Butt-Load of Covers!
For no apparent reason, I've recently picked up a bunch of releases that consist of cover versions. So let's have some quick reviews.
But, before I start, let's talk a little about covers. What I want in a cover is a new spin on an old tune. Note-for-note remakes don't do much for me. Unfortunately, most of these tracks suffer in this way. So, these aren't glowing reviews. That's okay, they can't all be winners!
I'm always a little surprised to learn that Shonen Knife are still recording. I'm also always surprised that they never sound any older. Here, they cover a selection of Ramones classics. There's no real spin on these songs. They sound like the Ramones, only with female Japanese vocals. (Meaning the voice is Japanese. The songs are sung in English.) If that works for you, then you're good to go. If not, you'll be let down. It's something to which I'll listen occasionally, but not regularly.
This is just one track, provided free to backers of their Kickstarter album. It's a revved-up version of the classic. Very listenable, although not as wild as the Plasmatics' cover. I like it, although it could be even more Dollyrotten.
So, we were having a conversation on Facebook about all-girl bands, which included Cheap Chick, an all-girl Cheap Trick tribute band. I know of them because the drummer for Betty Blowtorch plays in Cheap Chick. Looking for tracks by them led to this album packed with covers of hard rock/metal/punk tunes by all-girl tribute bands.
The album itself sounds a little tepid. About half the covers sound like decent bands covering classics, only with female vocals. The other half fares better. In other words, they just sound fuller, crunchier, louder. None break new ground with the songs. Still, if you liked the originals, you'll likely enjoy at least half the tracks here. But the novelty of the band members being female won't make this a regular player.
Interestingly, the band most represented was AC/DC, with three different tribute bands in evidence.
Songs for Slim - The Replacements
The last album is for a good cause. Former Replacements guitarist Slim Dunlop had a stroke. Because we live in a third-world country, he needs help with medical expenses. Paul, Tommy, and Chris got together and recorded some tracks for a benefit album. (Well, Paul and Tommy got together. Chris provided his own track.)
They actually pressed a limited number on vinyl and auctioned them off. (The first one pressed went for a cool ten grand.) Now the album is available as an MP3 release. (And, apparently, in non-limited-edition vinyl later next month.)
So, is it any good? Well, here's the thing, these are all cover versions. So if you were hoping for new Westerberg songs, this ain't it. If you love it when the Mats play oddball covers, then you'll likely love this release. But, if you're like me, and you don't really enjoy covers done by the Mats, then this ain't gonna thrill you much.
Still, you should buy it, for Slim.
Brand New Shoes!
It's been, what, 17 years or so since Shoes released a new studio album? And, yet, here's a new one! It's called Ignition.
So how is it? Well, I think it's great. But I'm a fan of the band. Basically, if you like Shoes, then you'll like this album. It fits like a well-worn pair of jeans. It doesn't break any new ground. But, frankly, I don't think they need to. I look forward to another similar release in 2029.
If you don't like the band, this release won't change things. You still won't like the band. Although you should, at this point, start re-evaluating your taste in music. Seriously.
If your problem with the band is that they're just too soft to be power pop in your eyes, you might want to try Double Exposure
instead. It contains demo versions of the songs from Present Tense
and Tongue Twister.
These versions are punchier than what you'll find on the earlier releases. However, it's still not raucously loud power pop.
If you have no idea who Shoes are, well, they're a power pop band with an emphasis on a softer, fuzzier sound than someone like Cheap Trick. They ladle on more harmonies than many power pop contemporaries, too. They're also known for producing this lovely shimmering stuff in their own home studio.
And, one final note: It's just Shoes,
not The Shoes.
The Triumphant Return of the Dollyrots
Okay, let's be clear. I didn't love the Dollyrots' third release A Little Messed Up. I didn't hate it but it seemed like they were expanding in a bad direction.
About a year ago, I received news that they were going to make a fourth album. But, instead of sticking with a label, they were going to crowd-fund the new release via KickStarter. They greatly exceeded their modest financial goal and, a year later, we have a new set of tunes to which to listen.
So, how did it turn out, you ask? Should you head over to their site and pre-order it? The answer is an emphatic YES!
If you went and read my review of the third album, rest assured that the new one fixes everything I didn't like. It's a buzzing bouncing ball of punky power-pop goodness. It's not a carbon-copy of the first two albums but it progresses from them in a good way. There's a wee bit of keyboard in places, effective but not distracting. Luis' back-up vocals are more evident. Slow songs are kept to a minimum. It's, frankly, what the third album should have been.
My favorite track is the single, Hyperactive.
It's fast and fun with choppy verses and a chorus with which it's fun to shout along. I love how the last line of the chorus comes in a beat early. And there's a cute video for it:
Oh My Darlin'...
I've long become disenchanted with iTunes.
No, that's not right. I've never been enchanted with iTunes at all. It's a big piece of bloatware when all I really want to do is play music.
Alternatives on OSX? Well, there are some, but they've always lacked one important thing, smart playlist support. I rely pretty heavily on smart playlists. So most alternatives have been non-starters.
But now there's Clementine. It's a cross-platform player with smart playlist support. Sweet! So I fired it up!
And it works pretty good. It's free, but in order to stream to my AirPort Express, I had to buy AirFoil for $25. (If you play directly from your computer, then you won't need this.)
Alas, there was a problem when setting up playlists. Many of my playlists use the star ratings I've given tracks. But, that info doesn't reside in the ID3 tags. It's local to iTunes. Clementine supports ratings, but it has no way of grabbing iTunes' rating info.
So, I whipped up some AppleScript to grab the info. It queries every track, grabbing the artist, song title, and album title, plus the rating. Then it dumps it all to the clipboard, pipe delimited. I then pasted that into a text file called Dump.txt. Here's the code:
tell application "iTunes"
set dumpTruck to ""
set theseTracks to (every track of library playlist 1)
repeat with thisTrack in theseTracks
set thisArtist to artist of thisTrack as string
set thisName to name of thisTrack as string
set thisAlbum to album of thisTrack as string
set thisRating to rating of thisTrack as string
set dumpTruck to dumpTruck & thisArtist & "|" & thisName & "|" & thisAlbum & "|" & thisRating & return
end repeat
end tell
set the clipboard to dumpTruck as text
display dialog "Done!"
If you're wondering why I didn't extract directly from the iTunes database, it's because the SQLite database is encrypted. I think. I'm not checking because then I'll feel stupid.
And if you're wondering why I didn't extract the data from iTunes' XML file, it's because Apple doesn't understand XML and parsing that file is a royal pain.
Anyway, once I had the data extracted, then I whipped up some Perl to insert that data into Clementine's database, which is also SQLite, but is unencrypted.
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use DBI;
use strict;
my $db = DBI->connect("dbi:SQLite:clementine-test.db", "", "",
{RaiseError => 1, AutoCommit => 1});
open(FILEIN, "<Dump.txt") or die;
my @lines = <FILEIN>;
close(FILEIN);
chomp(@lines);
foreach my $line (@lines) {
my $artist = '';
my $title = '';
my $album = '';
my $rating = '';
$line =~ s/'/''/g;
($artist, $title, $album, $rating) = split(/\|/, $line);
if ($rating ne '0') {
my $newRating = $rating/100;
my $sql = "UPDATE songs SET rating=$newRating WHERE ((title = '$title') AND (artist = '$artist') AND (album = '$album'))";
print $sql . "\n";
$db->do($sql);
}
}
All the code does is go through each song. If the song has a rating of more than zero stars, it converts that to Clementine's rating scheme and updates that song's rating in the database. No, it's not optimized at all. I don't care. It's a one-time thing.
Tick Season
So, my last music review post wasn't very glowing. So here's one that is...
Deer Tick - Divine Providence
I was introduced to Deer Tick's brand of music by the guy who did the Replacements documentary. He said that Deer Tick has the same ramshackle go-for-broke feel as the Mats did. And I'll be damned if he wasn't right.
I don't know much about the band's music other than listening to their latest, Divine Providence. They're not from the Minneapolis area; they're from Rhode Island. But they sure sound like they could be. And I mean that in the best possible way.
It's almost like the Replacements had sloppy drunken sex with the Jayhawks and birthed something weird and wonderful.
I keep saying they,
but it's really just one guy, John McCauley, with an ever-evolving band backing him. And McCauley himself swaggers with drunken abandon, possessing a voice like some unholy hybrid of Paul Westerberg and Tommy Stinson.
The album itself has thoughtful slower songs, sparse songs, loud songs, and a glorious drinking song.
Oh, and a wonderfully screwy video:
More Deer Tick CDs are on their way. Should arrive today!
My Fourth Favorite Monkee
Davy Jones is dead. Despite my snarky headline, shamelessly nicked from my first favorite cousin, I am sad about Davy's death.
No, he didn't really add much, musically, to the Monkees. But he was a constant throughout the band's history. They would not have been as popular as they were without the appeal he held for a large portion of their fans.
The Monkees were an unjustly maligned band. Pretty much everything you probably believe about them is wrong.
A Bit Let Down
Last year was poised to be a great year for music I like. Butch Walker had released perhaps his best album yet. And there were upcoming releases by Tommy Stinson and The Jayhawks. The Jayhawks release was notable for the reunion of the classic
line-up, including Mark Olson. So, how did these releases stack up?
Tommy Stinson - One Man Mutiny
Stinson's One Man Mutiny is good, but not as good as Village Gorilla Head. I think part of the problem is that Tommy has contracted a slight case of Singer/Songwriter Disease. Butch Walker himself suffered from a bout of this back in 2009. Basically, it's when a musician tries to be a more serious and fully realized artist. This is usually a bad thing.
But Tommy's case isn't too bad. The release isn't as fun as the prior one, but it's still a good listen. Well, except for the first song, for which Tommy's voice is entirely unsuited. He's going for gravelly. But he doesn't have that sort of voice. He has a punkish bawl. It just doesn't work.
What does work really well is the addition of vocals via Tommy's wife. Her voice is very much a female version of Tommy's own. They meld well. Sometimes she's doing harmonies; sometimes they're trading off the lead vocal. In either case, it works well.
So, while I'm not as pleased with Tommy's latest as I am with Butch's, it's still a good listen with promises of further productive husband/wife collaborations.
Speaking of new
vocalists, let's talk about the Jayhawks.
The Jayhawks - Mockingbird Time
So, how is the all-new-old Jayhawks' release Mockingbird Time? Meh.
Let me be clear right off the bat, I'm not one of those folks who thought the Jayhawks starting sucking after Olson left in 1995. But I did enjoy his reunion with Gary Louris on Ready for the Flood. So I had high hopes for this new album. (By high hopes
I mean I was quivering with excitement.)
And the resulting music isn't bad. But it's tepid. There are pleasant songs, but no great songs. The harmonies are okay, but not great. Olson sounds more like a younger Willie Nelson than anything else. And while that sounds like a compliment, I don't mean it as such. It makes his voice distracting, intrusive, no longer a complement to Louris'.
The music lacks the pop smarts of latter Jayhawks songs. But it also lacks the country twang of earlier Jayhawks songs.
It's just a lackluster effort, even taking into account my expectations. I find myself maybe singing along to a chorus hear and there, but not to whole songs, and certainly not while searching for additional lines in the harmonic depth in which most Jayhawks songs swim.
Now Playing
You might have just noticed the song playlist over there on the left. For the longest time, I had a home-brewed solution
to the problem of posting whatever was playing.
My solution
consisted of a PHP script running in the background which would call AppleScript to poll iTunes every 30 seconds or so and extract the band and song name. If it had changed since the previous polling, it would post the info. At first, I posted this to a Twitter feed. (SexyNuns,
which is no longer active.)
Later, I hacked the code to instead ship the info up to this server, where it would be inserted at the top of the posts.
The sucky thing was that it meant I always had to remember to run the script. And the functionality was very limited.
So, one day, I did a quick search for alternatives and found Now Playing, which is a plug-in for iTunes. It actually counts as an iTunes visualizer. When the song changes, it creates a nice XML file with the information. The XML file can optionally include the last however many songs.
If that weren't enough, Now Playing also tries to find the song on Amazon and provides links to the album art. Nice!
And then it can do several things with the information. You can FTP it up to a server, as I'm doing here. Or, you can have it post the info to Facebook or Twitter.
The guy who wrote it also provides a nice chunk of PHP code that'll parse the XML and create basically the layout you see to the left. (Although I modified it to make older song choices have smaller album art.)
All in all, a sweet chunk of functionality and well worth the asking price of $15.
Call Butch a Spade
I did a rather detailed review of Butch Walker's previous release, I Liked It Better When You Had No Heart.
He has a new CD out, called The Spade.
I'm not going to do a detailed review of it. There's no point. It's just really good and you should go get it. It had a bunch of big juicy party songs, the type only Butch can do so well. It has a couple folk/country tinged songs. It ends with a raucous bar number.
In many ways, it's I Liked It Better When You Had No Heart,
only done better. That previous release had a gimmick. It was entirely conceived, written, and recorded in a week. And it does suffer for that, with some songs a bit unfinished. (Unfinished == lacking in hooks.) This one grabs you immediately. Well, it grabbed me immediately. (Get it? Because it has the hooks. Haw haw haw!)
About the only criticism I can level is that it dwells a little too much on nostalgia. I'm not talking about the retro feel of some of the tracks. I'm talking about too many songs about earlier days. Shit, Butch, I'm a few years older than you and I don't reminisce about the good old days nearly as much as you do.
Whole Butt-Load of CD Reviews
I've been holding onto this post for a bit now, intending to finish it. Eh, I've waited enough. Here's a bunch of short CD reviews, in no particular order:
JG Thrilwell - The Music of JG Thrilwell
Oh, man, is this a great disc! It's all theme music from the Venture Bros. cartoon. But it's great theme music. Play it in the car and your drive will suddenly become more interesting, thrilling, even dangerous. Play it while you work and that memo gains new urgency.
It's become my new CD to which to listen while trying to get some work done.
(It supersedes the Fahrenheit 451 soundtrack, which in turn bumped off the Forbidden Planet soundtrack.)
Care Bears on Fire - Get Over It!
This band is made up of teenagers. And by teenagers,
I mean early teens. They're a trio of girls playing slightly punky pop. They're not bad. But they're really for the Nickelodeon crowd, not adults. In other words, they're not a pop-punk Donnas.
What they more resemble is a younger, simpler Dollyrots. Again, not as buzzy and fizzy, and certainly not as adult in subject matter. But it's that same sort of feel. So, maybe in a few years?
In terms of quality, it's a little hard to judge. They're just kids, on one hand. And they write their own songs, which is impressive. On the other hand, they did get some help from that Fountains of Wayne guy.
So, it's impressive for a trio of kids. But there's a certain sameness to each song, too. Speaking of which...
Foo Fighters - Wasting Light
I'm assuming that these guys realize there are other song structures than whispered verse/shouted chorus?
Okay, it's not that bad, but I haven't really dug anything by them in a long while. This isn't bad, but nor is anything grabbing me. And there is an awful lot of whispered verse/shouted chorus songs here.
Actually the last Foo Fighters song I really liked was FFL (Fat Fucking Lie), which I got as a bonus vinyl single back when we had a real record store. It's loud and in your face and doesn't whisper at all.
REM - Collapse Into Now
I've realized that my appreciation of REM is inversely proportional to how well Michael Stipe enunciates. This is mid-tempo rock. Nothing bad, but nothing thrilling.
I really didn't need to know that his smell like honey.
The Halo Friendlies - The Halo Friendlies/Acid Wash
These discs were a surprise. The one Halo Friendlies disc we have is glossy pop-rock, with a snarky lyrical bent. These earlier discs are way more punky. And rougher. And more poorly written.
Ouch! Okay, they're not bad, but they're not clever, either. This could easily be early Go-Gos.
The Cliks - Snakehouse
Frontman Justin has a really interesting and evocative voice. The songs themselves are uneven. Some really grab you. Some are just window dressing for his voice.
(Yes, I know why his voice is so interesting. So what?)
The track "Oh Yeah" will bounce in your head forever. The chorus is built the same as the Can't Stand Losing You,
by the Police, of course. But the songs really aren't similar at all. The Police tune is a driving track, almost mechanical. The Cliks' track is emotional shifting into almost-but-not-quite bouncy when it hits the chorus.
Bob Mould - Modulate
I was reading Bob Mould's autobiography and decided to pick up Bob's weird-ass solo disc. (The review for the book is coming right up!)
This disc is the one in which Bob discovers electronica and tries to incorporate it into his previous style. If you hated the song Megamanic
off of The Last Dog and Pony Show,
well, you probably won't love this either. But you might not hate it. Bob himself, in the autobio, admits that this is a pretty unsophisticated attempt. And he's right. But there's still some fun to be had. It's nice to see him stretch out into something vastly different from anything previous.
That said, I'm still glad his more recent work is more typical Bob. (Despite his claims that The Last Dog and Pony Show
was to actually be his last stab at guitar rock.)
And, if you find you really like this side of him, then check out his Loudbomb side project.
The Green Lady Killers - Just Fine
Great band. Great CD. The only problem is that My 45
rocks so ridiculously hard, that the rest of the album sounds tamer than it otherwise would.
Hell, buy it just for My 45.
Seriously.
Boosty Collins - Tha Funk Capitol of the World
This disc is one long party. The only track I really didn't like is the sop to white kids, Minds Under Construction,
featuring Buckethead.
Uh Huh Her - Common Reaction
Remember the girl from the Murmurs who later starred in The L Word?
Well, she's teamed up with a multi-instrumentalist for this interesting, but certainly not essential disc. It's a nice listen. But none of it is really sticking with me.
JET - Shaka Rock
If you liked JET's earlier shots at retro-rock, you'll like this, too. As had become a common theme in this post, nothing stands out for me yet. Nothing rocks as hard as Get Born. And there's nothing as nice as Eleanor
from Shine On.
Guns n' Roses - Chinese Democracy
Best Buy stockpiled this release. Honestly, they have entire racks filled with unsold copies. Now they're dumping them for $2 a pop.
Wasn't worth the two bucks.
But, hey, if Tommy Stinson can keep making solo records from what Axel pays him to be in GNR, then it was two bucks well spent.
The heavyweight vinyl version is the same price. Stock up for craft needs!
Cyndi Lauper - Memphis Blues
Cyndi, your baby-doll voice doesn't work in the context of the blues.
I was going to add a bunch of hyperlinks. But, hell, if you don't know how to use Google or Wikipedia by now, you're hopeless.
