Mystery Jets - Serotonin

British pop rock with some quality and style. But in comparing it to other British pop-rock, it either over-shoots the mark or glides completely by you. The first two tracks for example...

The album opener, "Alice Springs" blows up like a Pulp Top 10. "I'd stand in the line of fire for you..." has the rocked-up singalong chorus and the sentimental lyrics, but I still feel like we're just writing a modern day "Oliver Twist" musical. Too much.

The second track, "It's Too Late To Talk" - glides over you without digging in anywhere. It's verses are wordy without reason, which you forget all about when we pass the "doo doo doo doo" bridge and arrive at the one-line-title-repeated-four-times chrous.

That and the third track smacks cool into smooth synth-pop of old Spandau Ballet. And then, the album begins rocking less and driving up the pleasant pop. And that's not bad per se, but the choruses do get awfully repetitive in pop this poppy. And if keyboards aren't riffing or droning, they tend to grate on me. These '80s synth effects don't add anything to the songwriting- which really isn't bad.

A great example is a song called "Melt" which is simple, nice. "All I want to do is melt, melt, melt, melt into you..." The hook is total fun. They just drive it around too many times. They rarely dive into the deep end of the shit waters

Outside the synth effects, I'd be remiss if I didn't say that "Waiting On A Miracle" is a straight up Coldplay throwaway. Avoid.

The best track is clearly the last, "Lorna Doone". And it's about a movie character. Remember when I asked for droning, before? I got it. The Jets provide an Arcade Fire inspired break up song that hits all the right notes, takes itself seriously and walks away when its supposed to.

Dirty Little Rabbits

With very little being released mid-summer, I pulled an unknown out of the hat. Come to find that Dirty Little Rabbits are a side project of Shawn Crahan, who is a percussionist in Slipknot. ("The Clown" - not the dead guy, who was "The Pig") I would have expected that a sideman in Slipknot would follow the singer's direction and take up a more commercial group and collect bigger songwriting royalties. And while DLR is farther away from metal than even Corey's Stone Sour, I'd still be hard pressed to call it commercial.

Joining Crahan (who is playing drums here) is an organist named Michael Pfaff and a very dynamic/enigmatic chick singer named Stella Katsoudas. Guitar/bass round things out, but the arrangements are clearly led by Pfaff; and Stella is so clearly the band leader that even Jeff Beck would sit back and take direction.

But on a first listen, I must admit, I'm at a bit of a loss for words. Crahan is not afraid to beat the skins, but leans back when he's supposed to. The organ takes me back to Billy Joel's pre-fame heavy metal effort Attila. 70s, Deep Purple, power rock. And then, to throw everything for a loop is Stella.

First of all, she's WAY over the top in the mix. Vocals are never muddled. She runs the gamut from cute and poppy like Letters To Cleo... to wordsy and poetic like Fiery Furnaces or Dresden Dolls... to just full on annoying like Juliette Lewis.
I think I like it. (3 of 5 stars)

Peter Case - Wig!

An old power-popper has a intrusive heart operation and comes back with an unexpected response. A bare-bones garage blues rock recording from one day-long session.

It's hard to differentiate these recordings when talking about this album project. There's not a lot of room for experimentation during a day-long session. "New Old Blue Car" for example is an update from Case's own "Old Blue Car" from 1986 but ends up sounding like Tom Waits' "Goin' Out West" with Robin Zander on vocals.

A lot of the album has that same feel. Electric blues, electric piano, amplified/distorted harmonica. You can imagine Case sweating these out live and it feels great. I also just wondered then why he didn't cross the line and record it in front of a barroom full of friends.

The slow, acoustic Lead Belly cover, "Thirty Days in the Workhouse" breaks up the album into halves before we enter "Ain't Got No Dough", which (purposefully?) rips off the piano riff to "Money (That's What I Want)".

The album's end gets acoustic again with "House Rent Party", which may be my favorite of the set. The whole thing was great fun, and I'm sure I'd love to see Case live at the Slippery Noodle. But from an album, point of view, it will suffer in my eyes to what all of modern electric blues suffers from. Sameness in style that unless your adding an element to get lost in, can lose you. This is better than most, though. Don't let me fool you. (3.5 of 5 stars)

22-20s - Shake/Shiver/Moan

I thought I remembered the 22-20s from hearing at least a song before, and I remembered it being more garage-y. Maybe I made that up in my head, because the 22-20s rarely get rambunctious on this latest disc. And nothing is remotely sexy enough to make me want to shake, shiver OR moan.

Now, I love Arctic Monkeys, and I wouldn't call them a garage rock band either, but at least Alex seems like he's always half in the bag and is only coming around to have a go at your girl.

The problem seems to mostly stem from singer Martin Trimble. When he doesn't seem tired or bored, he's at the very least too proper for a rock band. Standing him next to Jack White would be like standing Hugh Grant next to Marlon Brando (1950). The answer is obvious. Also, production is entirely too clean. For his part, the drummer is trying to let go and rip it up here and there. But even on those tracks, like "Oceans", he's masked by a producer who wants everything to be heard a little bit. Every strum, every cymbal hit. No distortion whatsoever.

The benefit to playing and singing this lazy is that when you have a slow, lazy, snake-in-the-desert-sand song, it works. "Bitter Pills" is included for your enjoyment. Otherwise- spiritless. (1.5 of 5 stars)

The Gaslight Anthem - American Slang

After seeing The Gaslight Anthem at Lollapalooza last year, I finally caught up not too long ago with their breakthrough, The '59 Sound. And it's true that I got caught up in it. With the look and every bit as much intention as Social Distortion; their sound was considerably more whispy, even poppy. If they get too big, there will be a backlash and people will start calling them girl punk, but that'll be a misnomer. Yes, Brian Fallon is pretty and his voice emotive and clean. And yes, the songs are hooky. And yes, the songs have a sentimentality about them. But it goes back to the whole Jersey aesthetic- this idea of honoring your home and family, even as you are leaving them.

On the new record, we get more of the same formula. Only this time I feel a little less connected to it. It feels like the characters that are being sung to are the ladies. "The Queen of Lower Chelsea" as one of the titles goes. Nothing as ferociously heart-straining as the full-speed eulogy of the last album's title track.

No real low-points per se, just way fewer high points. Like a new collection of songs that were probably worked on 5 years ago and not completed. But hey, ya gotta keep workin'. One high point brings my favorite track to the front. "Orphans" is another lost-children anthem that we come to this music for. "We were orphans before we were ever the sons of regret." It's a line as worthy of our attention as "Tramps like us, baby we were born to run".



And it's true. These songs were created for us to form a kinship with. And even if the kinship is stronger with your kid sister, you should still invite 'em to the table. At least they're not 30 Seconds To Mars. (3 of 5 stars)

Villagers - Becoming A Jackal

Not a lot going on this week. I almost made my review this week of new releases by Christina Aguilera or maybe even Hanson. But opted instead for an artist I'd never heard of before. Based only on the description of "alternative singer/songwriter" and "Irish".


Good thing. Because these are some well-written songs. Songwriter Conor O'Brien is certainly alphabetically close to Conor Oberst. But you would have resembled the two anyway. The latter being among indie-folk's most prolific entities this past decade. But beyond their love of wordplay, Villagers employ some of the dramatic build-ups of orchestration that I've recently heard from other British-isle exports like Frightened Rabbit and the Rumble Strips.

Having complimented that though, my favorite song is the mellowest, quietest one. "The Meaning of the Ritual" is a confession of our inherent selfish nature in the realm of love. A close second is the exploding "Pieces" - which starts out stark, with a minimalist clinking of a 1950's style doo-wop piano, but the dynamically shifts to a orchestration wall-of-sound overload; complete with Conor actually howling to a moon. It might as well have been followed by an excerpt of Paul McCartney singing about brushing his teeth or something.
(4 of 5 stars)

Gemma Ray - It's a Shame About Gemma Ray

A complete covers album by this neo-soul singer from England. The track listing is pretty eclectic, showing only 3 song titles (of 16) that I even recognize. Most tracks last under 3:00 and the production is altogether sparse. Apparently different than Gemma's previous soul works.

To that end, the "soul" end, I could hardly see how this Gemma would qualify. Her voice here is lilting and wispy. I could not imagine it carrying some soul backed effort, where some outward emotion is necessary. But Gemma sounds completely appropriate with her accompaniment here. Mostly a single guitar and the vocal echo chamber. It's clearly a distinctive eerie atmosphere, almost film music. To this point, check out the Mudhoney/Nirvana cover, "Touch Me, I'm Sick".

But if I'm not completely sold on these tracks, I'm sure I can revisit their original songwriters. "I'd Rather Be Your Enemy" has some drums thrown on it here, and sounds not unlike ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead. But more than that, it was well written and I went back to country singer's Lee Hazlewood's 1971 version and found a gem.

On the other hand, Buddy Holly's "Everyday" becomes morbid and therefore, lyrically ironic. It's a shitty and obvious way to cover a song, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was the impetus for this whole project. Because it is a successful effort, generally. But to take a ultimately happy song like this and turn it inside out just for the sake of doing so is weak. It's like when pop-punk bands cover '80s songs just to be douchey.

But that's a rarity on this record. It is mostly straight ahead mood music. Maybe you'll sit on your porch with rum runners and watch it rain. Or maybe you'll play while you make love to that guy who not-so-secretly hates you. Your tragedy becomes you. (3 of 5 stars)