Sunday 28 April 2024

2024. Week 18, 10 singles + one mistake

What? 11 Songs this week?! Yes, all will be explained later on, in due course. As usual, we present you with a nice mix of music from different genres and niches. With music from artists that are around for a long time but totally new to me, to an artist who is around for even longer and a few truly new names. More than enough to discover, so enjoy!

Rare Earth. Vacation

Rare Earth used to be a band, sorry is a band. It had two well-known songs, both covers, 'Get Ready' and '(I Know) I'm Losing You'. Here it is the title of Vacation's first single of the upcoming album, 'Rare Earth'. Vacation may spend its time in the musical past, but far removed from the circa 1970 sound of Rare Earth. Expect to be taken back to the 1990s. Grunge, Britpop is what Vacation presents here. The song begins and ends with a nice guitar melody that sends a listener straight back to the days when the guitar became popular once again very fast. To me Vacation is a new name. I learn that the band has released eight(!) previous albums. There's no time for catching up I'm afraid. Based on Rare Earth it seems I have missed something through the years. Vacation knows how to blend in familiar features into its music that rocks no little. Rare Earth is a nice song.

Never Say Anything. Gramercy Arms

Not unknown to these pages, Gramercy Arms returns to this blog with a nice country-tinged single called Never Say Anything. An acoustic guitar drives the song, with around it a soft electric guitar playing these nice little licks and a pedal steel guitar providing the country feel as if someone is about to start crying. Dave Derby and producer Ray Ketchum have laid down a perfect mood for this song. Sometimes a song provides a certain feel and it can be enough. Of course, everyone on this single can play well, just listen to the nice guitar solos weaving into each other. That is not what Never Say Anything is about. It is about getting this song across. "Close your eyes and not say anything", that is the message the song shares with the listener. A wise advise, as this is exactly the way to enjoy the nice mood Gramercy Arms provides. Let me change that just a little. 'Close your eyes and just listen'.

On Top Of The World. Eric Din

Who is Eric Din? I have no idea. What I do know, is that he knows The Velvet Underground and David Bowie. They both shimmer straight through On Top Of The World. This song could have been written in the mid to late 60s. Din wrote the song mostly inside of his head where it turned over and over for a long time. When he started to record it things fell into place fast. And then it took some percussion, as you can hear in the song. On Top Of The World appears as a song that is somewhere between professional and amateur. Don't be fooled by that one moment where the song appears to be falling apart. That moment aside, On Top Of The World is nice and rich in sound. It has that The Velvet Underground style guitar playing and the early Bowie just creeps in here and there. And Eric Din? He plays in a band called The Uptones and records music for himself as well. His Bandcamp page (https://ericdin.bandcamp.com/) is filled with songs and albums.

The Woman You Will Never Know. Kate MacLeod

Kate MacLeod returns to the blog with a special single released for this reason: "In recognition of National Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women’s Day which falls annually on May 5". The message is harrowing. "I am the woman you will never know", including the ghostlike repeating. MacLeod manages to catch the mood to show how serious this topic is. She's not alone in this. Carla Halverson Eskelsen, joins her on vocals with far deeper voice than the more traditional country voice of MacLeod. Bob Smith plays percussion and Robert Dow the acoustic bass. So, I guess Kate MacLeod plays the violin herself, as this is a quite prominent instrument in The Woman You Will Never Know. The single falls nicely in the folk tradition of telling stories that often do not end well. Above all, it is proof that activism can go together with beauty. Kate MacLeod manages to share an important message within a beautiful song.

Sailing Song. Tylor & The Train Robbers

It is starting to seem like country music is the theme of this week. And believe me, it is purely coincidental. Besides, what are the chances of having the name Ketchum twice in the same post? See above under Gramercy Arms. Tylor & The Train Robbers features Tylor Ketchum. The band presents a country song that has enough pop and rock elements within it to please more than just one musical genre. Someone like me can crossover easily. Sailing Song has a nice slide guitar part and a very warm organ sound sailing into the song regularly. This band is of the kind who seem to do things simply right without having to play any tricks or add special effects. Tylor & The Train Robbers let the song do the talking and succeeds with ease.

The Dotted Line. The Spackles

The Dotted Line is a strange song. A verse that is extremely strained is followed by a chorus out of a past 1965 play book and yet it does not follow the dotted line left behind by bands from that past like The Kinks or The Small Faces. In a way I'm left with the feeling that the three that make up The Spackles, Marie Slurrie - guitar, vocals / Phil McKraken - drums / Brian "Spackle" McKraken - bass vocals, have heard small snippets of famous songs, without ever having heard the context and started to learn themselves play from there. This results in some very great moments alternated with sheer chaos. This makes The Dotted Line as fascinating as it is strange to listen to. I'm still not certain which is winning though.

All In One. Been Stellar

All In One is bunch of nerves. The whole band seem to be on edge, with the drummer in the worst state of all. Been Stellar expresses itself from a position where there seems to be no rest and no way to relax. Just listen what happens around one minute and ten seconds. Should I have to listen to this sequence for much longer, I truly would be jumping out of the window. I can imagine a liveshow where the stroboscopes would be blasting full on for half a minute, driving everyone mad. Been Stellar is from NYC and about to release its new album in June, 'Scream From New York, NY'. The band makes a statement with All In One. The song lasts for a little over five minutes and knows a few different sides. Towards the end straightforward alternative rock slips in, like I heard on the previous single, 'Passing Judgement', see week 13. Having listened to the song a few times, it seems to draw me in anyway, but it was close to being discarded.

What Would You Call Yourself. Fink

An album was here five years ago and there was one single almost three years ago. Fink returns to the blog with a strong single. What Would You Call Yourself reminds me of early Coldplay, a song like 'Clocks'. When a song comes close to a banger like 'Clocks', Fink must be doing something right. His single has this driving force. It is already in the relatively empty beginning. It's not truly empty. The instruments are sort of mixed in a stacked way, so they all seems to come from the same source. And then the song opens like a flower in bloom. (Wasn't that a Fink album title?) That driving rhythm does not change, the song just widens and widens making it ever stronger. I'm almost sorry for that 'Clocks' reference, as What Would You Call Yourself has an inner strength all from itself but perhaps the comparison helps to bring people over to What Would You Call Yourself. It deserves it totally.

Docket. Blondshell ft. Bully

Alternative rocker Blondshell or Sabrina Mae Teitelbaum returns to this blog with a nice rocking single. She receives support from a singer called Bully, a name totally unknown to me. Teitelbaum explains that after writing Docket she kept hearing Bully's voice inside her head. No longer, as we can now all hear her contribution. It appears to me that it was not only Bully she heard, as parts of the verse start another song inside my head, from some post-punk band or other from around 2000. The song goes off in other directions so there's nothing to worry about. Docket rocks with the right amounts of light and shade in it to make the song more interesting. The same goes for the voices. Blondshell and Bully's duet make Docket more interesting than if it had only been either of the two. The ending is abrupt and the final line "my worst nightmare is he", does give cause for reflection to whoever that he is. And Bully? This is now the solo project, former trio, of singer Alicia Bognanno. Now you know all.

How We See The Light. John Cale

Only a few weeks back we had Keith Richards covering Lou Reed's 'I'm Waiting For My Man', that originally holds John Cale's bass or piano of course. Last month John Cale turned 82 but is not calling it quits yet. On 14 June his new album is released called 'POPtical Illusion'. How We See The Light is a fairly modern sounding song, sung by an old man with an old voice. Cale recorded his voice a few times to give it more power as a whole. The sound of the song is dense. An instrument is allowed to escaped for a moment to be drawn back into the whole. Over and under it are more mysterious sounds, almost ghostlike, like the wind blowing through something providing background noise. How We See The Light holds a faint trace to the most driving songs of The Velvet Underground in the way the piano is played, but does not hold any of that band's energy. Although this track is fine to listen to, it is also the last spark of a once fierce fire. John Cale is still at it and rightly so. Just as long as you do not expect fireworks.

Wout de Natris


P.S.

Shadow Changes. Kate MacLeod

Without looking I clicked on the video You Tube presented me and was baffled by the beauty presented to me. Unwittingly I was listening to Shadow Changes by Kate MacLeod. A song from 2001 put on You Tube in 2015. Here's what I had written before I found out that the single I wanted to review was not released yet on the time of writing. Shadow Changes is too beautiful to ignore.

Time for a little singer-songwriter and folk music. Kate MacLeod was on this blog in the past two years with the Jean Richie experience songs she recorded. Today she returns with a special song "In Recognition of National Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women’s Day", which falls on 5 May this year. The song starts with a beautifully clear recorded country guitar. Kate MacLeod's voice follows and that is the sort of moment the world stops for a few minutes. I'm listening to sheer beauty for three and a half minute.

(And then I found out, reading about contributions that I did not hear on this song. And yes, I've heard many songs like this before, but this is the bonus one that always comes along at some point. Sheer beauty it is.) WdN

No comments:

Post a Comment