Guitarist Steve Hackett may be best known for his work with early Genesis in the 1970s and participation in the 80s rock super group GTR, in which he played alongside Yes guitarist Steve Howe. But for over thirty years, he has had a distinguished solo career, releasing a number of exquisitely wrought recordings with a variety of collaborators. Those who are “in” on the existence of this impressive catalog might wish that it had less of a cult status, as that’s what would befit much of Hackett’s output from a qualitative standpoint. However, remaining slightly below the mainstream’s radar has had had a fortunate byproduct. Hackett has been able to avoid the pressures of mainstreaming and homogenizing his records’s content, a fate that has befallen far too many prog legends once the A&R people got their way. Instead, Hackett has happily explored eclectic music-making; work that encompasses prog rock epics, synth-haloed alt pop songwriting, blues-inflected electric guitar shredding, pastoral neo-folk ballads, and crossover classical compositions played on nylon string guitar. Sometimes all of these approaches appear on the same album.
Beyond the Shrouded Horizon, Hackett’s most recent studio release, epitomizes this eclecticism. Yet, amid all this variety, it is a musically cohesive and engaging recording. The principle reason: Hackett’s singular creative vision remains crystal clear and his chops and voice are both in sterling shape. Fans of the guitarist’s progressive rock catalog will warm to “Loch Lomond” and the twelve minute epic “Turn This Island Earth;” the latter features guest bassist Chris Squire (of Yes). Squire also provides a contrapuntal bass part on symphonic prog song “Looking for Fantasy,” and lays down a sepulchral groove on “Catwalk,” a roiling blues-rock number that showcases Hackett’s soloing at its most hot-blooded. Amanda Lehman lends nimble vocals to three songs, while John Hackett duets with Steve on the pastoral psych pop piece “Between the Sunset and the Coconut Palms.” Longtime collaborator Roger King provides beautiful synth textures and keyboard playing throughout.
Hackett’s two brief acoustic guitar solo compositions, “Wanderlust” and “Summer’s Breath,” are tantalizing palette cleansers: one would love to hear them in expanded incarnations. For those wanting a concise “single-worthy” pop song, complete with Beatles-esque harmonic shifts and supple string arrangements, Hackett supplies “Til These Eyes.” Yes, Beyond the Shrouded Horizon is a stylistically omnivorous collection; but one that maintains high musical standards throughout.
Last night, Sharon Van Etten played the song “Serpents” on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon (video below), debuting a new band featuring a guest appearance by Aaron Dessner (the National). The song is from Van Etten’s forthcoming 3rd LP, Tramp, which is slated for release on 2/7/12 via Jagjaguwar. It’s also been released as a single b/w non-album track “Mike McDermott.”
The performance featured a more amplified sound palette than her previous work, adding tinges of indie rock to Van Etten’s alt-folk style, with the songwriter inhabiting a bolder demeanor fronting the proceedings. Add the key ingredient of stardom’s formula – a memorable lead-off single like “Serpents” – andTramp appears poised to be Van Etten’s breakout release. Congratulations on a very successful network TV debut!
As you probably know by now, Robert Pollard has reformed Guided by Voices with much of the lineup from its nineties lo-fi heyday. They appeared last night on on David Letterman, performing “The Unsinkable Fats Domino,” the lead-off single from their new album Let’s Go Eat the Factory. And other than a little tumble by bassist Greg Demos partway through the song, they sounded just great. (Don’t worry, he’s okay!)
You can mail order the new LP now (as well as its digital equivalent) or wait ’til 1/16 to visit your local record-seller. But by all means, take the time to hear it: although some of them might be past the stage-diving portion of their careers, Pollard and Co. sound refreshed and inspired.
Bad as Me, his first studio album in over seven years (the last was 2004′s Real Gone), is a musical homecoming of sorts for Tom Waits. While there are certainly plenty of songs that share affinity with various releases from throughout his body of work, from Frank’s Wild Years to Mule Variations to Alice, there’s also a conscious embrace of what one of my friends called “Hollywood Tom Waits.” By that, he meant the early years of Waits’s career, when he was both a Beatnik bard and aspiring film composer (and actor); one who’d duet with Crystal Gayle and collaborate with Bette Midler. The years before Waits’s persona became larger than life. And before he began to work with longtime partner and collaborator Kathleen Brennan. Brennan, a playwright, would urge and enable Waits to plumb the dramatic depths of his songwriting craft. So, pre-1983; pre-Swordfishtrombones.Brennan is still listed as coauthor on all the songs on Bad as Me, and the lyric narratives remain taut and clever. But she seems willing to take this stroll down memory lane with her partner.
And while calling Bad as Me “Hollywood Tom Waits” could have been leveled as a criticism, connoting a step backwards or a more superficial creative process, one needn’t – indeed shouldn’t – take it that way. Instead, it can be reckoned as a rapprochement between Waits’s latter day experimentation and some of the features of his earlier work: supple melodic writing, a penchant for good hooks and compact structures, and an ambiguous approach toward emoting: one that often leaves the audience unsure of whether he’s being satirical or on the level.
Thus it often is on Bad as Me as well. Waits can sing the refrain from Auld Lang Syne on “New Year’s Eve,” the album closer, without it seeming bathetic or mawkish. He can croon an ostensibly sentimental ballad like “Last Leaf” in a duet with Keith Richards (a longtime collaborator if a larger than life legend in his own right). But the sandpaper swoops of their combined voices make the performance’s bald emoting seem earnest, hardworn, andearned; a careworn moment of vulnerability rather than two old hands blubbering into their beers.
There’s plenty of edge and ebullient polystylistic experimentation on the CD too. While Waits recruits new band members to the fold – his son Casey Waits plays drums and Red Hot Chili Peppers’s bassist Flea plays bass on couple of tracks, a number of others are longtime collaborators. Marc Ribot and Larry Taylor create an angular backdrop for the barnstorming blues of “Raised Right Man.” David Hidalgo joins Ribot, Taylor, the younger Waits, and a horn section in the rollicking rockabilly of “Get Lost.” The title cut finds Waits channeling Screaming Jay Hawkins, abetted by saucy baritone sax and Ribot outlining an off kilter yet catchy tango rhythm. Things get stranger still on “Face to the Highway, ” a song that recreates the blurred edges of many a cut on 2002′s beguiling Waits record Alice. And “Hell Broke Luce” is a Harry Partch percussion-enabled howling and rap with motoric pulsations that ultimately devolves into skronk cum circus music. It’s easily the track on Bad as Me that displays the most avant attitude.
One is not only impressed with the suavely chameleon character of the CD’s supporting cast, but with a similar vocal suppleness from Waits himself. Not only can he still inhabit all sorts of characters, but the dynamic range he brings to bear, from delicate falsetto and hushed whispers to infernal rasping, bellowed sprechstimme and screams that, for less durable singers, would likely be polyp inducing. All in the service of a baker’s dozen of songs of equally durable quality; ones that can stand beside some of the best material in his catalog to date. Long live Tom Waits.
Kate Bush releases 50 Words for Snow, a new CD, today via the Anti imprint. Below is an animated video accompanying one of the album tracks from her official YouTube channel.
The Jim Jones Revue’s sophomore record, Burning Your House Down, is out Tuesday 8/16 via Punk Rock Blues.
JJR on TOUR
September 1 – Vancouver, BC @ The Biltmore Cabaret
September 3 – Portland, OR @ Doug Fir Lounge
September 4 – Seattle, WA @ Bumbershoot Festival
September 7 – San Francisco, CA @ Independent
September 8 – Los Angeles, CA @ Echo
September 10 – Brooklyn, NY @ Music Hall of Williamsburg
September 11 – Allston, MA @ Brighton Music Hall
September 12 – Montreal, QC @ Casa del Popolo
September 13 – Toronto, ON @ Horseshoe Tavern
September 14 – Chicago, IL @ Schuba’s Tavern
September 16 – Philadelphia, PA @ The Blockley Pourhouse
September 17 – Washington, DC @ Black Cat
September 18 – Hoboken, NJ @ Maxwell’s
Bucharest born singer Sanda Weigl will be performing at the 92nd Street Y Tribeca tonight. She’s celebrating the release of Gypsy in a Tree, her new album of Romanian folk music inflected with jazz, rock, and out there sounds.
She joined by a diverse group of collaborators: Stomu and Satoshi Takeishi, Shoko Nagai, Doug Wieselman, and Ben Stapp; a rock band, a gypsy band led by Emil Bizga, and appearances by Anthony Coleman, Ned Rothenberg and Ljova Zurbin.
You can check out a stream of Gypsy in a Tree, as well as show details, below.
Friday, April 22 at the 92Y Tribeca,
200 Hudson Street, NYC.
Doors open at 8 p.m. for the 9 p.m. show.
$15 in advance, $18 at the door.
212-601-1000.
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