Interview with Trever Keith

I had a chance to review the album by Trever Keith titled Melancholics Anonymous a while back and I truly loved it. This was the newest material I had heard from the front man of quite possibly the most influential band my ears have been blessed to come across: Face to Face. I’m pleased to announce that I had the chance to talk to Trever before he embarked on his solo tour and when I wasn’t gushing over his influence on me we discussed Face To Face, collaborations, his solo record and the current state of independent music.

DOA: Thanks for taking the time out of your busy schedule to sit down and talk to me. First of all, and I stated this in my review your latest album, I wanna say that you unwittingly prompted this interview when you released the album Don’t Turn Away. If it wasn’t for that album, I don’t think I would be writing for a music web-zine or playing in a band. So I wanted to thank you for that.

Trever: Thanks a lot that’s awesome.

DOA: First, I want to talk about the Face to Face shows you’ve been playing. You had 3 dates at the start of April, one of which was Bamboozle. How did talks to reunite for these shows come about?

Trever: What prompted Face to Face getting back together? Probably like right around the time we announced the break-up and set up our fair well tour and not long after the tour was over, we started getting offers to go out and play again and they’ve been steadily coming in over the past few years and we’ve been turning them down. The reason me and Scott felt we needed to break the band up is because we had some other avenues we wanted to pursue creatively and we knew the music we were writing just didn’t really fit in the context of Face to Face. We didn’t want to change what we built in that band too much. We had that experience a little bit on Ignorance is Bliss and it really didn’t work out for us. So, rather than continue in a different artistic direction and still keep it calling Face to Face, we thought it’d be best to make it a clean break, retire the band and go on and do some of the other stuff we wanted to do. But, ya know, after having about 3 or 4 years of having the freedom and being able to get out there and do stuff: Scott and I got the second Viva Death record finished, I formed a project called The Legion of Doom with Chad Blinman; we did a mash-up album, a bunch of remixes for film soundtracks and stuff like that and I was able to write and record my solo record and get that up on my website. Once we completed the things we wanted to do, we sort of looked around and we couldn’t think of any reason not to put the band not together. The idea is that we’ll keep Face to Face going really just as a live act kind of thing. We’re not really looking to make anymore records. We’ve already put out half a dozen albums so there’s plenty of material. The outpouring we got from the fans was that people just really wanted to hear us play live and there was enough of a response that we were like “Well, why don’t we just put it together and only play live?” It just seems like a very doable prospect for everyone. I approached Scott about it and he thought it was a great idea and we talked to Chad and reached out to Pete and everybody was down for it. Ultimately, it didn’t end up working out, at least for the moment with Pete, because he made a commitment and joined The Offspring. It looks like he’s going to be doing a lot of work with them in the future so I’m not sure what sort of availability he’s going to have. Right now, Chad, Scot and I are booking some festival dates, but none of us are looking to pursue it full-time and at the same time we don’t see any good reason not to go out and play some shows and have some fun as long as the fans are interested and we’re capable.

DOA: Definitely, I mean you have a big enough discography where you can go out and play a bunch of different songs and keep it fresh and other bands say that the touring aspect is what they love the most about it…

Trever: Well, that was always our strong suit in Face to Face anyway. Everyone’s talking about how bad a shape the record industry is in and how hard it is out there and that kind of thing, which is true, but we never sold platinum records, and we never sold gold records as Face to Face. We always made our living and made our business by playing live. I think it’s what we were actually best at as a band. It took us a few records before we were making really good sounding albums and we really found our way as recording artists. We were writing good songs but it took us a while to actually figure out the art of making a good record, I think. Really the strongest part of the band has been the live show and its only gotten better over time.

DOA: I just wanted to comment on Ignorance as Bliss. I personally think it’s a totally misunderstood masterpiece. It’s my second favorite record, Don’t Turn Away being my first. Ignorance as Bliss showed so much of what you guys were capable of. I love all of the others just as much but Don’t Turn Away and Ignorance really spoke to me.

Trever: Cool, that’s awesome, thank you.

DOA: At the shows and if you’ve gotten to meet some fans in person, how has the “Welcome Back” been?

Trever: Its been amazing, I think it exceeded any of our expectations. The two smaller warm-up shows we did at the Glasshouse in Pamona were just so great. The first night when we walked up on to the stage, before we played a single note, the audience was so loud it sounded like 8,000 people. But you know, it was about 800. It was really, really good and a lot of people it seems are happy to see that we’re gonna be out playing shows again. We’re really grateful for that and thrilled that everything has come together to allow us to keep doing it.

DOA: Those smaller shows are the best.

Trever: Yeah, they were a lot of fun. I mean, Bamboozle was great too but there’s something about a more intimate setting that, you know, you can be a little closer and it gives you little more direct contact.

DOA: When did you decide that you wanted to try a solo album?

Trever: Well, I knew I wanted to write different material and I was writing and recording some demos as early as during the Farewell Tour. I didn’t know it was going to be a solo record until the very end. At one point I thought maybe I’d put a separate band together, like what Scott did with Viva Death. And actually I think that might’ve been the thing I would have felt the most comfortable with. It’s still a little bit odd and a little uncomfortable to consider “solo project”; it sounds so cliché to me every time I say it. But, if I’m realistic about what we’ve been able to build in Face to Face, my name is easily the most recognizable way that I can start a new project from scratch. There’s some name recognition and basically I did write, record and play all of the instruments with the exception of the drums so it is really a “solo record” for lack of a better term. It just seemed to be the only real option to me when it came time to actually put it out. It’s kind of a limited release: I’ve made it available on my web site as a download and I’ve pressed 1,000 copies that I’ve signed and hand numbered and that’s all I’m doing right now. I’m not on a label or that kind of thing. I’m hoping if this goes well and people buy a bunch at shows and the tour does well, I’m going to consider talking to licensors and do a more formal release of the album.

DOA: If you had to describe the new album Melancholics Anonymous in one sentence, what would you say?

Trever: Man, you’re killing me. You should be able to tell by now that I can’t do that in one sentence (laughs). I think maybe the best way to describe it in a way people can relate to it is that it’s a natural extension from the Ignorance is Bliss album. Now, in once sentence that may not be entirely true so I have to qualify it (laughs).

DOA: Well, I definitely know what you’re talking about, I’ve listened to the album a few times…

Trever: Well, I think that the overall tone and feel of the record is very much like Ignorance in its emotion. I called it Melancholics Anonymous cause it has a kind of “melancholic” feel and I think it’s like Ignorance is Bliss in that way but in a lot of ways it goes in completely other places. We didn’t do anything with loops, samples, or drum machines or any sort of programmed music on Ignorance and this record has quite a bit of that. It’s something I sort of established and that I hope to continue to do. It’s not something I want to use as a crutch; it’s not an electronic band or anything like that per se, but I like having the ability to use that as an option for instrumentation cause it’s a really cool thing, it’s really distinct.

DOA: Around the time you wrote this album, what were you listening to the most, like what influenced you?

Trever: Oh man, well if I tell you that then you’ll know exactly who I ripped off (laughs). What was I listening to? Radiohead, I was listening to a lot of Radiohead. I think I might’ve been listening to the first Modern English record a lot. Echo and the Bunnymen, The Cure, The Smiths. But bands like the The Cure and The Smiths have been my favorite bands since the 80’s so its not fair to say that I just picked those records up and started listening while I was writing my album. There was a band I discovered that I was listening to a lot during the writing, and that’s The Doves. As a matter of fact, someone actually told me that a couple of songs actually sort of reminded him of The Doves and I was like “That’s pretty cool” and I definitely considered that a compliment.

DOA: How long have you had these songs in you before you decided to put them all together?
Did you happen to have any of these ideas in your days with Face to Face?

Trever: Some of them go back probably…like “Absolution” I think I wrote probably 7 or 8 years ago.

DOA: So you’ve had these in you since you were with Face To Face?

Trever: Oh absolutely, I’ve been working on a lot of these songs for quite some time. Not all of them; maybe a handful and a lot of the rest of them were written while I was working on the album.

DOA: How does your song writing process go and how does it compare to when you were with Face to Face?

Trever: It’s incredibly similar. The only thing that’s different for this solo stuff is that I worked on it entirely on my own. And once I had it sketched out, my producer Chad Blinman and I would sort of bounce ideas back and forth off each other. But the songs were pretty much finished at that point. Chad did do a lot of drum programming and he added a lot to the production. With Face to Face I’d have the most sparse idea, you know, it might have been a chord progression and maybe a melody or two I’d have in my head to go over the chord progression and I’d bring them to rehearsal and Scott and I would jump on it and work on it immediately. It was a lot more immediate developing the songs with Face to Face; I’d have Scott at the soundboard and sometimes Chad and sometimes Pete to collaborate a little bit and work on those with me before Scott and I did the same process. This was a lot more challenging because I wasn’t working with anyone writing the songs and you have to fight a lot of self doubt and when you don’t have someone else there sort of cheering you on and saying “Oh man this is a great idea, we should do this and that” and here you have to work on it yourself and you get the point where you’re like “Does this just suck?” (laughs). It’s a lot more challenging to work on it without collaborators for sure.

DOA: One of my personal favorites on the album “Say Goodbye Again”, particularly spoke to me because of a situation I was in recently. If you could, without getting too personal if you aren’t comfortable, talk to me about what inspired that song?

Trever: “Say Goodbye Again” is not necessarily about a relationship. A lot of the lyrics I write are not always necessarily about a specific experience. A lot of them are conceptual and “Say Goodbye…” for me certainly was. I hate to get too much into the detail of it because I don’t want to ruin it for you. If you were applying it to something in your life and you had an idea of what it meant and it connected with you, that’s really my ultimate goal. I kinda hate to get too overly descriptive about the lyrics because I take an approach of really big broad strokes when I write lyrics. “Say Goodbye Again” is really about dealing with your own sort of nihilism. To take literal words from the lyrics, it’s about continuing to do something or keeping a person around, or a habit or crutch that you know isn’t right for you, that you know is the wrong situation; but you just continue to do it because you’re sort of in a perpetual cycle. The title is “Say Goodbye Again”, like your constantly trying to quit something you just can’t seem to quit. It’s basically about bad behavior.

DOA: That’s pretty much one of the things I got out of it. What’s your favorite song on the album?

Trever: You know it sort of depends. I think I change favorites on and off. I tell ya, lately in our rehearsals for the tour, I’ve really, really been enjoying performing “Absolution”. It’s just been sounding so cool in practice and its just been a lot of fun to play. But, I like them all. I was really strict with myself about choosing songs and a lot of times if I had an idea that I had been working on for months and it just didn’t pan out into something I thought was a great song, I would kick it to the curb. I really feel like I had a pretty good quality control on these songs and I only put stuff on their that I really look.

DOA: Admittedly, I had been out of the loop about your projects for a long time, until I heard about your solo album, and I was wondering, besides the Legion of Doom, have you collaborated with other bands, or artists in any way shape or form in the studio or on stage?

Trever: I did one small thing but it was incredibly quick. I made a very brief guest appearance on the most recent Say Anything record. Along with about thirty other guest vocalists (laughs). I think they made a double album and they had a ton of people come in and do stuff. They were recording here in L.A. not very far from where I live. I just went into the studio one afternoon, they told me what the parts were, I knocked ‘em out and I was probably there all of about 2 hours. But it was cool, the guys were super cool and it was a good experience. I think that’s about the only other thing I’ve done. I’ve spent the bulk of my time working with my collaborator and partner Chad Blinman; either on my solo record or doing a ton of Legion of Doom stuff. The stuff we do in Legion of Doom is incredibly time consuming. If we get hired to do a remix it could take 2-3 weeks to get that completed. You’re talking working 5 days a week, 12 hours a day to get that stuff put together. Him and I have been doing a lot of work together. We have songs on the Underworld: Evolution soundtrack, Saw 2, Saw 3. We have something coming out in this new movie called “Midnight Meat Train”. I’ve been spending most of my time in the studio these past years.

DOA: Who would you like to collaborate with?

Trever: Well, I have my favorite artists. It would be amazing to do something with Morissey; that’d be incredible. I don’t know off hand. There’s a lot of really great talented people out there. You just kind of hit me blindsided with that one, that’s one I might have to think about for a while. Like I said before, I really like the guys in The Doves. It would be amazing to work with someone like Bjork. She’s just so incredibly talented. I don’t know, quite a few people actually. I’m kinda drawing a little bit of a blank.

DOA: How do you feel about the independent and punk music world of today, compared to the years when you were with Face to Face? How has it changed?

Trever: Well, quite a bit has changed. I don’t know if it’s still fair to call it punk rock or indie, but indie is kind of its own thing. Basically whenever I think of it now I just see like, dudes in really tight pants and poofy haircuts. When we’re talking about that aspect of it, it’s incredibly depressing to me. It reminds me a lot of when I was a young teen and I was going through the 80’s and that whole glam metal thing. It’s kind of a bummer that that’s what we’re seeing again. Because, the thing that was really bad about that, the focus was taken off of the music and it was put onto the fashion and it was really putting more into the idea of being a rock star and not being an artist and not making great music. I think what was great that came out of the 90’s, was the whole anti-rock star movement where there was far less emphasis put on the clothes you were wearing, or how good looking you were, or your ability to dance great or any of that bullshit. It was about creating great music that mattered and had meaning and that connected with people. I think we’ve lost a hell of a lot of that in punk rock and alternative music and I think that’s really sad. There was band’s like Face to Face and others from our wave of punk rock, and bands like Green Day or The Offspring that were hugely successful and hit the stratosphere. What came next after that is kind of a bummer and it seems like it’s sort of getting worse. It’s not good for rock n’ roll but it tends to go in cycles and hopefully we’re gonna get something cool and organic again before too long cause it’s really fake right now and it’s kind of a bummer.

DOA: I know what you mean, I mean you played with a lot of younger bands at Bamboozle so did you see any of that when you were there?

Trever: Not even just the bands, just a lot of people in the audience. It seemed like half of the audience was in a band and they were there trying to promote their own bands. It felt like the 1980’s on the Sunset Strip where everyone was wearing spandex and handing out their flyers and it was like shameless self promotion everywhere you looked.

DOA:I’ve even seen things at shows here in Texas, where you see a lot of that, so its kind of everywhere.

Trever: Yeah, I mean what happened to just going out there and playing shows? Just get out and play music and play in front of people. Instead of trying to sound like the last band everyone thought was so awesome, sound like your old band. I don’t know, I probably sound like a grouchy old guy now (laughs).

DOA: (Laughs) I agree with you 100%, sir.

Trever: When I say these things, again, I wanna temper it by saying that its definitely not the standard; its not like everything out there sucks. But, the majority of what I see is not very cool. The bands that I tend to like are bands that have something about them that’s at least a little bit unique. What we’ve seen recently is just so many copycat bands that have no real identity of their own, and that’s another thing that was going on a lot in that eighties glam metal phase. Every band looked the same, every band sounded the same, just changed the band name. I think we’re seeing an awful lot of that again. Bands need to have their own sound, their own thing and those are the bands that stand the test of time. Copycat bands just come and go pretty quickly.

DOA: I honestly don’t see myself listening to certain bands years from now, but I can see myself listening to your stuff and other things I took from the SoCal punk scene. I mean I still listen to that stuff to this day even though it’s a mix of other things as well. I appreciate it when bands tend to grow with me and evolve. Alright so, how far do you want to take your solo career? Do you have any other projects lined up in the near future?

Trever: Creatively, my solo career is really my main focus right now. That’s the kind of music I’m writing and enjoying to play. I would like to be able to take that to its logical end. As successful as I can be, I would welcome it all. And that’s really going to be my main career focus Face to Face will remain something that we get together and do and have a lot of fun doing, and you can expect a dozen or more shows out of us a year at least. But where my real heart and creative thrust is for making new music is in my solo career. And, I also intend to keep The Legion of Doom alive and well. It’s electronic remix music, so it’s a very different kind of flavor so I wouldn’t expect everyone who’s a fan of Face to Face or whose a big punk rock fan to necessarily go along with that. It’s another part of music and production that I really enjoy and I think I’m getting a little bit better at each time, and my partner Chad is certainly very talented at it and its just another way to branch out a little bit. My hope is to continue to keep all three of these projects going simultaneously and work on them as hard as I can and try to be as successful as I can with it.

After that I went on to mentioned that there has been an unfortunate backlash on bands that tend to try to stretch beyond what they would normally do: His album and the things that he did with Face to Face i.e. the sorely underrated Ignorance is Bliss. And with a thanks and congratulations on the solo record, our interview ended. Trever was a fun guy to talk to and I hope as many people get to experience his music online as well as on the road in the near future.

Trever Keith’s Web Site: http://www.treverkeith.com

The Dodos – Visiter

So what’s the deal with so many indie bands squeezing in antiquated and otherworldly influences into their music? Maybe it’s just that in our day and age, where so much music is deemed as derivative and/or insipid, it’s just too hard to find that fresh, new sound. What The Dodos, duo Meric Long and Logan Kroeber, do on their first official release, Visiter, is nothing strikingly new. But what they have been able to do is combine all of their influences with liveliness and ingenuity that is, frankly, brilliant.

Long’s childlike but personal voice is a marvel on softer selections like “Winter.” With a descending, dreamy guitar line and Kroeber’s soft drumming, the lyrics about a lost love are poignant and heartfelt. When the horns come in, it’s musical heaven. “Red and Purple” features some of Kroeber’s best drumming as he delivers a syncopated rhythm creating the perfect counterpart to the song’s catchy and memorable melody as Long sings, “I know, that I am yours and you will be mine.”

A seven-minute song like “Joe’s Waltz” starts with a quiet beginning, before it grows into a bluesy explosion of guitar and intense drumming. The song crashes with toy piano, slide guitar, toms and so much more. Long and Kroeber shout and squeal, “You neeeeeeed help, you neeeeeeed help, you neeeeeeed help, you neeeeeeed help!” The tandem push and pull against each other, letting the music rip and roar all the way. And that’s only one song. There are thirteen other songs and they all have flashes of radiance.

These are songs that are crammed with wondrous ideas and every single one of them works. It’s simply stunning that only two people created the walls of sounds that are crafted on here. And even though they use entirely acoustic instruments, the sounds are full, dynamic and forceful. Long and Kroeber have an astounding ear for unforgettable melodies and hooks; to be succinct, Visiter is packed with them.

“It’s that Time Again,” which was written on the road, is a perfect segue into the bluesy stomp of “Paint the Rust.” And that’s just it, the great moments never let up on this terrific album. The next song, “Park Song” is a quite, hummable song that is an utter joy to sing. Long sings about a lazy day where he woke up too late, went back to sleep and then decided to head to the park by himself. It’s a perfect addition and fits snuggly before the album’s centerpiece, “Jodi.” With the guitar playing an arpeggio, before spreading the notes out, the drums jump in with a frenetic, relentless pace. The Dodos are able to create a true culmination of breathtaking sounds and those lyrics are affecting, “Jodi my dear, I’m sorry but I must disappear, I leave you with a song and a tear just please don’t wash away.”

All of the comparisons aside, this is an impeccable album. Every song on here is filled with its own outstanding moment and every other second is a second filled with staggering, excellent music. The Dodos have shaped and formed a superb blend of intricate drumming, remarkable acoustic guitar and touching vocals—this is truly something exceptional.

Grand National – A Drink & A Quick Decision

Up-tempo and diverse electro-pop from UK duo Grand National is a refreshing departure from the norm, drawing from many genres and playing with a complexity that makes it hard to believe that there are only two guys in this band. Punchy rhythms and melodic vocals keep it current, since it draws from influences that are distinctly 80s, most noticeably on tracks such as “Animal Sounds.” A Drink & A Quick Decision is the second release for Grand National, and the band has been touring extensively since gaining some wide acclaim in publications like Spin, Blender, and Entertainment Weekly.

Grand National takes risks and does it well; these multi-instrumentalists explore different genres, and have made music that is not only accessible but also never repetitive. For example, they utilize some Latin flavors on “New Space To Throw” and then move seamlessly on to the subdued acoustic guitars of “Joker and Clown.” From dreamy pop to tunes that could easily be danced to, A Drink & A Quick Decision offers something for everyone, from the sonic touches on “Tongue” to the dance club beats on “Reason to Hide In.”

Grand National is Rupert Lyddon and Lawrence “La” Rudd, and the pair is not only adept at playing their instruments but also at writing lyrics, shown best on tracks like “Pack All of the Things You Need.” The range of musical influences from which they draw is astounding, and well represented throughout the album. At some points, they sound like The Police, then magically sound like Explosions in the Sky, then all at once sounding like lounge music with a techno twist. Crazy as at that combination seems, somehow, it really does work. This album, as well as Grand National’s great debut album, Kicking the National Habit, both have garnered deserving praise and are definitely worth checking out.

Triclops! – Out of Africa

It is a tragic and rare occurrence for a band to create a song far greater than anything else they’ve done. Aerosmith had “Dream On,” Queen had “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and the Grateful Dead (at least in reference to the rest of the same album) had “Terrapin Station,” just to name a few. Out of Africa, the debut LP from Triclops!, has added this band to the list. Out of seven tracks, only one is really worth your attention.

Formed in 2005 by John Geek and Chrisitan (last name unknown, but formerly of Bottles and Skulls), they call their music “…the best acid punk around today” and “…meandering yet tension-filled psychedelic epics.” They’ve garnished positive reviews from SF Weekly and Aquarius Records. A seventh of Out of Africa legitimizes these claims while the rest of it, while not horrible by any means, isn’t worth praising either. Their output doesn’t justify their ego.

Beginning the album with a song called “March of the Half-Babies,” Triclops! obviously wants to share a laugh with the listener. After a few simple chord strums, the moving bass line highlights what is easily the albums’ most progressive track. The vocals are jolting at first as an extremely high pitched voice (representing a baby I assume) is overdubbed over an already falsetto voice. The tempo changes often and the chorus is a brief but catchy hook. These guys obviously listened to a lot of The Mars Volta. Around four minutes, the song gets very chaotic as babies are heard crying. They chant “Mommy” (I think) and make weird noises. For an opening, “March of the Half-Babies” sets the expectations very high. They mix in proficient musicianship with an off-key sense of humor that Frank Zappa and Devin Townsend would adore. Sadly, the remaining six tracks are quite a letdown. In fact, it’s almost like Triclops! becomes a different band entirely (a rip-off of At the Drive-In is an easy claim).

“Iraqi Curator” starts off well enough with a hovering, dream-like voice and simple drumming. However, it soon turns into generic, obnoxious punk rock. The vocals one these remaining tracks are unrecognizable from those of the opener. “Freedom Tickler” is a commentary on America, but it’s so shallow and formula that you’ll forget it as you’re listening. “Duende War” is fast paced, in-your-face annoyance. It’s got an attitude without the quality to back it up. Luckily, “Cassava” brings back some originality and flavor, but that’s most likely just in comparison to the previous tracks. “Secret 93” has some progressive guitar playing and a good amount of dynamics, but, like “Cassava,” it’s main strength is that it’s better than what already came. The final track, “Lovesong for the Botfly,” sounds a whole lot like the other songs, but it does have an interesting change in the middle to almost an entirely new song, which has an ominous coding in its message that “…you don’t need love.”

Out of Africa had so much potential judging by its opening piece. “March of the Half-Babies” is so good it makes you desperately search again and again, listen after listen, in hopes that you’ve missed something as great in the other six tracks. Sadly, that spark disappears six and a half minutes after it began, resulting in a remaining thirty-three minutes of almost zero innovation and indulgence. There are little fragments of what made the opening track such a breath of fresh air scattered throughout, but they are only that, and nothing more. Your best bet is to put “March of the Half-Babies” on a mix CD (which it certainly deserves) and forget about the rest. The Mars Volta and At the Drive-In did it much earlier, and much better.

Carl Creighton – Minnesota

New York singer/songwriter Carl Creighton has delivered a pleasant enough debut. The water treaded is safe and Creighton does a respectable enough job of allowing his tender tenor to shine through on many of the songs. Although some of the wordplay sounds forced and almost, in some cases, flawed there are enough brighter moments on Minnesota for any music fan to enjoy.

A major flaw is the way Creighton sounds like he really struggled with these lyrics. The first line of the opener, “Smoking is Ugly” is downright cringe-worthy, “Smoking is ugly, that’s why you do it.” First impressions count for a lot and it took a lot for me to delve into this further after that first line. Other times, it sounds like Creighton is fumbling with words to use and he suffers in too much repetition as he sings, “And I do miss my family and you must miss your family so I’ll be your family if you’ll be mine” on “Be My Best Friend.”

Songs like “Minnesota” and “Erin” are tender songs dealing with true life emotions. And the music paired with them is equally enjoyable and even great in sparse moments. The harmonica and the way Creighton softly sings in the former are terrific, as are the smart choice in strings. The closer, “Baby’s Breath” is a sad, somber song but the piano-driven ballad is affecting and moving. However, the song would have been much better if Creighton sung it on his own, instead of with a female vocal and that’s mostly because she lazily sings the lower harmony. It isn’t appealing and it distracts since it’s in the way most of the song.

Easily the best song on the debut is the painstaking ballad about losing a love, “El Paso.” The song is remarkable because Creighton is able to hone in all of his strengths into this one gem. The lyrics are built around an eventful and fateful night that leads to an ultimate loss. Creighton sings about how the only thing that should matter is the couple’s mutual love. So check one, the lyrics are good. Also, the music is somber and crafted in a manner that it simply adds to the lyrical content, rather than hindering it. The electric guitar particularly shines with a memorable melodic line. So check two, the music is good. Finally, what makes this song so enjoyable is the way Creighton arranges the music so that it builds to an intense and emotive climax. The music expands to a bittersweet exaltation as Creighton belts out, “We weren’t meant for this town but we were meant for us.”

Ultimately, this is a shaky first album for Creighton. The music is weighed down by a few mistakes here and there but that shouldn’t discount what a talented musician he appears to be. Creighton does have a solid voice and his music breaths with his soft and peaceful arrangements.

The Mae Shi – Hlllyh

I apologize in advance for the Grateful Dead reference, but the long, strange trip The Mae Shi takes you on with Hlllyh is quite worth witnessing a few omnipresent, psychedelic mushroom-inspired, white people dances. The record isn’t for everyone (least of all Grateful Dead fans), but it is fascinating by its controlled chaos and maniacal energy. It begins with basic rock song structures (albeit with some weird melodies and electronics mixed in) before evolving into a full-blown house dance record without the listener even noticing.

Hillyh opens with the cactus-fried harmonies of “Lamb and Lion” before segueing into the Pavement-influenced “PWND” and “7XX7.” “Boys in the Attic,” a straight up hard rock song, sounds like classic Aerosmith if they were fronted by Neil Sedaka. “The Melody,” “Leech and Locust,” and “Run to Your Grave” are twisted combinations of Cheap Trick, Beastie Boys, and old school Atari music.

But by “Kingdom Come” the dance party breaks out. It quietly follows the end of “Run to Your Grave” with funky, Stevie Wonder-type keyboards before evolving into a hyperkinetic disco track complete with a zillion beats per minute, computerized vocals, and pulsating synths. Even if the listener despises dance music with every fiber of their being, they have to respect the chutzpah The Mae Shi have for busting out into full-throttle Danny Tario mode seemingly out of nowhere.

The anthemic rock of “I Get (Almost) Everything I Want” follows and can be seen as a generational hymn in this age of mass consumerism and entitlement. The album starts dragging after their second stab at dance music, however, with “Young Marks” and “Book of Numbers.” The two songs are annoying pieces of 80s New Wave-inspired techno that make the listener wish The Mae Shi had the good sense to quit while they were ahead with “I Get (Almost) Everything I Want.”

Hlllyh is by no means an easy listen. The vocals and hyperactive rhythms can grate on an untrained listener pretty quickly. However, if the listener can get beyond all that, they will be rewarded with a fun record and a fairly ingenious collage of different sounds and music styles.

Ellen Allien – SOOL

Ellen Allien’s career has been nothing but explosive. From the ass-shaking intensity of her debut, Stadtkind, to the subdued, under-the-surface rumble of Orchestra of Bubbles, her 2006 collaboration with Apparat. Taking just as many cues from IDM than just Techno or House, Ellen Allien always manages to build a beautiful, complex track. The world’s formal album intro to Ms. Allien, through Stadtkind, provided us with a “Homotopy to Marie on ecstasy”. It’s a dancey affair, for sure, but there’s a hell of a lot of industrial tension boiling. Her sophomore album, Berlinette, is where you can hear Allien getting really comfortable with her sound. Berlinette was much less intense while still managing to sound big and aggressive. And while Berlinette is what broke her to the “mainstream,” Thrills and Orchestra of Bubbles saw Ellen Allien reaching out to do things she hadn’t done before. On Thrills she went for a more typical techno sound, more classic; on Orchestra of Bubbles, Apparat and Allien explore a bit of House and work a lot more with the atmosphere of the album– yet you can still here the minute flourishes that act as a signature: this is Allien’s sound.

Not ever able to stay in one place, probably because she nails down tracks no matter what direction she takes her music in, Ellen Allien has returned with a full-blown look into the atmosphere of an album. Numerous times SOOL, Ellen Allien’s fourth studio album, gets called “minimal” in the press release. Wait, minimal? When asked what she meant by “minimal,” Ellen Allien responded “Minimal is just there…A whiff of positive, but nevertheless abysmal energy creates room for the ears. For yours and mine.” While you could possibly get away with calling Orchestra of Bubbles minimal (although it is a long stretch), Allien’s definition certainly applies to SOOL. If there is one way to sum up her latest endeavor, “room for the ears” is definitely it. Not thick, gauzy like previous Allien releases, SOOL sounds as if Ellen Allien built a track up then removed layers one by one until she achieved her desired sound. This sounds most logical on the track “Bim” which sounds so bare that it is almost haunting.

“Bim” creates a trance-like state in the listener through its seemingly simple beat and Ellen’s repetition of the word “bim”, among other things, creating a deep hook. Once again, starting with a completely bare palette, “Sprung” follows “Bim” in the same pattern: starts with a simple beat which is built and layered as the track progresses. Although this seems monotonous, it actually is a very intriguing listen. Not only does Allien allow for you to experience the full beauty of her track, but it also allows you to feel like you’re in the studio watching her at work. The entire album seems to be a direct progression from the previous track, but with the reset button pushed every time. There is a definite flow to the sequencing of SOOL, there is no doubt about that, but it’s interesting how Allien manages to start each track fresh, sounding completely different (“Bim” vs. “Zauber”), and still manage cohesion.

Ellen sums SOOL up perfectly in her own words:
“SOOL is everything, everyone and none – SOOL is a phantasm, a creation, which reflects the album’s atmosphere, and also my person… And, SOOL is curiosity, room, and architecture. Sketches; drawing; adhering.”

Haunting, bare, meticulously crafted, and beautiful – this is SOOL.

Pattern Is Movement – All Together

Pattern of Movement is back with another album, the third release and the band’s third label. All Together has a soft and almost playful attitude to it, to the point where some of these mellow tracks sound like lullabies (“Tragedy,” I’m looking at you).

Singing carries the day on this record, and its prominence forms the core of the melodic and narrative structures. “Jenny Ono” has a bit of the barbershop quartet about it, even, if you block out the richness and subtlety of the backing music. It’s easy to miss the music; it takes some effort to get past the upfront singing. But it’s the music on such tracks as “Trolley Friend” and “Peach Trees” that rewards attention. Similar to kindred spirit Caribou, Pattern Is Movement embraces lush electronic orchestrations to put some heft into its pop music. “Trolley Friend” plays with its 3/4 time signature to induce a swing feel, and its sonic breakdowns sound just like Caribou.

It can be hard to make out exactly what the lyrics are about, and it’s quite possible that there’s something dark around the edges. “Peach Trees,” despite its sing-song XTC-like pop sensibility, has the couplet “Wish that I could / Kill your father” – if I’m hearing it correctly. Another track, “Sea Captain,” has a rolling keyboard line and strings that approximate turbulent seas. Musically, the mood has Shannon Wright’s dark timbres, and again there might be something unsettling about the lyrics – something about lying “prostrate on the floor.” The tune ends with a swinging pop chorus.

Seeming at first to be an album of simple pop-leaning ditties, All Together has more going on than you’ll hear at first listen. For two guys, the band puts together some complex arrangements and gets at a rather full sound. It’s not as odd as Animal Collective, but it’s in the ballpark, even if it’s less obvious about it.

R.E.M. – Accelerate

Have you noticed how most, if not all, of the critics who have reviewed R.E.M.’s new album, Accelerate, sound like huge fanboys of the band? And that’s not a crack on the writers, by no means, that’s just a credit to a band who is one of the best American bands of all time. So when I was presented the opportunity to review this album, well, I didn’t hesitate one bit. Not only is this R.E.M.’s best album in over ten years but it is one of their best albums, period.

For years, fans of the band had been waiting and waiting and waiting for their next great album; that next great album to prove all of the detractors wrong. You know, those people that when they hear the name R.E.M. think of them as just some old band that used to make music way back when. Oh no, they are wrong in so many ways and with Accelerate, this is a band that is back and a force to be reckoned with.

The trio of rockers that begin the album are tremendous highlights. The focus here is on the angular and jangly guitars, which are, finally, again, front and center. And all of the band’s original trademarks are back too. Peter Buck’s guitar on “Living Well is the Best Revenge” is snarky and it bites with the ferocity of a cool veteran poised to prove that he still matters. Mike Mills charismatic backing vocals on the entire album are so pleasantly perfect that it’s remarkable, especially on “Sing for the Submarine.” And then, there are Michael Stipes’s unmistakable vocals. Stipe hasn’t sounded this viscerally engaged in years and he spouts and remarks the lyrics with an undying passion that is inspiring on hard jams like “Man-Sized Wreath” and “Horse to Water.”

In more ways than one, the band knew that they were at their wit’s end. Buck stated in an interview with English publication Q that, “Even Michael [Stipe] was going, ‘Y’know, if we make another bad record, it’s over.’ It’s like, ‘No kidding.’” So the band went drastic and even retraced some of their old tricks that worked on their first classic albums. Buck and Mills started working on music in 2007 and while on tour last summer the band played new material on stage and would rework it. When they were ready to record, they followed the advice of The Edge and enlisted Jacknife Lee to produce the album with the band. Lastly, the band only scheduled three-week recording sessions to help keep their focus. The reward, is a magnificent album that finds R.E.M. sounding like a true band again.

Even the softer songs are chock full of intensity and drive. Never one to deny his political side, Stipe’s lyrics are poetic and engaging throughout. The laid back “Houston” depicts a sad post-Katrina era and Stipe’s bitter but honest lyrics hit home, “If the storm doesn’t kill me, the government will.” The title track follows with more driving guitars and this time, it’s Mills’ bass that jumps out at you. Even the album’s closer, “I’m Gonna DJ,” is a refreshing smack of R.E.M. While the drums pound away, Stipe sings about collecting vinyl and Mills gleefully sings, “Woo-hoo-oo” behind everything. It’s a clear sign that this is a band having fun again.

It’s a stunning feat that a band of seasoned veterans, after a string of poor outings, could still gather themselves and deliver yet another marvelous album. Even as just a fan of the band, it’s really something special. With the rocking tunes, energetic vocals and those smart lyrics, Accelerate is a true return to form for a band that really needed it. I just hope that they have more to give.

Sun Kil Moon – April

Mark Kozelek returns this April under the Sun Kil Moon moniker, releasing the aptly-titled April (the follow-up to his critically-lauded Ghosts Of The Great Highway album from 2003) on his own Caldo Verde record label. April is known as the “cruelest month” and “April showers bring May flowers”, and true to those adages, many of the songs on this album flow with Mark’s trademark inner emotional turbulence, supported by subtly-picked guitar runs that mirror his rambling and bittersweet vocal melodies.

Mark is accompanied by drummer Anthony Koutsos (formerly in Red House Painters), bassist Geoff Stanfield, percussionist David Revelli, violist Michi Aceret, and a host of guest vocalists, including Bonnie “Prince” Billy (aka Will Oldham), Ben Gibbard, and Eric Pollard, although one is hard-pressed to discern who is singing back-up vocals on which songs.

As with Mark’s other musical incarnations, whether as Red House Painters or under his own name, a fine-tuned and patient ear, and a good turn of the volume knob towards high, is required to fully appreciate the nuances of his music. Mark is not, and has never been, a purveyor of the catchy, three-minute pop song. His creations are lengthy, measured-pace, and develop over time, and his mainly autobiographical lyrics are just as important as the instrumental framework, if not more so (Mark recently re-released a hardcover book of his song lyrics titled Nights Of Passed Over).

Memories of Mark’s past live on in the present, continuing their existence through his reflective lyrics. Previous events in his life, the people he has been involved with, and the locales he has lived in and traveled through figure greatly in his ruminations, and it’s as if the barriers of time, distance, and departure that separate the past from the present have been compressed within his memory, so that the past is keenly undiminished and actively shapes his emotional landscape to this day.

While Mark’s songs may be slow-paced, low-key, and long, they are neither pools of placidity or founts of dirge-like despair. There is a restlessness to his reminiscing, as if he’s not resigned to the past and how it has affected him. There is a sense of urgency in his pained, yet mellifluous tone, as if the wounds and wonders of the past have not faded into the background of his mind over time, and it’s tellingly reflected in a lyric from Mark’s early Red House Painters’ song titled “Rollercoaster”, where he contemplates the time he spent at a state fair with someone he cared for, singing longingly that “I’ll never be able to relive this day / except in memory.” This haunting sentiment is a hallmark of all his songs, a reminder that the past is a constant presence in the present.

April opens with alt-country sound of “Lost Verses”, and Mark’s vocals are light, sweet, and tentative on the long verses, lifting up at the ends of phrases amid the gently strummed guitars and brushed cymbals. He sings of voices that “arrive and disappear” and that, with the approaching dawn, he’s “rising toward the light”, and his voice rises in kind on the chorus, wistfully, yet uplifting, as the guitar lines briefly fade, bringing his emotions into stark relief, in only for a moment.

By the second verse, a measured drum tempo kicks in, and by the third verse, melancholy viola is introduced and male background vocals shadow Mark’s main vocal line, as he uncovers buried feelings and memories within him, and, by extension, within the listener, by the mere mention of “touchstone” words or phrases that provoke an emotional response, evoking images of the “ocean”, “salt water”, and “April rain.” Mark sings of watching over loved ones and old friends in a high register, backed with lighter male vocals, and after the eight-minute mark, the song takes a detour as a indie-rock guitar line insinuates itself into the instrumental mix, picking up the pace and sounding like a Dinosaur Jr. riff, with its slightly distorted, but clean-burning sound. The guitar follows the base melodic line and doesn’t “rock out”, but it’s a pleasantly unexpected way to end the song.

“The Light” continues to follow this indie-rock thread with a fuzzy, low-key, repetitive rock guitar riff slowly circling the laid-back beat and cymbal tap, as Mark sing-talks in a plainer, mid-range tone. On certain parts of the vocal phrases, a bass guitar comes in, giving the proceedings more weight. As always, Mark extends the “verse, chorus, verse” format with meandering verses that eventually reach the chorus payoff of doubled vocals, with one line sung in a more vivid register, sweet, but pained, about how “this house feels like an old lost song / it calls for me to play along”, but “somehow I don’t belong.” The rock guitar gradually fades away, as two twangy guitars pick up the melodic line, and wander around with it against a laconic drumbeat for a while. Mark, along with the rock guitar, soon return, and it’s back to the repetitive, narrow instrumental structure of the short-phrase guitar riff penning in Mark’s “far-reaching, swaying, and free” lyrics and emotive vocal delivery.

The ghost of Mark’s previous band, Red House Painters, looms over “Lucky Man” (a shorter song at just under six minutes), with Mark’s voice moving through a range of tones, from low-register, dusky, and depressive to bright and delicately pensive, over the course of the song. Even the sound is reminiscent of Red House Painters, with the softly glistening, rolling, finger-picked guitar lines and absence of drum beat. Mark sounds more insular and poignant on this song, drawing the listener into his world of “sleepy gray skies”, and his visit to a place where “heaven’s church bells ring” and where “I didn’t know my purpose until I stepped inside.”

The next number, “Unlit Hallway”, is well-known to fans of Mark’s, due to the inclusion of a live version on Little Drummer Boy, an album of songs recorded in live settings and released under his name. This studio version is, superficially, close to the live cut, but differs markedly in its emotional impact. There are mostly the same instrumental aspects, with strummed guitar, piano runs, bass guitar, brushed cymbals, and steady-paced drumbeat, except for the addition of finger-picked banjo that gives the song a more country-style vibe. There is also the same elongated “verse, chorus, verse” structure, and lyrics of “walking down the unlit hallway of life / there’s hope, I know” and an angel that comforts and guides him, and that “I feel you near / like you’re still here.”

The deal-breaking difference is in the chorus sections, when Mark sings “Breathe, my love / wake, my love / hold me, my love”, along with higher-register, male backing vocals. On the live version, it’s just Mark, strongly pleading and pouring out his emotions for once, creating an impact based solely on the intensity of his delivery, and it’s breathtaking to hear. On this studio version, Mark holds himself back, coming across too under-the-breath soft in his murmuring vocal delivery, where his words, and emotions, aren’t accentuated clearly. What should be a cathartic chorus release sounds like another part of the restrained verse section.

“Heron Blue” is an interesting change of pace, a storytelling song that sounds like a narcotic Mark Lanegan murder ballad, with a guitar in the background picking out a dark, repetitive pattern and Mark sing-talking in a low register. There is no drumbeat, but an underlying tension runs through the song, and after a couple minutes, another, brighter guitar line is added, insistently dancing around the original, darker line. Mark takes on someone else’s perspective, describing characters and a room lit by candlelight, sing-talking with a grave inflection “Don’t cry my love, don’t cry no more / it overwhelms my breakin’ heart.” The song excels at creating an unsettling, minor-key mood, where Mark’s vocals darkly shine as he sings “it haunts me in my waking dreams / I cannot bear to leave”, sometimes against doubled vocals in a higher range that follow the melodic line, as well as an interplay of the “light and shade” guitars.

The live version of fan-favorite “Moorestown” can also be found on Little Drummer Boy, but the studio version here is just as compelling. This ode to a girl he cares for is classic Mark Kozelek, from the meandering instrumentals (although it is a short song at only four and a half minutes!), to his meditative recollections of the past, to his aching, but languid vocal tone, and the key words he chooses to conjure up the past. Great distances are covered, geographically, temporally, and in memory, as Mark sings of “salt water taffy at the Jersey shore” and that “we’d spend our days just driving ’round / old parking lots and neighborhoods” in Moorestown, New Jersey, against rolling guitar strum and an unobtrusive drum beat.

Mark treads much ground in his lyrics, as he follows this girl “across the earth”, from L.A. to New York, and from London to Kosovo to Kentucky to New Orleans, his voice wavering, but rising, as he reveals “I slept with her”, but that at some point she “moved away to Williamsburg” and as he reminisces, “looking past a cold long sea / can’t bear to wonder now” about the glowing lights in Moorestown and when he first knew her- and the pull of viola and other strings match the earnestness of Mark’s vocals.

Mark usually reins in his emotions on the verses of songs, but on the delicate “Harper Road”, another short song at under four minutes, he lilts angelically on a vocal note here and there on the verses, surrounded by the stream-like guitars that follow the contours of his voice. Again, there is no beat, just guitars, plucked viola, and Mark’s melancholy and fragile vocals that climb as he sighs “Don’t leave, my love / don’t leave my side.”

“Tonight The Sky” is Mark’s “rock song”, albeit, not in the traditional sense of soft verse, loud chorus, and blazing guitar solo. Mark usually doesn’t create short, compact numbers, and this song is no exception. He draws out the “verse, chorus, verse” structure with several verse phrases before getting to the chorus section. A steady drum beat starts it off, along with Mark’s plain vocals, and a burning, distorted, but contained guitar line that stays in the same groove for about two minutes.

Then the chorus kicks in and Mark sounds strong and opens up more vocally, sometimes with doubled vocals, reflecting outwardly instead of inwardly, singing “Tonight the sky will open for you”, and about natural landmarks like mountains and the ocean, against an equally strong rock guitar line. Halfway through the song, the guitar intensity picks up and Mark sings in a more ethereal tone, and then pushes his vocals out against two guitar lines, one of which rocks out more with a sustained frisson. The momentum slows and calms, then starts up again, cycling through more subdued, plain-vocal verses and short-knit loops of fiery guitar on the choruses.

A guest vocalist helps Mark out on the country-style “Like The River”, harmonizing in a higher tone on the chorus, against mellow-picked guitars and an erratic drum beat that doesn’t even sound like it’s being played at a consistent tempo. The pace goes from slow to slower, then back to slow again, with hushed vocals as Mark sings “faded away along with my thoughts”, even though the instrumentation continues on unevenly.

“Tonight In Bilbao” commences with flowing guitar strum, drum beat, an underlying heavier tone of stand-up bass, and Mark’s brighter vocal delivery, where, on the chorus sections, he sings with a shy upswing, emphasizing words like “Barcelona”, and focuses on a just-forming relationship (“she came in from the storm”). The guitars remain at the same pace through most of the song, and Mark submerges his words at the ends of phrases, as he sing-talks on the verses that “the train pulled away” and “I stared at faraway lights.” He builds up the chorus with several short, yearningly-delivered phrases as a subdued viola line comes in, full of regret and sadness. The rambling guitar quietly fades away, leaving a sparse beat, and plucked string notes, until the vocals return, with Mark singing hesitantly, lightly, and in short phrases. All of the instruments make a comeback by the end of the song, creating a smooth, but understated sonic mix.

The closing solo, acoustic “Blue Orchids” features gentle, stream-like guitar notes and low-key, but light vocals, as Mark sings more plainly on the verses, and twins with the guitar line melody on the chorus, singing of “last goodbyes.” Starting midway through the song, the guitar line takes on a Spanish feel as it fleetingly runs up the musical scale (this will happen twice more to the listener’s delight). Then the rambling guitars take up their delicate pattern again, as Mark lingers over the words “She comes in every morning…afternoon… evening / lays down beside me, softly breathing.”

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