Matt & Kim “Sidewalks” Review – Track by Track
November 4th, 2010 • Album Review, Brooklyn, Electronic • No comments
#1: Block After Block – This track sounds more like a remix of a Matt & Kim song – there are just too many layers of sound. It’s more oriental-sounding like “Good Ol’ Fashion Nightmare.” The thing is that Kim is clearly playing a drum machine, and that is a totally new direction for the band. i know they’ve used it a little in the past, but this flat jingly snare sound doesn’t work here. I think this track would be better live.
#2: AM/FM Sound – Again it really doesn’t open like a Matt & Kim song. The verse sounds really tacky, like they struggled to write the melody. The chorus, however, is more fun and catchy with the “oh ay oh”s. This track is a little reminiscent of Cinders, but I just don’t really feel like I could dance to this.
#3: Cameras – I’ve already been in love with this song for over a month. I love the bells Kim is playing as well as the syncopated brass. Matt’s voice sounds so natural and excited in this song. The effects on his voice are just what they’ve always used in their prior albums. True, it’s not clear keyboard/drums of To/From and their self-titled album, but the elements are all there. I think it’s the syncopation and explosive jolting energy which really make this song so amazing.
#4: Red Paint – The drums and Matt’s voice are pleasantly familiar in this track, but then there’s too much cymbal and nintendo noises which distract. The volume levels seem off – Matt and the flute are kind of drowned out by extra vocal layers and whatever else they added in.
#5: Where You’re Coming From – I like this one more than most of the songs on the album. The beat is good and the energy is up a little more. It’s like the “Turn This Boat Around” of this album. It’s the feel-good, change-the-world, inspirational one. Whatever happened to abstract lyrics like “pitchfork, switchblade, salt water and this hose/I tend to believe my eyes before my nose.” No, apparently now Matt is showing people how to become a man, how to walk into a grave, claiming he knows where you’re coming from.
#6: Good for Great – Honestly this song is just asking for Fireflies and Riding Solo mash-ups. This song also just seems so boring…which doesn’t make sense because Matt and Kim are such enthusiastic performers. The lyrics take almost an environmental theme: “So I’ll leave these pages in the trees.” The layered vocals are awful in this song too, unfortunately – making it sound like Hawk Nelson or Forever the Sickest Kids.
#7: Northeast – Aww another song about New England. Okay this is the Daylight outro of this album. Matt’s vocals are pretty good and he references Good Ol’ Fashion Nightmare: “as I said, the skyline’s brighter tonight.” There’s a nice drum addition and synth, but still it’s too simple and cliche for them. It ends very abruptly. It seems like it’s building up, and you’re hoping something awesome will happen next, but no…the song just ends.
#8: Wires – I have a great feeling about this one – it reminds me a lot of Dash After Dash, especially with the low distorted keyboard. I think they could have chosen a more crisp snare sound, but other than that this track is really quite good. The vocal layering fits much better here, and the drumming gets better and better. This is the second best track on the album, I’d say.
#9: Silver Tiles – At first I was really excited that they were doing a Silver Tiles remake. Now I feel betrayed. Matt’s vocals are almost the same as the original though he has a little more control. I HATEHATEHATE the tinny back up vocals. They make his voice sound like Matt Theissen automatically and totally drown him out. I feel like they’re trying to make this sound more professional and mature; and it sucks. They did almost nothing to remake it – they just re-recorded it with their fancy new equipment and effects.
#10: Ice Melts – The last track has a few more classic Matt & Kim qualities, like the keyboard following Matt’s voice and if you listen closely you can hear the bass notes on the keyboard. This, for some reason, sounds more like a track 2 than a last track. There’s definitely more energy in this song, though the balance between instruments and vocals still isn’t quite right. The bells pull the Cameras theme back in. Again the ending is very abrupt – much too abrupt for a last track.
Overall I was clearly disappointed with Sidewalks. I miss their old minimalist keyboard and drums feel – it felt much more genuine and the excitement from Matt’s voice and Kim’s beats was contagious. This album just feels different than their older ones. As an album itself, it’s actually pretty good. It’s just within the context of their other albums it falls very very short. It was smart of them to release Cameras as a single first, though – it’s definitely the best track on the album.
(Belated) Dr. Dog Photo Blog!
October 25th, 2010 • Maine, Photo Gallery, Rock • No comments
Enjoy these photos courtesy of Liana Blum of WRBC’s Fall Concert!
Time Travelers Bed of Roses EP
September 11th, 2010 • Folk, Maine, Rock, Uncategorized • No comments
In honor of their show tonight (9 PM at the Benjamin Mays Center, Bates College), we’d like to point you in the direction of the Time Travelers’ self-released EP, Bed of Roses, which you can pick up over at Bandcamp. The Time Travelers are a 4-piece band comprised of Bates College seniors, reunited after a one-year break during which members were scattered across the globe. If you’re not too busy, you might also find the time to like them on Facebook.
Concert Calendar, Fall Semester 2010
September 9th, 2010 • Concert Calendar, Maine, News • No comments
Welcome to another year of faithful blogging here at WRBC’s Monkey Blog. We’ve updated our calendar to include these wonderful events happening in the next few months.
Update your planners and keep checking back to The Monkey Blog for more updates!
September 15: Woods – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
September 23: The Books – University of New Hampshire, Durham, NH.
September 24: Mates of State – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
September 24: Mastodon – Port City Music Hall, Portland, ME. (21+)
September 25: Dr. Dog – Library Quad, Bates College, Lewiston, ME.
September 27: Japanther & Screaming Females – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
September 30: Murder By Death – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
October 11: Deerhoof & Xiu Xiu – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
October 12: Free Energy – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
October 15: My Morning Jacket – State Theatre, Portland, ME.
October 16: moe. – State Theatre, Portland, ME.
October 18: Dark Dark Dark – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
October 19: The Hold Steady – Port City Music Hall, Portland, ME. (21+)
October 20: OK GO – Port City Music Hall, Portland, ME. (21+)
October 21: High on Fire – Port City Music Hall, Portland, ME. (21+)
October 22: Yonder Mountain String Band – Port City Music Hall, Portland, ME. (21+)
October 22: Josh Ritter & The Low Anthem – State Theatre, Portland, ME.
October 27: Guster – State Theatre, Portland, ME.
October 29: Lady Lamb The Beekeeper – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
November 2: Land of Talk & Suuns – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
November 3: Matt & Kim – Port City Music Hall, Portland, ME. (21+)
November 6: Michael Franti & Spearhead – State Theatre, Portland, ME.
November 27: State Radio – State Theatre, Portland, ME.
November 28: Doomtree – SPACE Gallery, Portland, ME.
If you know of any fun or interesting concerts going on close to Bates, please email wrbcmonkey@gmail.com. We’ll add it to the list.
Dr. Dog, Live at Bates
September 6th, 2010 • Maine, News, Rock • No comments
DR. DOG is coming to Bates College for WRBC’s first big show this fall.
Come see the FREE concert September 25 on the Library Quad, brought to you by WRBC 91.5 FM and CHC.
The mini music fest will begin in the early afternoon and will end by 9 PM. Bates’ own Time Travelers will kick off the event, followed by opener Delicate Steve.
…
Dr. Dog’s latest album, “Shame, Shame,” has been wildly well-received. Pitchfork hailed the work “arguably the band’s finest moment,” and music critic Doug Wallen categorized their sound as “a little folk, blues, indie rock, soul, bluegrass—and a whole lot of down-home harmonizing. It conjures images of old friends sitting on a porch swapping instruments and just letting the tape recorder run.”
Mark your calenders and get psyched for an epic start to the year!
Listen to Dr. Dog: www.myspace.com/drdog
Listen to Delicate Steve: http://www.myspace.com/delicatesteve
Artistic Temperament
August 26th, 2010 • Did You Know, Japan • No comments
My friends are nice enough to pick out some of the more interesting articles from the New York Times and send them to me. WRBC will now pay it forward and send them to you:
Summer Music: Dubstep
August 22nd, 2010 • Electronic • No comments
Dubstep is an emerging genre of music that combines the dominant sub-bass lines of dub (as in dub reggae) with the jittery half-time drums of two-step. This music will break your headphones, so you’re going to have to find a system with some nice deep bass to enjoy these tunes. Dubstep already has developed several cliches, including layered synths, ‘wobble bass,’ and the ever-present ‘bass drop.’ A bass drop usually consists of a gap in the music, after which the main phrase comes back in but with an overwhelming synth bassline. Below are two dubstep remixes: The first is a ‘typical’ dubstep remix by UK artist Chrispy (who was only 17 at the time), and the second is a mix by Canadian duo Zed’s Dead, which pushes the envelope a bit.
Summer Music: tUnE-yArDs
June 26th, 2010 • Album Review, California, Commentary, Folk, Summer Playlist, Video • No comments
I investigated the music of tUnE-yArDs (the moniker of Oakland-based Merrill Garbus) the way I always look at new music that’s been getting a lot of rAvE rEvIeWs: with caution. Obscure bands getting rave reviews are even worse…and I don’t want to be that person who’s touting the next up-and-coming band-you’ve-never-heard-of. But tUnE-yArDs was a pleasant surprise.
Let’s start with the basics. tUnE-yArDs isn’t that obscure. Pitchfork, for what it’s worth, ranked Garbus’ debut effort, BiRd-BrAiNs, as the 44th-best album of 2009, which is no small honor. BiRd-BrAiNs was released on the Marriage label, shared by notable acts such as Dirty Projectors and YACHT. She’s now signed on to the UK independent label 4AD, which she shares with the likes of The Big Pink, TV on the Radio, and Bon Iver.
Bon Iver forms a particularly relevant comparison. Like Bon Iver, tUnE-yArDs’ first album was recorded in a makeshift home-studio with whatever was at hand…which was comprised mostly of Garbus’ ukulele. Interviews with Garbus suggest that she owned significantly less gear at the time of BiRd-BrAiNs‘ recording than she tours with now, meaning that what she’s got onstage is more than what she recorded the album with. The album was mixed with free-for-download software on her home computer. This makes the album super-lo-fi, most likely with one mic for just about everything. This style is important in terms of Garbus’ expression, insofar as the album was more a catalog of her life, a journal of how she felt, than a studio album. Garbus herself calls it a ‘living history.’ Live, tUnE-yArDs reminds me more of Professor Murder, with the live band’s sparse melody section and prolific drumming. Like Professor Murder, tUnE-yArDs has multiple drumkits on stage, and often as many as three people banging on them at once, forming a very rhythm-oriented sound. Also like PM, the bass guitar sits pretty far forward in the mix (it’s half the melody section), and the mildly-distorted bass sound really fills a lot of space. Garbus’ voice sails over it all, with an unabashed, sustain-filled tone.
Bottom line? If you love the ukulele, and can take some real lo-fi, please grab BiRd-BrAiNs for a listen this summer. At least a couple of songs should speak to you. If you hated Bon Iver and can’t stand Professor Murder, a police officer who stopped me recently gave me a rave review of a recent Staind show he was at, so you could probably check that out.
Review: Grace Potter and the Nocturnals (Hollywood/Ragged Company)
June 10th, 2010 • Album Review, Concert Review, Folk, Rock • 4 comments
I recently had the opportunity to watch Grace Potter perform live. Each time is a treat. She shakes and drops, teasing the crowd with her rockin’ legs and “candy ass.” Abandoning her trademark soul, Gracie has gone rocker-girl with her new partner-in-crime Catharine Popper, formerly of Ryan Adams and the Cardinals. Popper’s smart, up-beat baselines and sexed-up style bump the Nocturnals to a new level. But on the new album, and to some extent in concert, our Gracie has gone missing. The soulful organ-grinding girl from Burlington has gone Hollywood, literally. While This is Something certainly marked a shift Potter’s style, she maintained her seductively bluesy sound. However, signing with Hollywood Records seems to have finally hijacked the bands studio sound, turning our Gracie into a magnate for 15-year-old high school girls, alienating the old-guard hippie crowd that gravitated to her during tours with Gov’t Mule.
It isn’t simply the turn towards hard-core rock that has me rattled. It’s that she abandoned what made her special, and worth listening to: The Organ. Without it, she looses the soulfulness that makes her hard-core rockin’ so damn sexy, its distinctiveness in a world of blonde country stars with cookie-cutter verse chorus repeat bridge banality. With Grace Potter and the Nocternals, the band’s latest effort, the B-3 largely fades into the back. Its sound varies. Alternating from choir accompanist to circus master, the Hammond has lost is soul in Ms. Potter’s latest album. For all those who crave the unnerving, reverb-saturated, rock grind that drove tracks such as “Treat Me Right”, “Ragged Company”, and “Sweet Hands” on Nothing but the Water, the reality will soon set in that Gracie likes to shake it, and the B-3 hides what all the men in the 9:30 club want to see.
Ms. Potter played many of her new songs, returning briefly to NBTW for brilliant renditions of “Sweet hands” and “2:22”. She remains a force to be reckoned with on-stage, even if her voice sounds constrained at times. Slipping her shoes back on after a raunchy opening set she remarks, “ I don’t care what anybody thinks, I’m putting then back on ‘cuz they make my butt look like candy. See?” turning her back to the audience and accentuating what could never be even intentionally obscured. Just as her new songs feature a smart lyrical compactness, her on-stage banter maintains a sharp and witty character. Popper eggs her on. “Take it off,” she taunts. Potter retorts, “talk about womanizing ourselves” as the band plunges into “Ah Mary”, the crowd-pleasing political scorcher about America.
Her new songs however, offer little of the sound that first attracted me to Potter’s music. They are marred by backup vocal tracks that dilute the sheer power of her voice. She rarely lets loose, with outtros comprising loud guitar rock and the occasional Potter shriek instead of the heart melting blues notes she used to hold for miles. Electrifying guitar solos replace jazzy organ jams. “Tiny Light” showcases her vocal talents at moments, but they become lost in the country-pop choruses. The organ finally breaks through in earnest in “Only Love” a Bonnie Raitt styled throwback about heartbreak and love. It’s truly one of the more enjoyable tracks on the album; the chorus has a jazzy fullness, delivered with a guttural emotion missing from many of the country-tinged offerings.
The single “Medicine” represents some of the best elements of Ms. Potters revamped sound, most notably her songwriting and thumping classic rock guitar lines. The song describes a seductive “policy woman” who pulls the narrator’s lover away. The seductive intruder has “the medicine”, but our storyteller steals “her bag of rattling bones” and “magic stones” en route to securing “the medicine”. Our storyteller gets herself a pair of “mojo hands”, ending the song proclaiming, “I got the medicine that everybody wants.” The phrases are bright and sexy, there’s a sense of achievement in Potter’s voice that mimics the song’s lyrical theme. Missing from the album is the bands one-of a kind rendition of Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit” as featured in Tim Burton’s Almost Alice. I’m not sure what prompted this decision, but I regard it as a significant oversight that reeks of big-label money-sucking tactics. The band’s cover is magnificent. Live, it’s spectacular. Popper bangs out the iconic baseline with an addictive coolness and suave that sets the tone for Ms. Potters picture-perfect vocals.
The album is overall quite good. Ms. Potter’s vocals soar on several of the tracks, revealing how truly talented she is. The album seems to be an attempt to channel the electricity and vibrancy of the band’s live work into a studio album. On this level, they have succeeded spectacularly; the album simply rocks from start to finish. But I can’t help longing for the soulful organ rock that first attracted me to Gracie. It’s there; It’s just in the background now. Just like her concerts, the album is chocked full of erotic grunts, ohhs and ahhs, sensual reminders of watching Ms. Potter perform live.
Grace Potter and the Nocturnals leaves me asking one question. Where has Gracie gone? I know she’s still there somewhere, waiting to break loose live in the nation’s most prominent music clubs. The new album however seems to pander to a different crowed. In front of me was a group of high school girls. “They don’t get it,” my concert neighbor, a long time Potter fan remarked about the bands music and the girls. They may not get the old stuff, the music that first seduced me; music that made Grace a tiny light on the otherwise marginal roots-rock throwback scene. However, they do get the new Grace, the Hollywood Records Grace with harmonized back up vocals and mainstream normalcy. They get it because they are used to it, and GPN puts it right in their laps, no work needed.
Grace Potter and the Nocturnals: B
Live Concert: A
Music Video Log: 5/12/10
May 12th, 2010 • Video • No comments
Here is another catalog of four sweet new music videos. The first one of the month of May.
Soft Black – The Earth is Black
Since starting this music video log column, I have gotten several emails from bands and filmmakers wanting their videos posted, this one is one of the best.
T.A.T.U. – Sparks
Would you have expected anything less from the Russian pop duo?
Ólafur Arnalds – Hægt, kemur ljósið
A brilliant animated video, which wonderfully encapsulates the music of this fabulous new Icelandic composer.
Memoryhouse – Lately
I dont really know what’s going on, but whatever it is, I like it.