Drew Tewksbury: Multimedia Journalist » Album Reviews http://drewtewksbury.com A cornucopia of Drew Tewksbury's print, broadcast, and online content Fri, 09 Apr 2010 07:52:13 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.3 en Yeasayer and Warpaint Besiege the Natural History Museum http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/02/11/yeasayer-and-warpaint-besiege-the-natural-history-museum/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/02/11/yeasayer-and-warpaint-besiege-the-natural-history-museum/#comments Thu, 11 Feb 2010 08:23:47 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/02/11/yeasayer-and-warpaint-besiege-the-natural-history-museum/
  • The Mountain Goats
  • Concert Review: The Horrors
  • Death - …For the Whole World to See
    • ]]>     Yeasayer at the LA National History Museum 2.7.10 by Timothy Norris

    A show is never just a show in Los Angeles. It’s a plague, or a slow-burning forest fire creeping across the city days before a performance takes place. It starts as hype metastasizing across online social networks and water cooler conversations, then becomes a scramble for tickets, followed by a wait in line, wallowing with others mired with doubt: “Are we going to get in?” The emails, tweets, and texts started days before: “You going to Yeasayer?” The main event will own the stage for a fraction of the time spent thinking about, planning, and traveling to the concert, so this better be worth it. But for every hoop you jump through to see a performance at the Natural History Museum, like Friday’s Yeasayer and Warpaint, fortune favors the brave.

    First Fridays at the Natural History Museum has become one of those distinctly L.A. events that defines a season. Coachella ushers the end of Spring. Summer starts when the Hollywood Bowl opens and revival films begin in the cemetery. But winter belongs to the Natural History Museum. Amid Friday’s rain and cold, the Museum was was cozy and intimate. For those lucky to get in (the show sold out quickly), this second installment of First Fridays was a fine time to gather with your closest corpses (living and taxidermied).

    L.A.’s own Warpaint enveloped the audience with the driving rhythms of their ethereal and full-bodied rock. Dual singers and guitar players Emily Kokal and Theresa Wayman traded chugging strums and soaring vocals. Kokal, the blonde on stage right, emitted a voice powerful and aching, sometimes warbling or slow-climbing. On “Elephants” Wayman quickly finger-picked crystalline arpeggios, clearing the way for Kokal to lonesomely sing, “I’ll break your heart,” while thick bass of Jenny Lee Lindberg, and Stella Mozgawa’s killer drumming lit the flames that propelled Warpaint as precisely interlocked machine.

    With their straight-forward set up, just guitars, bass, and drums, Warpaint refreshingly created rock that wasn’t poppy, but still swarmed with hooks that dug deep to the heart. Enrapturing and evocative, their airy and slightly foreboding sound opened doors to introspective spaces far away from the stuffed marmots and caribou of the North American Mammal hall. Ending with their stripped down Sonic Youth-sans-noise, “Krimson,” Warpaint redefined the way rock is written, and written about. Their guitar playing isn’t cocksure, and the bass isn’t ballsy. They don’t swagger or strut. They rock but aren’t rock stars. And they aren’t just an all female band, whose prowess is defined by their sex. They’re not a riot grrls, a chick band, or Lillith Fair fodder. Warpaint is a distinct rock band whose songs stand on their own. They do not exist in comparison to male bands, or as a minority in the rock world. They are what they are. So music writers, let’s take an oath.

    I, (state your name), do solemnly swear, that as a music writer, I will forever refrain from calling a musical act made up of women a “girl band.” I will stop highlighting women who play guitars as oddities, or note that a female drummer is good “for a girl.” Let’s not marvel in their ability to rock, as though it were lightning unable to strike the same spot twice.

    Let’s grow up.

    Signed, (Your Neighborhood Music Writer)

    As for Yeasayer, they’ve grown up a lot since they piqued indie media interest in 2007. Their often reported arrogant demeanor and navel-gazing experimentalism has fallen away, as they fine tuned their multi-genre mixing into a more streamlined unit. The five piece filled the stage with keyboards, drums, guitars, and even cowbell on a podium. The Brooklynites served up a dancey set, infused with electonic beats, organic instrumentation, with Chris Keating leading the sonic circus on vocals. The heavy bass of Ira Wolf Tuton, who was dressed in a wifebeater (we should stop using this term too, right?) while sporting some sort of midieval hair cut, rumbled and popped.

    Shifting from dubby fretless bass to rafter-quaking synth bass, Tuton held the band together, whose disparate elements (and egos) led them astray in the past. Now, on the eve of their new record release, Yeasayer shows the same focus that appears on the forthcoming “Odd Blood.” The rhythm heavy “Ambling Amp,” provides a lighthearted bounce, and the Arcade Fire-ish “I Remember” centers around an ascending piano line and falsetto vocals. They also gave some crowd favorites including their swaying single, “Tightrope.” For a band that was subsumed in so much hype, they have apparently learned to not take themselves so seriously. Brooklyn can be insular, but the world is not. So as Yeasayer forges on into more inclusive direction, making more music to dance to, we say to Yeasayer:

    Welcome to the world.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from LA Weekly’s West Coast Sound Blog Feb 8th, 2010

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    2. Concert Review: The Horrors
    3. Death - …For the Whole World to See

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/02/11/yeasayer-and-warpaint-besiege-the-natural-history-museum/feed/     Cold War Kids’ Lukewarm Friday Night at the Wiltern http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/01/25/cold-war-kids-lukewarm-friday-night-at-the-wiltern/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/01/25/cold-war-kids-lukewarm-friday-night-at-the-wiltern/#comments Tue, 26 Jan 2010 06:30:36 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/01/25/cold-war-kids-lukewarm-friday-night-at-the-wiltern/
  • In Sounds from the Far Out: Riding with Night Horse, Spindrift, and Tee Pee Records
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  • The Stranglers’ Hugh Cornwell Gets a Grip
    • ]]>     View more photos in Timothy Norris’ “Cold Ward Kids @ Wiltern” slideshow.

    ColdWarKidsTN022.jpg
    Timothy Norris

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    It all started with a WTF moment.

    The stage lights set the Wiltern aglow in a lavender haze, four video screens blasted ambient images, but the Cold War Kids were nowhere to be seen. It wasn’t one of those Sun 0))) moments, where mystique was the goal, instead technical problems made the Cold War Kids begin with a hiccup. Trudging on through the false start, Long Beach’s finest (sorry, Sublime), rolled out a relatively reserved show for a band who used to really rock it.

    If we set the Wayback Machine to 2007, we’d see the Cold War Kids owning the stage, Nathan Willet leading his bandmates in sweat-drenched, flailing homages to Bijou porch-stompers. But four years later the Cold War kids have cooled off a little.

    (Same Venue in 2007, same band though?)

    Their self-described brand of soul-punk, has evolved lately, largely leaving both soul and punk by the wayside. Willet’s pipes still are the finest in rock when it comes to lung-busting crooners, but the new material feels a little “Top 40″ and mainstream. Maybe that’s their goal. There’s nothing wrong with getting big. But can they still rock by taking it down a notch?

    They debuted the piano heavy, “Audience,” singing an ode to an “audience of one.” The Wiltern’s audience swayed and chatted over drinks, but only got semi-raucous when The Cold War Kids dropped their phenomenal anthem, “Hang Me Up to Dry.” The song from their 2006 album Robbers and Cowards, still has the power to move. The simple bass riff interlocks with the drums, laying down solid foundation for Nathan Willett’s howling voice that could raise a congregation’s hands to the rafters, or to God, or to whatever.

    When Willet pleaded for a death row pardon during “St. John,” the sense of urgency, and passion dripped with the swagger of classic Cold War Kids. With a jammy cover of “Long As I Can See The Light,” by Creedence Clearwater Revival, they gave another shout out to the songs of the South. But the South Bay residents have largely abandoned their swaggering, backyard sing-a-longs, for more streamlined pop-rock sound. Cold War Kids aren’t becoming Coldplay, yet, but they are definitely growing up.

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    2. Punk ‘77 by James Stark
    3. The Stranglers’ Hugh Cornwell Gets a Grip

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2010/01/25/cold-war-kids-lukewarm-friday-night-at-the-wiltern/feed/     Yahowa 13 - Magnificence of Memory http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/07/01/yahowa-13-magnificence-of-memory/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/07/01/yahowa-13-magnificence-of-memory/#comments Thu, 02 Jul 2009 03:33:33 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/07/01/yahowa-13-magnificence-of-memory/
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    • ]]>     dc393mini.jpgI know you and in slumber/I’ve got your number/And it’s written on your forehead.” Such is the offering in “Camp of the Gypsies,” from the spiritual consciousness cosmonauts-cum-psych-rockers Yahowa 13. The intraneural exploration by Yahowa 13 began in the 1970s when members of the Source Family—a psychedelic commune in the Hollywood Hills— formed the musical group with their leader Father Yod at the helm. When Yod died in 1975, they disbanded, but in 2007, original members Djin Aquarian, Octavius Aquarian, and Sunflower Aquarian began touring again. On Magnificence in the Memory, Yahowa 13 returns to the manic world of bizarre rock first populated by Can and Captain Beefheart. The album resuscitates the otherworldly jams and chants that makes Yahowa 13 a mindbending pleasure whether you’re tuning in or dropping out.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Univeralis Column for Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 2009

    View the printable PDF from Flaunt magazine

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/07/01/yahowa-13-magnificence-of-memory/feed/     Foreign Born - Person to Person http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/foreign-born-person-to-person/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/foreign-born-person-to-person/#comments Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:45:54 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/foreign-born-person-to-person/
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    • ]]>     Foreign Born - Person to Person

    Foreign Born’s music, as their name implies, travels. On Person to Person, the band takes musical traditions from around the world, wraps them up in indie-pop, and delivers them neatly packaged as extremely catchy summer songs. We’re taken to the new orleans bayous, south African townships, and the beaches of Lagos. The stomp and sway of zydeco seeps into “Winter games,” as singer Matt Popieluch’s wavering, laid-back voice plays with cowbells and handclaps. The tip-toeing of the ebullient guitars of “Early Warnings” evoke the South African rhythms that made their way into Paul Simon’s Sub-Saharan infused, Graceland. But Person to Person does not simply glean these cultural influences, instead Foreign Born interprets them through a filter of rock and roll. “Vacationing People,” takes Brit poppy rhythms, interweaves Caribbean guitar lines, and culminates in a brass band closing out the song in a slow march. sunny, but never sappy, Person to Person provides a vacation from ennui-filled, mope rock.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Univeralis Column for Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 2009

    View the printable PDF from Flaunt magazine

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/foreign-born-person-to-person/feed/     Isis- Wavering Radiant http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/isis-wavering-radiant/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/isis-wavering-radiant/#comments Sat, 13 Jun 2009 16:42:21 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/isis-wavering-radiant/
  • Foreign Born - Person to Person
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    • ]]>     http://www.8raita.fi/shop/images/isis_-_wavering_radiant_0903_76a.jpg

    M
    etalheads employ the finest tools of musical vivisection. They carefully dissect a song, examine its parts, then catalogue it using what logicians call a material conditional. Example: If a vocalist mimics vomiting over blastbeats, then it qualifies as grindcore. If the vocalist barfs about eating human flesh, then it’s goregrind. But the system breaks down with Isis, the prog-metal band whose melodic, slowly burning musical movements swell into symphonies of combustion. On Wavering Radiant, the band continues to test the auspices of what constitutes metal. Their previous effort, In the Absence of Truth, explored the more melodic side of rock, relying on intricate guitar play and airy drum lines. Wavering Radiant takes the melodic guitar work that has defined Isis for the last decade and lays it over more traditionally metal beats. The double-bass kicks are back, but the album still explores the introspective spaces that makes the band more akin to Massive Attack and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. The eight-and-a-half-minute anthem “Ghost Key,” begins only with softly rolling drums, crispy minimalist guitar, and bass that wouldn’t stand out in a new wave song. Then the weight of vocalist Aaron Turner’s gruff barks and tsunami guitar washes away the simple intro with extreme heaviness. Like most Isis songs, “Ghost Key” alternates between these moments of quiet and clamor, buttressing order upon disorder, and amplifying each when shored upon one another. Isis could be a much more accessible band if Turner abandoned the guttural screams, but if he did, Isis may cease being metal. Metal fans, after all, tend to want to be on the fringe enjoying a genre that is, by nature, inaccessible to some people. still, Isis continues their practice of hard-edged music that is inclusive and undeniably interesting.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Univeralis Column for Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 2009

    View the printable PDF from Flaunt magazine

     

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/06/13/isis-wavering-radiant/feed/     P.J. Harvey & John Parish - A Woman a Man Walked By http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/pj-harvey-john-parish-a-woman-a-man-walked-by/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/pj-harvey-john-parish-a-woman-a-man-walked-by/#comments Thu, 07 May 2009 21:57:58 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/pj-harvey-john-parish-a-woman-a-man-walked-by/ , Harvey has stomped headfirst into the cock-heavy world of rock ’n’ roll. Related posts:
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    ]]>     http://blogs.denverpost.com/reverb/wp-content/photos/pj.jpgPolly Jean Harvey has carved out a lot of dark spaces on her albums. From the evocative and harsh Riot Grrl-ish lashings of her early-to-mid ’90s works Dry and To Bring You My Love, Harvey has stomped headfirst into the cock-heavy world of rock ’n’ roll. On A Woman A Man Walked By, she teams up with producer and innovative guitarist John Parish, a frequent collaborator. Where the album really succeeds is on “The Soldier,” a delicate whisper of a song built around simple guitar strums and lonesome piano tinkling. Parish’s guitar work is as distinctive as Harvey’s voice; at times it’s reverbed out and beautiful, while at other moments it’s coarse and weathered. “Sixteen, Fifteen, Fourteen” showcases Parish’s eclectic approach to the acoustic guitar, wherein notes that would normally sound off-key or odd fit right into his barroom-meets back-porch-style playing. The languish of Harvey’s vocals on “Chair” coupled with Parish’s dissonant electric-guitar assaults makes for an interesting rocker. A Woman A Man Walked By sheds a little light on Harvey’s enshrouded realms, making for a more relaxed and fun listen that doesn’t lose its edge to levity.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Universalis column in Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 May 2009

    View a PDF tearsheet of this review
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    For Your Perusal:

    Related posts:

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/pj-harvey-john-parish-a-woman-a-man-walked-by/feed/     Black Math Horseman - Wyllt http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/black-math-horseman-wyllt/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/black-math-horseman-wyllt/#comments Thu, 07 May 2009 21:42:41 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/black-math-horseman-wyllt/
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    • ]]>     Black Math HorsemanApocalyptic visions have never sounded as alluring as on Black Math Horseman’s debut album, Wyllt. With serpentine slide guitar crawling behind the heavy melodies, Wyllt is a slow burn of rock that swells into a heavy bombast. Imagine Godspeed You! Black Emperor with delicate, droning female vocals. Yet Black Math Horseman differentiates themselves from the relatively recent swell of stoner rockers by making selective omissions. Dispensing with the guitar solos that push psych-rock into musical masturbation, Black Math Horseman focuses on creating sonic landscapes that move with the ominous and foreboding beauty of a glacier. Gone are the guitar harmonies and acoustic interludes that have crept into much of the heavy rock circuit; in its place come mood and movement, as the band’s delectably gloomy slow-core seeps like oil into the ocean.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Universalis column in Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 May 2009

    View a PDF tearsheet of this review
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    For Your Perusal:

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/black-math-horseman-wyllt/feed/     Moderat - S/T http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/moderat-st/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/moderat-st/#comments Thu, 07 May 2009 21:16:42 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/moderat-st/
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    • ]]>     ModeratHybrids can be monsters, but collaborations can be masterful. Such is the case for Moderat, the collaboration between electroheavyweights Modeselektor and Apparat. Released seven years after Moderat’s first EP, the group’s self-titled album is essentially a dance club, each track a different room of some industrial East German warehouse: the trance room (“Seamonkey”); a chill-out Eurolounge (“Out of Sight”); electo-rock back alley (“Porc#1,” an intersecting point possibly forged from Modeselektor’s 2008 tour with Radiohead). Moderat tips a glow stick at smarty-tronic dance scenesters Aphex Twin and Leftfield, but never flows too far into the glitchy Tourettes-core stop and start of IDM. The sauntering swing of “A New Error” provides the perfect bass-heavy invocation for a head nod or a floor stomp. Recorded at Berlin’s Hansa Studios (where David Bowie recorded Heroes), Moderat is the marriage of two musical worlds fused together along with the precision of digital and the warmth of analog.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Universalis column in Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 May 2009

    View a PDF tearsheet of this review
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    For Your Perusal:

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/moderat-st/feed/     Dirty Projectors - Bitte Orca http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/dirty-projectors-bitte-orca/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/dirty-projectors-bitte-orca/#comments Thu, 07 May 2009 15:00:01 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/dirty-projectors-bitte-orca/
  • Dirty Found Magazine
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    • ]]>     dirty-projectors-coverart.jpgWith stutter-stepping jazzy vocal and guitar cadences over moments of face-searing rockouts, Dirty Projectors’s latest full-length effort, Bitte Orca, ticks like a broken clock. “Useful Chamber” epitomizes the mad genius of bandleader, guitarist, and vocalist Dave Longstreth, as the song meanders from psychedelic hip-hop to avant-stoner rock. Captain Beefheart be damned, Longstreth keeps the experimental interesting while keeping the toes tapping. Where Longstreth takes you in a song is unpredictable— through forests of strings and valleys of distorted bass guitar, or, what is that? It might just be the sound of schoolgirls in a feather fight, or maybe it’s Angel Deradoorian, who drops the bass to blast out the groovy jam “Stillness Is the Move.” Singing over layered backing vocals, Deradoorian is the Mariah Carey of the indie world; her voice could break glass or melt butter. She, like Longstreth, practices melisma, the act of extending a sung syllable over several notes. This technique doesn’t often find its way into rock—it usually finds a home in Middle Eastern pop songs, African- American gospel, and opera—yet it earnestly defines the quartet as truly unique in the indie-rock scene. For some it may be too much, but for a new take on what prescribes indie-ness, innovation, risk-taking, and accessibility, Dirty Projectors definitely cover all the bases.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Musica Universalis column in Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 May 2009

    View a PDF tearsheet of this review
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    For Your Perusal:

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/05/07/dirty-projectors-bitte-orca/feed/     Local Customs: Downriver Revival http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/local-customs-downriver-revival/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/local-customs-downriver-revival/#comments Tue, 14 Apr 2009 01:05:18 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/local-customs-downriver-revival/
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    • ]]>     Numero GroupIf a town had a voice and an imagination, what would it sound like? In the industrial town of Ecorse, Michigan, a man named Felton Williams found out. From 1967 to 1981, Williams’ basement was nearly the Capitol Records of this struggling Michigan town. He recorded virtually everyone there, from aspiring soul stars and gospel crooners, to rockers and pedal steel guitar tutorials. Behind the mics in William’s basement, anyone could be a star, if not just for a moment. Locked away for nearly 40 years, the Numero Group has caught hold of these never before heard recordings on Downriver Revival, an extremely evocative listen to Williams’ collection of local talents. Williams’ recordings showcase the double lives that hid in the troubled town of Ecorse; where a church secretary could wail out the blues at night, or a mechanic’s hands could crawl across the keys of a Hammond B-3 organ.

    The Young Generation’s “Running Mod,” brings the best of mod-era protopunk to this small Michigan town. Bobby Cook & the Explosions pour out smooth funk. Shirley Ann Lee emerges as the star, on her home-produced radio show, which showcases her soulful, and slightly pained, gospel serenade. Accompanying the album is a documentary DVD that walks the streets of Ecorse and an interactive digital tape archive that opens over up William’s archive with 200 sound clips. For aficionados of found sound and forgotten recordings, Downriver Revival isn’t just an interesting listen; it is a catalogue of the sound of a town and an audioportrait of everyday people’s dreams and escapes.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 2009

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    For Your Perusal:

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/local-customs-downriver-revival/feed/     Two Fingers - S/T http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/two-fingers-st/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/two-fingers-st/#comments Tue, 14 Apr 2009 00:49:18 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/two-fingers-st/
  • Fussible from Nortec Collective
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    • ]]>     Two FingersHip hop has seldom celebrated the spirit of Trans-Atlanticism, but Two Fingers’ self-titled album dredges up dark and international flavors for an album that is an island between cultures. Two Fingers takes on the template of late 90’s era electronica (primarily drum ‘n’ bass and trip hop) and cross-pollinates it with hip hop aesthetic, creating a sonic middle ground palatable to enthusiasts of either genre. The beats are an international affair, served up by Amon Tobin, the Brazilian legendary drum ‘n’ bass and trip hop innovator and Joe “Doubleclick” Chapman. The deep fuzzy bass and driving beats (Electronica geeks may call it a bit “aggro”) feature the rapid-fire flow of North Londoner Sway and the lazy raps of Missy protégé Ms Jade. Sway’s Cockney drenched word bullets fly on “That Girl,” a big drummed jam that’d gives “Bombs Over Baghdad,” a run for it’s frenetic money. The album creates a new sound for English rap, which breaks from a streak of bad luck in the States. The unpopularity of U.K rap in America has less to do with the choppy Cocky accents and undecipherable cultural references (Sowf Londo’ digs on the “woop-woop” don’t help either), as it does beat incongruity. English rap and American hip hop evolved in distinctly different environments; whereas American hip hop takes cues (and most of its samples) from soul and funk songs, English hip hop derives its influence from dub, dancehall, and early techno. Drop an American hip hopper into a Brixton club and immediately watch the Septic (rhyming Cockney for Yank) become the water in the oil. The beats just don’t make sense. Most Americans dance on “on the one,” (just ask James Brown) so when dub and English rap drop on the fourth beat, American asses cease movement. But Two Fingers’ rumbling debut gets asses shaking for East End birds ‘n’ blokes and homies in the Westside Connection.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 2008

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    For Your Perusal:

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    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/two-fingers-st/feed/     Crystal Antlers - Tentacles http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/crystal-antlers-tentacles/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/crystal-antlers-tentacles/#comments Tue, 14 Apr 2009 00:34:18 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/crystal-antlers-tentacles/
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  • Interview: Voxhaul Broadcast
    • ]]>     Crystal AntlersIt’s easy to get lost in the mix. With Crystal Antler’s searing drums and soaring organ on their debut Tentacles, it would be easy for singer and bassist Johnny Bell’s voice to drown in the whirlpool of psychedelic rhythms. But it is this competition for space that makes Bell’s voice so unique. His voice reaches up over the tumultuous psychedelic sound soup with a strained yell (not a scream, by any means) burgeoning with an urgency and a plea to be heard. Even though the gentlemen hail from the musically-rich industrial wasteland of Long Beach (home to one of the largest ports in the world), Crystal Antlers spout out a Los Angeles-sound circa 1965 and 1977.

    Tentacles is a conversation between soul of The Doors and grime of The Germs, and no more is this evident than on “Dust,” the organ-driven rocker. The prog-infused “Your Spears” shifts from a poppy post-apocalyptic game show theme (C’mon doooown), to a swaggering soul-filled chorus, a tactic oft used by Morrison and the gang. But Crystal Antlers is not just a musical rerun; they push LA rock into a new direction that celebrates the soul and the clamor of four decades of Southern California sound.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 103 2009

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    For Your Perusal:

    Related posts:

    1. Local Customs: Downriver Revival
    2. Darker My Love - 2
    3. Interview: Voxhaul Broadcast

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/04/13/crystal-antlers-tentacles/feed/     Amadou et Mariam - Welcome to Mali http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/amadou-et-mariam-welcome-to-mali/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/amadou-et-mariam-welcome-to-mali/#comments Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:54:34 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/amadou-et-mariam-welcome-to-mali/
  • Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump
  • Télépathique - Last Time on Earth
  • These Are Powers - All Aboard Future
    • ]]>     amadou et Mariam - Welcome to Mali
    Amadou Bagayoko and Mariam Doumbia live in a world where sound is everything. They met as teenagers at the Institute for the Young Blind in the West African nation of Mali, where Doumbia cultivated her blithe, songbird voice and Bagayoko developed his playful guitar plucking. They fell in love soon after, and, in 1980, they married and became known as “the blind couple from Mali.” Now, with Welcome to Mali, Bagayoko and Doumbia’s poppy African rhythms are infused with an electro-pop aesthetic that eschews expectations of music from the duo’s home continent. The track “Sabali” is produced by Damon Albarn, former Blur frontman and Gorillaz mastermind, who gently lays Doumbia’s wafting vocals adrift over synthy keyboard arpeggios and a subtly pulsing kick drum. Unlike Albarn’s Gorillaz project, Bagayoko and Doumbia lack kitschiness and, instead, capture a feeling absent from many releases in the early 2000s: genuineness. Their last album received the professional treatment from Latin superstar producer Manu Chao, and Welcome to Mali serves more of the funk soup that Chao whipped up on that record. Mixing irresistibly dance-y West African instrumentation and up- tempo dub with subtle electro, Welcome to Mali is the hub of many disparate musical styles. But every single song moves and quakes with near-flawless construction. On “Magossa,” Bagayoko’s guitar strums play against the stutter-stepping bass and dance with a delicate, floating flute line. Welcome to Mali repackages African music for the twenty-first century—and for an audience that sees the limitless possibilities and interplay of a global culture. Bagayoko and Doumbia have the vision.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 102 2009

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    For Your Perusal:



    Printable PDF from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump
    2. Télépathique - Last Time on Earth
    3. These Are Powers - All Aboard Future

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/amadou-et-mariam-welcome-to-mali/feed/     Death - …For the Whole World to See http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/death-for-the-whole-world-to-see/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/death-for-the-whole-world-to-see/#comments Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:39:42 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/death-for-the-whole-world-to-see/
  • The Stranglers’ Hugh Cornwell Gets a Grip
  • Calexico - Carried to Dust
  • Cold War Kids’ Lukewarm Friday Night at the Wiltern
    • ]]>     Death - For the whole world to seeIn 1971, brothers David, Bobby, and Dannis Hackney cooked up Death in their Detroit garage. Little did they know that more than three decades later, their efforts would become the stuff of music lore. Death’s album, set for release thirty-eight years after the band’s birth, is now a must-have for proto-punk enthusiasts. (For the metalhead who is accidentally reading this magazine while using a few pages to wipe up spilled bong water: No, this is not the Floridian band started by the father of death metal, Chuck Schuldiner.) As African-American garage rockers (“punk” wasn’t a musical phylum until years later), the Hackney brothers were ahead of their time. Their music—original and raw with socially conscious lyrics—stands miles apart from the sound of Detroit’s Motown explosion. Funkadelic producer Don Davis recorded …For the Whole World to See in 1974 and captured Death’s hard-groove sound—some of it siphoned from Detroit’s own MC5. Soon Clive Davis, head honcho of Columbia Records from 1967 to 1973, wanted to sign the band, but only if they changed the name. The Hackneys refused, broke up the band, and moved to Vermont (how punk!). Bobby and Dannis would go on to form the reggae band Lambsbread. The story of Death would have ended here, but their anachronistic, punk-ish sound has piqued the interest of record collectors dredging the Internet for rare recordings of a few songs from the band. Death’s bass-heavy “Politicians in My Eyes” grooves with the speed of Bad Brains, but came out years before the oft-cited black punk progenitors. Indie label Drag City now presents a first listen to Death’s visionary album and offers the band’s hyperkinetic, drum-driven freak rock as the perfect catalyst to rock faces in your grandmama’s romper room and kick your cat right in the whiskers.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 102 2009

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    For Your Perusal:

    Read about Death in the NY Times

    Printable PDF from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. The Stranglers’ Hugh Cornwell Gets a Grip
    2. Calexico - Carried to Dust
    3. Cold War Kids’ Lukewarm Friday Night at the Wiltern

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/death-for-the-whole-world-to-see/feed/     These Are Powers - All Aboard Future http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/these-are-powers-all-aboard-future/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/these-are-powers-all-aboard-future/#comments Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:17:45 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/these-are-powers-all-aboard-future/
  • Clipd Beaks: Hoarse Lords
  • Juana Molina- Un Día
  • Dälek - Gutter Tactics
    • ]]>     These Are Powers - All Aboard Future
    If the avant-garde is dead, then These Are Powers plays in its graveyard. These ghostly dancescapes, although not exactly avant-garde, certainly toe the line of experimentalism, if the term actually means anything anymore. After all, “experimental” music (as many bands choose to label their sounds on MySpace) is a nebulous catchall for music that breaks convention or involves supposed never-before-heard sounds. These Are Powers employs both tactics; but it’s all too easy to lump the band in with the (comparatively) newly recognized “experimental” bands Fuck Buttons, Wolf Eyes, and countless other sound torturers from Brooklyn. Instead, These Are Powers ground the electronic manipulations and guitar groans with (mostly) steady sub-bass lines, making evocative dance music that is equally introspective and head-nod worthy. All Aboard Future is not just something you throw on while cooking buckwheat pancakes.The subtle industrial drum thumps push the consciousness into tribal territory. And yes, that means this is mind-bending music. “Adam’s Turtle” mixes atmospheric mutations of eyeball-headed experimentalists The Residents with a sparse, glitch-hop beat. The eerie toy-piano tinklings of “Sand Tassels” and the haunting lyrics “there are waves blowing up against my window”  swirl in a murky aural tide pool. If  These Are Powers could even have a single, “Easy Answers” would be it. The tribal sub-bass pulsates over mangled melody as singer Anna Barie’s swaggering vocals channel P J Harvey: “Don’t you forget about  me baby, ’cause I ain’t forget about you, you, you.” Don’t worry, Anna.  You’re entirely unforgettable.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 102 2009

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    For Your Perusal:


    Printable PDF from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. Clipd Beaks: Hoarse Lords
    2. Juana Molina- Un Día
    3. Dälek - Gutter Tactics

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/these-are-powers-all-aboard-future/feed/     Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/animal-collective-merriweather-post-pavilion/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/animal-collective-merriweather-post-pavilion/#comments Wed, 25 Mar 2009 17:45:37 +0000 admin http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/animal-collective-merriweather-post-pavilion/
  • Fussible from Nortec Collective
  • Portugal. The Man - Censored Colors
  • Suicide - Live 1977 - 1978
    • ]]>     Merriweather Post Pavilion - Animal CollectiveAn Animal Collective album usually takes some time. Call your secretary, cancel your afternoon meetings. Take a rain check for that dinner date, tell your girl you’re staying in. Animal Collective albums hijack your life. But on Merriweather Post Pavilion the collective offers its most accessible release to date. The bouncing beats of “My Girls” melt into nursery-rhyme vocals that coalesce in a transcendent chorus complete with handclaps. It’s a hipster religious revival, certain to be engorged with hyperbole spouted by museo-geeks everywhere. But don’t worry about being a lemming for Merriweather Post Pavilion. Just dive into the uplifting effervescence of an album that brims with optimism and feels so damn good. Enjoy.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 102 2009

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    _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    For Your Perusal:



    Listen to Animal Collective

    Printable PDF from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. Fussible from Nortec Collective
    2. Portugal. The Man - Censored Colors
    3. Suicide - Live 1977 - 1978

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/03/25/animal-collective-merriweather-post-pavilion/feed/     The Drones - Havilah http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/the-drones-havilah/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/the-drones-havilah/#comments Tue, 13 Jan 2009 03:33:54 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/the-drones-havilah/
  • Isis- Wavering Radiant
  • Ryan Gosling
  • Yahowa 13 - Magnificence of Memory
    • ]]>     drones-cover.jpgIn Vino Veritas.” In music, there is truth, too. Like a drunken night that puts everything on the table, The Drones’ fourth album, Havilah, exposes ugly and beautiful truths with its twisted visions and demented cast of characters. The Australian band’s songs inhabit a darker side of California folk-pop and the psychedelic ’60s. The gentle guitar plucks of “Careful As You Go” fight with the twang of Gareth Liddiard’s snarling voice and the drunken cadence of his Australian accent. Liddiard’s bellowing and playful growls recall the works of creative madmen, such as Roky Erickson, Neutral Milk Hotel’s Jeff Mangum, and even Charles Manson (whose musical experiments are actually pretty good. Part-time maniac Dennis Wilson agrees.). On “I Am The Supercargo,” Liddiard’s preacher-with-fever-dreams howls evoke Nick Cave at his most psychotic. After all, we want a little madness in our musicians; they are the ones on the forefront of consciousness, blazing trails through emotional spaces we’re not ready, or willing, to explore. On Havilah, The Drones tumble into darkened realms, swaggering with delightfully sloppy guitar and tumbling drums, as the record brims with the urgency of a confession from the gallows.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 101 Jan 2009

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    issue-100.jpg
    For Your Perusal:

    Listen to The Drones

    Watch The Drones

    <All Tomorrow’s Parties Recordings>

    Check out this printable tearsheet from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. Isis- Wavering Radiant
    2. Ryan Gosling
    3. Yahowa 13 - Magnificence of Memory

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/the-drones-havilah/feed/     Dälek - Gutter Tactics http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/dalek-gutter-tactics/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/dalek-gutter-tactics/#comments Tue, 13 Jan 2009 03:26:50 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/dalek-gutter-tactics/
  • Foreign Born - Person to Person
  • Portugal. The Man - Censored Colors
  • Motion City Soundtrack: ‘Nerds at Heart”
    • ]]>     d_gt_cover-2.jpgMy Bloody Valentine would have no analogue in the rap world if it weren’t for Dälek. The New Jersey spawned hip-hop duo, producer okt0pus and MC/producer Dälek, occupies a musical space that defies categories. Shoegaze rap? Noise hip-hop? Darkwave-grunge-grrriot guys? Not quite. Regardless of their phylum in hip-hop’s family tree, Gutter Tactics—released on former Faith No More member and current avant experimentalist Mike Patton’s label, Ipecac Recordings—takes the duo’s songs deeper into the moody chrysalis of layered, fuzzed guitars, breakin’ beats, and politically charged lyrics. On “No Question,” the moans of what could be a thousand guitars put a blanket of warm noise under Dälek’s flow and the sped-up Portishead beat. As with the best rock songs, Dälek and okt0pus have a verse-chorus structure that eschews much of contemporary hip-hop’s rambling lyrics laid over infinitely looping ten-second clips. It is in this void of lazy creativity, so often masked behind a thin veil of postmodernism (“Man, this shit’s recombinant!”), that hiphop’s third decade festers, marked by mind-numbing copycat-ism. Dälek isn’t the future of hip-hop, but an appealing alternative to the superficial flotsam of today’s chart toppers. Unlike pop-rap, Dälek’s thick, evocative soundscapes—essentially an orchestra of noise laid over classic hip-hop breaks—function as melancholic movements and head-nodding soundtracks for introspection.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 98 2008

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    issue-100.jpg

    For Your Perusal:

    Listen to Dalek

    <Ipecac Records>

    Check out a Printable Tearsheet from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. Foreign Born - Person to Person
    2. Portugal. The Man - Censored Colors
    3. Motion City Soundtrack: ‘Nerds at Heart”

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/dalek-gutter-tactics/feed/     Mr Oizo - Lambs Anger http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/mr-oizo-lambs-anger/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/mr-oizo-lambs-anger/#comments Tue, 13 Jan 2009 03:13:11 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/mr-oizo-lambs-anger/
  • Arabian Prince - Innovative Life - The Anthology 1984 -1989
  • Two Fingers - S/T
  • Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump
    • ]]>     Mr. OizoIf Justice built the house of French dance thrash, Mr. Oizo tears it down on Lambs Anger. Deconstruction is nothing new for France’s l’enfant dancible. Mr. Oizo’s (pronounced WAH-zoh) cut-and-paste musical process first lit up the radar on the international scene in 1999. As a music-video director, Quentin Dupieux, aka Mr. Oizo, wrote a song for a Levi’s commercial (starring a yellow puppet named Flat Eric. Google it!), then dropped it (“Flat Beat”) into his experimental breakbeat album, Analog Worms Attack. In 2005, with his second album, Moustache (Half a Scissor), Dupieux pushed his sound forward, marrying fragmented samples with hyperkinetic synth tracks that could have crawled out of a Casio keyboard. Mr. Oizo seldom fits into the musical zeitgeist, choosing instead to forge new genres—and Moustache (Half a Scissor) did just that as the prototype for the French revolution waged by Justice and other Ed Banger Records alumni. On Lambs Anger, Dupieux births a bizarre little baby. The record reveals influences from Afrika Bambaataa, Daft Punk, and vinyl deconstructionists like Kid Koala, but overall, the bizarre production of the album—chopped-up funk samples, cheese-ball analog keyboards, and tongue-in-cheek vocal snippets (“Bruce Willis Is Dead”)—distinctly brands Lambs Anger as none other than Mr. Oizo. By far his most listenable album, it dispenses with julienned beats in favor of constant pumping of the French House kick drum (see also, Daft Punk’s “Da Funk”). “Cut Dick” is a hilariously corny funk song that, somehow, is totally satisfying with its ridiculous keyboard-sax solo over the unceasing bass drum. Partially engorged with huge rave sounds of the mid-’90s, “Pourriture 2,” “Pourriture 7,” and “Gay Dentists” improve Euro-House synth licks and super-reverbed-out drum machines with wiggle-inducing rhythms. Many of the album cuts could be club singles on their own, but the minimalist, electro cut “Steroids,” featuring Paris-based, bratty-rap wunderkind Uffie sorta rapping over soul claps and booty bass, proves to be one of the most strangely sexy dance tracks of the year. Lambs Anger has so much going on, including an irresistibly silly remake of “It Takes Two,” that it is nearly impossible to process it all now; reflecting upon it in a year will prove that Lambs Anger was the prime mover in a generation of something new. And something truly weeeeeird.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 101 Jan 2009

    Check out this printable tearsheet from Flaunt Magazine*
    _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    For Your Perusal:

    Listen to Mr. Oizo

    Watch Mr. Oizo

    <Ed Banger Records>

    Related posts:

    1. Arabian Prince - Innovative Life - The Anthology 1984 -1989
    2. Two Fingers - S/T
    3. Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2009/01/12/mr-oizo-lambs-anger/feed/     Juana Molina- Un Día http://drewtewksbury.com/2008/11/03/juana-molina-un-dia/ http://drewtewksbury.com/2008/11/03/juana-molina-un-dia/#comments Tue, 04 Nov 2008 05:50:15 +0000 Drew Tewksbury http://drewtewksbury.com/2008/11/02/juana-molina-un-dia/
  • Amadou et Mariam - Welcome to Mali
  • Battles: Tonto + EP
  • Calexico - Carried to Dust
    • ]]>     http://www.dominorecordco.com/images/artists/juana_molina/originals/molina_undia_square.jpgImagine the following: Tina Fey the immensely talented actress and writer, who is inarguably at the height of her game, decides tomorrow to forsake her acting career to become an experimental songstress who crafts delicately beautiful ballads. Former Argentine TV actress Juana Molina did just that. She left behind her fame (reportedly leaving fans in her home country aghast) to return to her roots in music. Her father was a tango singer, and, within the constrained rhythms of her music—fragile micro beats seemingly sewn together with spiderwebs—she reveals the rhythmic skeleton of South America at her core. She whispers and coos gently, “Que difícil,” over crunchy guitar upstrokes, warped keyboards, and ticking kick drum in “Dar (Qué Difícil).” Many of the songs on Un Día are made up of inexplicably danceable beats and, oftentimes, a simple handclap drives an entire track. Creating complex rhythms between vocal layers—some of which are just sounds that become the beats to her intertwined lyrical wandering—her inclusion of subtle electronics, like the mangled dial tones percolating below her sweet, siren-like vocals in “Los Hongos De Marosa,” push the album into uncharted territory for a woman with a guitar. Her sound is more akin to the innovative music of Björk and Joanna Newsom than, say, that of Jewel. But, she keeps it palatable and strangely beautiful.

    By Drew Tewksbury

    from Flaunt Magazine, Issue 98 2008

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    Flaunt Magazine Issue 98

    For Your Perusal:

    Listen to Juana Molina

    Watch Juana Molina

    <Domino Recordings>

    Printable PDF from Flaunt Magazine

    Related posts:

    1. Amadou et Mariam - Welcome to Mali
    2. Battles: Tonto + EP
    3. Calexico - Carried to Dust

    ]]>     http://drewtewksbury.com/2008/11/03/juana-molina-un-dia/feed/