BASIA BULAT
Heart of My Own
When Basia Bulat released her first full-length, Oh, My Darling, in 2007, it was quite under the radar. Sure, it was released on legendary UK label Rough Trade and later on Hayden’s Hardwood Records in Canada, but it was unassuming (not unlike Bulat herself). It had, after all, been recorded primarily to serve as a souvenir of a moment in time—a record of the music being made among a small group of friends and family. The intervening years have brought a Polaris Prize nomination, trips around the folk festival circuit and lots of attention for this appealing singer-songwriter, who was transformed from English Literature grad student to indie folk darling. You’ll be pleased to learn, as I was, that Bulat has lost none of her charm with Heart of My Own. Her music is still deceptively delicate at times, building into crescendos of emotion and sound. The record has a more old-school folk feeling, with the autoharp front and centre on tracks like “The Shore” and “If It Rains.” The poetry of her lyrics is still straightforward enough to be accessible but not too simple as to descend into cliché. In short: this record affirms that the faith we placed in her, after falling in love with her debut release and her live performances, was well-given. (Secret City Records, www.secretcityrecords.com) Jenny Henkelman
Review: The Rockridge Brothers – Rockridge Hollerin’
THE ROCKRIDGE BROTHERS
Rockridge Hollerin’
Stockholm, Sweden is one of those cool and clean northern European cities that devote themselves to being cosmopolitan yet steeped in history. The Rockridge Brothers—Pontus, Peter, Ralf and Kristian—absolutely have got to be bluegrassiest band in all of Stockholm, and maybe even all of Sweden. The fact that these young fellers have glommed on to a fairly regionalized, American musical form is as admirable as it is abstract. From the fiddle-infested opening track “Rocky Island,” you know these guys are serious. Rockridge Hollerin’ is dyed-in-the-wool, down-home mountain music that finds men in matching black suits hunkered around a single microphone creating rootsy magic. Most of the tracks are pretty obscure covers and if you consider yourself an in-the-flesh, acoustic bluegrass music disciple, this album will get you to a-reelin’ and a-rockin’ mighty quick. Seventeen tracks, no waiting. (Red Rocking Records, www.rockridgebrothers.com) Jeff Monk
Review: Tara Jane O’Neil – A Ways Away
TARA JANE O’NEIL
A Ways Away
On her fifth album (and her first for K Records), the wonderful Tara Jane O’Neil gives further proof that she’s no ordinary singer-songwriter. Consciously soaked in reverb (the album fittingly closes with a song called “The Drowning Electric”), the tracks that make up A Ways Away are melancholic and spacious, meticulously arranged and completely absorbing. O’Neil has once again hit upon a beautiful balance of style and substance. A Ways Away’s 36 minutes of introspective haze, accented by delicate guitarwork and a slew of guests (including notables like Mirah, Osa Atoe and Ida), seems too short. With an album this good, it’s hard to pick out standout tracks. “Drowning” is a haunting song of loss, propelled forward with sparse rhythm and a sweeping electric bridge that falls like a curtain across the chorus. The aching “Howl” might have been the album’s centerpiece, had it not first appeared on 2004’s You Sound, Reflect; regardless, O’Neil gives it new life here, adding rhythm, strings, and stirring vocals. “Dig In,” the lead-off track, skates over the clatter of sleigh-bells, with O’Neil’s guitarlines escaping and returning to the song’s root chord again and again (later, “Pearl Into Sand” circles back and picks up the same theme). Her songs may be simple and familiar, but the reassuring A Ways Away sounds about as good as coming in from the cold. (K Records, www.krecs.com) Jonathan Dyck
Review: Reckless Kelly – Somewhere in Time
RECKLESS KELLY
Somewhere in Time
Austin, Texas-based roots rockers Reckless Kelly are performing songs by American singer/songwriter/relative-unknown Pinto Bennett, and doing a bang-up job. This album of a dozen honky-tonk, country carousers and moon-burned shuffles is likely going to be one of the more highly regarded albums of 2010, and it may even get the obscure Bennett a few more fans. Like a cross between Joe Ely and Billy Joe Shaver, Bennett writes songs about those that plug away through life’s emotional highs and lows to cut loose at some local watering hole on Saturday night. The album leads off with a couple of attention-getting rockers which set a tone that is immediately switched to the classic country sounds of “Bird on a Wire,” “I Hold the Bottle, You Hold the Wheel,” and the fiddle and steel driven “I’ve Done Everything I Could Do Wrong.” You’ll find it difficult to get this out of your head, and your music player… it’s just that good. Both Joe Ely and Pinto Bennett guest, making Somewhere in Time pretty much a modern classic of the form. (Yep Roc, www.yeproc.com) Jeff Monk
Review: The Beets – Spit in the Face of People Who Don’t Want You to Be Cool
THE BEETS
Spit in the Face of People Who Don’t Want You to Be Cool
My, my. What a fantastic album. Yeah, flipping through CDs you might think it looks absolutely retarded, with its long-ass title and pencil-crayoned wrestling figures of decades past. What could it be? Field recordings of a special-ed music class pressed up for door-to-door fundraising? As cool as that would’ve been, you get something even cooler if you pick this album up. The Beets play pop music. Kinda like the Beatles. Yeah, those Beatles. The songs are catchy as hell and they all sing together. Yeah, they might sound a little drunk, but at least they’re in tune. From the start, the combination of the gang vocals and the simple, repeated melodies catch on and you’ll. And holy reverb—the Beets sound like they were recorded at the bottom of a giant plastic bucket. The Beets are like a mulch of Sic Alps/Galaxie 500/Beach Boys (yum!), some of the better stuff that’s coming out of this nouveau lo-fi movement. (Captured Tracks, www.capturedtracks.com) Patrick Michalishyn
Review: On Fillmore – Extended Vacation
ON FILLMORE
Extended Vacation
Originally hand-picked to back Jim O’Rourke on his 1999 album, Eureka, bassist Darin Gray and percussionist Glenn Kotche first conceptualized On Fillmore while on tour with O’Rourke in 2000. Since then, they’ve released three albums together. Their fourth, Extended Vacation, has taken three years of hard work and bits of time stolen from their other musical endeavors (Kotche is a member of Wilco and both have various solo projects). Extended Vacation’s particular take on sound collage is composed of field recordings, stand up bass, vibraphone, and a diverse collection of percussive sounds. The result is a spacious, at times tedious, collection of enchanting mid-tempo compositions reminiscent of Michael Andrews’ work on the Donnie Darko soundtrack. In other words, the vibraphone dominates things quite a bit. “Complications” and “Off the Path” sound authentically liminal and eerie, while “Day Dreaming So Early” (like the majority of tracks on this album) seems to be overrun by occasionally obnoxious bird sounds. Bird enthusiasts take note, this is your post-rock soundtrack. (Dead Oceans, www.deadoceans.com) Jonathan Dyck
Review: Molina and Johnson
MOLINA AND JOHNSON
Molina and Johnson
Collaborations like this always sound good in theory. Both great artists in their own right—Will Johnson, the largely unsung helmsman of Centro-Matic and South San Gabriel, and Jason Molina, the well-seasoned songwriter behind Songs: Ohia and Magnolia Electric Co.—Molina and Johnson should be an exercise in one-upmanship, a chance to push and be pushed. There are some worthy songs here and it’s hard not be intrigued with such a beautiful album cover. But apart from Johnson’s wistful “All Gone, All Gone” with Sarah Jaffe, the death-rattle duet of “Now, Divide,” and the duo’s most developed effort, “Almost Let You In,” the album is chock full of old fashioned molasses. Especially after the half-way point, it takes real effort to stay interested in the fractured piano/guitar template and the particularly unmemorable solos of “Lenore’s Lullaby” and “Each Star Marks A Day.” If Molina and Johnson took the time to explore some of the differences and dynamics between their respective approaches, this could have been an interesting record. Instead, echoing Johnson’s words, it sounds like these boys are “just passing through.” (Secretly Canadian, www.secretlycanadian.com) Jonathan Dyck
Review: Dave Rawlings Machine – A Friend of a Friend
DAVE RAWLINGS MACHINE
A Friend of a Friend
Who can count Ryan Adams, Gillian Welch and Conor “Bright Eyes” Oberst as their close personal friends? Guitarist/songwriter Dave Rawlings can, and for his latest incarnation as Dave Rawlings Machine, there is more than enough confirmation that Rawlings has adopted a little of each of these artists’ good and bad traits. His unfortunately reed-thin voice will appeal directly to those who love Oberst’s similarly pallid ramblings. Either ol’ Dave seems to long for a simpler time, if his lyrics are to be believed, or he has discerned that today’s roots music consumer wants exactly this kind of lackadaisical, meandering bilge. Dave is a pretty hot guitar picker, but when he misses a few notes pretty obviously here and there, it just adds to the overall rustic feeling. Gillian Welch adds her squeaky little mewl in the right places, making these nine tracks as authentic as the next album of this type which will doubtlessly be released all too soon. (Acony Records, www.aconyrecords.com) Jeff Monk
Review: Beach House – Teen Dream
BEACH HOUSE
Teen Dream
Anyone from the outside looking in is going to say that Beach House’s third album Teen Dream sounds exactly like their first two. Haters gonna hate. The Baltimore duo have limited means for their live show (an organ, one Strat, a drum machine, and Victoria Legrand’s kickass voice) but they do wonders to create heartbreaking maxims that don’t get worn out in the song’s length of three to six minutes. The chorus of “Walk in the Park” wilts quite nicely: “In a matter of time / It will slip from my mind / In and out of my life / You would slip from my mind / In a matter of time.” Beach House are still making swaying songs with revelations about relationships that are as full of hope as they are of concessions. These songs are mature, lacking a naïve charm to be the thoughts of teenagers, but again, haters gonna hate. (Sub Pop, www.beachhousebaltimore.com) Taylor Burgess
Review: Le Loup – Family
LE LOUP
Family
The second album by Washington, D.C. septet Le Loup is a far more organic, natural sounding record, than 2007’s synth-heavy album. Family is arguably just as hypnotic and vast as its predecessor, but fills its space with grandiose arrangements and psychedelic pop rather than electronic punctuation. It’s a sound that can be easily likened to Animal Collective, Fleet Foxes, and Sufjan Stevens all at once. Yet the band manages to blend these influences into a cohesive whole so effortlessly that they end up carving out a niche that is distinctly their own. The Animal Collective influence will be most apparent to listeners, as many of the tracks hold the same temperamental weirdness that Avey Tare and co. made famous. “Beach Town,” one of the strongest numbers on Family, starts with an infectious bass grove, quickly overlaying a clattering of percussion in a droning haze. By the time the guitars are introduced, more than halfway through the track, the band has already hit a soaring stride. It’s in these moments that Le Loup shows immense strength as a songwriting collective, and they do so again and again throughout the album’s run. The carefully crafted, diverse, and interlocking sounds painted by the numerous band members come together naturally, much like a family ought to. (Hardly Art, www.hardlyart.com) Kevan Hannah