The REVIEWS
Algiers
The Underside of Power (MATADOR)
Algiers’ self-titled debut revealed a politically conscious band not afraid to use music to deliver a message. As the storm clouds continue to gather over America, the message has sharpened, and an already good band has harnessed the negative emotions sweeping the country to become something more.
The Underside of Power is at once a lament for the state of race relations, and a rallying cry for the dispossessed. Seeped in rage that never tips into bitterness, the Georgia four-piece continue a unique brand of gospel infused post-punk. It’s also the sound of four musicians settling into themselves; comfortable in their anger and accomplished at wielding it. The promise of Algiers blossoms, familiar rhythms exploding more forcefully.
Race features across the record, lead singer Franklin James Fisher’s powerful voice reeling off a list of black men and women killed recently on “Cleveland.” But he also senses power shifting. Amidst the swirling guitars of closing track “The Cycle/The Spiral: Time to Go Down Slowly,” Fisher’s voice rises to deliver the defiant “I cried out for power/Someday I will find it.” The title track is even more explicit, the chorus declaring “I’ve seen the underside of power/It’s just a game that can’t go on.”
The message is clear: things are bad but a reckoning isn’t impossible. Algiers have more than just a message though. Shuddering vocals and handclaps are merged into Fisher’s soulful voice, jarring guitar, and haunting piano. It allows switching between the frenetic direct stare of a track like “Animals,” one that starts big and grows only larger when the bass kicks in, to the elongated delicacy of piano led “Mme Rieux.”
This is one of those zeitgeist capturing records, all done without compromise or a hint of triteness. Algiers were once a band with promise; now they’ve fully arrived. (www.algierstheband.com)
By Stephen Mayne
alt-J
Relaxer (CANVASBACK MUSIC)
One wouldn’t assume that a series of zeroes and ones could be sung in a convincing, let alone catchy, refrain. It might also seem equally impossible to sing a revolutionary new rendition of a song as overexposed as “The House of the Rising Sun.” Yet alt-J do all that and more on their new LP, Relaxer.
Yes, the British trio have plenty of surprises on this new album, their third since 2012’s Mercury Prize winning debut, An Awesome Wave . At a refreshingly restrained eight tracks, this compact and filler free release still explores a vast array of genres and styles in its 40-minute running time. The hauntingly hushed take on “The House of the Rising Sun” is one of the most startling of those curveballs. Following that song (the album’s third track) with the threadbare lo-fi, garage rocker “Hit Me Like That Snare,” is all but whiplash inducing. And if that wasn’t enough, they continue their genre shuffling immediately after that with “Deadcrush,” which has a hip-hop beat.
This all-over-the-map approach makes Relaxer a bit dizzying and tough to digest at first, and yet you’ll be immediately captivated and intrigued by its distinctive mix. And once you give it a few more listens, many of its varied songs will worm their way into your ears as some of this summer’s best indie rock offerings. Indeed, “frenzied” or “varied” or even “wildly ambitious” might have all been more apt monikers, but regardless of what it is (or should have been) called, you won’t be able to settle down and stop talking about Relaxer anytime soon. Alt-J’s fellow alt-rockers will have a tough time breaking into that conversation even as it comes time for everyone to draw up their “best of 2017” lists, seeing as this astoundingly eclectic album is sure to rank high. (www.altjband.com)
By Kyle Mullin
Alvvays
Antisocialites (POLYVINYL)
It was hard to read anything about Alvvays’ 2014 debut and not see a reference to the legendary C86 mixtape. The shorthand reference for twee Britpop will probably continue during the Antisocialites press cycle, too, even though frontwoman Molly Rankin has said she never heard the cassette while growing up on a remote island off Nova Scotia. Still, it’s easy to imagine the jangly guitar pop bands influenced by the epochal tape filtered through to Rankin, along with more widely available tunes from ’80s pop-rock and post-punk acts. On the band’s second album, it’s hard not to hear The Go-Go’s or The Cars as Alvvays pursue a more polished pop sound. There are more synths and less discordant guitars. Rankin’s voice is more directly front-and-center in the mix, less filtered by hints of lo-fi production that kept the excellent debut squarely pegged as lineage indie rock, for better or for worse.
If there is autobiographic content on the new record, there is no clear line, and the songs likely work better taken as a collection of individual sketches. Rankin’s lyrics skip familiarly between snarls, longing torch songs, and their opposite—derisive kiss-offs such as “Not My Baby.” There is no anthem like the standout single “Marry Me, Archie” from the band’s 2014 debut. Antisocialites’ lead single, “In Undertow,” comes close, especially during the verses, but loses steam during an endlessly repetitive chorus. Repetition tends to dog the album elsewhere. See, again, the chorus to “Dreams Tonite,” where Rankin repeats “If I saw you on the street/Will I have you in my dreams tonight?” for almost the entirety of the song’s second half. Even on “Plimsoll Punks,” one of the record’s most energetic songs, Rankin digs for uncharacteristically deep-belly vocals before flitting effortlessly into a falsetto. But it’s a sing-songy repetitious chorus that drags a song otherwise full of hooks.
Fans of the debut will still find plenty to like here, even as the group’s sound has lifted further from the ground towards more ethereal planes familiar to Beach House or even Chromatics. (www.alvvays.com)
By Ed McMenamin
Avey Tare
Eucalyptus (DOMINO)
Avey Tare’s music has always grasped with the ideas of space and nature. From his earliest works with Animal Collective to his 2014 LP as Avey Tare’s Slasher Flicks, David Portner has used nature as his muse to bring to light his writings about love and loss. On his latest LP Eucalyptus , Portner once again brings his kaleidoscopic musical mind to the forefront, but this time we find our singer/songwriter in a much softer and more subdued state of mind.
As a member of Animal Collective, we are used to Avey Tare’s frenzied reflections on the human experience over tribal drums and sputtering samples. Portner’s yips, howls, and guttural screams grew to be one of the defining sounds of the group, the ying to Panda Bear’s yang in a sense. On Eucalyptus , Portner brings the acoustic guitar to the forefront on a much more straightforward record than we are used to seeing from the freak-folk icon. Opening track “Season High” brings together acoustic guitar with a melting synthesizer that evokes images of a dew-drenched morning that precedes a hazy summer day. Nothing is ever cut and dry with Avey Tare, either musically or lyrically, but his latest record might be his most clear to date. This is more “folk” than “freak,” and Portner plays the role with great gusto.
Not that this record is a great departure from his past discography, but if you are looking for the “Reverend Green” screaming Avey Tare to make an appearance, you will be disappointed. Still, this is David Portner at his most raw and exposed, a songwriter who has never been afraid to bridge the gap between the experimental and the familiar. Eucalyptus is the work of an artist in control of his creative forces, able to bring to light the most sensitive and natural feelings and emotions a person can experience. (www.aveytare.com)
By Ryan Meaney
Baio
Man of the World (GLASSNOTE)
Like many of us, it’s safe to say 2016 will not go down as Chris Baio’s favorite year on the planet. Opening with the death of his favorite artist David Bowie, the Vampire Weekend bassist’s annus horribillis was compounded by the Brexit shit-storm hitting the fan in his adopted homeland of England in June. And then there was Trump.
Man of the World is Baio’s attempt to make sense of those crazy 366 days (it was a leap year) in the only way he can: through the sound of hook laden pop melodies. As protests go, these 11 songs don’t conform to the archetypal blueprint of Dylan et al, but underneath its glossy ’80s veneer this is a record that depicts a world spinning quickly into the abyss.
During his excellent 2015 solo debut The Names , Baio seemed desperate to shake off his Vampire Weekend shackles. Here, he’s more comfortable embracing the effervescence of his day job. “The Key is Under the Mat,” especially, is an all-swaying polyrhythmic rollick straight from the same songbook as “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa.”
Yet sonically and narratively many of these cuts are smarter than they seem. “PHILOSOPHY!” is a trumpet-parping, guitar skipping jaunt that finds Baio tackling the perils of bullshit news; on “Vin Mariani” he is “learning to live with a decision” as a grinding synth line eventually gives way to stripped back a cappella; while the transitory electronic scales of “Shame in My Name” unpeel into a peculiar burst of experimental hopscotch.
It’s not a perfect product by any means—“DANGEROUE ANAMAL” comes perilously close to self-bloated naval gazing—but the execution and intent is striking. In a world that feels like it’s shattered beyond repair, there’s something reassuring about Chris Baio’s determination to pick up the pieces. (www.baiobaio.com)
By Billy Hamilton
Beach House
B-Sides and Rarities (SUB POP)
Beware the B-sides and rarities album. Hardly an attempt to woo new fans, and commonly a ploy to keep devotees entertained between albums, B-sides and rarities albums may include some intriguing material
