Didn’t It Rain

Not completely driven by this list (but certainly helped by it), I have been on a folk/Americana/alt-country music kick lately.  Yes, I still listen to rock ‘n roll regularly, but I have found myself very intrigued by the richness of the music.  Fleet Foxes and Gillian Welch certainly contributed to my enjoyment, as well as artists such as Abigail Washburn, Steve Earle, and Uncle Tupelo.  I wouldn’t call any of these as dying music forms, but you typically do not hear these songs on regular radio very much, if at all.

One name that I have come upon while doing this blog is Jason Molina.  One of his music projects, Songs: Ohia, has two records on this list.  I recently listened to Didn’t It Rain and was immediately drawn by its spirit, its sparseness, its richness.  Molina himself has an interesting background.  He played bass guitar for various heavy metal bands in his home state of Ohio, but eventually he decided he wanted to release his own material.  This sound deviated sharply from the metal he had been playing.  Molina released ten LPs and four EPs under the Songs: Ohia moniker.

# 160 – Songs: Ohia, Didn’t It Rain (Metascore = 85)

Didn’t It Rain opens with the title track, a quiet piece with Molina on vocals and guitars and Jennie Benford providing backing vocals.  You really feel like you are sitting in the room with Molina singing this song, his voice the loan sound (for the most part) to be heard in a hollowed out, abandoned house that had been around for decades.  Midway through the song the pace picks up slightly, and Molina’s guitar is accompanied by mandolin, but the mood stays the same.  Despite the storm that’s over them, Molina perseveres through it and offers a helping hand to his fellow but careful not to cover his own back.

The vibe in “Didn’t It Rain” carries throughout the record.  As he progresses through “Steve Albini’s Blues” to “Blue Factory Flame”, Molina’s mood grows darker and darker.  This seems to peak in the two-song suite of “Ring the Bell” and “Cross the Road, Molina”, where Molina sounds like he’s pouring his heart out on the ground, drained from the crumbling of an emotional breakdown.  “Blue Factory Flame” is like the post-fallout point, where he’s looking at himself, where he lives, and convinced of the inevitable doom that sits in front of him.

There is a quiet intensity throughout this record, something Neil Young-ish about the record, like Harvest or the acoustic moments in After the Gold Rush.  The music is very bare boned early in the record…mostly Molina strumming his acoustic with occasional accompaniment via banjo or mandolin (few percussion instruments appear on the record; the percussion comes from the strumming).  Starting with “Ring the Bell” and carrying through the rest of the album, the music has a broodier electric sound to it, something more akin to “Cortez the Killer” or “Down by the River”, but still dark and intense.

I must say I was transfixed by the sound of this record.  The raw emotion that Molina bleeds into the lyrics and music made this a really interesting listen for me, especially on a rainy day here.  Did it blow me away?  No, but it certainly has given me another record to consider buying.

Keep It Clean

I don’t know a whole lot about Canadian hardcore band F*cked Up other than their last two records—The Chemistry of Common Life and David Comes to Life—have been widely hailed for their subject matter as well as their music.  However, in reading more about them, they are a band that has released a ton of material as well as collaborated with a wide number of artists, including Danko Jones, Nelly Furtado, the Circle Jerks, and many others.  To call their music hardcore punk (as referred on some websites) would be sort of false because they have diverged from that early path to a more experimental hardcore sound.

F*cked Up is not afraid to push boundaries with their music or album artwork, as they have had some legal troubles with a few of their records.  But within the records themselves there is a depth not always characteristic to punk and hardcore bands.  How many hardcore or punk bands have you heard sing about plants?  (Ok, maybe mushrooms, but I’m referring to other plants.)  F*cked Up likes to stretch boundaries, and nowhere is this more evident than on their first big success, The Chemistry of Common Life.

#189 – F*cked Up, The Chemistry of Common Life (Metascore = 85)

“Son the Father” opens with a short flute prelude before the guitars come churning in.  Soon lead singer Pink Eyes (aka Damian Abraham) comes pummeling in.  When I hear his voice, he reminds of the lead singer of Green Jelly on “Three Little Pigs” but singing far more intelligent lyrics (songs that involve Rambo at the end are campy at best).  When I listen to “Son the Father”, I feel like I’m hearing Adam’s tale (Adam from the Bible) of his bloodline, spoken in a way where he questions whether or not his descendants deserve a second chance.  It’s something different for sure.

Questioning and understanding faith is the underlying theme here.  Whether the band is ultimately successful or not (doubtful), through each song they ask questions and seek answers why people believe what they believe, what it means for them, etc.  Pink Eyes doesn’t try to be judgmental or arrogant about the questions; he’s just trying to understand the meaning of life and death.  Some of his musings are done under the influence, perhaps needing that hallucinogenic push to better understand.

Whatever the outcome, this is a lyrically dense record.  One would think based on their band name alone or sound that lyrics would take a back seat to the overall edge they portray.  You would be wrong, as this grafting together of intelligent lyrics with a sometimes hard, more times melodic sound make a very intriguing record.  The critical reviews of this record tended to focus on the edginess of the band while casually mentioning the lyrics.  The lyrics make this record more than the sound, in my opinion.  This was an interesting listen.

More Utensil Artwork

Today’s entry comes from a previously discussed band, Spoon.  I left off discussing one of their earlier records, Girls Can Tell, an album that seemed to lay the groundwork for where the band would go in future releases.  Why I think Spoon is unique, I don’t know.  To me they are not like other bands I have heard…at least with the sounds put together the way they are.  Perhaps it is the way they employ different sounds, whether one of the members is beat-boxing (“Stay Don’t Go”) or Britt Daniel is playing unusual chord patterns on guitar.  Or maybe it is Daniel’s lyrics, which are frequently personal but come off in a strange, goofy fashion.

Something about Spoon is unique to me, and Kill the Moonlight (#63, Metascore = 88) does not change my opinion.  The sounds are different but build upon the foundation established by Girls Can Tell.  Every song sounds more concise, more focused than they did on Girls Can Tell.  The record itself clocks in at 34:50 and has no songs over 4 minutes in length (unlike Girls Can Tell, which had two songs over 4 minutes and is about a minute-and-a-half longer).  When you listen to the record, there are sounds coming from both sides, from behind you and in front of you, from all over.  Some bands have trouble filling in the empty space; Spoon does not.

While I thought I liked Girls Can Tell, I enjoyed Kill the Moonlight more.  There’s a great opener – “Small Stakes” – with a great organ riff and pumped up vibe, and there’s a beautiful closer – “Vittorio E.” – that is very minimal yet very full.  Lyrically (when I pay close attention) Daniel is able to weave in stories and feelings in a non-cliché way; I don’t feel like I’ve heard this story before or he’s rambling about the same stuff all over again.  There is never a particular rhyme scheme, just times of what feels like stream-of-consciousness that flow from his mouth.  I do not know whether this is his writing style or not, but I feel as if most of the songs he develops the sound ideas first and builds the lyrics around the sound.  Or maybe Daniel does both at the same time. I like many songs off the record, but “Someone Something” I probably like the most.  Musically it is an odd song, non-traditional in a chordal sense.  I like the harmonies with the “someone somethings” throughout, and the lyrics, while choppy, get the theme across.

I find Kill the Moonlight more accessible, more refreshing than some of their other albums I have heard.  What Spoon has put together here is a well-written album that baffled the critics when it came out because, while it was definitely a Spoon album with their sound, Kill the Moonlight took the best elements of all of their earlier work and made it sound commercial without being commercial.  The album sounds like a band that knows what it does best, knows how to write interesting melodies, and knows how to deliver them.  Their later albums (Gimme Fiction, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, and Transference) do not reach this level of sophistication; they have their individual moments, but the albums themselves lack the cohesion of Kill the Moonlight.