If you like The Fray, Five For Fighting, Yellow Card or any other pop-punkish band, you’ll enjoy The Script and their Science & Faith album. Simple hooks, beats and melodies work with O’Donoghue’s earnest lyrics. At times, there’s a sense of urgency (closer, Exit Wounds) or bombast (Walk Away, which features B.o.B) or contemplation (Nothing).
Category: Music
Pop, rock, alternative, classical, indie, folk, lo-fi, any thing with a tempo and a beat and some rhythm
-
Carolina Chocolate Drops – Genuine Negro Jig
Carolina Chocolate Drops’ album
Genuine Negro Jig is a throwback, reviving traditional country, bluegrass string and jug music. It begins with an instrumental led by a fiddle that sets the tone for the remaining tracks–music from an era that mp3s forgot. Simple, direct and earnest, the album includes a mix of originals and traditionals. The originals, such as Hit ’em Up Style, Kissin’ and Cussin’ and Trampled Rose feel almost contemporary. Hit ’em Up Style has a hip hop beat and emphatic delivery as the fiddle carries the song. Kissin’ and Cussin’ has a sultry vibe with Rhiannon Giddens delivery. The traditional tracks, Cornbread and Butterbeans, Trouble In Your Mind and Snowden’s Jig are playful, energetic and spirted.Stand out tracks:
- Trouble in Your Mind – fun and spirited
- Hit ’em Up Style – most contemporary track on the album
- Cornbread and Butterbeans – catchy banjo and homely lyrics
- Kissin’ and Cussin’ – great delivery
- Why Don’t You Do Right – great vocals
-
Brandon Flowers – Flamingo
Brandon Flowers’ solo album, Flamingo, is a good, solid collection of tracks. With Las Vegas as his back drop, flowers tells stories of those to succumb or persevere in the bright lights. He varies the tempo and pacing of the album, beginning with a soaring Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas and kicks it up with Only the Young. At 41 minutes and 10 tracks, the album feels like a first act with Swallow It feeling like an impromptu closer.
Stand out tracks:
- Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas – it sounds like an anthem, but it’s a cynical, rocking ballad of the excesses of Las Vegas
- Jilted Lovers & Broken Hearts – sounds like something Bon Jovi would do
- Was It Something I Said? – a punk pop ditty with a good beat and catchy lyrics
-
Social Distortion – Hard Times & Nursery Rhymes
Some thoughts on Social Distortion’s latest,
Hard Times & Nursery Rhymes:Mostly sounds like garage rock with some bluesy riffs. Not too many punk chord progressions.
Stand out tracks: Alone & Forsaken (direct and punky), Still Alive (closer, anthemic), Bakersfield (6.5 minute bluesy guitar anthem story)
Some songs go on too long, with half the tracks clocking in over 4 minutes, and 4 songs head over the 5 minute mark.
-
A rock show at your house
If bands/artists playing intimate shows to 50 people at someone’s house is a trend, that’s a trend I can fully support.
“It was at my friend Bodie’s small apartment in Boulder, and Joe Pug was playing,” said Browne, who writes and edits the popular website Fuel/ Friends. “There were probably 40 people in a tiny one- bedroom apartment. But the energy in there, being so close to Joe when he sang, really startled and impressed me. It was almost uncomfortable how intimate it was.”
-
PJ Harvey – Let England Shake
PJ Harvey’s Let England Shake contains numerous songs, full of atmosphere and reverb. Some vocals don’t seem to make it through all the layers of production. The only standout track, to me, is On Battleship Hill, but only because it feels tribal, like something Enya would do. Not really impressed with this album.
-
Cage the Elephant – Thank You Happy Birthday
Cage the Elephant’s Thank You Happy Birthday takes you on a roller coaster ride through an amalgam of 90s rock. In the layers of drums, guitars, bass and slightly nasal vocals, you’ll hear influences of the Pixies who experimented with sonic textures; effect laden guitars, ala Smashing Pumpkins; simple chord structures in the vein of Blink 182; lyrics that resemble Oasis penchant for imagery.
Always Something leads the album off with a slightly electronica track with a cynical take on modern life–catching your girl with another guy, violence against a homeless guy. Modern stuff. Aberdeen has the first catchy hook on the disc as it builds into a shout about a girl. Indy Kidz is driven by frenetic vocals and sawing guitars with the song building to a Rage Against the Machine like spoken word outtro. Shake Me Down seems to be the lone misfire on the album with no memorable hook. 2024 feels like something Blink 182 would do if they were serious about life. Sell Yourself is an angry more primal, cynical commentary on people selling themselves for a quick buck. Then the album drops in tempo to a warbling ballad, Rubber Ball about trying hard to do good things. With Right Before My Eyes, Around My Head, Japanese Buffalo and Flow… you’re in the final stretch of the ride, where each song will remind you of something you’ve heard before.
Lastly, after the closing track, the band offers a more down beat take on Right Before My Eyes, where the slower, ballad like tempo fit the lyrics better.
-
Some Kind of Trouble – James Blunt
Some Kind Of Trouble by James Blunt is offensively bland. Nasal, sugary, signer songer writer pop that all sounds annoyingly similar.
-
The Decemberists – The King Is Dead
Is the album title an allusion to The Smiths’ The Queen is Dead, or a nod to their past album’s, The Hazards of Love, overreach? I don’t know. For the latter, Hazards was an epic indie rock opera, which to some seemed pretentious. The King is Dead, however, is a much simpler album with straight up rock songs in the vein of The Decemberists’ instrumentation and Meloy’s vocals.
Don’t Carry it All, Down By the Water and Rox in the Box are the most upbeat, rock songs on the album. January Hymn and June Hymn slow the pace down and Dear Avery gently strides off as the album’s closer.
-
Iron & Wine – Kiss Each Other Clean
Kiss Each Other Clean by Iron & Wine combines Sam Beam’s southern gothic imagery with a more lush pop rock sound. His previous album, The Shepherd’s Dog, showed hints of this change, going from a soft spoken singer song writer to genteel rock ‘n’ roll front man. Tree By the River, Walking Far from Home and Rabbit Will Run are stand outs. Big Burned Hand is driven by a deep, funky bass line with some angry lyrics. The album fades out with a shimmering jam on Your Fake Name Is Good Enough for Me. Themes of scorn, forgiveness, sin, nature and catharsis run throughout. He’s still a folk singer telling stories in his songs.
The sound and production have matured, and it seems curious as to what he’ll do next.
Note, the Deluxe version comes with two extra songs, Black Candle and Lean Into the Light. The former feels like it could have fit into the album with similar bass lines and progressions, but Lean Into the Light feels soulful, as if it was something to make the indie rock kids sway to the backing harmonies.