at the click of a button. Efficient? Yes. But it doesn't make for nearly as many good stories, or one-of-a-kind performances.

The DVD edition of Desperate Man Blues, issued by the archivists at Dust-to-Digital, makes some welcome concessions to modern media. It includes not only the original 2003 documentary, but also 40 minutes of additional footage, a full-length performance of Son House singing "Death Letter Blues," and a new short that goes into greater details about Joe's life. The latter extra is particularly entertaining, as it features tales of Bussard's adventures while running the last 78 label in the country, Fonotone, and operating a pirate radio station out of his house as a teen.

And the music? Impeccable. Whenever Bussard drops the needle on a shellac platter, he bops and dances and rattles off anecdotes. Fortunately, Dust-to-Digital has also issued a companion soundtrack, featuring 19 tracks by Blind Willie McTell, the Carter Family, Charley Patton, Uncle Dave Macon, and many more. Any able-bodied soul who doesn't spring into a jig upon hearing the giddy string-band hoedown "Indian War Whoop" deserves to have their legs chopped off.

Bussard comes across as a cantankerous cuss; he dismisses rock as a "cancer." But roots-music devotees owe him a huge debt of gratitude, and thanks to the DVD of Desperate Man Blues, now you can welcome Joe into your home any time... without fear of him sneering at your Uncle Tupelo albums.

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Some parents are ecstatic when their child expresses an interest in taking music lessons. But that wasn't the case for Seattle singer-songwriter Kristen Ward, who headlines Wednesday, December 20, at Conor Byrne.

"I didn't have any vocal training," says Ward. "My mom refused to put me in singing lessons as a kid. She said, 'You can do it when you're older and your voice has developed. But you can't do it now because they're going to ruin your personal style. You have to develop your own sound first.'"

Smart lady. One of the most distinctive elements of Ward's debut album, Roll Me On, released on the Chroma imprint earlier this year, is her earthy, full-bodied vocal timbre; think Christine McVie with more oomph, Linda Ronstadt at her rawest. Lucinda Williams rates among Ward's favorite artists, and you can hear a little of that in her own delivery.

Ward didn't tap into the magic of her own pipes overnight ("My voice dropped when I got a little older"), but in the meantime, she followed her mom's advice, even going as far as to drop out of high-school choir when the director kept pushing her to trill like more of a girlie-girl. "Finally, I said, 'Screw this,'" she recalls. "I just wanted to go have beers with my underage friends and sing at parties. So I got used to singing in front of my friends."

Typically, adolescents assume their parents don't know what they're talking about. But Ward's mother could speak with authority about music: She also wrote and performed her own songs, even going so far as to record and release an album of her country-bluegrass originals when Ward was in middle school. "From the time I was a kid, we were always singing. Mom would just sit there with a guitar, and we'd sing old John Denver and Carole King songs before bed. I grew up around musicians. We had band practices in the basement. I didn't know any different."

Even though country music was out of vogue when the singer was a teen, she couldn't help but be exposed to it: "My mom had always loved country—good country, not the crappy radio stuff."

At 14, Ward began composing her own ditties and testing them out on Mom's colleagues. A decade later, she has an album of her own to show for her studies, although the 12 songs on Roll Me On were composed exclusively in a six-month run shortly before the making of the record. "Lowdownville" sets a downtrodden lyric ("I was really heartbroken over this guy who'd dumped me on my ass," Ward admits) over a midtempo beat and Duane Eddy–style guitar licks, courtesy of producer Brad Zeffren. Organ and harmonica enrich the sensuous, smoldering "Clean As Coal," while "Dark Night of the Soul" is a rough-hewed rocker about spiritual growth.

And yes, that is Ward's mom, Julie Neuffer, providing backup vocals throughout the album. "She's got a real gift for singing harmonies," Ward says. Maybe it's something genetic.

kurt@thestranger.com

Built on Symbols

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 14 Dec 2006 04:00:00 -0800

These Arms Are Snakes Talk Rock and Religion by Kurt B. Reighley

Having a chat with locals These Arms Are Snakes isn't as simple as it was in 2003, when the arty, incendiary hardcore quartet first formed. Not that they've become rock stars—they're just impossible to pin down right now; bassist Brian Cook reports he's spent fewer than 12 hours in Seattle since October. After time zones and phone snafus kept sabotaging attempts to talk during the group's recent UK tour, Cook finally wrestled a few free minutes to answer questions via e-mail about the band's second album, Easter (on Jade Tree).

You're on the road right now, and TAAS have racked up many, many miles touring. How do you feel about the phenomenon of bands blowing up via MySpace with only a few gigs under their belt?

It's completely stupid and I hope it's a trend that ends quickly. I believe in hard work and paying your dues. I've been in touring bands for 11 years now, and I feel lucky to have 100 people come check us out. Too many bands these days feel like they're owed a music career because they have bad haircuts and spend more hours on the internet than in the practice room.

It's been said the band took a more "organic" approach to writing this album. Could you please elaborate?

For all our previous records, we've written a bunch of songs and then bashed them out in the studio as quickly as possible. I've always been satisfied with those records, but I also found that there were parts that worked well in the live setting and not so well on record. We wanted to make an album that worked well in both the live realm and onstage, which meant going into the studio with an understanding that the songs would change and mutate over the course of the recording process.

Drummer Chris Common produced Easter. What were the advantages or disadvantages of having him do double duty?

It meant we had to be even more critical of ourselves, and I think it really exhausted Chris physically and emotionally. But it was also really exciting to have that degree of freedom in the studio. It's a lot easier to take some chances and try new things when you don't have an outside party at the helm, no matter how comfortable you are with that person.

There seems to be a fixation with the body and bodily functions on Easter. Can you pinpoint how or why that theme emerged?

My sole lyrical contribution is the song "Perpetual Bris." I watched some PBS show on the bris process, and was amazed to hear all these fathers talk about how emotionally moved they were when they performed the ceremony. The idea of scarring the body of a newborn being synonymous with an act of love really made me sick. I see it as being pretty symbolic of most religious philosophies. I'm not sure I understand why a loving god would allow suffering to exist.

How literal a role did Judeo-Christian philosophy and concepts play in the album's creation?

We didn't go into the studio with the idea that we were going to make some sort of statement on religion. There is certainly dialogue about religion on the album, but that's just one piece in the puzzle. Steve [Snere]'s lyrics have always focused on analyzing the decisions we make in everyday life, and ultimately the biggest "Why?" anyone can ask is "Why are we here?" That's a spiritual question, but it's also the one that seemed to tie all the songs together.

Was anybody in the band brought up in an especially religious environment?

I was raised in an American Baptist family. I went to church every Sunday until I went off to college. I'm still fascinated by the Christian faith and the way it's shaped our culture. With that history in my upbringing, it makes sense that I'm the person that suggested the title.

Do you find the commercialization of Easter more appalling than that of Christmas?

I find the juxtaposition of someone being crucified and resurrected represented in the modern age by pastel rabbits and decorated eggs so bizarre that it's pretty amusing. It's perhaps a bit sad that people don't think about the choice of symbols a bit more. After all, religion is built entirely on symbols.

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Some musicians launch their careers via American Idol, others do it one MySpace friend at a time—Oregon singer-songwriter Laura Gibson chose a different track. Her first standing gig was a weekly show, on Tuesday nights, at the Portland HIV/AIDS services center Our House.

"I had this idea—maybe it was out of fear of playing live—that I just wanted to play for people who were sick, or bedridden for some reason," she recalls. "I volunteered there for three years. I didn't always play music; sometimes I just washed dishes or went on walks with residents. But that was definitely my first big audience."

Now audiences can see and hear Gibson at more-conventional venues. She plays Thursday, December 7 at the Sunset Tavern, opening for Norfolk & Western, and her debut album, If You Come to Greet Me (on Hush Records), is in stores now. But her unique career kickoff makes sense when examined in the context of her musical evolution.

Gibson waited until she was 20 years old to pick up a guitar: "I didn't sing or play any music at all growing up." She was a track star in high school and college, but when surgery on her ankle sidelined her for months, she decided to use the time to learn to play.

In that choice, too, she took a path less traveled. "I went to one guitar class. It was a crowded room full of people playing just chords, so I decided to just try it on my own," she recalls. Her other big outlet during recuperation was writing—poetry, journals—and eventually the two interests began to intersect. Timidly, she played one of her original songs for a friend in their dorm room. From there, things slowly snowballed.

If You Come to Greet Me retains the intimacy of that collegiate premiere. Much of the album's elegance hinges on how other timbres weave gracefully in and out of the ether, and around Gibson's skeletal guitar picking: A singing saw on "Nightwatch," lap steel and banjo on "Small Town Parade." But the focal point is always her voice, a quiet but riveting presence that recalls Cat Power and Jolie Holland.

Capturing that delicate instrument on tape initially proved tricky. "I would get really tense and bummed out," she says. But then, one day while recording in San Francisco, she decided to do vocals while resting in an oversized recliner. Bingo. She nailed it.

"It probably goes against everything they tell you is the way to get the best vocal take, but I felt really relaxed. So when I finished the record in Portland, I recorded most of the vocals while sitting in a comfortable chair."

Luckily, Gibson is less nervous about sharing her gifts nowadays. "I can be myself in front of people, and not have to put on a fancy show," she concedes. "I do the best I can, but if I tend to be a shy person, then I can be shy onstage. That seems to work out okay."

kurt@thestranger.com

It Goes and Goes and Goes

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Arlie John Carstens is trying by Kurt B. Reighley

Arlie John Carstens is trying to thaw out—literally and figuratively. When he left his home in Los Angeles yesterday, it was 77 degrees. Temperatures in Seattle today, however, are hovering around freezing. As Carstens pulls off his coat and stretches, his limbs pop and creak like ice cubes expanding under hot liquid.

Wretched weather is part of why the Juno frontman split town in 2003. "Seattle is a lovely city," he insists. "I was born at Swedish, I lived my whole life here. But having issues with chronic pain and depression, it got to a point where, anticipating another fall and winter, I just said, 'I've got to get out of here.' And I did."

But this particular visit by the singer-guitarist requires reacclimation of a different stripe. For the first time in three years, Carstens and his bandmates in Juno—guitarists Gabe Carter and Jason Guyer, and drummer Greg Ferguson (with former Hint Hint drummer and Neumo's booker Jason Lajeunesse stepping in on bass)—are reuniting for two KEXP benefit shows.

"During the years that we were active, that station was very supportive of our music," says Carstens. "So how could we say no when they asked us [to play]? I've been listening since I was 12 or 13 years old. KCMU—which later became KEXP—that was the radio station that informed my musical choices." Although he's wearing a Minor Threat T-shirt, Carstens peppers his conversation with references to acts like Pere Ubu, Felt, and Eyeless in Gaza—all bands he discovered via KCMU—as often as Hüsker Dü or Fugazi.

Over the course of two albums, several singles, a split-EP with the Dismemberment Plan, and many explosive live shows, Juno forged a powerful, distinctive sound. This is the Way it Goes and Goes and Goes (1999) and A Future Lived in Past Tense (2001) showcased epics that married the ferocity of hardcore with broad swathes of atmospheric guitar effects. Now, after an extended hiatus, preceded by two years of activity in "fits and starts," the band is striving hard to quickly reconstitute its potent mix of immediacy, majesty, and emotional intensity.

"It's crazy," says Carstens of the band making music together again. "It's like we were cryogenically deep-frozen three years ago. Now we walk back into the room and begin thawing out, and we're exactly the same people that we were for all those years that we were playing together."

Which can be both a pleasant and painful thing. "When I first walk in, and we start rehearsing, I'm from Los Angeles. I'm just visiting," he says, apropos of practices thus far. "But about 10 minutes into being there, in order to remember those lyrics, you close your eyes and that triggers all the memories that went into creating them.

"That was one thing about this band and this music," he continues. "We never did anything disingenuously, or that wasn't from the heart. For me, these are hard songs to revisit, because they are born of entirely real, and often tragic, events. Moving to California has allowed me to get a bit of distance from those things."

The complexity of Juno's music compounds the challenges, too. Even though extended passages allowed for improvisation, with changes being based on a head nod, the overall structures were mapped out in excruciating detail. "A lot of that was because we had three guitar players," he explains. "On any given song, I would be playing in one tuning, Gabe would be in another, and Guyer a third. And in order to do that, we had to be very thoughtful."

While the Juno sound incorporated many disparate elements, brevity was rarely one of them. "The hardest part is, I swear to God, we never wrote a song that was under five minutes," he adds. Two of the band's best-loved songs, "Leave a Clean Camp and a Dead Fire" and "The French Letter," clocked in near the 10-minute mark on record. In the period it takes to run through a Juno original halfway, screw up, and start over, most other rock bands could bash out two or three numbers. "It's time consuming," admits Carstens. "But so far, practicing has been a lot of fun."

The singer says the band has not discussed what will become of Juno after this weekend. For his part, his focus these days is on Ghost Wars, a long-distance collaboration with producer/musician Eric Fisher (Damien Jurado), featuring contributions from almost 20 members of the extended Seattle music community, including Rosie Thomas, Nate Mendel of Foo Fighters, and members of Pretty Girls Make Graves, the Blood Brothers, and more. The duo has recorded basic tracks for 25 songs, and is slowly refining 11 of them, with an eye toward releasing an album sometime next year.

Juno might not have been in sync with the Seattle scene during its original run, but extensive touring on three continents won them dedicated fans in far-flung places, and Carstens expresses gratitude over e-mail messages sent from Barcelona, Sweden, and Western Australia celebrating their reunion.

"It's humbling," he concludes. "You can't have delusions of grandeur when you're writing songs that are 11 minutes long. At places, our guitar tones might have been elegant or beautiful, but overall, this music expresses very dark themes that wouldn't, and probably shouldn't, appeal to a lot of people. So whenever we get feedback from people that they like it, I'm always amazed. And very appreciative."

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Carrie Clark grew up in Oregon, weaned on pretty standard fare. "Even now, all my dad will listen to is Willie Nelson, Elvis, and the Beach Boys," she says. ABBA was a popular favorite on car trips. Some Crystal Gayle. Nothing out of the ordinary.

But then things got a bit more... unusual. Clark taught herself to play piano and guitar, and began writing songs. In high school, she sang in chorus and the occasional musical. After graduation, her diversification accelerated. "Since I moved to Seattle, I was in a reggae band, then a Belle & Sebastian—type pop band, and then jazz and big bands," she recounts.

Seems So Civilized, the new album by Clark and her band, the Lonesome Lovers, bears the stamp of her active mind and homegrown aesthetic. Drawing on classic country, blues, jazz, and cabaret, she proves as refreshing yet tricky to pin down as Nellie McKay. Moody surf guitar and dreamy vocals cast a melancholy spell over "Long Black Coat," but a few cuts later, as she spins the tale of the femme fatale "Josephine," Clark is kicking up her heels while an accordion pumps away. Her seductive purr and playful piano ignite the flirtatious "Just for Tonight," while "Sweet Betty Blue" is a rollicking barnstormer inspired by her grandmother.

Although this is Clark's third full-length, Civilized... is her first recorded with her longtime bassist Danya Smith and guitarist Greg Fulton. "Our friendship, and how we play off of one another, provided a lot of inspiration for the songs that ended up on the record."

According to the songwriter, her bandmates complement her idiosyncratic muse. "Both Danya and Greg are music-school kids. They help when I get stuck, because they have rules and structure to fall back on. A lot of times, I come up with things because I don't have that. Every now and then I'll bring them a new song, and they'll just scratch their heads and go, 'What is this?' I'll put stuff together that other people wouldn't, just because I like how it sounds."

To capture the mercurial sound of Carrie Clark and the Lonesome Lovers—who headline at the Sunset Tavern on Saturday, December 2—the band headed north, to record with Toronto producer Darryl Neudorf. "I really wanted to work with Darryl," says Clark. "I love the work he's done for Neko Case and the Sadies, the textures and moods that he creates. That was how I heard these songs, and thought they should be presented." Fortunately, after Clark sent him some of her material, Neudorf felt equally excited about the project.

Next up, she hopes to tour the West Coast and Southwest. After that? Who knows. Heck, given her eclectic skill set, Clark could probably make a kick-ass metal record... if she wanted. "I might," she concludes, laughing. "But I don't think I have enough angst in me for that anymore. We'll see. Chalk up a few more life experiences and you never know what might come out."

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 23 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Don't let the gritty name fool you: Captain Gravel might sound like a company that sends out trucks to follow the snowplows and make highways safe for commuters, but the moniker really belongs to one of Seattle's smoothest string bands, who are appearing at Conor Byrne on Friday, November 24.

The quintet's lineup features mandolin, upright bass, banjo, guitar, and fiddle. No drums, but they certainly don't want for rhythmic pep. Bassist Ingrid Eyen and guitarist Chad Gibson share lead vocal chores, while at other intervals everyone clusters around a single vintage microphone and croons in close harmony. "We have great practice sessions sitting around [fiddle player] Michael Connolly's old-school Hammond organ, working on vocal parts," says Gibson.

That team spirit carries over into other aspects of performance practice. On most of the 11 tracks of their new CD, Mountain Lair, everyone takes a turn in the spotlight. One moment, focus might be on mandolin player Miller McNay, then 16 bars later the baton is passed and Binkle Roberts puts a completely different twist on the same melodic idea with his quick-fingered banjo picking.

Good-natured humor permeates their sound, too. "The Blues My Naughty Sweetie Gives to Me" catalogs a litany of tongue-in-cheek disappointments, from being left out of a will to forgetting to pack a bathing suit. On "Downtown," Eyen kicks up her heels in a big city where grizzly bears belly up to the bar. And "Mean Son of a Gun," featuring a protagonist who shaves with a discarded tin can, is a ridiculously hot-blooded ditty about a cool killer.

"For the album, we really wanted to let our individuality through," says Gibson. "We consider ourselves as having a distinctive voice amidst the other bluegrass, old-time, and string bands."

Captain Gravel aren't exactly modern-day mavericks à la young bucks like Nickel Creek and Old Crow Medicine Show, but they sure as hell aren't your granddad's bluegrass band, either. "There is a ton of contrast in our group," continues Gibson. "We're from across the world and all our backgrounds are quite unique." Binkle originally hails from Manchester, England, and is an accomplished player of the highland bagpipes; recently, he traveled his way across Croatia, playing Hawaiian music on street corners.

Connolly, who grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, plays over a dozen instruments besides fiddle. Gibson is originally a rock guitarist from the Chicago region. "And I don't even know how Ingrid first found the bass," he confesses. "But she's played in family, folk, and psychedelic rock bands all over the country."

This curious overlap of influences and experiences also informs their sense of style, which recalls an Eisenhower-era department-store ad. "We love our vintage suits," concludes Gibson. "We may not be a traditional bluegrass band, but there are aspects of that tradition we have a ton of respect for. Bill Monroe used to demand that his band always look professional. Our take on it is to maintain a sharp-dressed stage appearance, while putting our own unique spin on the music."

kurt@thestranger.com

Don't Look Behind the Couch

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 16 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

The Agony and the Ecstasy of Crafts (and How to Avoid the Agony Part) by Kurt B. Reighley

Crafts promote creativity, engender peace of mind, and provide a sense of accomplishment. All good things. But here's what they don't tell you in ReadyMade: Crafts will break your heart.

I'm not bagging on crafts. I love them. Right now, I'm reproducing a series of classic LP jackets in needlepoint; I started with Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols. Two weeks ago, I knit a scarf that looked like 14 feet of uncooked ground beef, fat streaks and all. If something doesn't move fast enough in my home, chances are I'll glue googly eyes and a pompom nose on it.

But for every project that turns out as planned, another can go horribly awry. All seasoned crafters know this, but we rarely discuss it. It is our dirty little secret: Crafts can hurt. Recently, I devoted weeks to a complicated sweater, full of calculated runs and holes for that "distressed" look. But as I neared completion, I realized that the finished article would be far too big—for me and for anyone who isn't a pro wrestler. (And yes, I checked my gauge before starting.) So it sits in pieces, hidden behind the couch in a Hefty bag. Sometimes, as I watch television, I can hear it whispering: You failed, loser.

But even the most perfectly executed purse, skirt, or stuffed animal invites woe for the disciple of domestic arts: Brace yourself for rejection. Nothing is so devastating as discovering that your favorite sister-in-law has banished that stocking cap you made for her last Christmas, the one with all the detailed duplicate stitching, to the furthermost corner of some dark closet, never to be seen again.

Oh wait. There is something worse: Watching that same relation instead plop some piece of mass-produced crap from Urban Outfitters or the Gap on their head before going out into the cold.

Now, I could pontificate about how patronizing Seattle's independent clothing designers and artists is good for small business, cuts down on sweatshop labor, curtails global warming, improves digestion, and on and on. But I'm no economist; I'm just some guy with a crochet hook and a typewriter. My logic for supporting local craftspeople is much simpler: It reduces heartbreak.

First of all, you minimize your own hurt feelings and wasted time. Mastering any domestic art requires practice and tons of trial and error. Sure, you could spend weeks learning how to print your own T-shirt designs. Be my guest. But before you do, look around. This city is lousy with folks who have already suffered the indignities of a hundred off-center screens and ink spills (not to mention run up massive student loans for degrees in design) just to get to the point where they can manufacture something eye-catching that speaks to your sense of style. And you're a hell of a lot less likely to run into someone else wearing your new favorite top if you go made-in-Seattle rather than picking the latest off-the-rack number from Old Navy.

Secondly, local artists put themselves on the line when they ask you to open your wallet. When you snatch up that handcrafted belt buckle and demand of the vendor, "How much?" you atone for every Father's Day gift he or she slaved over in shop class, then subsequently watched vanish into the recesses of Dad's sock drawer, untouched until that fateful garage sale. You get a new accessory, they skip a month of psychotherapy. Everybody wins.

This is not to say that the mental and fiscal well-being of every so-called artist and designer in King County is your responsibility. If something is poorly made, don't buy it. If you do, you're only encouraging sloppy workmanship. Back in the early days of I Heart Rummage, I used to feel guilty if I left without purchasing something, anything, every time. Support your community! my conscience whined.

What do I have to show for my good intentions? Several whimsical but shoddy man-bags, now with busted straps and/or closures, taking up valuable shelf space in my cramped apartment. Ask questions about techniques and materials. Don't be intimidated; pretend you're Nina Garcia. We can't all sew in a zipper, but most of us can recognize when it hasn't been done well. Better to notice flaws now than when your adorable new felted change purse splits open as you're fishing out change on the bus.

Insurance premiums for artists don't run as high as for firefighters or police officers. Nor should they. Our injuries are mostly minor: pricked fingers, blackened thumbnails. But crafts-related broken hearts? Those require community awareness to keep numbers down. For everything else, there's hot glue.

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 16 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

"I am so tired of seeing bands who don't know what they are," says Brent Amaker. That's hardly an accusation one can level at Amaker and his band, the Rodeo. They have a distinct, straightforward sound and a consistent look. Until recently, the quartet—who play Cafe Venus and the MarsBar on Thursday, November 16—even had a signature mode of transportation: They all rode motorcycles.

Their eponymous debut CD (available now at shows) is single-minded in its musical vision. The Rodeo play old-time country, with clip-clop rhythms underpinning Amaker's low-register growl. Think "Tennessee Flattop Box" and you're right on the money.

"If you listen to any old Johnny Cash, that sound is consistent on those records," observes Amaker. "And that is the type of country music we like. When we set out to do this project, we put specific limitations on ourselves.

"It's been fun using more of a Ramones formula: This is who we are, this is what we do, and we're going to write confined within the context of what we do." They even write most of their songs in the same key, G, because it suits Amaker's range best.

But simplifying the modus operandi throws up other challenges. Drummer Curtis Andreen faced a particularly hard task. "Curtis was a rock drummer. He was all over the place. And we only gave him two drums: a kick and a snare. He asked, 'Can't I have a high hat?' No. This is what you get. It took him a little while to adjust to that, but now he's fantastic."

The Rodeo keep their lyrical subject matter focused, too. Songs including "Give Me the Whiskey," "Get the Hell Out," and "I Guess You Want to Die" are about exactly what you'd imagine. But, honestly, Amaker would rather sing about kicking ass than do it. "I like the whole mean-cowboy act," admits the Oklahoma native. But it is a put-on... at least, partially. "As with many musicians and actors, I get to let out a dark side that is buried deep within."

Speaking of dark, the guys also have a band uniform: black. Black jeans, black shirts, black cowboy hats. Again, this is part of a specific scheme. "One of my biggest influences for this project, even though we play country music, is the Briefs," the singer/guitarist reveals. "When I first moved to Seattle, I went to some of their shows, and thought, 'Goddamn, these guys are doing it right!' They knew what they were, and they dressed and looked the part."

But as they gear up to tour the West Coast next year, one of their trademarks is being phased out. "In the beginning, this was about motorcycles." The guys traveled to gigs as far away as Bozeman and Reno on their hogs. Today, it seems more gimmicky and less practical. "We have become a real band and defined our sound more," he concludes. "Now it's all about the music."

Spoken like a man who knows who he is.

kurt@thestranger.com

Return of the Giant Slits

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 16 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

"Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard," declared X-Ray Spex singer Poly Styrene by Kurt B. Reighley

"Some people think little girls should be seen and not heard," declared X-Ray Spex singer Poly Styrene on the 1977 single "Oh Bondage! Up Yours!" And when all-female punk band the Slits burst on the UK scene that same year, opening for the Clash, they scared the crap out of those people.

Singer Ari Up was just 14 when the Slits started in 1976. Three years later, she and bandmates Tessa Pollitt and Viv Albertine posed topless and slathered in mud on the cover of their 1979 debut album, Cut. Although they could barely play their instruments at the outset, they soon won a rabid following, largely thanks to their reputation as uncontrollable wild women.

Now, 25 years after the original incarnation dissolved, Ari Up chuckles when asked about her pre-Slits childhood. "I was actually very quiet," she says. "I didn't have many friends. I came home from school and played piano, and kept to myself. But everyone perceives me as having been noisy and rambunctious, because that's what I later became.

"The joyous, wild-and-free part of me, that was always me there. I was born an entertainer. I wasn't shy, when it came to the stage."

But while artists like the Slits, Styrene, and Siouxsie Sioux were dashing notions of how women in rock were supposed to behave, the men behind the scenes in the music business didn't welcome them warmly. "Mostly, my memories are really terrible ones," Up recalls of her early interactions with stagehands and techies.

"We were probably rude, too, but in a nervous way," she concedes. "Especially if we felt we didn't get any support, and no one understood what the fuck we were doing. I was probably shouting, 'I can't hear, turn up the mic!' and then [the sound guy] would call me a brat. It was a pretty rough time for us then."

One of the last original punk bands to sign a record deal, the group made up for lost time with the innovative Cut. Featuring staccato guitar riffs, pulsating tribal rhythms, and sing-song vocals punctuated with birdlike trills as well as gruff shouts, the Slits sounded like no one else on originals like "Typical Girls" and their kinetic version of "I Heard it Through the Grapevine."

"Obviously, we had moved on from 1977," says Up. Musicians like dub-reggae mavericks Dennis Bovell and Adrian Sherwood, jazz trumpeter Don Cherry and his stepdaughter Neneh, and Bristol post-punks the Pop Group were all part of their creative universe. "We kept evolving quickly, and felt so inspired, that we had to keep trying to make people hear our music." In 1980, they released three groundbreaking independent singles, including the stop-start jam "In the Beginning There Was Rhythm."

The Slits disbanded in late 1981, after releasing their dark sophomore set, Return of the Giant Slits. There was, Up insists, no animosity between the members. "We remained friendly; we didn't talk, but that didn't mean we were enemies." The singer left London ("to stay would have been suicide for me"), and today divides her time between Jamaica and Brooklyn. But when she ran into Pollitt while promoting her 2005 solo release Dread More Dan Dead, they decided the time was ripe for the Slits to rise again.

The band's current incarnation includes Up and Pollitt, plus several new members, including Hollie Cook, daughter of Sex Pistols drummer Paul Cook. Their new three-song EP, Revenge of the Killer Slits, offers a crash course in the band's eclectic sound. "Slits Tradition" reasserts their strong feminist stance via chanted vocals and a throbbing bass riff. "Number One Enemy" is the first official recording of one of the Slits' earliest songs, a blistering blast-from-the-past featuring Marco Pirroni of Adam and the Ants on guitar and Cook senior on drums, while "Kill Them with Love" puts a drum and bass spin on a number Up originally cut as a solo artist.

Expect a healthy dose of new material along with old in concert. "I want to make sure the Slits are not mistaken for retro or vintage," concludes Up. It may have been a quarter-century since the Slits last toured the U.S., but they have not mellowed with age. "We're definitely still a threat."

Philosophy and Underwear

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 16 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Party, Think, and Feel with Kid Congo by Kurt B. Reighley

Throughout his career, Kid Congo Powers has always maintained balance, however precarious his surroundings.

Even before picking up an instrument in the late-'70s heyday of L.A. punk, Powers had his sights fixed on making music. "I wanted to play rock, and have fun and party," he begins. "I also wanted to be able to say something, and make people think and feel."

Hence his new album's title. "Philosophy and Underwear," he says. "That says it all." Accompanied by the Pink Monkey Birds, Powers dishes out a mélange of high art and lurid sleaze. Garage-rock guitars bump and grind with organ and electronics, and bitch-slap handclaps punctuate Powers's loopy talk-singing, which he delivers with a wink and a leer.

One of rock's most storied sidemen, Powers grew up on the stages of seedy clubs and lavish theaters. His resumé includes membership in the Gun Club, the Cramps, and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, collaborations with electro-brat Khan and postpunk cabaret diva Little Annie, and his gradual emergence as a songwriter and frontman with Congo Norvell and the Knoxville Girls.

Yet Powers easily identifies the rich vein of continuity that runs through his disparate engagements: "In all those people, there was a strong sense of otherness. They were all offbeat, untraditional, and very sure of their vision."

And they recognized his kindred spirit; even in the crazy quilt of early punk, a queer, rock-obsessed Mexican-American stuck out. "That's one of the reasons why [Gun Club founder] Jeffery Lee Pierce picked me out of the crowd and said, 'You should be in a band.' It was more about an aesthetic and a feeling than learning how to play music."

Of course, Powers has mastered the latter over the long haul, too, and sets with Pink Monkey Birds address his past as well as present. "I throw in some classics and surprises. Fans of any of my previous incarnations will like it all," he concludes. "At least, they better."

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Saskatchewan. Such a funny word—like saying "sasquatch" and "Szechuan" simultaneously. Go on, try it. Sounds silly, right? Except, of course, when B. J. Snowden sings it. Then the name of that chilly Canadian province seems utterly magical.

B. J. who? The dude who sang "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head?" No, dum-dum, that was B. J. Thomas. Bertha Jean "B. J." Snowden—who performs twice on Thursday, November 9, first at Wall of Sound Records and later at Cafe Venus/Mars Bar—is a disarmingly sincere songwriter and performer, perhaps best known for her composition "In Canada," featured on the compilation Songs in the Key of Z: The Curious Universe of Outsider Music.

What in tarnation is an artist who warbles the praises of the Great White North doing in a column allegedly devoted to Americana? Cool your jets, cowboy. Admittedly, Snowden exists outside the universe of No Depression and the Tractor Tavern. When it comes to her stage attire, she favors sequins over spurs, cornrows to cowboy hats. Her mom drives her to shows, and her Van Halen—loving son often accompanies her on guitar.

But Snowden doesn't really fit in to any genre or scene, which is precisely what makes her so beguiling. Her debut album, the 1996 release Life in the USA and Canada, bursts with ditties about the two nations and their denizens. "In Canada" kicks off with what sounds like a musical quote from the Elvis Presley classic "Can't Help Falling in Love," before blossoming into a paean to Snowden's "home away from home" where "they never will be mean." But fear not: She loves America, too. "U.S. Navy Song" opens the album with a moving homage to our troops at sea.

Although she works as a schoolteacher, Snowden graduated from Berklee College of Music, and her chops are surprisingly formidable. Her primary instrument is the piano, but her enthusiasm for her art suggests she hasn't met an object yet she couldn't coax sweet music from. She started composing at age 3, and she still retains a childlike innocence in her art today.

The chord changes of "Ode to Lesley" recall Burt Bacharach, while the instrumental "Happy Beat" suggests Duke Ellington composing incidental music for Sesame Street. "La Luna Bella" dabbles with Latin rhythms. As a vocalist... well, Snowden's pitch isn't always rock solid, but hell, the same can be said of Liza Minnelli and Maria Callas, and nobody contests their iconic status.

Snowden is a uniquely American success story. She self-released her own cassettes, one of which made its way to a New York record store, where employees were so smitten they bankrolled Life in the USA. Fred Schneider of the B-52s produced her Christmas EP and has been a vocal champion. She sings about peace, love, and naval fleets with showbiz flair, yet nary a hint of phony-baloney smarminess or post-whatever irony. "Saskatchewan" may always be good for a chuckle, but B. J. Snowden is nobody to laugh at.

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

But Snowden doesn't really fit in to any genre or scene, which is precisely what makes her so beguiling. She has pioneer spirit. Her debut album, the 1996 release Life in the USA and Canada, bursts with ditties about the two nations and their denizens. "In Canada" kicks off with what sounds like a musical quote from the Elvis Presley classic "Can't Help Falling in Love," before blossoming into a paean to Snowden's "home away from home" where "they never will be mean." But fear not, she loves America, too. "U.S. Navy Song" opens the album with a moving homage to our troops at sea.

Although she works as a schoolteacher, Snowden graduated from Berklee College of Music, and her chops are surprisingly formidable. Her primary instrument is the piano, but her enthusiasm for her art suggests she hasn't met an object yet she couldn't coax sweet music from; soprano recorder features prominently on many of her originals. She started composing at age 3, and she still retains a childlike innocence in her art today.

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Darren Smith titled his new album Last Drive, and the inner sleeve depicts him torching a pickup truck. But evidence to the contrary, in real life Smith—who plays Friday, November 3, at Conor Byrne—respects his ride, a 1997 Subaru Outback ("I know, it's not really rock 'n' roll"), and wisely so. "Just over the last two weeks, I toured through Idaho and Eastern Oregon, and put about 2,200 miles on it," he admits. "It handled like a champ."

Many of the songs on the rustic Last Drive deal with characters in the process of coming or going, or wrestling with sentiments between stations. The truck driver of the titular song yearns to see his departing sweetheart one last time. "Someday" recounts the brief family reunion incurred by a funeral, while the romantic "Goodnight Stars" finds a wanderer putting on the brakes long enough to fall in love.

Then there's the lead cut, "Dogtown Mines." Accompanied by subtle accordion and mandolin, a dusty epic—inspired by the story-songs of Gillian Welch, the Louvin Brothers, and Steve Earle—unfolds via Smith's casual vocal delivery. "That one was one of the most fun to write because I had a specific story in mind. I wanted to create an old-time-sounding song with a story that might be old, or might be contemporary. It built on the idea of the main character going off in search of wealth, with the plan of returning home a 'rich' man, but life sort of got in the way. The story builds on that, and how priorities change."

Just as Smith, who formerly played in Seattle ensemble Straw Dogs, takes his time to sing his originals—even the shortest cut on Last Drive clocks in at over four minutes—he is equally devoted to refining them in excruciating detail. "I spent a long time sitting with most of the songs on the record. I like to have them around awhile before I record them. I'll make demos and listen, revise, re-record, until I have something that I can stand to listen to more than once. It's a painful process, because I really hesitate to finish songs. But recently I've gotten better at letting go."

Smith has also gotten better about jumping in his Subaru and driving to wherever the bookings take him. His emerging fan base in Idaho, where he recently played with Josh Ritter, seems to be particularly strong. But he has no intention of leaving Seattle; he loves the music community here too much. "You really can't go it alone in this business.

"Part of it is that I love to see live music and am curious to see what local bands are up to," he adds. "I always learn something from seeing a performance," citing Damien Jurado, Rocky Votolato, and Conrad Ford among current faves.

"Speaking of which, any Seattle bands that are looking for a touring support act, don't hesitate to call," he concludes. "No, seriously! I travel light." And he has his own wheels.

kurt@thestranger.com

The Remix

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

From Theater to Record Store to Gallery by Kurt B. Reighley

Whenever David Bowie plays Philadelphia, he visits the city's art museum. His destination? Gallery 182, devoted to Marcel Duchamp. Seattle painter Michael Lane can appreciate such artist-on-artist fixations. Growing up in the City of Brotherly Love, he listened to music obsessively while he drew. He still spends hours in record stores, poring over album covers.

Recycling ideas is an essential skill for musical icons. Just ask Madonna. (Or Bryan Ferry, who abbreviated Duchamp's title The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even for a 1978 solo album filled with covers.) And so it is for Lane, who produces vivid screen prints of rock stars: Bowie, Morrissey, Patti, Siouxsie. Lane salvages items discarded by theaters—canvas opera backdrops, pieces of neoprene, even old paint—and uses them as his medium. "After a while, they knew not to throw anything away," says Lane of his former employers at a Philly set-design shop. Today, Seattle Opera and Issaquah's Village Theatre donate leftovers.

Even his images are recycled; he sticks to iconic ones like Lou Reed on the jacket of Transformer. From there, he riffs on the source material. Colors, textures, and overlays are cued by his love for the musicians. Grace Jones is "disco, Pop Rocks, and Mountain Dew," Lane says, rendered in shimmering gold, orange, and pink; Iggy Pop stares out in steel and flat black, his face all angles. A sly nod to Andy Warhol punctuates his midnight-blue-and-moonlight portraits of seedy-underbelly obsessive Reed. Two tiny red puncture wounds dot the rocker's neck; Reed's nickname for the pop artist and sometimes Velvet Underground manager was "Drella," a contraction of Cinderella and Dracula.

Lane deliberately keeps these works modest sized and affordable, producing them in unlimited editions. A five-by-five-inch Iggy, Lou, or Bowie costs $12, less than most new albums. "I'd like them all to go home with people, just like a CD or tape would."

Absolutely Fabulous

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 04:00:00 -0800

Pet Shop Boys Finally Come to Seattle by Kurt B. Reighley

There are words some people will wait decades, even a lifetime, to hear: "I love you," "here's that money I owe you," "yes, I'm gay." Oh, and a few more... "Pet Shop Boys are coming to town."

Finally, that last one is happening. After eight studio albums, countless hits, and a career reaching back 25 years, Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe—AKA UK pop duo Pet Shop Boys—are playing their first Seattle concert. It's about bloody time.

"Seattle is one of those places that has always eluded us, but we're very excited about it," insists Lowe. "I'm a huge fan of Frasier." And then he lets loose a hearty laugh. Lowe punctuates almost all his answers thusly. This comes as a welcome surprise. Despite his reputation as the quiet one, perpetually hidden behind a hat and dark glasses, Lowe proves quite gregarious. Goofy, even.

Most fans are grateful that PSB tour at all, however infrequently. It certainly wasn't part of the plan when the band formed in 1981. "We never considered playing live at all, for a long time," he admits. Their crisp, often complex electronic arrangements defied reproduction in concert, while going out with a busload of musicians seemed antithetical to their studiocentric aesthetic.

Finally, in 1989, they relented. "We got an offer to play Japan. We thought, 'If we're not going to get a band together, we should look at other ways of performing live.'" They recruited filmmaker Derek Jarman (Jubilee, Edward II) to oversee the production. "He put together this amazing show with projections and dancers, and it went down really well. From that moment, we got a bit of a taste for live performance, which we've kept ever since."

Philip Hoare is an old friend of Tennant and coauthor of Pet Shop Boys: Catalogue, a new book featuring almost 2,000 career-spanning visual images: record sleeves, photos, set designs. A veteran of many PSB concerts, he recalls highlights from all their elaborate stage shows. "But the opening sequence of the Performance tour is what stays with me longest," he writes via e-mail. "The utter thrill of the pounding intro, and knowing that the spectacle was about to unfold. The fact that I saw that one in London, Prague, New York, and Blackpool"—where Lowe grew up—"seemed to underline the panoptic glory of it: a psychosexual drama, beyond opera or pop."

At the Radio City Music Hall date on that 1990 world tour, Hoare sat behind Liza Minnelli—who had recorded her comeback album Results with PSB a year before—and had an epiphany. "Her presence seemed to turn the show into a seamless glam segue, from Cabaret to the [David Bowie's] Station to Station tour, and into the 21st century... all the things we ever dreamed of."

This sense of an aesthetic that transcends a specific era is essential to why Pet Shop Boys' early records hold up much better than those of many of their '80s peers, and why their new ones still occasionally surprise. "We concentrate on writing songs," says Lowe. "All of our songs, you can play on the piano." Even stripped of all their technological frippery, they still mesmerize; compare the synthesized original rendition of "Rent," from 1987's Actually, with Minnelli's stately reading cut two years later and see.

"Neil and Chris are both classicists in a way," observes Hoare. "Their pop sensibility is refined, honed... they kind of fell straight into it, fully formed. Neil's taste is certainly not mine (he likes the Beatles, for instance), but what he hears, I realize, is structure, and, to a certain extent, pop history. Chris is different. 'I'm clever,' Neil once told me, 'but Chris is a kind of genius.'"

Twenty-five years on, devotees still respond to those smarts. So do colleagues. Robbie Williams tapped the duo to produce a cover of the My Robot Friend homage "We're the Pet Shop Boys" for his latest album. And in Sweden earlier this year, two pretty young maids billed as West End Girls released a whole album of PSB covers. "Ooh, they're great," says Lowe of the latter. "We actually do 'Shopping' in our show because we heard their version of it." Rumors that the Girls would tour America supporting the Boys, however, proved false.

Oh well. There's another Pet Shop gig for Seattle fans to look forward to.

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 26 Oct 2006 04:00:00 -0700

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Chris Smither calls Boston home, but in his lifetime he has covered a lot of ground. He was born in Florida and raised in New Orleans before he relocated to Beantown and started performing in the '60s. And where is he today? For a moment, he isn't sure.

"I had to look out the window," he admits after a slight hesitation. "It's full of mountains... looks like the Southwest... must be Albuquerque."

During a show at the historic Station Inn in Nashville a few weeks ago, Smither—who performs Sunday, October 29, at the Tractor Tavern—introduced the title track of his new album, Leave the Light On, with a crack about how he'd hoped to license the song to Motel 6 for an ad campaign. Alas, thus far no nibbles. Which seems odd. After all, Emmylou Harris, Bonnie Raitt, and Diana Krall have dug his originals enough to cover them in recent years.

Leave the Light On is the 12th full-length by the bluesy, seasoned singer-songwriter, and a great introduction to his charms. First among them is his low-key singing style. In my notes from his Nashville show, the following comment stuck out: How can he mumble and be so articulate? Smither laughs at that observation. "It's very important to me that audiences understand the lyrics. Without the words, my music is worthless... Well, not worthless, that's 75 percent of it, easily. And people tell me that I do mumble, but they don't seem to have any trouble making out the words."

And his lyrics are well worth listening closely to. On Leave the Light On, Smither ventures into new territory, taking a vocal political stance on two tracks. "Diplomacy" takes aim at our inept national leaders, while "Origin of Species" pokes fun at intelligent design. And both do so with a grin firmly affixed. "If you can be clever, it keeps people from accusing you of taking yourself too seriously," he notes, citing Randy Newman as an example of another satirical songwriter he admires. "There are people who disagree with me, yet still laugh at those songs which are fairly topical in nature."

The disc also features a rendition of Bob Dylan's "Visions of Johanna," recast in three-quarter time, and the immortal "John Hardy," the most-recorded folk song in history. Although he has loved the song since he learned it in adolescence, Smither says the last of the four verses ("there are a million," he chuckles) he performs has taken on particular resonance with age. In the song, after the gallows is blown down and John Hardy's life is spared, his jailers disregard this display of divine intervention and throw him back in the clink—prompting the narrator to concede that now he's seen everything and is ready to die.

"That's so consonant with how I feel about the way people treat other people," Smither admits. Hopefully, though, he'll stick around a while longer to keep singing about those sentiments... wherever he may find himself.

kurt@thestranger.com

Group Effort

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 26 Oct 2006 04:00:00 -0700

Damien Jurado Is Not a Singer-Songwriter by Kurt B. Reighley

Damien Jurado wants to be more like Alice Cooper. Not by staging mock decapitations, nuzzling snakes, or improving his golf handicap. But from here on out, Damien Jurado is no mere individual: Damien Jurado is a band.

Since his 1997 Sub Pop debut, Waters Ave S., this avuncular local has accrued devoted fans via thoughtful, evocative songs and quirky vocals. Regardless of whether or not he recorded or toured with sidemen, he has been identified as a solo artist. But with the release of his seventh full-length, And Now That I'm in Your Shadow (on Secretly Canadian), that era has closed.

He told his fellow musicians—Jenna Conrad and longtime collaborator Eric Fisher—the news as they were making this album. "I said, 'Look, you need to know that I'm done doing solo work. If you want to continue playing with me, I'd really like that. This is a formula that works and I don't want to continue doing this anymore unless you guys are into it.'

"It was a bit of a hostage-taking situation," Jurado admits, "but that was the way I felt."

What pushed Jurado, a passionate but mild-mannered guy, to this breaking point? "I was sick of playing solo shows and fed up with being known as a singer-songwriter. Especially in this day and age."

But wait. Listen to a composition like the new "I Had No Intentions." A snapshot of the immediate aftermath of a violent crime, sung in a weary but focused voice and accompanied by acoustic guitar, it recalls Bruce Springsteen's stark 1982 masterpiece Nebraska. Can this be described as the handiwork of anyone but a singer-songwriter? Well, that specific term is rarely applied to the Boss. And therein lies Jurado's beef. If he is to move forward, he must dispel the limitations he feels being pigeonholed as a singer-songwriter has imposed upon him.

"That tag should give you the ability to do whatever you want," he opines. "However, most reviewers and some fans don't quite get that. If I wanted to make a reggae-inspired record, I couldn't do that. I would be lambasted." He cites his fourth album, 2002's uncharacteristically poppy and electrified I Break Chairs, as a prime example. "The press hated it, the fans didn't know what to make of it. They were all like, 'What is this?'"

"I want to be set apart," Jurado continues. "I don't want to be lumped in with Bright Eyes and Will Oldham, because the music I do is not that at all. It is very story oriented and cinematic." He would prefer to be branded a maverick, à la Antony and the Johnsons or Sufjan Stevens. "Artists that [industry] people have no idea what to do with. But at the same time audiences, the public, love them because what they do is so different."

Yet after nearly a decade of making records and touring under his birth name, Jurado knew better than to jettison the brand recognition. "I didn't want to go out and change the name completely, like Bonnie Prince Billy or Magnolia Electric Co. did. That's too confusing."

Jurado knows about confusing people. Signed to Sub Pop before similar acts like Rosie Thomas or Iron & Wine joined their roster, he was an anomaly, and found himself sharing bills almost exclusively with indie rock bands such as 764-HERO, rather than other troubadours. "To be playing acoustic, and look out in the audience and see people like Isaac Brock, right as Modest Mouse was fast up and coming, was very weird."

But by the time he released Audio Postcards and Letters in 2000, a song-free compilation of messages culled from anonymous answering-machine cassettes purchased in thrift stores, it was increasingly apparent that Jurado was not your typical coffeehouse crooner. With each release since Ghost of David (also 2000) he has integrated more atmospheric elements into his arrangements and refined his intimate musical tableaux peopled with believable, broken characters.

Which brings up another advantage to Damien Jurado, the guy, stepping aside for Damien Jurado, the group; listeners, he hopes, are less likely now to assume his songs are strictly autobiographical. Because they rarely are. "I don't want to write from my perspective," he concludes. "What would I write about? How I live in Shoreline and have a big backyard?" Good point. Even sober son-of-a-preacher-man Cooper might find that a bit dull.

kurt@thestranger.com

Border Radio

Kurt B. Reighley — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 04:00:00 -0700

Roots & Americana by Kurt B. Reighley

Your old lady took off with your best friend. The boss works you like a dog. The rent is past due, and the ceiling leaks. What to do? Why, sing and dance and make a joyous racket. Because that's what having the blues is all about, according to Portland duo Hillstomp—who play the Funhouse on Saturday, October 21.

"One thing I've learned through playing this music is, the blues isn't really about being sad," opines drummer John Johnson. "It's about using music as a celebration, to bring yourself up and out of something." Hence Hillstomp's cheery disposition. "Maybe we seem relatively happy because playing this music is having the effect it should."

"We play this music because it deserves to be played, and isn't being played properly by enough people," he continues. "And it needs to grow. In a lot of ways, blues is a genre that has been sputtering out. Which is why, for the most part, when you ask young people if they like the blues, they say, 'God, no!'"

For Johnson and his partner, singer/guitarist Henry Kammerer, the blues is a living, evolving sound. It is neither exclusively the domain of a clutch of wizened, rural African Americans, nor of ponytailed dudes unfurling extended guitar solos. Their sophomore album, The Woman That Ended the World, features 11 songs fashioned from the simplest materials: lively, concise guitar figures, plucked and picked over and over, and sparse but driving percussion. Kammerer doesn't bark, he sings, using dynamics and phrasing to add texture to simple, repetitive lyrics. The album includes a few brooding numbers ("In the Hole"), but mostly, this is uplifting music. And unless you are a well-versed expert, the originals are nigh indistinguishable from their covers of Muddy Waters, Fred McDowell, and R. L. Burnside.

Still, Hillstomp catch the odd round of flack from purists—skeptics who think young white guys can't genuinely play the blues. Nuts to that. "The minute you understand blues, you totally understand that at its very deepest core it is a music of inclusion," says Kammerer. "Sometimes it is about not being able to be included—and we have all had our experiences with that, with being the strange person—but it is inclusive."

Johnson adds that they face similar challenges about their credibility from other camps. "Not knowing exactly what to call our music, on some occasions we stick the word punk in there, to try and differentiate the kind of blues we're talking about. And people get in our face about that, too."

The blues and punk. Two of the most primal, iconic forms of pop. Do Hillstomp ever feel cowed, knowing all the great songs and artists of yore they must compete with? Nah. "It's funny, but you could ask the exact same question of both Mississippi John Hurt and the Sex Pistols," Kammerer concludes. "Because so much had come before them, too. I don't want to sound big-headed, but I'm just honored to be a small part of that great tradition of original, rootsy music."

kurt@thestranger.com