Recording review - The Fierce and the Dead, Magnet

The total package of physical and mental gymnastics

^4.0/5.0

One of the things I love about Matt Steven's music is that he doesn't just alternate between visceral guitar expression and intellectually satisfying geometric balance. Instead, he blends them together into a spicy melange that milks excitement and intensity from that dichotomy. Even in a short 1:41 piece like "Magnet in Your Face", he can find the space to surprise. That tune jump starts The Fierce and the Dead’s Magnet EP with a furious assault of thick, head-banging guitar. The simple thrashy vamp sinks straight into your reptile brain like some kind of insistent, metal-flaked drug. While the rhythm obsessively circles this compelling focal point, the lead comes in and prods the song forward with an angular pentatonic line. The song is a third of the way into its brief run and if it were any other band, that Neanderthal DNA would make the song as predictable as a simple mathematical series. Sure enough, the one-two of the opening leads to the obvious three of a slightly introspective bridge, but then that bridge melts away, leaving a clean, disarming interlude that suggests fractal reflections with a playful bounce. While the tune does settle back into the adrenal punch of the main riff, that post-rock side trip colors the rest of the song. It makes you wonder how far afield the band would take it if they gave themselves the luxury of five or six minutes to develop it further.

The following track, ''Palm Trees", takes the opposite tack, starting with a crystalline guitar that feels like a Cubist sketch: a static scene visualized from different angles. But Kevin Feazy's throbbing bass joins in and triggers more rambunctious play. Relatively soon, though, the two approaches reach a detente of coexistence , each complementing the other. The song still has some tricks though, with a final Gothic crescendo that collapses into the chaotic echoes of a hornets nest.

Magnet gets off to a strong start with these two new pieces, but the band also mixes in a retrospective set of tunes. Two of these are rehearsal recordings of songs from their last release, Spooky Action (review): "Let's Start a Cult" and the title track. It's not immediately clear whether these were demos or if the band was working out how to perform them live. I'd guess the latter because the arrangements seem fairly clearly planned out. Neither of these enjoy the sweet production of the album versions, but the Stuart Marshall's drumming is expressive and vibrant, and each gives a sense of how TFatD's songs are built from sections to form a coherent whole.

They round out the reissued tunes with a version of "Flint", originally from 2011's If It Carries on Like This We Are Moving to Morecambe (review). This take is more focused, dropping the original's extended space echo intro. Without that trippy start or the edgier production choices, Magnet's version shifts the perspective from a tentative search for solid ground that grows in confidence to one that starts with a clearer sense of self-possession and hidden resources. That feels right because it reflects how much TFatD have evolved.

EPs are usually stopgap moves to tide fans over between meatier releases, seldom turning out to be essential listening, but between the solid new material and the revisited songs, Magnet is a good snapshot of TFatD's development as well as their enduring talent. They cram a lot into 20 minutes and it's a treat to bask in that yin yang of delicate crunch, of distorted introspection, of The Fierce and the Dead.

Magnet is available from the group's Bandcamp page.

Recording review, Ozric Tentacles, Technicians of the Sacred (2015)

Contemplate the infinite through electronica and progressive guitar shred

^4.5/5.0

It’s a short attention span musical world,where the emphasis is usually on tight pop expressions. But while mere gestures are enough to satisfy most consumers, there are still some genres that need the maneuvering room of a full album to develop their ideas. In the four years since Paper Monkeys came out, space rock stalwarts Ozric Tentacles apparently had so many inviting trails to explore that even that was too confining . Their latest release, Technicians of the Sacred, sprawls out over two full CDs. Despite the obvious excess, there's not much in the way of fluff: while the songs take their time to find their target trancelike moods, they never fall into monotony. Longtime fans will find plenty of familiar ground, but the emphasis is on electronica punctuated by Ed Wynn’s shred-tastic guitar.

Disc 1 leads off with “The High Pass”, which takes an eight and a half minute nomadic trek through many of the sonic environments that the Ozrics enjoy the most: underwater dives, expansive vistas, evocative action zones, and spelunking trips deep down into the heart of the machine. The dynamic flow accommodates both incremental transitions and freefall plunges that reset the context. The tune wanders from chill electronic grooves to mind-warpingly intense prog-rock guitar, but the anxious rhythm and pensive funk bass line remain more or less constant. The restless electro energy may form the foundation, but there are plenty of distractions that provide ear-catching details that vie for the listener's attention, from blooming synth melodies that shift and grow to a robotic interlude that would be perfect for popping.

The music that follows could be soundtrack excerpts from a randomized set of dreamscapes. The Krautrock infused “Far Memory” seems fit for an underwater world, full of echo and frequency shifted shimmers, while the electro-pop “Changa Masala” has an infectious syncopated rhythm that suggests sleepwalking through a Bollywood set as it melts away into space. The imagination can run wild in these intriguing snow-globe worlds. The band dives into each with enthusiasm and little worry for how the songs might evolve. So a cheery electronic piece like “Zingbong” might start with an uptempo New Age feel, propelled by a busy gamelan synth run and terse bass line, but the Ozrics are content to let a Zappa-esque guitar periodically warp the piece into an off-kilter jumble, knowing that they can always nonchalantly slip back into the clarity of the main riff.

The second half of the album gives freer rein to the band’s progressive rock side, with plenty of energetic guitar mutation and distortion. This disc begins with my favorite track on the album, “Epiphlioy”. The Beats Antique style world-tronica groove is built on a galloping Middle Eastern dervish rhythm that’s intricately tied to a synthesized sonic palette. Like the evocative pieces on the first CD, the song suggests a series of images: a tense chase with an undercurrent of excitement, a visit to a nomadic camp in the desert, a spaced-out psychedelic trip in the middle of an oasis. It’s easy to get lost in the drawn out narrative of the piece, but the exotic tone, along with the touchstone rhythm guitar part, provide grounding enough for the extensive 12 minute sojourn.

By the time we reach the final cut, “Zenlike Creature”, it’s been a long disorienting trip. We’re ready for the centering focus of looped interlocking patterns, but even here, the meditative flow gives way to a more progressive groove. The track see-saws from thoughtful to assertive, eventually picking up an Alan Parsons style momentum. Despite the dynamic give and take, though, there is still a kind of imperturbability at the root of the song. It's as though the band is saying, "Ignore the illusion (māyā) and just settle into the moment." The macrocosm of Technicians of the Sacred reflects this message as well. It never delivers a clear mythology or answers. Instead, it just offers a hypnotic zone to contemplate the infinite. Or not, as you see fit.

Recording review - Steven Wilson, Hand. Cannot. Erase. (2015)

Music vs. narrative: take your pick

^3.5/5.0

Context is often the key to appreciation. I prefer to approach new music with as little baggage as possible, so I came to Steven Wilson's Hand. Cannot. Erase. as a blank slate, ready to see where it led me. His music usually has an ambiance that is best experienced without any preconceived notions. This time, though, I had a hard time getting a grasp on the album; I couldn't find the context. The bigger, more progressive moments were beautiful and moving, but the first two tracks seemed emblematic of the project as a whole. There was a discontinuity between the slow fade-in amorphousness of the first piece and the dynamic expansion of the song that followed.

Normally, Wilson helps his listeners keep that tabula rasa mindset by offering little commentary about his music. Even though he isn't too fond of putting his work under a microscope, this time he’s had several interviews where he’s discussed the story of Joyce Carol Vincent that inspired Hand. Cannot. Erase. She was a young woman who dropped away from her friends and family sometime around 2000. What made this newsworthy is that she died in her London apartment in 2003, but her body wasn't discovered until 2006. Wilson came across the documentary/drama, Dreams of a Life and found both the movie and the real story compelling.

It's a good starting point for a concept album: aside from the poignant ending, there's a fundamental mystery that gives an artist room to speculate and expand upon. Fittingly, the songs on Hand. Cannot. Erase. are fairly indirect, offering their own oblique signals as they outline the woman's gradual abdication from her community, punctuated by kernels of loss and pain. Wilson doesn’t tie himself to the details, but steps into his own parallel narrative. For example, his ending expands on a minor factual detail to suggest a final hope for reconnection that comes too late. With a freer hand, he positions his character at the center of a self-imposed conflict. The songs are full of ambivalence, sometimes repurposing or reframing the same words to offer cross meanings. The music is similarly hard to pin down. Sparse simplicity lurches into stormy surges of emotion, and electronic elements are juxtaposed against warm analog instruments.

Knowing the inspiration clarifies things a bit, but ultimately, it’s not quite enough.The larger musical gestures like “Ancestral” fall outside the project's conceptual arc because their scale dwarfs the delicacy of the story. It’s a tough trap for Wilson to avoid. The indirect approach lets him leave room for interpretation, but that subtlety can't compete with the scope of his musical expressiveness. If that’s the downside, the upside is that he is continuing his creative growth and expanding his palette by integrating more sampling and electronic sounds as well as bringing in a female singer, Ninet Tayeb, to represent his lead character.

The album starts slow and thoughtful, but the second, longer track, “Three Years Older”, picks up the pace with the energy of The Who spliced with flashes of Rush. The instrumental section spins out for a solid three minutes before the first words come in. The song is effectively an overture prologue that sets the stage for the album’s story. Wilson sings with a gentle sympathy, sketching out a chain of disengagement that, by the end, suggests a suicidal solution. Once the vocals are out of the way, the remaining three minutes launch into a series of diverse themes that range from pensive introspection to a frantic King Crimson style break. These sections try to bridge the polar ends of his character’s solitude and her seething social anxiety.

The music is a good reflection of Wilson’s usual style, and the.loneliness is clear, but the roiling emotion feels out of proportion. Later, “Home Invasion” and “Ancestral” will evoke a similar reaction: the music is among his strongest writing, but they seem tied to his own perspective rather than relating to the tale he’s trying to tell. Despite the tenuous connection to the album’s narrative arc, “Ancestral” turned out to be my favorite track on Hand. Cannot. Erase. The rich textures swing through extremes, from the sparse beat and brooding guitar at the start, accented by a jazzy flute, to the fluid, expressive post-rock shred on the solo. A mix of old and contemporary influences adds to the melange, creating a blend of Radiohead with Gentle Giant.

Even if the album has trouble balancing its song arrangements with the narrative, Wilson has done a good job of echoing the unknowns of Vincent’s life with lyrics that hinge on ambiguity. On the title track, “Hand cannot erase this love,” is an assertion of connectedness, but there’s also an undertone of co-dependence and a hint of domestic violence. On “Transience”, the line, “It’s only the start” initially seems optimistic, but then it turns around to represent the dark fate that’s coming. If there’s a moral here at all, it’s tied to how we should understand Vincent’s life choices. There’s a fundamental paradox: it seems she chose this path as a coping mechanism in reaction to social pressure and disappointment, but ultimately it led to her destruction as she faded from life and memory.

Wilson succeeds at using the bare bones of Vincent’s story to explore the nuances of this conflict. At the same time, his music writing and performance are as strong as ever. I just wish I didn’t have to pick between the two when I listen to Hand. Cannot. Erase.

Recording review - ...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead, IX (2014)

A demanding muse powers the evocative flow

Insistent and obsessive, …And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead write and perform like they’re in the grip of a sometimes terrible muse. Words burst forth as if they can’t be contained. Deep swells of ringing guitar cascade down, almost overwhelming the mix. Dynamic drops to soft moments are less a respite than a chance for the storm to gather its strength anew. Their work has a sense of urgent immediacy that demands attention. Even when the vocals are almost washed away and the lyrics are hard to follow, the songs have an emotional heft. Their latest release, IX, finds the band with less of an overriding concept than The Century of Self (2009) or Tao of the Dead (2011), but a strong tide washes through it, promising catharsis. Last year’s Lost Songs saw the band focusing on tighter, more accessible pieces along political themes, but IX falls back to their core strength of revealing personal truths, giving their material a little more rope. Maintained the stripped down lineup and tighter arrangements of their last album, the new set provides an organic extension, the band flexing dynamics just like the good old days and expanding their sonic tapestry with deftly applied strings and keyboard textures.

Trail of Dead jumps right in with “The Doomsday Book”, leading with a few seconds of sustained chords before drums propel the song forward in a headlong rush. Guitars join in earnest with a ringing arena-worthy wash, and the slurring, emotive vocals are almost buried under the drone of driving syncopation and makeshift walls of guitar. They remain clear enough for listeners to follow the theme of loneliness, of facing challenges without someone who makes it worthwhile. This kind of stirring intensity is what the band does best, and this tune dispels any doubt that Trail of Dead has lost a step.

The playlist unwinds from the veiled threat behind the martial punk rhythm of “Jaded Apostles” to the uptempo post-rock palette of “Lie Without a Liar”. These songs contain oases of quiet moments, but the band finally takes a deep breath on “The Ghost Within”, the heart of the album. Moody and thoughtful, the song is permeated with a weariness that fits the lyrics, “There’s a curse upon your home/ There’s a sadness in this room.” The vocals may be worn down, but the song builds energy as it reaches the end of the verse. On the second pass through the changes, it heats up and uses repetition to draw out tension, before it finally builds into an inevitable boil with the accusatory lines, “And I want you to let go/ And I want you to come home.” The music is a rich haze of bitterness, regret and loss, along with a sense of the love that was. By the end it all slips away, and Conrad Keely repeats those lines with the sparsest accompaniment, lost and wistful.

Trail of Dead fills IX with their usual spectrum of genre blends: Green Day pop punk, indie rock posturing inspired by the Replacements, sculpted U2-like theatricality and other, less identifiable flashes of world beat and post-rock. More importantly, the crafted production is sparked to life by their raw emotion and ability to surrender themselves to the power of those feelings. It’s not perfect – “Lie Without a Liar” could benefit by stretching out and adding a new direction or two, and “How to Avoid Huge Ships” is more a musical interlude than a fully developed song. But the band has never offered perfection. Instead, it’s the adrenaline of soaring and diving, the evocative flow that drags the listener from peak to peak and the sense of more vivid colors and experiences. Their muse still feeds their compulsion, and we’re the luckier for it.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Interview - Ray Shulman of Gentle Giant

Ray Shulman played bass and a list of other instruments in the progressive rock band Gentle Giant. The band’s 1974 release, The Power and the Glory has been recently reissued (review), with remastering by Porcupine Tree’s Steven Wilson. I spoke with Ray about the remastered package and Gentle Giant’s past.

Jester Jay: Hi, Ray. I’m very excited to talk with you about the reissue of The Power and the Glory. I know that you’ve had some interaction with Steven Wilson over the years. For example, you were credited with DVD authoring on his album, The Raven That Refused to Sing (and Other Stories).

Ray Shulman: I’ve worked with him for quite a while now on a few of his Blu-rays and DVDs. So, we got to know each other quite well.

JJ: Did that have anything to do with him getting involved in this project?

RS: A little bit. Actually, I found out that he was a fan of Gentle Giant and he’d been dying to do the remixes for a long time. It just became an opportunity. The timing was right. We were ready. We’d had offers from other people who wanted to mix it in surround (sound) before and we weren’t very enthusiastic. But because I knew Steven and I really like his work, I like what he does – I like him as an engineer, as a producer and he’s a great musician – the time was definitely right.

JJ: I would agree. He’s done a wonderful job with the King Crimson back catalog and his other projects. What did he bring to The Power and the Glory?

RS: We were happy with him. What we said was, “Do whatever you want. Do it how you feel. Don’t be dictated to by our mix, by the original mix. Just go ahead and do it.” But on the other hand, he’s so respectful of the past. He won’t do anything alien. Like, for instance, he wouldn’t use modern reverb or anything like that. He definitely has a reverence and respect for what we did back then. But what he brought… obviously, the technology has moved on enormously since we recorded the album and, in a way, I think that his philosophy is, “mix it how you would mix it if you were working today, bring that technology to bear, but don’t let it dominate.” To me, it sounds more open and a bit deeper. I think our original mix is really good, but he definitely brought a depth to it and an openness to it that I really like. Also, just the fact that when he mixed it in surround sound, he mixed it in 5.1 and that opened it up a lot for me. I really enjoyed his mixes.

JJ: In contrast to the 35th Anniversary reissue that Derek (Shulman) put together, I noticed that Wilson included the instrumental outtake from “Aspirations” instead of the live version of “Proclamation”.

RS: Steven just found that on the multi-track and I think he really enjoyed it. What it was, we did a couple of versions on that track, “Aspirations”. It’s more or less a jam in the studio; it’s basically one take and we’d just overdub a vocal, I believe. But we did it and we just couldn’t get the feel right. I think we went to the pub and after we came back from the pub, we decided to take a last try. That’s how it was. I think Steven found the outtake on the multi-tracks and he wanted to include it.

JJ: The regular album version is great, but this one really lets you focus on the smooth integration of all the musicians coming together on it. It has a very immediate sound. 

I had another question about the track list for the remaster. In the past, members of the band have expressed unhappiness with the title single, saying that it was an afterthought, that the record label came at the end, looking for a single. Do you still feel unhappy with that piece?

RS: In a way, you’re right. It wasn’t really part of the album. The record company at the time was definitely looking for a single, something they could take to radio. So, I think we recorded about three different tracks. We can never find the other two tracks. I think we had three goes at writing a short piece, a three minute piece and “The Power and the Glory” is ultimately what we were happiest with, but it was never going to be included on the album. Nowadays, it just has historic value, as opposed to any kind of intrinsic album value. It’s kind of a rarity, in a way.

JJ: I agree that it doesn’t quite fit the album, but it also doesn’t seem to be that bad a piece.

RS: No, exactly. And also, I think that, with time, you kind of mellow. Things you were kind of militant about at the time… time passes and you can see some kind of value in it.

JJ: Can you tell me about the DVD and Blu-ray?

RS: Yes, what happened was that when I knew that Steven was going to mix it, I thought, “What’s the best quality audio you can put out there?” At the moment, it’s really Blu-ray for uncompressed surround sound and 96/24 stereo and it’s DVD, which is somewhat lower quality, but it’s still high end audio. When we decided to do that, for the visual side, you can do captions for each song: just the title of the song appears on screen. But because I work in graphics as part of my day job – I do some motion graphics – I thought I’d have a go at doing something. I started off…I think the first track I did was “Cogs in Cogs”. I made up some motion graphics for it and I sent that to Derek (Shulman) and Kerry (Minnear) and they were really encouraging. They said, “This is great. Carry on and do it.” Any kind of spare time, I’d try to do something for each track. In the end, we ended up with an album full of visuals. It’s not a strict interpretation of the lyrics really; it’s more an interpretation of the music. Derek wrote the lyrics and, obviously, every listener can interpret them in different ways, but I just wanted to give something just to accompany it. Hopefully, the people who buy it will appreciate that.

JJ: Looking back at when Gentle Giant originally made this album, how did you develop your arrangements? You guys were all multi-instrumentalists, so how did you decide on the roles and textures for a particular piece?

RS: Well, myself and Kerry were the main music writers and Derek was the main lyricist. In the early days, we used to collaborate more: one section would be my section and one section would be Kerry’s. As time developed, we wrote whole pieces on our own. Kerry’s pieces, he’s a classically trained musician, so he’d almost write them orchestrally and even if you learned the parts by ear, they could be on manuscript. He’d share out his arrangement as he demoed it. Then later, in rehearsal, you’d add your own touches to it. Likewise, with mine, I’d write on guitar and when it came to giving Kerry a keyboard part, it made the keyboard part kind of unconventional because Kerry would play a guitar line on the keyboard and then embellish it with different implementations. In the studio, we’d always record a basic track, with just a bass, drums, basic keyboard and guitar. Then after that, we’d really experiment and try all these newfangled instruments, just to have a go on. Or even older instruments; we’d bring a pipe organ into the studio, just to see if it added any kind of textural thing to any particular song. There were also new, electronic instruments coming in at that time, as well. So, you’d want to just bring them in, even if you hadn’t worked out a fixed idea. If the texture fit, Kerry would always come up with a part that worked. It was like that, really.

JJ: Listening to a piece like “So Sincere”, it’s like a roller coaster ride. It runs through a host of musical ideas.

RS: That one is particularly well written. That’s one of Kerry’s tracks and it’s a fine piece of writing, I think. On any level, you could transcribe that as a score.

JJ: That’s part of what stands out about Gentle Giant’s music. The interesting rhythmic complexity has a well-crafted sound.

RS: It’s good you said that, because, at the time, it was hard to get a mass audience into that kind of sophisticated arrangement.

JJ: I know that some of your later material tried to find a wider audience and cross over. Bands like Yes and Genesis transitioned into a more popular sound. Was this a conscious attempt to move towards a more mainstream sound?

RS: It was, in a way. In order to continue, we always wanted to grow the audience. We were very aware that our early stuff was quite sophisticated. In a certain way, you almost needed to be a musician to understand it. As you say, a lot of our contemporaries were crossing over to a more mainstream audience. That must have been on our minds at the time, but there was always something holding us back. We could never quite fully do it. Even though on surface, we’d write a kind of commercial song, we’d always have to throw in something weird to entertain ourselves. But unfortunately, that also alienated the mass audience. It was never meant to be a mass audience kind of music. It should have just remained part of the underground, really.

JJ: Before I close, I’d like to hear about your more recent work. I know that you’ve worked a lot as a producer and as a composer. Can you tell me about some of these projects?

RS: I’ve done so much. Since the band, since 1980, I’ve done all kinds of things, always to do with music. When the band first broke up, I wrote music for advertising over here. It was very well-paid and I developed a knack for writing to order. I did that for quite a while, but I got bored with that. Then I went into production. In the late ‘80s throughout the ‘90s, I was in the studio all the time recording bands like the Sugarcubes, a band called the Sundays and lots of more independent bands. I enjoyed that for a while. After that, it was enough of the studio. I was spending so long in the studio, hours and hours, I really didn’t have any kind of home life. So, I decided to retire from production and the next thing I did was write music for computer games. I got into computers early on and loved them. I got into games and I started writing some soundtracks. And then, when DVDs came, I thought I’d learn how to do some graphics and I could work from home and make my living that way. And that’s what I’ve kept doing, really. I’ve had quite a diverse career, but it’s always about music and that’s where I am today.

JJ: It’s been a pleasure to talk with you and it’s been great to reacquaint myself with The Power and the Glory.

RS: Thank you ever so much.

(This interview first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - Gentle Giant, The Power and the Glory (Steven Wilson remaster) (2014/1974)

A timeless progressive treat shines for a younger audience

Steven Wilson is a sonic archaeologist, patiently brushing away the sand and the cruft to reveal the bright beauty of the past. The Porcupine Tree frontman divides his professional life between learning from the classic prog rock groups, celebrating their monumental accomplishments, and making his own contributions to the art. Ever since Robert Fripp bestowed his blessings on Wilson’s production work by inviting him to be the curator for the King Crimson back catalog, he’s tackled a number of his earliest influences and remastered their classic works with loving care. Gentle Giant’s The Power and the Glory (1974) is his latest project and he’s done a brilliant job of cleaning it up and fine-tuning the impact, both in stereo and in 5.1 surround sound. This engineering effort can be underestimated and undervalued, but the comparison between Wilson’s mix and my old vinyl (or what you may find online) is stunning. This release is rich and lively, and somehow newly relevant.

It helps a lot that this music is somewhat timeless. Sure, the complexity and technical expression are anchored in an early ’70s aesthetic, but Gentle Giant often struck out on their own path and weren’t really concerned with what their progressive contemporaries were doing. Moreover, the band members were each adept at multiple instruments and they could draw on a wide range of inspirations from folk to baroque to avant-garde jazz.

Wilson makes his mark from the start. “Proclamation” opens with a grey-noise wash of crowd sound quickly overtaken by an electric piano riff and the clarity is crisp. The mix cleanly separates Derek Shulman’s vocals from the sparse bars of keyboard; both are lightly reverbed but the delays are different enough to create a good separation between the two. The keyboards recall Supertramp’s early days, but the angular phrasing behind the vocals is distinctly tied to Gentle Giant’s sense of rhythm. By the third verse, the other instruments have joined the interlock. This sets up a tight melodic interlude that transitions through a series of moods. I can’t help but savor the interplay of beat and harmony as they mesh and separate. This is the band’s hallmark: the music is unpredictable and intricate, but a structure emerges and, by the end, the patient listener is rewarded as order coalesces.

The next track, “So Sincere”, winds its way between tentative, sidling melodies and stumbling King Crimson style exclamations. The stylized singing takes advantage of some very old-school close harmonies, but the most engaging feature is how the players stay tightly aligned, whether it’s the piano and guitar leapfrogging one another or a riff skittering across a series of instruments. This is among the more accessible tunes on the album, but it’s still quite challenging and far from casual listening music. The piece seems almost schizophrenic as it tries to encompass a feverish set of ideas in just under four minutes. Rather than providing no handle, there are a multitude of entry points and the song is too restless to let any dominate for long. But despite the challenges, they never drift off into incomprehensibility or self-indulgence.

The Power and the Glory proceeds through its allegory of idealism and corruption. It’s less heavy-handed than some concept albums, relying mostly on close attention to the lyrics, although “Valedictory” is more overt as a tarnished reworking of the themes from “Proclamation”. Along the way, Gentle Giant traipses across genres, showing off their many-faceted musical interests: a jazzy turn on “Aspirations”, intense fusion on “Cogs in Cogs”, folky touches on “No Gods A Man”, and the hard edge of “Valedictory”. Like the 2005 remastered version, Wilson’s package includes the title single that was never part of the original release. While the band has dismissed this track as atrocious, it really isn’t that bad, even if it’s a bit bouncier than the other songs. Where the 35th Anniversary edition included a live version of “Proclamation”, Wilson opts for an instrumental outtake of “Aspirations”, which works remarkably well in this form. Kerry Minnear’s piano anchors the piece along with Ray Shulman’s warm bass. Without the vocals, it’s easier to fall into the reverie of the groove.

Listening to The Power and the Glory now, it still stands out as a strong, coherent piece, but it also plays up the differences between Gentle Giant and their more long-lived contemporaries. The guys in Gentle Giant turned inward, spurring each other into deeper musical expression, while other bands like Yes, Genesis, and Styx, who were hardly dealing in trivialities, each found formulas to connect with a larger audience. Later in their career, the band would soften their intensity in a bid to make the same transition, but they never quite found the balance between the complexity of their ideas and the accessible clarity that the market demands. To their credit, they’ve never tried to resurrect the band in the years after their 1980 split, in recognition that they wouldn’t want to compromise on the integrity of their legacy. As this remastered version shows, their ideals powered a strong artistic vision and a musical aesthetic you rarely hear anymore.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - That 1 Guy, Poseidon's Deep Water Adventure Friends (2014)

A nautical concept album, orchestrated with absurdist flair

That 1 Guy's latest album is all wet. The first release in a projected four-part "Magicland" series, Poseidon's Deep Water Adventure Friends is a concept album anchored down in the ocean depths. The individual songs are all connected through that nautical theme, although the continuity ebbs and flows. But even if the narrative is a bit disjointed, That 1 Guy (Mike Silverman) keeps listeners engaged with his usual mix of Frank Zappa-style absurdism and storytelling flair.

Silverman's fans are already familiar with his showmanship and technical chops on his self-designed instrument, the Magic Pipe. Something like a high tech diddley bow, the pipe combines two bass-string shafts and a collection of synthesizer triggers. Silverman performs as a one man band, bowing, plucking, and tapping his way to a wide range of sounds. Although his act is best appreciated live, his recorded work is plenty entertaining, even without the visual impact. Poseidon's Deep Water Adventure Friends continues that with catchy songs and full arrangements.


The album sets sail with "The Great Navigator", with the Magic Pipe providing the creaking sway of ropes, wood, and canvas. Ambient sounds back the cello-like tones, contributing to the mood. Silverman gives this instrumental prelude a rich, cinematic sound, full of grandeur. With this send off, the adventure really begins with "Infinite Depths at the Bottom of the Sea". Here, Silverman summons the post-rock excitement and optimism of early Styx and Rush, with staccato arpeggios and windmill chords and an undercurrent of electronica. His voice is deep and resonant like the mature Iggy Pop as he begins, "It used to be the greatest tale that's ever been told/ And it can't compare to what we're gonna see and where we're gonna go." He continues to set up a mythology of mystery under the ocean. The music feels adventurous as it melds Indian/East Asian electro beats with a progressive rock aesthetic. His wordplay here is really fun, "And we'll never get away to infinity/ Because the infinite's only in its infancy/ And when the infants all swim away to infamy/ At the bottom of the sea..." He relates the tale of a crew lost in lateral motion on the sea's surface, but it becomes clear that they were destined to head in a different direction

This leads to the arpeggiated excitement of "Poseidon", where Silverman portrays the underwater god with a fathoms deep pitch-shifted voice. The verses create a sense of expectation, but they're punctuated by a crunchy rock vamp. That heavy sound is revisited in the driving grind of "Electramafied", which also recalls Geddy Lee's work with Rush.

Silverman closes out the album by returning his adventurers to the land in "The Breakers and the Brine". All in all, the story itself is relatively shallow; his characters had some interesting encounters and they take stock during this tune, but it's not particularly linear. That 1 Guy makes it explicit that this is only "the first of four seasons," so more clarity may be forthcoming. Rather than get hung up on the narrative, though, it's probably best to just enjoy the songs and their shared context. The music hangs together well, with a stronger sense of Indian rhythms and electronic grooves than his earlier releases. He's always incorporated synth beats in his work, but they're more pervasive here, perhaps because he's moved away from the butt-shaking funk feel he's often favored in the past. I miss some of that visceral thump, but Silverman is pushing himself artistically. The pieces on Poseidon's Deep Water Adventure Friends feel more orchestrated but still retain his unique musical voice and vision. I'm glad to have joined him on this outing and I'm looking forward to the next installment from Magicland.

Recording review - The Fierce And The Dead, Spooky Action (2013)

Post-rock vignettes offer complexity and surprises

Pretty pop songs and simple I-IV-V blues rock jams are all too predictable. Flannel and comfort food have their appeal, but sometimes something stronger is called for. Spooky Action celebrates the idea of being challenged without earning the “difficult listening” label. The Fierce And The Dead build their progressive rock instrumentals with an eye for intriguing structures that ignore cookie-cutter shortcuts. Like jazz, their tonal exploration and rhythmic complexity draw on a richer palette of angles and textures. But where jazz usually forces a choice between relaxed harmonic flows and free jazz chaos, guitarist Matt Stevens and his band embrace the whole gamut, sometimes within a single song. A raw cathartic growl might yield to introspection or a sudden sense of purpose, only to thrash again shortly.

Oftentimes, the band’s animal expression is tied to Kevin Feazey’s rough bass tone. On the album’s first single, “Ark”, he leads the charge with a raspy rallying cry. Soon, he’s flanked by a pair of jangled guitars. The bouncy groove is warm and sunny, but the foggy bass keeps a chill in the air. The tune gradually grows more refined, with interlocking arpeggios sliding into place. By this time, Feazey has been seemingly defanged. But the genteel moment is overturned with a sudden punch of distortion and sharp drum beat that releases the bass to briefly stalk between the ringing guitars. His freedom is quickly curtailed though and the melody asserts a thoughtful control. It suggests that events are falling into place, that ambitions are coming to fruition. Even the bottom end finds a supporting role. But like most plans, this one eventually confronts a harsh reality and the percussive crunch returns. After chaos spends itself in a victorious show of force, order returns, but makes a more tentative sortie. The drums and bass cautiously step forward with a triplet riff and the guitars test the waters with simple expansive notes that lightly echo in space. Growing in confidence, the tune builds in volume and complexity, finally rising to a satisfied climax that balances the beauty of singing guitars and the beastly bass. It’s particularly nice that the band avoids self-indulgence by fitting such progressive excursions into a manageable run time. “Ark” tells its story in about four minutes.

The Fierce And The Dead had its roots in Steven’s solo music, which is filled with ethereal guitar loops. When Steve Cleaton joined for the group’s last EP, On VHS (2012), his guitar and keyboard work pushed the band to develop a rougher edge. “Intermission 3” harks back to their beginnings with a loose ambient flow. Softly hazed echoes and a windswept soundscape set the mood. As sounds swell into view and then fade, there’s the disorienting sense that something is pacing at the edge of perception. The eerie tension finally bleeds off like a fading apparition, lulling the listener. But it’s a false sense of release and the dissipating fog is ripped apart with the transition to the title track. Like a cold splash of water or a jarring slap, “Spooky Action” triggers an adrenaline spike. The tight, staccato rhythm and thick wall of guitar snarl offer a distressed King Crimson vamp as the song takes its time setting the hook. In a trademark dynamic shift, the tune brings the fear to a head then drops into a sun-dappled interlude. Cheery pop guitars and percussion chimes offer a carefree rebuttal to the opening anxiety. The song is permeated with a feeling of acceptance as it picks up a stronger sense of direction. Even the sudden fearful shift back to the opening can’t sabotage the mood completely. Taken together, these two songs form a joint view of the supernatural. “Intermission 3” sets up the mystery of the unknown, the start of “Spooky Action” captures a shocking confrontation with the unexpected and underneath it all, the third panel promises more comforting possibilities. Ultimately, the fear remains with the band unwilling to cocoon themselves away from their unsettling encounter.

While Cleaton certainly drives the punch on “Spooky Action”, his influence feels strongest on “I Like It, I’m Into It”. The heavy track opens with a blend of Thrak-era King Crimson and pulsating acid rock. Stuart Marshall’s drumming is exquisite, providing the perfect framework for the 15/8 grind, then exploding into flamboyance for the turn around breaks. This time, the dynamic drop has its own flavor. The last guitar note hangs while the bass thumps its way through a post punk march. When the guitar joins in, it’s ejected the distortion for a crystalline chime. The piece builds with repetition to wind itself into a classic rock jam and psychedelic lead before closing out on a tightly synchronized finish.

The evocative songs on Spooky Action serve up a stream of surprises, but maintain a coherent sonic aesthetic that finds resonance in such diverse artists as El Ten Eleven, XTC, Robert Fripp, and Black Flag. The bite-sized pieces evolve and develop into fully formed vignettes. It’s no wonder that Stevens and the band are making such a splash on the post-rock scene, with a Limelight nomination this year at Prog Magazine. Surrounded by trivial music, the Fierce And The Dead‘s instrumentals are a bracing tonic.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - Yamantaka // Sonic Titan, UZU (2013)

Artsy zen perfection of fire and space

Songs or albums? For most people, it’s no contest. Picking and choosing single tracks lets them winnow the pearls from the crappy packing material that some bands use to pad out their albums. Through playlists or iTunes shuffle, juxtaposing bands and songs provides novelty and synchronicity, satisfying the need for variety. Then a band like Yamantaka // Sonic Titan (YT//ST) comes along and negates the whole question. On UZU, the Montreal art and music collective pitches the viability of the concept album, but they also deliver strong songs drawn from a multidimensional sonic palette. In classic concept album form, tunes smoothly meld into one another and many exhibit similar strains of melodic DNA. But while the pieces share a mood, they aren’t overburdened with a ham-fisted storyline. As a complete set, the songs offer a genre-jumping wild ride but each can also stand alone.

On paper, YT//ST embodies an artsy stereotype that could easily fall into parody. As much performance artists as musicians, they’ve mixed media from rock operas about rival drag queens (33) to video games (YOUR TASK//SHOOT THINGS) along with their album releases and they usually perform in stylized Kabuki-like makeup. Their self-proclaimed musical style is not merely descriptive, but asserts an artistic statement: “Asian diasporic psychedelic black stoner synth opera.” Since that’s a bit of a mouthful, they’ve coined the term “Noh-Wave” as a shorthand descriptor, crossing Japanese Noh Theater with a reference to the no-wave music scene of the late ‘70s. It’s all very precious, but in a refreshing surprise, their music successfully avoids the kind of pretentious self-indulgence that usually comes with this stereotype.

Noh-wave is a cute bit of wordplay, but the band isn't abrasive enough to sell the no-wave half of the term. Instead, their musical foundation is rooted in progressive rock, especially the stylized sound of bands like Renaissance. Ruby Kato Attwood’s singing never quite rivals Annie Haslam’s warm purity, but the strong femme vocals enrich the songs. Often draped with echo and chorus, they fit well with the orchestration that varies from simple piano to heavier rock guitar. While the band’s sweet spot is centered on prog rock, YT//ST takes small steps into art rock and larger leaps in symphonic metal, experimental music, psychedelia and electo-pop. Like the artistic stereotype, this mish-mash of styles shouldn't be a recipe for success either, but the band traverses the list with fluid grace, smoothly transforming from one to the next, even within a single song.

UZU opens with a Chopinesque piano on “Atalanta”. When the ethereal vocal joins in, the track slips into that progressive, theatrical Renaissance mode. The song itself stays stripped down; Attwood’s trained voice, backed by the simple piano, suggests prophecies delivered on open dream-plane. But it picks up power and momentum when the song transitions into the symphonic metal start of “Whalesong” with the addition of pounding drums and a driving bass line. Angular guitar riffs, crunching chords and keyboard backing contribute to the intensity, but the singing remains distinct and distant. It’s an eerie effect, pitting an ice princess inside a glass shell against the fiery music. Dynamic drops allow elements of the last song’s piano peek out from under the insistent power ballad. The sound builds into a thick, trippy swirl before letting the Sturm und Drang dissolve completely to take us back to the uncluttered soundscape of “Atalanta”, this time overlaid with the sound of a flowing river. The watery ripples melt into a chaotic sonic collage for the next track, “Lamia”. Here, the tension builds into a precise math-rock crunch. The drumbeat is insistent, with paradiddle riffs and cymbal washes beating against the methodically steady guitar and bass. If the ice princess was spooky in “Whalesong,” now she’s taken on the title’s demonic persona, shrouded in swirling echo. Simultaneously wicked and ethereal, her advice has a threatening subtext, “If you have a heart/ Keep it in your body.” Reverberations overlap and interfere and the repetitive cycle of distortion is hypnotic, pulling you under her spell. There’s a sense of continuity from the first tune, distant foreboding is finally realized.

Although UZU is full of strong tracks, YT//ST chose their first single well. “One” touches base with the band’s appreciation of cross-cultural exploration and starts with an Native American flavor. Chanting vocals and an infectious double-time tribal beat set the stage and then mutate into an acid-washed garage grind. Retro psychedelic guitar weaves it way into the groove and the message kicks in, “Ever wonder what it’s like to live in America?” The melting pot sound incorporates myriad essences of American music: Amerind tones, surrealistic San Francisco textures, rock intensity, an electro-beat breakdown and even a bit of free jazz chaos. This is exactly the America I want to inhabit and this is the tune I want to build a whole playlist around.

In keeping with the Asian themes that YT//ST incorporates, a yin-yang balance is at play. Songs of heady intensity are immersed together in the swift, twisting current of the playlist while a concept album bears its theme lightly. Stylized artistic gestures create powerfully concrete music. As a result, UZU sits like a perfect Zen koan: Is it the songs or the album that connects? Not songs, not album, the mind connects.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - Sigur Rós, Kveikur (2013)

Powerful moments and industrial undertones, but still room for nuance

Members of Sigur Rós describe Kveikur as “more aggressive” than their earlier work and there are new sonic elements of industrial grinding and swells of chaotic noise, but they haven’t forgotten their ethereal roots. While the noisy touches may be compensation for the departure of multi-instrumentalist Kjartan Sveinsson, they add an insistent tension that expands the group’s emotional range. That visceral connection is still the key to Sigur Rós’ success. They’ve always stood as an example that emotional openness can trump lyrical meaning. Whether in their native Icelandic or their self-invented “Hopelandic”, the band has largely resisted pandering to their English speaking fans. It’s paid off because Jón (Jónsi) Þór Birgisson’s expressive vocals transcend simple words to reach for grander truths, leaving the specific interpretation to the listener. The new album carries on the tradition with songs like “Isjaki” and its sense of rueful experience, as well as the hopeful reflection of “Stormur.” Older fans needn’t worry, though; despite the noise, there are enough soaring, open moments to prove that the band’s musical core remains whole.

The windy, crackling static at the start of “Brennisteinn” creates an expectant moment before the song lurches forward with rhythmic, body-blow punches. With a Pink Floyd melding of bass grind, howling guitar and Jónsi’s inspiring vocals, the song taps into an epic, post-rock power source. The rumbling percussion and rattling bass tones suggest a leviathan remorselessly crawling forth into the world. The roiling storm of sound showcases Sigur Rós’ new direction, but they deftly reconnect with their thoughtful side when the thunder bows out to leave a pensive, reflective interlude. Where Jónsi’s voice had settled into a lower register, now he sweeps into his bruised, falsetto range. The transition from tumultuous crescendo to the eye of a storm is reminiscent of My Morning Jacket. The pause is quickly overtaken by an insistent beat and psychedelic haze. The final section of the song slips away into a dreamy reverie with long tolling notes and noisy swells of intruding feedback.

“Brennisteinn” is a strong opening salvo for the album, immediately raising the question of whether the band would push on into more bombastic extremes or settle back into their normal comfort zone. They feint towards tradition as the second track, “Hrafntinna”, carries on the dreamy feel with loose jangles of percussion. These quickly coalesce into a moody progressive rock that blends Porcupine Tree and Radiohead. Clashing chimes and buzzing cymbals provide an industrial undertone. Sigur Rós take the song out on a warm, orchestral horn line. Dynamic shifts like this recur throughout Kveikur, offering a yin-yang energy; floating vocals tame the heavier sections while cathartic cacophony provides an edge during calmer pauses. While the band has always balanced soft moments with greater energy, the group’s embrace of chaotic texture accentuates the contrast.

If the opening song pushes forward with a confrontational energy, the title track holds the second half of the album together with a relentless, compelling power. Distant ship horns sound through the fog as grating factory sounds are looped into a rhythm. Jónsi’s initial vocals are like a spaced-out, bluesy, Icelandic cover of Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Bad Moon Rising”, mutated with reverse reverb and echo. Orri Páll Dýrason’s driving, tribal back-beats propel the hypnotic groove into something like Adrian Belew’s “Big Electric Cat”. The droning, heartfelt vocals hover over a thick, wooly sound. Swirls of noise wind through the percussion like smoke, accented with prickly rasps and whining guitar feedback. The song builds to a frothy climax; then it dissipates into an ambient freefall of bass-heavy resonance.

After the weight of “Kveikur”, Sigur Rós breaks the tension with crystalline perfection at the start of “Rafstraumer”. Despite its relative brevity, the song feels epic. Just shy of five minutes, it moves from simple clarity to driving rock and then builds into an emotive anthem before melting into soft introspection. This feeds into the barren spaciousness that starts “Bláþráður”, which makes its own trek from gentle assertion to an operatic bombast before fading back down to its austere opening. The album closes on a minimalist meditation as echoes shine through on the instrumental lullaby, “Var”. The querulous piano melody is a far cry from the assault of “Brennisteinn”, reminding everyone that the band still appreciates the nuanced moments that they’ve created in the past.

If any of Sigur Rós’ new clashing dissonance reflects personnel conflicts associated with Sveinsson leaving the band, then they’ve channeled that stress into a vibrant creative vision that reinvigorates their sound. There’s little on this album that could be relegated to background music, but it still delivers the emotional payload of their earlier material. Coming fairly quickly on the heels of their 2012 album Valtari, Kveikur reassures their audience that the band hasn’t lost momentum trying to regroup.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review: Portugal. The Man, Evil Friends (2013)

Worlds of possibility grow out of a partnership with Danger Mouse

It’s all about trust. Portugal. The Man spent years developing their iconic mix of retro psychedelic rock, soul and pop. Then, when they first signed with Atlantic Records, fans had to trust that the band could maintain their outsider edge. In The Mountain, In The Cloud (2011) proved that a big label meant a better studio budget but it didn’t compromise their stylistic integrity. Their latest album takes the band a step further: could they partner with famed producer Danger Mouse (Brian Joseph Burton), taking advantage of his assertive aesthetic, and still preserve their sonic personality? Portugal. The Man have been bringing pop elements into their recent music, but Danger Mouse’s production and recording work are anchored in a pop milieu well outside the band’s home base. Bands he’s worked with — Gorillaz, the Black Keys, and Norah Jones, not to mention his own Gnarls Barkley — come from a completely different musical mindset.

Evil Friends is clearly a collaborative effort, with Danger Mouse bringing in synth treatments and pop vocal production, but the band’s gutsy move has paid off. They’ve surrendered some of their epic, open jams in exchange for a new set of textures. Under Danger Mouse’s influence, they’ve also threaded the songs together with a selection of integrated references. Sometimes those connections are overtly obvious, like the bridge from “Creep In A T-Shirt” returning as a verse in “Evil Friends”: “It’s not because the light here is brighter/ And it’s not that I’m evil/ I just don’t like to pretend/ That I could ever be your friend.” Other times, it’s just a familiar snatch of melody or repetition of phrase between tracks. This structural reinforcement is mirrored in the album’s running theme of anti-religious secularism with a cast of outsiders.

The opening track, “Plastic Soldiers”, eases into the band’s new sound. Danger Mouse works some slick transitions between song sections, like pairing an EQ shift with a building tempo to pull the song forward. John Gourley’s diffident falsetto rests on a bed of acoustic guitar and synthesizer. “Creep In A T-Shirt” follows and, while it also relies on Danger Mouse’s production and rhythm treatment, it feels more like the band’s older material. The piano and bass team up to lay down a moody funk vibe as Gourley plays a loner sociopath, “I’m just a creep in a T-shirt, jeans, I don’t fucking care.”

While the first three tracks sounded great, it was “Modern Jesus” that locked me into the album and Danger Mouse’s role. If this song had been on their last album, the chorus would have grown into a heavy-handed anthem. Instead, the production wraps that chorus in synth strings, blunting the impact. But this creates a tension that gives Gourley’s lines a stronger sense of resolve. His secular message, “The only faith we have is faith in us,” is not so different from Aleister Crowley’s “Do what thou wilt,” a strong statement that doesn’t require bluster. The reflective mix of electronic and acoustic instruments also recalls older Radiohead songs; some of the phrases that recalls Thom Yorke, “You don’t need sympathy/ They’ve got a pill for everything.” Repeated listening cements “Modern Jesus” as the centerpiece for Evil Friends, suggesting that evil is the eye of the beholder.

At the other extreme, “Sea of Air” is pure Portugal. The Man. The song feels like an outtake from In The Mountain, In The Cloud as it opens with a Fleetwood Mac acoustic rock groove. One set of lines even seems to be a message to the character in that album’s closing track, “Sleep Forever”, “When you talked to God about suicide/ When you never came back, I hope you’re still alive.” A brief Beatlesque crescendo, full of horns, punctuates the song before it drops into a sing-along chorus that sets up the elegiac “Waves”. Danger Mouse’s main contribution to “Sea of Air” — a strange, run-on bass riff tacked onto the end of the tune — is fairly superfluous.

The album closes out with a matched pair of songs. Each embraces a different flavor of willful ignorance and denial. The super-poppy “Purple Yellow Red and Blue” lays down a trippy funk groove as Gourley asserts his entitlement to an easy life of leisure, “All I want to do is/ Live in ecstasy/ I know what’s best for me.” In contrast, “Smile” would prefer to pretend that the sadness in the world doesn’t exist, “I don’t need to talk about the world, all right/ I just want to sleep with a smile tonight.” The stark piano accompaniment foreshadows a rude awakening sometime in the future because reality always finds a way to intrude. The bridge slides into a retro, psychedelic soul revue, name-checking the opening track:

I’d like to try to forget the times
Have changed and we all live and die
Plastic soldiers
Slowly growing older

As the guitar thrashes its way into a “Hey Jude”-style jam ending, the lyrical callback makes one message absolutely clear: it’s time to start Evil Friends over again for yet another listen.

Portugal. The Man has faced numerous challenges recently, such as upheavals in the band personnel and swelling popularity. Partnering with Danger Mouse could be seen as a desperate move to reinvent themselves or as caving to record label pressure, but it’s neither of those things. Gourley and his group have consistently evolved their sound over their recording career and this is just the latest step. Given their open minds and open ears, expect to hear Danger Mouse’s production influence flavoring their next project, which will offer up its own surprises.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Capsule review - Steven Wilson

6 May 2013 (Boulder Theater, Boulder CO)

Rather than a full review, I just wanted to share a few observations:

Steven Wilson was incredibly punctual. The show was scheduled to begin at 8:00 pm. At 7:59, the band took the stage and the first notes of "Luminol" started at 8:00 on the nose. Then, it was a straight two hour set, followed by a 15 minute encore of "Radioactive Toy" from On the Sunday of Life (1991).

Wilson was almost as much a control-freak in concert as he is in the studio. The bulk of the audience was seated and he directed when people could stand en masse. At one point, after they had been standing, he indicated that they should sit down for the first section of the song.

Another one of Wilson's rules was that there was to be no photography, including cell phones. That order was lightly enforced, but most people complied. Wilson has said in the past that he wants his audience fully engaged without a layer of technology between them and the show. Aside from the single shots I took at the start and finish, I left the camera alone during the show and enjoyed it all the more.

The music was phenomenal. Wilson's backing band is packed with virtuoso talent. Nick Beggs was particularly impressive. His bass playing pushes the boundaries of the instrument. He was also very adept on the Chapman stick. Wilson's recent work with surround sound remixing was also relevant. Speakers were distributed around the room and several songs, like "The Watchmaker", took advantage of the mix to provide a home theatre experience in the hall.

Wilson has grown as a performer. The show had a similar feel to Get All You Deserve (2012), a concert video made during the Grace For Drowning tour. He was much more comfortable interacting with the crowd than earlier in his career. He seemed completely relaxed and engaged, even making some self-deprecating jokes and riffing on a small raven puppet that someone tossed onstage.
 

Recording review: Tom Slatter, Three Rows of Teeth (2013)

Steampunk prog: ravenous steeples never sounded so good

Musicians should leave the marketing to trained professionals. Then they’d be less likely to brag about making “a steampunk prog-rock album” or tout the dubious merits of including “ravenous church steeples” within their songs. But damned if Tom Slatter doesn’t deliver all that and more on Three Rows Of Teeth. Given that steampunk has mainstreamed here in the U.S., his timing is particularly apt, but the music might prove to be too challenging and experimental for the pocket-watch-and-goggles-at-the-mall set. The songs frequently rely on jump-cut tempo and stylistic transitions to keep the listener off-balance and to change the perspective of a given section. Although it seems like a sign of attention deficit, this technique serves these narrative pieces and their strange, dark themes.

Following his steampunk inspiration, Slatter gathers retro, bygone elements and juxtaposes them in a modern, post-rock context. Evoking such diverse artists as Mike Keneally, Gogol Bordello, Greg Lake and Blondie, the quirky music swerves between fever dream intensity, playful tension and desperate contemplation. If Edward Gorey were resurrected to develop an unsettling film project, he might well choose this music for his soundtrack. It’s a wild ride with top-notch playing that’s partially offset by the quavery vocal tone. Slatter’s voice is somewhere between Thomas Dolby and bluegrass guitarist Peter Rowan’s work with the psychedelic band Earth Opera. Despite this technical weakness, the songs stay within his range and his singing fits the feel of the collection fairly well.

Three Rows Of Teeth starts strong with its title track, which takes the form of a recurring nightmare. The theatrical beginning sets the scene of an airship journey gone awry. When the ship is attacked by toothy monsters in the clouds, the progressive rock groove and layered vocals are suitably bombastic. A sharp cut into madcap carnival music represents the panic as the airship plummets. Frantic harmonized guitar riffs chase themselves like Keneally’s spidering melodies, punctuated by tight, coordinated breaks. During this headlong rush, we encounter the ravenous steeples Slatter warned of: “this nightmare came to life to feed.” The imagery in “Three Rows Of Teeth” is vivid if somewhat incoherent, capturing the surrealistic feel of dream logic. Once the elements have all come together, the song fragments into a series of leaps: the fearful falling, remembered echoes of the journey’s start, then back again. There is no escape.

From this nervous welcome, the album opens into a hallway of disquieting songs, each with its own skewed view. A conspiracy of silence picks up a sharp edge of threat from the bounce of gypsy flair on “Mother’s Been Talking To Ghosts Again”, while “Dance, Dance, Dance” uses Dadaistic images and avant garde interludes to convey a manic desperation. My favorite stop centers on the steampunk cyborg in “Self-Made Man.” Slatter’s sampled mechanical rhythm foreshadows this tale of human augmentation where minor improvements give way to larger replacements. Even if the hubris in this Frankenstein theme is familiar – “I’m better and I no longer care” – the music makes it special. The rhythm guitar in 12/8 provides the whirring gears behind the main machine beat, while the lead guitar looses an occasional moan like the character’s shrinking humanity. The delicate bridge exposes the back story that drives the cyborg, its ragged control relieved only by the fluid bass line representing his lost wife.

The album’s most ambitious creation is saved for last. “The Time Traveller Suite” is split into three tracks, structured something like Phish’s Gamehendge saga. The first, “What We Say Three Times Is True,” toys with a psychedelic collage of sound before using a Greg Lake guitar line to begin the tale. A man wakes to a strange visitor. This girl with a missing eye greets him and disappears. As the song shifts into an art rock jam, the man’s obsession with the girl leads him to build a time machine and search for her in the future. Zooming forward in time to a dark era where the world has broken down, the tune takes on a frantic pace, culminating in an odd new wave section reminiscent of Blondie’s “One Way Or Another.” Then the song wheels around and returns to the arty narrative, rebuilding the tension anew. The second track, “Rise Another Leaf,” acts as a short, pensive guitar interlude that flips the time travel back to the past. While the first piece laid out the basic plot, this section is less clear, providing a rough sketch and fewer details. The post-rock end of the song-cycle, “Love Letter and Entropy”, weaves the themes of the first two tracks together into an epic time-loop trap where neither the future nor the past offer resolution. By this point, the refrain that “the girl with the missing eye will be mine” takes on fatalistic tone, eventually sinking into the desperate hope that we’ll

Find love if we say it three times
Find love crossing the years, you’ll be mine
We’ll find love
What we say three times will be true. 

All told, the suite spans over 21 minutes and a long medley of stylistic reinventions. The song has enough detail to intrigue, but leaves the tale quite open to interpretation.

Three Rows Of Teeth supports its experimental sound with rich imagination and fine playing. Abrupt changes and genre defying arrangements won’t work for more pedestrian pop ears, but Slatter’s madness is definitely methodical.

(This review first appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - Steven Wilson, The Raven That Refused To Sing (And Other Stories) (2013)

Prog polymath delivers a stunning solo album

It’s so tempting to be jealous of prog-nerd Steven Wilson. As the post-rock Golden Child, he seems to have it all. It was one thing when he built Porcupine Tree from a one-man, psychedelic in-joke to one of the most significant progressive rock bands, extending his own multi-instrumental skills to collaborate with brilliant players. Then he parlayed his recording experience into producing other bands like Opeth and Anathema, developing a reputation as an engineering iconoclast. When Robert Fripp entrusted him to remix the King Crimson back catalog, it led to additional work with Jethro Tull and Emerson, Lake & Palmer. So, while his band and solo work has been defining the new directions of prog music, he’s also been quietly weaving himself into its history.

His latest solo album, The Raven That Refused To Sing (And Other Stories), bridges the past and the present, featuring the engineering talent of famed producer, Alan Parsons. Parsons is well known for his role in creating the tonal magic of the early to mid-1970s with Pink Floyd and others. Speaking to Anil Prasad’s Innerviews, Wilson casually talked about contacting Parsons for the project: “Luckily, he knew who I was and was already familiar with some of my surround work.” With all of his unshakeable confidence and stature, Wilson ought to be insufferable, but his overarching focus on the music and his finely tuned ear mark him as a savant rather than a show-off.

On The Raven That Refused To Sing (And Other Stories), he turns that ear towards the classic prog sounds of King Crimson, Genesis and Yes. There was a sublime alchemy in that era, where the albums blended a sense of exploration with musical virtuosity. Later, the scene became bloated and self-indulgent, but, like his inspirations, Wilson’s arrangements are tight and directed. The six songs alternate long voyages with shorter, more thoughtful pieces, creating a structural dynamic that matches the sonic range of the album. The pieces are based on a set of ghost stories written by Wilson and illustrator Hajo Mueller. A book containing these stories is included in the deluxe version of the album, along with a four disc set (CD, demo CD, 5.1 Surround sound mix DVD-V/Blu-Ray and instrumental Blu-Ray). Even without the stories, though, the moody surrealism comes through in the music.

The album starts with “Luminol,” a long track that breaks down into a set of vignettes. Opening with a confrontational punch, Nick Beggs’ bass propels the tune forward like a relentless pack of wolves. Splashes of guitar launch the song into a Jeff Beck style jazz fusion jam, complete with a wicked flute solo fluttering by at a breakneck pace. The driving beat locks up momentarily for a freeze-frame, harmonized Yes vocal phrase:

Here we all are
Born into a struggle
To come so far
But end up returning to dust

The song evolves away from the headlong rush into some rhythmically interesting developments before returning the theme. A choppy riff resolves and fades down, setting up a major transition into a looser progressive section that evokes Crosby, Stills and Nash, with sweet harmonies and a floating Stephen Stills guitar lead. The diffuse feel is a relaxing contrast to the pressure of the beginning, but it gives way to an art rock procession reminiscent of early King Crimson. Eventually, Guthrie Govan’s shredding lead guitar pushes the song to resurrect its opening drive. “Luminol” demonstrates Wilson’s vision: it’s full of allusions to the past, but features a crisp, modern edge.

The longer pieces use their larger scope to develop evocative soundscapes. “The Watchmaker” evolves a mellow, acoustic groove into a crystalline fusion before resolving into art rock experimentalism. But “The Holy Drinker” proves more interesting, giving all the players room to shine. Trippy space rock is accented with an angular, spiky lead line. Adam Holzman’s keyboards lay down support for Theo Travis’ free jazz leads and Marco Minnemann’s percussion is phenomenal. After the vocal section, the song runs through a tight, harmonized set of riffs followed by jazz flute before collapsing into an unbalanced, ambient interlude. Despite the lull, the mutated fills suggest hidden threats and dangerous currents, which are revealed with a grinding attack of doom.

The shorter pieces are more tethered, with “Drive Home” and “The Pin Drop” coming closest to Wilson’s earlier work. They feature Porcupine Tree’s lush orchestration and his typical vocal detachment. But the title track that closes the album is my favorite of these three. A tentative piano line provides a Radiohead texture supporting Wilson’s raw vocal. Parson’s engineering is beautiful, preserving sonic detail as layers slowly accrue. The track breathes, slowly blooming into life, even as the lyrics crack with pain and loss. Minnemann’s contribution is subtle until the drums kick in at the five minute mark, when the song fully opens into acceptance. It’s a strong resolution made sweeter by the solo piano reprise of the theme after the fade.

The Raven That Refused To Sing (And Other Stories) is an amazing album. Emotional without being maudlin and technical without being cold, Wilson’s ghost stories offer a multi-faceted view of mortality and meaning. Whether you surrender to the flow or engage with the twisting musical dimensions, it’s a wild, surprising journey. Why be jealous of talent? Just respect the gift.

(This review first appeared in Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - Porcupine Tree, Octane Twisted (2012)

Almost studio perfect, but fans are waiting for newer material

Porcupine Tree’s roots as a solo project for Steven Wilson makes them more comfortable in the studio. As they’ve developed into a full band, they’ve preserved that tight, clean sound in their live shows. In large part, that’s due to Wilson’s obsessive focus on the details of the band’s performance. The new release, Octane Twisted, is a sprawling live double album. Disc one presents the title suite of The Incident (2009), recorded at Chicago’s Riviera Theatre on April 30, 2010 during their tour behind the album. The second disc features songs from the second set in Chicago as well as performances from their Royal Albert Hall show (10/14/2010).

This live recording of “The Incident” on Octane Twisted is almost studio perfect. This sets up a paradox. On the one hand, the concert doesn’t expand on the source material: trim out the small touches of stage patter and audience response and the songs would match the recorded versions fairly closely. With Porcupine Tree on hiatus and Wilson paying more attention to his solo work and other projects, it’s a poor substitute for a fresh studio album. Still, Octane Twisted showcases an amazing band breezing through a rich, orchestral collection of songs. These phenomenal musicians live up to Wilson’s attention to detail. Their technical skill transcends ego in the service of the flow and Wilson has carefully calculated the dynamic shifts to match his vision.

Porcupine Tree’s well-rehearsed approach makes them the antithesis of jam band improvisers, but the music still feels light and lively. “Time Flies” lyrically references the Beatles and Hendrix, but Wilson’s calm voice and the jangly guitar layered over a staccato rhythm feel more influenced by the head space of Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here. Subtle keyboard washes suspend the tune. The transition from the galloping beat to a softer guitar pattern feels casually executed. The shift to introspection lets the tune drift aimlessly. The mood deepens and the first note of lead guitar impinges, signaling growing concerns. A syncopated drum beat develops to support a cathartic, swirling lead. Each section may have been worked out, but the flow is natural.

Wilson’s compositions balance grand, epic gestures with softer, thoughtful moments. “The Blind House,” see-saws between a grinding metallic groove and sparsely backed vocals. The lyrics are threatening and the heavy breaks give the song a psychic heft. This weight fits the larger theme behind “The Incident”, reflecting the human traumas behind impersonal news stories. The suite wraps up with “I Drive the Hearse”, which offers a delicate finish so the listener can decompress from the impact of the preceding tracks. The song meanders into a drawn out ending, allowing some of the tension to finally release.

The second disc contrasts the coordinated flow of disc one, pulling in songs from across the band’s catalog. They reach all the way back to 1995’s “Stars Die”. Porcupine Tree give themselves permission to loosen up the arrangements on this older material. The material from the Chicago show is solid, but the two longer tracks from the Royal Albert Hall concert deliver the peaks. The full length, extended version of “Even Less”, originally released on the compilation Recordings (2001), stretches into an epic journey. The first half’s pain and anger drifts into an ambient spaciness before coalescing back into a more intense bass-driven interlude that sets up a return to the main theme. The closing track is the moody “Arriving Somewhere but Not Here” from Deadwing (2005). Wilson’s breathy vocals insinuate unseen dangers as the music layers in a subtle sense of disquiet. The tempo and rhythmic power build to set up the metallic shred section that forms the heart of the song. The collapse into a jazzier guitar line offers a moment of relief before picking up the verse again. I love the dynamic progression: the thoughtful start begins the story until it erupts into a more visceral headbanging beat only to fall into the softer end section.

The contrast between the two halves of Octane Twisted offers a choice between the studio-style clarity of the first disc and the looser arrangements of the second. Either selection has its strengths, but unfortunately neither offers what fans really want, which is new material from Porcupine Tree.

(This review originally appeared on Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead, Lost Songs (2012)

Raging against apathy, an album for the times

…And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead are hard to pigeonhole. That’s true of many bands, but Trail of Dead makes it harder because they’re adept at juxtaposing hardcore punk thrash against melodic post rock jams, zooming from dense peaks of noisy assault to sparse sections of delicate psychedelia. Their more recent projects have been sculpted with a finely attuned sense of dynamics. Lost Songs still balances some soft with the loud, but it’s much less exploratory than Tao of the Dead or The Century of Self, their last two albums.

Instead of a heady mind trip or an evocative prog rock story, Lost Songs is a different flavor of concept album. Co-founder Conrad Keely has identified global politics and a reaction to apathy as the album’s themes. But rather than a disengaged, intellectual approach, Trail of Dead takes inspiration from bands like Fugazi and Public Enemy to focus on expressing strong emotional responses. Much of the album is steeped in righteous anger laced with an incoherent anguish. Reacting to an unjust world, they still have the resolve to face it down with punk rock intensity. Structurally, the music reflects a constant chaos under the surface, goading it to rise on a cathartic tide.

Lost Songs starts out heavy, catches its breath for a couple of songs, then builds to a climax with the punk punch of "Catatonic". While the album is front-loaded with fury and frustration, the band finishes out on a softer, optimistic tone that seems drained by the rage and exertion.

The first track, "Open Doors" quickly transforms from a percussion driven post-rock vibe into a frantic rush with thrashing drums and guitars. But the album really hits its stride with the next song, "Pinhole Cameras". The intro is a little off balanced, but the main groove is similar to "The Far Pavilions" from The Century of Self. It runs headlong with a persistent anxiety:

It makes me sorry
My pinhole camera
These photographs
Reveal no answers

The sonic space is packed; layers of guitar distortion and pounding drums threaten to bury the vocals. The bridge opens up the sound with a heavy bass line and some guitar shred. Then the tension breaks for an airy dynamic drop into a trippy dreaminess. A chorused and corroded guitar lays down a lead while the background is filled with ambient sounds of cymbal jangle and washes of guitar. The interlude passes and the last verse takes over to close the song.

The pace continues through the power punk/pop of "Up To Infinity", the dark pressure of "Opera Obscura", and the uptempo new wave of "Lost Songs". The first real relief comes with "Flower Card Games". The open, psychedelic looseness seems overdue, like a breath of cool air. The bass and simple guitar riff add a post punk moodiness that develops until it’s reminiscent of Jane’s Addiction’s sound on Nothing’s Shocking. Trail of Dead assembles the same kind of pensive bass groove, droning guitars, and echoed vocals that rise up to a near wail. This pause is short-lived, though, and the tempo picks up again after the last meandering notes fade away and the next track begins.

"Catatonic" tackles apathy head on:

I see dying in your palm
I see nothing in your eyes
I see torment in your past
I see boredom in your glass 

The sneering vocal recalls Green Day, along with the punk energy, but the music is richer with a background full of low grade chaos. The drums have the relentless drive of a twitching, restless leg. The bridge drops back to a simple guitar/drum line that’s eventually buried under a heap of noise. The angst and disdain remind me of Tommy’s "Smash the Mirror". The build up creates a sweet transition to the next track.

Where "Catatonic" tries to shock the listener out of apathy, "Awestruck" cajoles instead. The music kicks off with a mellow bass line. The droning vocal and lush guitars are a sharp contrast to the prickly walls of noise and heavy drumming throughout Lost Songs. The tone is cleaner and meditative. The chorus punches it up – “Get out!/ Get awestruck” – but the relative languor remains. As the song fills out, it climbs into an ecstatic indie rock naïveté. After the anger and anxiety, it’s a great palate cleanser.

While Lost Songs sacrifices some of the dynamic subtlety Trail of Dead often displays, it’s a powerful statement. In times like these, with unrest and threats around the world, it seems appropriate to rave and rage, even if we’re tempted into apathetic distraction.

(This review first appeared in Spectrum Culture)

Recording review - Callers, Reviver (2012)

Extends Callers' dreaminess into lush, progressive spaces

It's great to hear a strong band build on their strengths and reach into new spaces. Reviver is a phenomenal follow up to Callers' last album, Love of Life (review). That album seemed to use Sara Lucas' rich voice as an inspiration for each track. Lucas' sound still suggests strong singers like Phoebe Snow and Joan Armatrading, but the music is more forward and exploratory. It's a joy to hear the band develop their sound into progressive and art rock directions. Ryan Seaton's guitar/bass work were already impressive, but now he's developing more complex, interlocking parts.

Lucas and Seaton remain the core members of Callers. Drummer Don Godwin helped finish the album, but has since left the band. Meanwhile, Keith Souza and Seth Manchester of the recording studio Machines With Magnets collaborated on the album and eventually joined the band. Despite those changes, Reviver is a very focused album.

Like their earlier work, the new album is anchored in an emotional vibe. The sound is evocative and richly expressive, creating a range of moods beyond the core dreaminess of Life of Love. That expansion allows for poppier moments like Heroes (via Black Book Magazine), off-kilter dance rock like Howard 2 Hands, and jazzy progressive jams like It's a Ringer. Seaton denies that Callers are a jazz band saying they don't really improvise, but Reviver emphasizes a jazz feel based on an openness that allows for contrasting parts and interesting rhythms.

Crush Times opens by repeating a pretty ascending bit of guitar jangle. This peels back to a sparser instrumentation when Lucas comes in. The bass line simplifies and the guitar drops the occasion chord splash, accenting the vocal line. Lucas effortlessly floats on the breeze of the tune, smoothly wafting up or catching a brief, swift current. On the chorus, the guitar and bass mesh together on the melodic climb from the intro. The bridge challenges as it drifts away from the tonal center with a staccato counterpoint. It builds like a circle of fifths progression until it collapses back into the chorus changes.

The title track, Reviver, is a complete change of pace. The speedy guitar tosses out sharp edged chord fragments with frantic energy. Reminiscent of Robert Fripp's playing, it's a departure from Callers' dreamy side. When the vocals come in, the groove shifts into a bass driven space with open sounding guitar riffs like the Police's earlier work. The song evolves into a heavier progressive rock feel. Lucas' voice is as lush as ever, but shows a touch of steel:

You are closer to the sun
But I have got a window
We are older than ourselves
And I am your reviver
I'm your reviver
I lost myself, I lost myself

I'm guessing that Godwin is drumming on this; the way the drums leave some holes to accent the guitar while maintaining the tight beat sounds like his style. Seaton's guitar work shows off a palette of sonic textures, moving from burnished copper smoothness to warped and rippled sheet metal sounds.

Another change up is Long Control. It starts out in familiar space for Callers: down tempo and introspective. The light swells of keys add a nice touch. The first departure from the standard script hits when vocals come in, laying down a spacy, close harmony line. This is just a brief interlude. The phrase winds down and the song transforms into a poppy psychedelic soul groove that could be a deeper album cut from the 5th Dimension. The whole piece is so short that it feels more like a sketch than a worked out song, but it's really intriguing.

While Callers music is anything but derivative, these two songs alone suggest the band's growth, offering comparisons to Robert Fripp, the Police, and the 5th Dimension.  Meanwhile Lucas and the band have found a different balance that still relies on her range while giving the music more room to surprise and impress. If Reviver is indicative of what Manchester and Souza have brought to the band, they will likely continue to challenge the band to evolve their music.