March 22nd, 2016 1:36am
“Long Goodbye” is a song about coming out of a relationship that you know wasn’t very good and still being angry about how it ended. How could they be so careless with your heart? How could they string you along for so long? How did you fall for any of it? You blame yourself for being blinded by love, and maybe that’s it. Basia Bulat sings this song with a steely, bitter tone, and the words are rather cutting. But as much as the lyrics are a string of recriminations ostensibly directed towards the ex, it’s clear that this isn’t for them at all. This isn’t for their ears; it’s all directed inward. It’s the story you need to tell yourself over and over so a narrative sticks, and you can write off a bit of the past and move on.
March 21st, 2016 1:10am
I wonder if the hook to this song, in which the singer shouts “I can’t even remember being young!,” would’ve seemed defiant to me if I’d heard it a decade or so ago. Maybe it would’ve hit me as a cool line, but I don’t think it would’ve resonated as much. It feels genuinely rebellious to hear a rock band play a very fast and loud song about how conflating rock music with youth is total bullshit, and the mythology built around living fast and dying young is empty and dumb. “Sex & Drugs,” which is followed by an equally great up-tempo number called “& Rock & Roll,” is an earnest celebration of the fun side of rock, and I think for this band, a way of reclaiming it from everything in culture that’s made it seem tired and clichéd.
March 17th, 2016 1:42am
I love the way Kendrick writes about being infatuated with women. He always seems so consumed by his fascination, like he wants to learn everything about them and take in every last detail, as if there was a way for him to crack the code of what makes them so beautiful and compelling. As smooth, clever, and laid back as Kendrick gets, he still sounds a bit flustered thinking of this woman, and he seems so eager to impress her. He’s putting her on a pedestal in some ways, but at the same time, this song is mainly a meditation on imperfection, and how closely someone’s strengths are connected to their flaws. The really sweet sentiment here isn’t so much the “you’re beautiful exactly as you are” thing, but more that he sees this woman as an equal, and is drawn to her because they both are a bit out of step with the rest of the world. It makes some sense of the intensity of his crush – he’s a guy who can have his pick of available women, but he’s only fixating on the one who’s attuned to the same odd frequency he’s on.
Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge’s track is gorgeous, and could stand on its own quite well as an instrumental with that lovely, lyrical flute part becoming the most expressive element of the arrangement. There’s a light, slick feeling to the track, and it suits the infatuated tone – in this context, Kendrick sounds flirty and cool, and the words flow like they’re carried on a cool breeze. Cee-Lo’s vocal is great too, rooting the track firmly in mid 20th century R&B without making it feel overly retro.
March 16th, 2016 12:30pm
Beach House @ Webster Hall 3/15/2016
Beyond Love / Walk in the Park / PPP / The Hours / Silver Soul / Space Song / 10 Mile Stereo / One Thing / Wishes / Rough Song / Master of None / Bluebird / Take Care / Elegy to the Void / Myth // Sparks
I spent a lot of this show focused on Alex Scally’s guitar playing and wishing I could get a better view of what exactly he’s doing with the instrument. His style is so distinct but also oddly understated – for one thing, I think most people think of the keyboard drones as the most notable thing about Beach House’s sound, despite his guitar being the actual focus of their compositions. But then, a lot of what makes their songs work is this sort of emotional equilibrium between Scally’s parts and Victoria Legrand’s vocals. They usually take turns playing the emotive or meditative parts, so there’s this sustained soul-searching quality to their music. Legrand’s voice grounds the music, but it’s Scally’s guitar that gives the tunes drama and grace, and a low key romanticism that few of their immediate peers can match.
March 15th, 2016 12:20pm
I guess it was about time that sad boy indie dance music came back into style, right? TV Girl is a guy named Brad Petering who making tracks that would’ve sounded very suave and urbane back in the late ‘90s, and singing like Ben Gibbard’s lovelorn little brother about the sort of hopeless, haphazard relationships people typically have in their early 20s. “(Do the) Act Like You’ve Never Met Me” is a sad sack tune about the frustration of having to pretend like you’ve never been intimate with someone and acting like total strangers, even though part of your brain is screaming “THIS IS ALL A LIE! DON’T YOU REMEMBER???” This could easily be awful “nice guy” stuff, but Petering has a sense of humor about it – he doesn’t undermine his own emotions, but does put them in proper perspective with a nod and a wink.
March 14th, 2016 1:23am
Everything about this is strange in the best way. The band name is totally confounding – like, are those the names of the members? Is one of them called “Salami”? Is Salami Rose Joe Louis actually one woman? Why would a woman call herself that, if she’s indeed a solo artist? Who can say!
“I Miss You So,” like the other tracks available in advance of the full record coming out in a couple weeks, is zonked-out low-key funk, and at times sounds like a record that’s been slightly warped by the sunlight. The singer shifts between breathy girlish whispers and restrained soul vocals, like some kind of severely stoned jazz singer child. The music reminds me a bit of the sort of stylish vaguely R&B-ish, trip-hop-ish stuff that was big in upscale bars and shops circa the late ‘90s and early ‘00s, but a lot more psychedelic and hazy. A lot of the time it sounds like an extremely drowsy funk/R&B band, and it totally works. This song sounds very romantic and intimate, like something being whispered in bed in the middle of the night.
March 11th, 2016 2:47am
This is a pretty simple garage rock song, but it has the presence of something a lot more grand and ornate. A lot of that is in the main lead guitar part, which cuts through the song with the grace of a gentle folk tune while the drums bash out a simple beat that echoes like something a lot more epic. “Jobin” is just over two minutes long, but The Orielles do a lot with very little in that time, all at the service of a lead vocal that gets across some very critical words with just the right balance of seriousness and sass.
March 10th, 2016 12:40pm
I wasn’t surprised when I read a thing in which the singer of this band explained that “Hissing My Plea” was built out of bits of other abandoned songs. Not in the sense that the song is fragmented or doesn’t hang together well, but in that there’s several strong melodies and grooves in this, and it sounds very carefully crafted. I love the way they contrast this casual, stoner-ish bass groove with a very regal string arrangement, and the way Anna Fox Rochinski sounds so poised as she sings. There’s a delicate quality to her voice, but also this very grounded confidence in her phrasing, particularly as she expresses frustration and desperation. She makes the darkest feelings seem sorta serene.
March 9th, 2016 2:12am
There’s very little ego in Animal Collective. When they sing about personal relationships, it’s always in this gentle, supportive way, and appreciative of small moments with people they care about. When they sing about the world around them, it’s with a bit of awe or bemusement. That comes through in the sound of the music too, as they favor these sort of upbeat melodies that signal amiable generosity, or stoned introversion. “Vertical” is a great example of this, as the harmonies and syncopation are just odd enough that a rather straightforward melodic theme feels scattered and swirled. I love the effect this has on the way you hear the lyrics – these snippets of images and stray thoughts are evocative, but are scrambled enough that it’s less about a statement, and more about a sensation of feeling like everything’s spinning around you.
March 8th, 2016 12:54pm
Lucy Dacus keeps singing “I don’t believe in love at first sight” in this song, but every other line suggests otherwise, as she describes feeling totally paralyzed with lust for these men she sees in passing. Now, of course, that’s not real love, per se. But it is exactly what “love at first sight is;” the feeling of sudden intense infatuation with someone you see and feel very strongly that you need. “Direct Address” describes this feeling so well, examining the odd dynamic of filling in as many details about a person as you can from inference, and never acting on the attraction but holding on to the memory for years because the feeling was more eventful than most actual events. Dacus’ performance is lodged somewhere between frustrated irritation and coy flirtation, and the pace of the song feels impatient and restless. She sounds like she’s trying to shake herself out of a bad habit, but in the end when she recalls a man she saw in an audience years ago, the details are rendered with so much affection that she makes a good case for these moments being actually quite meaningful and beautiful.
