The Clientele: Minotaur

By msarko on 9/2/10 9:42pm
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It's impossible to tell what's going to be timeless. When something is new it seems as likely to be a fad as anything else. This is especially true for music, double that for pop. It took a few decades to establish jazz as the go-to sound for class and leisure regardless of era, just like it took a similar span to name the throbbing 4/4 beat the standard for dance clubs whether it's disco, techno, industrial or any other style. In the past few years I think a similar canonization has occurred for jangly folk-rock. It was a sound made popular by the likes of The Beatles and The Hollies, later to inspire the singer-songwriters of the 70's like James Taylor, fuel the 80's college music of R.E.M. and the sensitive alternative scene of the 90's a la Counting Crows. These days, the emotional, intellectual sound of evolved folk is a favorite of the indie world and it's no less affecting than it was fifty years ago. For a pleasant tour through that sound, look no further than The Clientele and their new mini-album Minotaur.



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Katy Perry: Teenage Dream

By msarko on 9/1/10 12:00pm
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At least once a year I force myself to review a glossy pop album, if only because I would be remiss if I only ever critique music I already believe has merit. Even though I rarely enjoy the experience, I always come away having learned something. In listening to Katy Perry's latest offering, Teenage Dream, I learned how frustrating it must be to live as a talented pop producer. No matter how awesome your backing track is, no matter how artfully constructed and impressively mixed, it's almost guaranteed to have some interchangeable pop idol talk-singing over it with some prohibitively bad lyrics. That's the real tragedy of Teenage Dream, as with so many generic pop albums.

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Mixed Tracks: Beautiful/Heartbreaking

By msarko on 8/23/10 2:08am
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Though a lot of art traffics in carefully calculated downers, it's still remarkably difficult to convey genuine sadness and longing in music without sounding cheap or maudlin. It takes the right combination of music and lyrics to make a song that can bring a tear to a listener's eye while retaining an air of artistic respectability. Here are five songs that manage to achieve just that.



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Abby Lincoln, RIP

By dfunzy on 8/15/10 2:33am
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We, the people of the world, have lost another great performer of music. She sung jazz and wrote songs. She passed yesterday, Saturday, August 14th, in New York. She was eighty years old. Her name was (is as long as her music last and that will be as long as there are recordings of sound and images.) -- Abby Lincoln.

Abbey Lincoln is being remembered as a lady who knew how to sing and to say something while she was singing, and that is saying something.

"I learned from Billie (Holiday)," Abby Lincoln told The Washington Post in 2006. "It isn't about showing how good your voice is. It's about saying something."

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Richie Hayward, RIP

By dfunzy on 8/13/10 5:20pm
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Richie Hayward, was an excellent drummer. He was the co-founder of the amazing jam band 'Little Feat', that played rock, country, jazz and blues. The band and Richie Hayward are being remembered for songs like "Willin."

The Associated Press reports that he died yesterday, Thursday morning, after complications of pneumonia. He was 64. Richie Hayward had liver cancer.

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A Flight of the Conchords Primer

By msarko on 8/8/10 9:34pm
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Despite their tongue-in-cheek self-description, New Zealand's Flight of the Conchords truly is their country's most popular guitar-based digi-bongo acapella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo. They've been churning out loving parodies of various musical styles for years, a talent they got to share with their widest audience yet during their self-titled, two-season HBO series. For those who have never seen Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement do what they do best, here's a quick primer.



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Arcade Fire: The Suburbs

By msarko on 8/5/10 2:09am
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It seems like every distinctive band reaches this point. They become so good at delivering a particular sound, even an emotional atmosphere, that they seem to get stuck in a very beautiful rut. Don't get me wrong, Arcade Fire's third studio album The Suburbs is a superb collection of songs that is among this year's best, but it's nothing you haven't heard before if you've listened to the band's other work. Whereas Neon Bible was a clear evolution from the solid groundwork set by Funeral, The Suburbs just feels like half a new idea surrounded by aural comfort food.



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Bobby Hebb, R.I.P.

By dfunzy on 8/4/10 6:21am
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Singer, song writer, Bobby Hebb has died at the age of 72. He is the man who wrote the instant pop standard, the 1966 classic that every body (Cher, Johnny Rivers, Stevie Wonder, Frank Sinatra with Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, The Four Seasons, the Four Tops, James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Les McCann, Dusty Springfield, Marvin Gaye, Wilson Pickett and Jose Feliciano), have recorded -- the song, "Sunny." Anyone who was/is into the pop music of the last half of the 20th century has heard his music.

The Associated Press reports, Bobby Hebb wrote the song after suffering the loss of his older brother Harold who was killed in a knife fight outside a Nashville nightclub.

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Tame Impala: Innerspeaker

By msarko on 7/21/10 10:02pm
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My opinions about music are usually pretty cut and dry. I either like the sound or I don't. I either want to keep listening or never hear it again. So, when an album like Australian psychedelic rock outfit Tame Impala's Innerspeaker comes across my desk I find it more than a bit confounding. It's not a bad album by any stretch. I even struggle to point out a single bad song on the entire disc. The problem is that absolutely none of it sounds particularly fresh but none of it really feels like a well-read throwback, either.



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Albums of Note: "Rio" by Duran Duran

By msarko on 7/7/10 7:04pm
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Today, the British dance pop group Duran Duran is synonymous with the sleek, fashion-obsessed music scene of the 1980's, but the band came very close to falling apart at its most crucial moment. The 1982 album Rio eventually went double platinum by the time it was reissued in America and grabbed the #1 spot in Australia, both major events that wouldn't have been possible without a real eye for innovation.



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