Mike Patton has moved from one project to another for years, being a part of groups like Peeping Tom, Mr. Bungle, Tomahawk and Phanomas. Patton’s latest project, the soundtrack for Derek Cianfrance’s The Place Beyond The Pines, is another very interesting work from Patton and shows that he can take some of the unusual aspects of his solo work and place them inside the confines of a Hollywood film.
Patton’s score does exactly what a good film score should do, gives a mood and enhances the emotional points of the film to make for a stronger experience for the audience. While The Place Beyond The Pines didn’t enthrall me in theaters, there were plenty of moments where the soundtrack stood out and other moments where the soundtrack did exactly what it needed to move the emotions into the right spot.
Looking at this soundtrack on it’s own doesn’t give me much to reflect back on, but many of the songs here are very good and deserve to be looked at on their own. Patton’s use of choir and electric guitar throughout the album is quite dark and brooding. The opening song, “Schenectady” and “Misremebering” have some strong Ennio Morricone sounds with the electric guitar picking over strings and some choir added in for some epic sounds. Other tracks here use these elements, but there’s a certain darkness to most of these songs that can be slightly unsettling. “Family Trees” and “Handsome Luke” have deep drums and choir vocals that are reminiscent of 2001: A Space Oddity and there’s also a moment where things start out beautifully just to suddenly take a dark turn with field recordings of crickets and some scattered piano going over some drone strings.
Plenty of songs here sound very good on their own, but they don’t have enough power in the film to really stand out in the medium. It’s odd that while many of the songs here are very well done, nothing really makes a strong impact or sticks with you. “The Snow Angel” is the only piece that I remember from the film. Mike Patton continues to show his power on The Place Beyond The Pines, but I don’t see myself coming back and listening to this again any time soon. It’s an intense listen, but there’s too many moments that sound the same as others and a little more variety would have helped too.
X’ed Out has Tera Melos still laying down some great playing, but many of the math rock elements are hidden here behind some fuzzy guitars. While this is still a very exciting record, some of the energy and fun of their previous record, Patagonian Rats is gone. Some songs like “Bite”, “Sunburn” and “Slimed” still have plenty of great moments, but other songs like “Melody Nine”, “Tropic Lame” and “New Chlorine” breeze by and don’t have much going on.
Rating: 6.4 out of 10.
CHARLES BRADLEY- VICTIM OF LOVE
The second record from this soul act is much stronger than his first with heavy influence from James Brown in Bradley’s frayed and worn vocals and The Temptations are felt all over the backing group (Menahan Street Band) specifically on the track “Confusion” (“Ball of Confusion” anyone?). Fans of old soul music will find every track here worth something. Charles Bradley shows that he has a unique voice in a genre that has lost it’s voice.
Colin Stetson had a big hit with New History Warfare Vol 2: Judges, it was the first time I had heard him, and he’s since gone on to make music with several other artists including helping Bon Iver record his latest album and touring with the group. The third and final part of Stetson’s New History Warfare trilogy, Vol 3: To See More Light, has even darker moments than Judges but there’s some very uplifting moments here as well. These darker moments are best exemplified with the pounding repetition of “Hunted” and the booming “Brute”.
But the strongest moments here are dedicated to lighter and uplifting moments like “Among The Sef” and “High Above a Grey Green Sea”. The best track here puts the best of light and dark together for the monster fifteen minute track “To See More Light”. The only thing that seems slightly off with this album is the use of Justin Vernon’s vocals, there’s nothing wrong with them, but they’re used too often even though they never take away from Stetson’s saxophone. The opening track, “And In Truth” has some beautiful sax swells, but it gets overpowered by Vernon’s strong falsetto. And even though fans of Stetson’s other material will find plenty of songs here that cover the same ground, the gems here are the strongest tracks that Stetson has ever put out.
On his previous album, Praise and Blame, Tom Jones not only ended up with his best album in years, it was his most powerful record yet. Tom Jones is known for his voice, and while his recent albums have shown his age, he’s still a very gifted singer. Spirit In The Room has Jones interpreting other people’s songs, and most of them are decent with covers of Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Richard Thompson and others.
The best thing here is his version of Leonard Cohen’s “Tower of Song” where the lines “born with the gift of a golden voice” are serious instead of a joke. Blind Willie Johnson’s “Soul of a Man” fits perfectly with Jones’s bluesy vocals. Another song, Tom Waits’ “Bad As Me” is too identical to stick out, and Jones even tries out some of the trademark Waits growl just to fall short. There’s one original track here, the bluesy “Traveling Blues” and it’s one of strongest numbers here, as Jones continues to show that he belt out a great and passionate blues vocal. Another stand out is The Low Anthem’s “Charlie Darwin” with a simple acoustic guitar and then a full choir coming in during the second half, it’s a slow and emotional song that made even more powerful with Tom Jones’s vocals.
Sure, Spirit In The Room is just another covers album, but it’s also another remarkable album from Tom Jones. While nothing here comes to match Praise and Blame, there’s plenty of songs here to show that Tom Jones is still one of the best vocalists out there.
The Flaming Lips have put away their gimmicks and put out a new record that’s easily the darkest thing they’ve ever put together. It’s odd that The Terror was recorded at the same as Heady Fwends, one album being very high energy and another sounding like a group lost in an abyss. While there’s songs on The Terror, nothing here stands out and the songs meld together to create one massive mood inducing experience. Wayne Coyne sounds out of it with some depressing and lyrics and although his voice isn’t at it’s best here, somehow it adds a certain quality to the record.
“You Lust” is the biggest psychedelic trip here, sounding like a Pink Floyd cut. The song clocks in at almost ten minutes, and while it’s a very intoxicating song, more changes over the track would have helped. ”Be Free, a Way” has the same issues with it’s progression. The song starts out great with some soft vocals and synths pulsing but the stays in the same register and doesn’t go anywhere. It sounds like it could explode at any moment and it never does. “Butterfly, How Long It Takes To Die” is even more dark than the rest of the songs here with spacey guitars and thick bass.
I could keep going about each song, but I find it to be the same story for every track here. The Terror has songs filled with some very interesting sounds, but nothing changes or builds enough to stand repeated listening. It’s not boring or flat, it’s just very easy to get lost and stop paying attention. Because of it’s slow, drone atmosphere the album does seem to go on for longer than it’s 50 something minutes. More dynamic sounds and builds would have helped, but The Flaming Lips have created something that sticks in one mood and carries it out.
The sixties are alive with this group’s fourth record. If you love stuff like Jefferson Airplane, The Velvet Underground or Nuggets comps, then there’s plenty of songs to love here. Indigo Meadow goes along the same path as other Black Angels releases, so I can’t help but feel like I’ve heard this all before on the group’s other work. It’s still a very entertaining listen, but nothing new here.
Rating: 6.0 out of 10.
IRON & WINE- GHOST ON GHOST
Sam Beam’s previous album showed him going into a very different direction with big horns and a full band. Now he continues down that path, but brings back plenty of his acoustic elements into the record as well. While only a few songs on here are great, the entire album flows very well and is quite laid back. It’s almost too soft at times, but I find it be Beam’s best work yet.
Paramore’s fourth record comes after a uneasy split with two of it’s members and the group is now down to three and this new album shows the group building even farther beyond pop punk than their great 2009 record, Brand New Eyes. I can say that I used to love this group a handful of years ago, although my taste in music has grown and changed, I can say that I still like many of the songs from Paramore’s discography, they’re a group that has built upon every release.
This album is sprawling, and it’s almost too much at seventeen songs. These tracks do carry enough sounds and changes to keep the momentum going through the entire record. There’s still plenty of pop punk here on the opener “Fast Car”, “Ankelbiters” and the single, “Now”. There’s plenty of songs here to keep their older fans happy. Other songs show the group going into different sounds with several “interludes” that have nothing but ukulele and vocals.
Paramore tries to grow up and mature on this record in several ways. Lyrically, “Ain’t It Fun”, “Grow Up” and “Interlude: Holiday” show this although the music is still put into what the group usually does. “One of Those Crazy Girls” sounds like a great Best Coast song with some Weezer thrown in. Another moment that stands out is the closing song, “Future” where things start out simple with some acoustic guitars and then building up with a wash of loud guitars that reminds me of Explosions In The Sky. It’s one of Paramore’s best moments and a fantastic way to close out the album.
Paramore is a loud record, and there’s little dynamic going on here. Everything is set at a certain level and stays that way. Yes, this is a collection of pop punk and rock tracks, but more songs needed some clearer loud/soft moments like the closing track. It’s not a badly produced record through. The great pop moments like “Daydreaming”, “Proof”, “Still Into You” and the christian rock sounding “Part II” work very well. All these songs would have been stand outs on any modern day pop artist’s album. And these songs are the ones that I keep returning to.
Paramore delivers one song after another that’s filled with energy and it’s enough to keep the entire album running until it’s all over. It’s not something for everyone, but there’s plenty of moments that show the group is more serious about themselves than ever before and it’s a big payoff for longtime fans to see the grow as much as they have over the years.
James Blake’s second album, Overgrown, goes down some of the same roads as his debut, but there’s plenty of growth going on here to set it in a different area than his debut. Blake’s album is dumped with many of the trademark atmospheric, chilly beats of his debut. But nothing here sounds as chopped or tossed in. Overgrown shows a certain amount of growth for Blake as a songwriter, while there’s several moments like “I Am Sold” or “Life Round Here” that don’t go far enough and end up being repetitive, all the other songs here sound fully fleshed out.
The opener, “Overgrown” sets the mood perfectly with it’s cold atmosphere that builds upon itself while the entire song is still kept in enough simplicity. “Take a Fall For Me” has some great opening beats, but the entire song falls apart with RZA showing up and rapping. It takes you out of the song completely and sounds like a mash up that doesn’t work. It’s the only time the record completely misfires.
The greatness of Overgrown lies in Blake’s voice, and how he uses it in an R&B setting. Although there’s a very unique sound going on with many of these songs, most of them are nothing more than modern R&B tracks. The single, “Retrograde” is the best song on the record with Blake reaching for a stronger R&B vocal than anything else he’s ever done. It’s powerful how he builds the layers of sound and his voice as the track progresses.
Tracks like “DLM” or the closer “Our Love Comes Back” are quite simple with it’s piano chords and could almost fit on the radio. But there’s still other songs here that are compelling by building up an interesting array of sounds. “Digital Lion” starts too abruptly, but it’s progression from a cold loop to a suffocating trap to a deep dub to an odd loop of Blake’s voice. (And Brian Eno does production on the song) “Voyeur” and “To The Last” are great examples of Blake combining his R&B vocals with his distant production and typical song structure.
Overgrown doesn’t stand out in my mind like his debut does, but Blake shows how to overcome the much used “sophomore slump” and build upon the work that he’s already produced. There’s a few moments where things don’t click, but when things do fit together on Overgrown they end up being better than anything on his debut.
The third record from this grindcore metal group has all the energy of their other releases, and that’s about all this record really has. But it’s enough. There’s nothing quite like Nails in metal music, and I can’t help but love Abandon All Life, and I’ll go as far as saying it shows growth from their previous record, Unsilent Death. Most of these songs are still very short (under three minutes) and the entire record goes by very quickly. One song, “Wide Open Wound” goes on for three and half minutes, and it’s the best song on the album. This album is a rush, but I’m hoping that the next Nails record will take it’s time and give us more.
Rating: 8.6 out of 10.
GHOST- INFESTISSUMAM
This group’s first record really took my by surprise with the clean production and great vocals mixed with some very dark, satanic lyrics. And while these elements are still here on Infestissumam, it tries to be too big and goes for a stronger hard rock sound than metal. It’s not as dark, and there’s too much Blue Oyster Cult here. There’s some really awesome songs here like “Year Zero” and “Secular Haze”, but there’s also some hilarious crap here like “Idolatrine” that sound like the group is having too much fun and recording stuff just for the hell of it.
While I can easily say that I’ve never been a fan of N’Sync, I have grown to respect what Justin Timberlake did on his 2006 record, Futuresex/Love sounds. While the record wasn’t great, and put too much emphasis on the first half, there were plenty of songs that stuck with you and were a perfect example of what pop music should do. Justin Timberlake spent a handful of years not dealing with music and focusing his attention on acting in movies instead including a fantastic role in The Social Network in 2010. Now he’s finally put his focus back on music with The 20/20 Experience, and it delivers. Yes, this is really nothing but a pop record, and it might seem a little bloated on first listen with many of the songs going on for over six minutes, but this record shows that Timberlake is still a master of pop music.
The first song, “Pusher Love Girl” tosses in a Stevie Wonder vibe with it’s funky keyboards. The lyrics are quite great too with lines about “rolling you up and letting you run through” and “I don’t ever want to come down off loving you”. Beyond these lines, there’s not much here in the way of clever lyrics, things are quite clear on The 20/20 Experience. Timbaland is back on all the tracks here with some of his best production (the guy has worked with almost every pop star over the past ten years). Despite Timbaland’s great production, the only guest that really shows up on The 20/20 Experience is Jay-Z on “Suit and Tie” and he’s not even there long enough to make that big of an impression. Sure, if anyone was going to pop up on a song like “Suit and Tie” there’s nobody better than Jay-Z, but it seems slightly pointless and very light.
“That Girl” is the simplest track here with the shortest track on the record, it also goes back to the sixties with it’s soul sound and Timberlake introducing himself and the band as “JT and Tennessee Kids”, the song runs down with some very funky grooves that sounds great with Timberlake’s voice. It’s also a perfect example of using an older, familiar sound and mixing with newer sounds with the use of modern beats and mixing. “Don’t Hold The Wall” uses some tribal beats and sticks with that for the first few minutes before it shifts off into a deeper beat with it’s use of bass.
Many of these songs have a similar format of starting off in one spot and repeating it until you think the song is going to end, and then the song takes a turn to turn into a slightly different track during the last several minutes. This isn’t a new trick, but it’s still a very great one when used correctly, and it’s used perfectly on many of the songs here. “Strawberry Bubblegum” seems to have three parts to it with the beginning vocals being altered into a deep range and then bringing Timberlake in with some sweet and precise beats. The song then fades out to become a different track that sounds like something Sly and The Family Stone would lay out with the funky keyboards and guitars.
“Tunnel Vision” seems stuck with it’s sampled vocal that runs through most of the song, and it can get a little irritating on first listen, although it really can put the listener in trance at a certain point (much like what Radiohead’s Thom Yorke said “if something sounds great, than repeat it”). “Spaceship Coupe” is one of the few tracks with a heavy bass line that resonates through most of the song, and the song ends up being one of the sexiest moments on the record (which is really saying something), and there’s a really nice guitar solo (which is also really saying something).
“Let The Groove Get In” has some very eighties sounds going on, it sounds like a highly energetic (and talented) Lionel Ritchie. There’s some great tribal beats and some horns. Although the chorus does get too repetitive, it really gets stuck in your head and it’s hard to let go once you start to hear it. Once the song shifts into it’s second half, it really turns up the eighties soul and sounds almost too much like Ritchie’s “All Night Long” (maybe it’s just the fact it repeats the title over and over).
At the end Timberlake can’t escape his past. N’Sync might end up haunting him forever. And it’s a good thing. He’s managed to take his weakness and turn it into his ultimate strength. “Strawberry Bubblegum” sounds like a Barry White song at first, but the moments where Justin goes “Love you till I make you POP” is a perfect reference to “Pop”.And the best track on The 20/20 Experience, “Mirrors”, could have been a N’Sync track with it’s contemporary R&B sound with stings and vocals looped over to create the beat. But what really brings “Mirrors” beyond the rest of the songs on The 20/20 Experience, are Justin Timberlake’s vocals. If “Mirrors”, or any song on this record, were done by anyone else I feel like they wouldn’t have worked. There’s a certain way that Timberlake sings, especially when he reaches into his higher range, that has a very strong effect. “Mirrors” takes Timberlake’s vocals to their most emotive while still keeping plenty of great beats swirling through the track.
The final song, “Blue Ocean Floor” is a very nice way to close out the record with it’s slower tempo and almost drone-like strings that go on throughout. Timberlake keeps his vocals in a higher register through most of the song, and it’s very beautiful. It’s almost meditative, and I wish there was at least one other song with this kind of feel applied to it. The 20/20 Experience might not strike some people as a fantastic record at first, but upon repeated listens and becoming familiar with the songs, the album does end up being a very rewarding listen. Looking at this record through the lens of pop music is almost too easy, and many of the songs deserve more than just looking at them in such a limited view. Like many of the great pop albums throughout history, this record grabs from plenty of influences over the years, but it has enough ambition and creativity to set itself apart from the rest.
