Our fleeting weekend rituals will come and go, leaving us to simply keep on planning all tomorrow's parties (just ask Nico). Music, thankfully, isn't like that--it's always growing on itself, taking the best of yesterday and creating the exciting new songs that comprise All Tomorrow's Music.
Conor Oberst and M. Ward perform in 2007. Photo by Flickr user tammylo.
Today is a great day on the collaborations front. From right field, we have a fly ball we've been keeping our eye on for a long time--the much much much anticipated Monsters of Folk project (featuring buddies M. Ward, Conor Oberst, and Jim James) has finally released its first single. Then from way out in left field comes a gorgeous song by the two people who very well could be today's absolute master of ominous, murky rock music and the contemporary authority on bright pop, respectively--Bradford Cox (a.k.a. Atlas Sound, frontman of Deerhunter) and Noah Lennox (a.k.a. Panda Bear). Yes, this truly happened.
First, the Monsters of Folk release: M. Ward takes the lead on this one, titled "Say Please," and it finds him rocking harder than he has since "Requiem," from 2006's Post-War. It's nice to see that, despite the band's bearded-man-with-acoustic moniker, they're as Horse-crazy as Woods, if a bit less endearingly rough around the edges (but what did you really expect?). At its core, though, "Say Please" and its chimey guitar pulse lay bare that Ward weaned himself on the guitar by learning the chord changes to early-Beatles tunes. Monsters of Folk's eponymous is due on Sept. 22, via Shangri-La. Find the song here or download it from monstersoffolk.com.
The Atlas-Panda collab, "Walkabout," is a near-perfect yin-yang of Cox's dark and Lennox's light. The melody, vocal harmonies, and pop bounce are distinctly Panda's. The atmosphere evokes the snaking haze of cigarette smoke, marked by an indefinable, disconcerting dissonance--this is all Cox. This tune is an alloy, but it's pure gold. "Walkabout" will be track three on Atlas Sound's second album, Logos, due Oct. 20 on Kranky.
A while back, I spent some time comparing "Guys Eyes," from Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavillion, to the Beach Boys' "You Still Believe in Me," from Pet Sounds. It looks like somebody picked up on another similarity between "Guys Eyes" and a Beach Boys classic--this time, the link is even more inescapable. Check out this YouTube mash-up of "Guys Eyes" and "All I Wanna Do," from the largely forgotten gem, 1970's Sunflower.
Someone named Scott Karahadian seems to have had the idea, and after just one listen to the each individual tune, it's apparent why. The songs' opening lines are almost identical--and they're in the same key. Both bands go on to use characteristically lush vocals and sparse percussion; on "All I Wanna Do" the electric bass is what really keeps the pulse going, and the only consistent drumming comes from a lone snare.
The haunting similarities between Panda Bear and Brian Wilson aren't on display here, as Mike Love, Wilson's cohort turned nemesis, takes the lead vocals.
Sunset Rubdown have offered up a substantial aperitif to get us primed for their new album, Dragonslayer, due on June 23. The six-minute-long “Idiot Heart” is now available for free download. Just click here. On the idiot spectrum, it's way better than "American Idiot," not nearly as good as "Idiot Wind." But that really doesn't tell you much.
From this track’s very first moment, you know it’s Sunset Rubdown. There are those reverby electric guitar chords, distorted to the point of sounding like not just the strings but the guitar itself is made entirely of metal.
A second guitar starts spitting back, panned to the opposite side and full of a ’70s-esque, fuzzy distortion. The sound borders on Boston, which turns out to be prognostic: the entire song is pretty heavily produced for Sunset Rubdown. Some chimes join in, then a halting rhythm section and a spacey lead guitar, and we’re off.
The song reaches high, and it’s better off for it. The big problem with Random Spirit Lover, the group’s 2007 LP, was that it was full of songs that threatened to get stuck in your head but lost their adhesive as soon as they faded out. (Take “The Mending of the Gown,” for instance.) The album was also undisciplined, filled with wordy meanderings that made Sunset Rubdown too easy to write off as the back-alley open mic joint where frontman Spencer Krug went to recite the crap he’d written but wasn’t sure enough about to bring to his brightest buddies (that would be Wolf Parade). But in turning up the focus, Sunset Rubdown is also running the risk of losing its spark and sounding a touch too rehearsed.
If we’re lucky Dragonslayer will achieve the balance between grating and grabbing that the boys struck last time around on “The Courtesan Has Sung.”
Anti- is putting its money where Neko Case’s mouth is. And after her latest album sold a whopping 200,000 copies, they probably owe it to her.
Last month, the label mounted a fundraising drive for Best Friends Animal Society, pledging to donate $5 each time a blogger posted a link to the single from her forthcoming album, Middle Cyclone. Looks like I missed the boat on this one (the promotion ended on Feb. 3), but I can still offer you a free download of the tune, “People Got a Lotta Nerve.” And while I’m at it I’ll help Case plug her cause (check out the video above).
Case’s new, 15-track album is due out March 3, and if the single is any indication it will prove a very logical next step in her career. The animal-rights anthem “People Got a Lotta Nerve” shows off her signature, slick but beefy guitar sound – electric, slide, and acoustic all pitch in – and her vocals are as whirling and dynamic as her head of bright-red hair—or (forgive me) a cyclone.
One listen to either of her last two albums is indication enough of Case’s passion for animal rights. Titled The Tigers Have Spoken and Fox Confessor Brings the Flood, respectively, these records are replete with zoomorphic imagery and Case’s perfected blend of mysticism and naturalism.
What this fey concoction boils down to is stirringly existential and emotionally accessible. When Case sings about animals, her voice’s stern force and intermittent vulnerability make us see ourselves in the characters. Tigers’ title track, a condemnation of the practice of keeping animals in captivity, is especially arresting because if you take a few lines out it could pertain to the human condition. “In a field behind the cages / He walked in circles ’til he was crazy / And he lived that way forever / Just as long as he could remember / If he’d wanted to remember.”
To flop into the psychiatrist’s chair for a minute, Case’s personal history might account somewhat for her commiseration with subjugated animals—more specifically, her affinity for helping abandoned ones. After a childhood of splitting time between her divorced mother and father, both of whom she has described as ill prepared for parenthood, she lit off on her own at 15 for a drifting adolescence of drug use and playing in punk bands. But no matter what's behind it, this new album is sure to be worth our attention.
NPR recorded an hour-and-a-half-long Neko Case concert on April 9, 2006 at Washington, D.C.'s 9:30 Club. Click here to play the concert with a Real Media player, or click here to play it with a Windows Media player.
There will be no "Look Both Ways" installment this week; the newspaper that usually publishes it as a column at the beginning of each week did not print on Monday.
Conor Oberst and M. Ward perform in 2007. Photo by Flickr user tammylo.
