album of the week: 3.4

The Menzingers

On The Impossible Past

(2012)

why you'll love it: Rousing ballads, honest and depressing lyrics

why you'll hate it: not doing a whole lot to stand out

This latest generation of melodic punk bands haven't done that much for me. I get a bit caught up in the hype around bands like The Lawrence Arms, The Gaslight Anthem, and None More Black; but once I start to settle down into one of their albums, little of it sticks. I think On The Impossible Past is the first album of this kind over the past 7 years that really has.

The Menzingers are doing a lot of what their peers are. Whisky drowned ballads told through power chords and grated vocals. The lyrics on this album have a sweet spot to them though. Depressing enough to set a tone, and realistic and grounded enough to keep from sounding naive and melodramatic. If I had any kind of talent and wrote songs, I'd like to think they'd go like this. So I have a sort of an appreciation for the pace and somber attitude reflected here.

This is one of those "What you hear is what you get" naked approaches to songwriting, so I don't have a whole lot to go on about. The songwriting feels very honest, almost Bruce Springsteen like, without sounding like it's trying to be. Nothing feels forced or tacked on. It's just a great album for jaded punks headed into their 30s to raise their beers to. There are a lot of those out there, but this one seemed to tug at just the right heartstrings for me; and my cynicism cannot detect any pandering to a certain crowd. Recommended!

OK... let's try this....

Sorry, I am a big dumb dramatic baby.

Next time something goes wrong I'll just flat out walk away, and not write a story.

album of the week: 3.3

tsushimamire

Shocking

(2012)

why you'll love it: ambitious & successful, something totally new for the band

why you'll hate it: Hells of "crazy Japanese", may be too silly for most people

Change is afoot for the decade+ old tsushimamire. Usually known for their aggressively cute meets straight-up aggressive punk collisions, the trio sheds schizo for substance. That "substance" is still crazy as all hell, but a well produced HOUR LONG concept album is something I never expected from a band like this.

The details of Shocking are in Japanese, but the broad concept of space aliens in the form of food coming to Earth on a dinner plate shaped saucer are there for you to take in. At least, if it wasn't before, there it is now. Shocking is admittedly heavily influenced by David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust. Every song is meant to either push the wacky "rock and roll aliens" story forward or flesh out the universe. tsushi really went above and beyond with this album. It has detail and melodies that I had no idea they were capable of. Despite being sung in Japanese, there are recurring themes and a flow to the album that anyone can get caught up in. Outside of the songs, they even created their own faux-band, The Shockings. The whole experience is lots of fun, and can't stop praising their ambition here.

There are no irritating "cute songs" here. At least not on purpose. There are only two songs that really come close to tsushi's edgy distorted template. Without their two most reputable traits, they somehow manage to create something unmistakably tsushimamire. Songs about food have always been a staple. Their usually vague perplexing oddness gets pushed up front and becomes more focused into this wild concept.

Do not mistake this for a pop album. Mari's voice isn't suddenly going to be easy on your ears. There still will be refrains and melodies that will check over your shoulder to make sure no one is hearing you listen to this. That album has plenty of compelling moments, but the voices are still nasally, they're still pronouncing English words funny, or repeating a phrase that just plain sounds silly. And that's how I like it. Tsushi is a strange and sometimes challenging band, and that's what I always want them to be.

Clocking in at nearly an hour, I'm surprised at how little I would cut. There are only a couple songs that I don't really dig, and it's the very long ones at the end I love the best. Pretty impressive for a band I once thought could barely maintain a half hour. They may be accidentally butchering the pronunciation of "messiah" (or are they?), near the end of the album, but I'm still hanging on every note; floored that they've held my attention for this long, and still experimenting with each track. The pacing of the album in the second half is brilliant. Without knowing the lyrics, you still get the big emotional swell of a story or journey. The first half has its moments as well, but a couple stumbles that will make you second guess. Persevere! By the end, you may be won over.

tsushimamire will never be the band most people look for in music. At their most accessible, they're still instinctively abrasive, or unashamedly flawed. This record will annoy the crap out of most people, but EVERYONE should listen to it at least once. All of it. The whole thing, in one sitting. You don't have to like it, but it is one of the strangest, most unique, and ambitious albums of 2012 for sure.

Album of the week: 3.2

Dan Sartain

Too Tough To Live

(2012)

why you'll love it: Uncharted territory, good use of simple songwriting

why you'll hate it: 19 minutes, every song sounds the same

After a disappointing return with Lives (2010), Dan Sartain is back with a new sound. Simplicity was what did in Lives, a vastly inferior follow up to the brilliant southern rockabilly swagger of JOIN DAN SARTAIN (2006). Instead of trying to go back and right the wrongs, Dan works with his new simplistic writing style to create a 19 minute Ramones style greaser punk album.

Too Tough To Live has not an inch of fat on it. No extended intros, or middle eights, and no extra verses. There is only one track on here that breaks the 2 minute mark. The songs are simple, but cut off (abruptly) before they get annoyingly repetitive.

As much as I'd love to hear another JOIN DAN SARTAIN, this looser, louder, and dirtier version of Dan is a pleasant surprise. I think it's a cool departure, but not a good permanent direction. 19 minutes of this is enough. These songs have a very lo-fi production. Almost to the point where the whole thing sounds like a demo tape. The way the songs are structured, you're not really missing out on anything by everything sounding to grainy and mashed together.

If you can't hang with this kind of production, there is nothing here for you. As someone who has been listening to Dan for a long time, I think it's a cool little change of pace. Definitely washed the taste of Lives out of my mouth.

new music roundup hoedown smash party

Here are audio samples of all the new releases I've tackled so far (and plan to get to over the next month).

Best of January / February 2012 from roomrunner on 8tracks.

album of the week: 3.1

Sleigh Bells

Reign of Terror

(2012)

why you'll love it: more party anthems, and a bit less fuzz

why you'll hate it: still a flimsy gimmick, diminishing returns

Sleigh Bells' sophomore jinx starts out with a live cut of the band addressing a roaring crowd. A little introduction to let you know that they are rockstars. Raw and beloved for how raw they are, introducing the track "True Shred Guitar". Wait… did I just hear a censorship bleep? This bleep doesn't just undermine their tough rock star facade, but it's clearly buried between the layers of the track. It only obscures the swear, not the guitar or crowd.

This is the problem I have with Sleigh Bells in general. It's all too artificial. Just as in their debut, Treats (2010), this isn't exactly a noise rock album. None of these songs are fundamentally apart from the norm or attacking the senses. Check out Zack Hill's Face Tat (2010). Those are songs that are conceived and constructed in a fucked up way. Sleigh Bells just writes normal catchy anthems, and lays a distortion filter over it. It's like how in photoshop, you can make a normal photograph look all "artsy" by playing with the filters.

I'm not saying Sleigh Bells needs to be more like Zack Hill, or that they're a couple phonies trying to convince you of being something that they aren't. It's just that this lo-fi filter they use is so shallow… so easy to poke holes through, that it really isn't worth it. Derek's guitar riffs on this album aren't even interesting, but Alexis' vocals are still really good. This is clearly a pop outfit, and all this arena rock nonsense is more of a distraction than flavor.

Forgetting all that, and judging this as a simple cathy album, this still is pretty weak. There are no standout tracks on this. There are a few good moments in "Demons" and "Born To Lose". "You Lost Me" slows things down in a satisfying way. But there are no "AB Machines" or "Tell Em". Nothing with a sting that grabs your attention. It's more of the same, without any knockout blows. Even the big praised tracks like "Comeback Kid" just make me want to listen to The Go! Team instead.

I don't know what Sleigh Bells' role in music is right now. To be Fischer Price's "My First Noise Rock Band"? That isn't so bad. There is nothing offensive about this album, but that is also its main problem. Maybe if there was. Maybe if they did aggressively go for artificiality, or pop, or noise, or anything. This is just that kind of neither here nor there wasted potential that leaves me more dissatisfied than something I would call straight up bad.