KID ROCK-Rock N Roll Jesus
Atlantic
Holy shit...
On his ninth album, Kid Rock would have us believe he's grown a social conscience -
'natural disasters and wolf-insheep's-clothes pastors,' he bleats on the country-tinged Amen, 'now I'm scared to send my kids to church' - but the Michigan yokel-rocker can't hide his deeper concerns for long. 'Who's gonna give me some sugar tonight?'he enquires on Sugar, before reminding us that he 'fucks hot pussy until it's cold' and panting for a full minute of So Hot like Robert Plant in Whole Lotto Love. It's a shame the lyrics are so crass, because Kid actually ploughs an interesting musical furrow between Lynyrd Skynyrd and Led Zeppelin, and could be so much more than a smutty redneck. Time to grow up...
Henry Yates
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
RADIOHEAD-In Rainbows
RADIOHEAD-In Rainbows
Radiohead's decision to drop "a chemical weapon on the music industry" (Thorn
Yorke's words) and release their seventh studio album only via their official website is an interesting one - especially the part where people decide how much to pay for a download. Far more interesting, though, would have been if punters were able to decide how much to pay for in Rainbows after they had owned it for a few days. For the record, I paid £5 - the price I believe download albums should cost; after all there is no artwork, no lyrics, no jewel box and the sound quality is inferior to what you'd get on a regular CD.
Cleverly, the albu;n is also being released by the band on vinyl and on disc, with added extras, in December - for the less than bargain-basement price of £40. Also, a traditional release of the album via one of those evil record companies is expected in early 2008.
The way In Rainbows is being distributed may have turned the entertainment world on its head, but the music is Radiohead's least revolutionary collection since the still weird Kid A. It is, though, fantastically good,and grows with each listening once you accustom your ears to the strange ebb and flow that is Yorke's whine,
sows and the dense, brilliantly technical over-layering of the music. The trick the band pull off brilliantly and with great style throughout is the sensation of a musical fog gradually lifting to reveal astonishing clear skies; the way Nude (an old track that has eventually made it onto an album) and All I Need slowly build towards crescendos puts them alongside this band's finest moments.
As the album progresses it gets simpler (for them), and all the layers start disappearing until we arrive at three final, stripped-down songs. Of these, the haunting ballad House Of Cards is magnificent (it opens with the most un-Thom Yorke of lines: "I don't want to be your friend/I just want to be your lover"), while Videotape is among the most heartfelt songs Radiohead have ever recorded.
Obscure and uncompromising they may be, but Radiohead are still a people's band, and they've made an album that can be enjoyed by fans who've grown tired of their experimentation as well as those who survived them. Power to the revolution.
Johnny Dee
Radiohead's decision to drop "a chemical weapon on the music industry" (Thorn
Yorke's words) and release their seventh studio album only via their official website is an interesting one - especially the part where people decide how much to pay for a download. Far more interesting, though, would have been if punters were able to decide how much to pay for in Rainbows after they had owned it for a few days. For the record, I paid £5 - the price I believe download albums should cost; after all there is no artwork, no lyrics, no jewel box and the sound quality is inferior to what you'd get on a regular CD.
Cleverly, the albu;n is also being released by the band on vinyl and on disc, with added extras, in December - for the less than bargain-basement price of £40. Also, a traditional release of the album via one of those evil record companies is expected in early 2008.
The way In Rainbows is being distributed may have turned the entertainment world on its head, but the music is Radiohead's least revolutionary collection since the still weird Kid A. It is, though, fantastically good,and grows with each listening once you accustom your ears to the strange ebb and flow that is Yorke's whine,
sows and the dense, brilliantly technical over-layering of the music. The trick the band pull off brilliantly and with great style throughout is the sensation of a musical fog gradually lifting to reveal astonishing clear skies; the way Nude (an old track that has eventually made it onto an album) and All I Need slowly build towards crescendos puts them alongside this band's finest moments.
As the album progresses it gets simpler (for them), and all the layers start disappearing until we arrive at three final, stripped-down songs. Of these, the haunting ballad House Of Cards is magnificent (it opens with the most un-Thom Yorke of lines: "I don't want to be your friend/I just want to be your lover"), while Videotape is among the most heartfelt songs Radiohead have ever recorded.
Obscure and uncompromising they may be, but Radiohead are still a people's band, and they've made an album that can be enjoyed by fans who've grown tired of their experimentation as well as those who survived them. Power to the revolution.
Johnny Dee
Monday, January 7, 2008
Richard Youngs-Autumn Response
Richard Youngs-Autumn Response
JAGJAGUWAR
Umpteenth album from prolific bedroom recording doyen and sometime landek bassist.
A cult figure once dubbed 'King of the Progressive Minimalists', Glasgow-via Harpenden's Richard Youngs' many albums have arrived in a bewildering panoply of styles; from prog revival to no-fi indie-folk and arid electronica. Autumn Response finds him in relatively accessible mode, armed with just an acoustic guitar and some opaque, introverted lyrics. Vocally, the album takes the form of a palimpsest, each song featuring two overlapping lead lines by Youngs that sometimes synchronise but more often meander independently over extemporised folk guitar backings. It makes for a disconcerting, somewhat schizoid listen. I Need The Light is a fine Richard Thompson-like essay - wilfully, aggravatingly blurred - while I Am The Weather sounds like Nick Drake dubbed into submission by Lee 'Scratch' Perry. On Low Bay Of Sky the vocal lines finally coalesce, revealing Youngs' crisp, mellifluous falsetto - the obdurate avantgardiste finally unmasked.
David Sheppard
JAGJAGUWAR
Umpteenth album from prolific bedroom recording doyen and sometime landek bassist.
A cult figure once dubbed 'King of the Progressive Minimalists', Glasgow-via Harpenden's Richard Youngs' many albums have arrived in a bewildering panoply of styles; from prog revival to no-fi indie-folk and arid electronica. Autumn Response finds him in relatively accessible mode, armed with just an acoustic guitar and some opaque, introverted lyrics. Vocally, the album takes the form of a palimpsest, each song featuring two overlapping lead lines by Youngs that sometimes synchronise but more often meander independently over extemporised folk guitar backings. It makes for a disconcerting, somewhat schizoid listen. I Need The Light is a fine Richard Thompson-like essay - wilfully, aggravatingly blurred - while I Am The Weather sounds like Nick Drake dubbed into submission by Lee 'Scratch' Perry. On Low Bay Of Sky the vocal lines finally coalesce, revealing Youngs' crisp, mellifluous falsetto - the obdurate avantgardiste finally unmasked.
David Sheppard
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Black Lips-Good Bad Not Evil
Black Lips-Good Bad Not Evil
VICE
Raucous, wreckless, acidfried garage rock from Atlanta braves.
Pulling back slightly from the grime-smeared lo-fi love letter to late-'60s weirdness that was 2005's Let It Bloom, the fourth album from these prolific and terrifyingly young Atlanta garage rockers draws their clatter of clanging riffs and sleepy-eyed pop melodies into tight-but-loose focus. Black Lips describe their sound as "flower-punk", encompassing ramshackle shanties (Katrina), limber and lairy rave-ups referencing everyone from The Standells to The Stooges, and ersatz country ache (How Do You Tell A Child That Someone Has Died). Indeed, the eerie evocation of bygone eras would leave Black Lips open to accusations of pastiche, if their lusty attack didn't stomp such reservations into the dust. Howling and hopped-up on some unnamed stimulants, Black Lips conjure not only the riffs of the early garage squallers, but their very spirit.
Stevie Chick
VICE
Raucous, wreckless, acidfried garage rock from Atlanta braves.
Pulling back slightly from the grime-smeared lo-fi love letter to late-'60s weirdness that was 2005's Let It Bloom, the fourth album from these prolific and terrifyingly young Atlanta garage rockers draws their clatter of clanging riffs and sleepy-eyed pop melodies into tight-but-loose focus. Black Lips describe their sound as "flower-punk", encompassing ramshackle shanties (Katrina), limber and lairy rave-ups referencing everyone from The Standells to The Stooges, and ersatz country ache (How Do You Tell A Child That Someone Has Died). Indeed, the eerie evocation of bygone eras would leave Black Lips open to accusations of pastiche, if their lusty attack didn't stomp such reservations into the dust. Howling and hopped-up on some unnamed stimulants, Black Lips conjure not only the riffs of the early garage squallers, but their very spirit.
Stevie Chick
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