So last year I made a fateful hot take tweet that Tool would never make another album - or even if they did, it would never live up to the expectations of fans. As of now, it seems like both statements are untrue, as there's a new Tool album and the fans seem overjoyed - hell, it might even be true for me... but that's more because I never had any expectations for Tool to begin with. Yeah, let's get this out of the way now, I've danced around it for years and it should be on the record: I'm not much of a Tool fan. Of the "big four" in progressive metal, I've typically ranked Tool as my least favourite among Queensryche, Dream Theater, and Fates Warning, and revisiting their entire back catalog for this review has only cemented that opinion. And there's no easy way to approach this opinion in a way that won't piss off the legion of Tool fans - which if I had less tact, boy would I have words for that crowd - and let me stress that I get Tool's appeal and influence; it's just that most of appeal and influence doesn't work for me whatsoever. And I don't even think that should be surprising - you all know how much of a fan I am of melody and tight song construction, two things that Tool seems to treat with disinterest at best as they lock into extended polyrhythms amidst a load of dated alternative metal downtuning which is technically complex and impressive, but emotionally unengaging. And this would be where the band would point to the songwriting... which is the definition of two-dimensional, soaking in try-hard nihilism and abstraction - a shame because there can be a real emotional core and idea to some of these songs bowled over by hamfisted lyrical bluntness - and quasi-spiritual pseudoscience that either is more impressed with its cleverness than its depth or only bothers to make sense after several bowls and a handful of caps! And yet it's absolutely no surprise to me that Tool became by far the "biggest" of the big four coming out of the 90s - they certainly sound most 'of the time', and to their credit they're absolutely a band with a lot of talent that took risks, even if its not my thing I can appreciate what they were trying on a project like Lateralus, especially when they actually embraced some convincing heaviness - but it also put to mind a common observation: a lot of progressive metal fans are also Tool fans, but not nearly as often the other way around. And normally this wouldn't be an issue - I prefer the more tuneful side of prog metal and there's normally a ton of that, I can leave Tool's bloated song structures and edgelord deflection and sloppy vocal mixing for the fans - except that Tool has been influential, and while it's inaccurate to blame the spread of utterly tedious focus on polyrhythmic groove patterns and djent over melody through progressive metal on them, on a compositional and structural level they share some DNA. And then factor in the structural disinterest in hooks and concepts that don't hold up to much intellectual rigor, especially when channeled through increasingly blunt poetry... look, I wasn't cheering when Tool went on indefinite hiatus, but I wasn't exactly cheering for their return either. So with all of that context established and all the dislikes firmly given, what did we get out of Fear Inoculum?
So I know I remain pretty much the only guy who cares about Resonators, but I'm genuinely pleased with how much I wound up loving this - fantastic hip-hop classic, so happy I got a chance to revisit it. Especially considering my next review is bound to disappoint a lot of folks... yeah, stay tuned!
Oh, we're going to get weird with this one. But first, let me back up, because I've referenced this album in passing before in previous reviews but haven't really provided much context or history behind its strange, strange lineage, even though it might stand as damn near one of a kind even to this day, one of the few examples of a narrative-driven Afrofuturist hip-hop concept album, described by some as a rap opera. The producer is Dan the Automator, a California-based producer who by the late 90s had established his reputation through collaborations with DJ Shadow and especially Kool Keith, who had created his Dr. Octagon alter-ego and had released the celebrated if utterly demented concept album Dr. Octagonecologyst. This was the project that arguably won Dan the Automator the most initial attention for blending in organic instrumentation against Dr. Octagon's graphic iconography, which saw him garner the attention of De La Soul affiliate Prince Paul, who teamed up with him under the name Handsome Boy Modeling School for a 1999 project called So... How's Your Girl - unfortunately, it's as goofy and slapdash as it sounds. Then a year later he'd team up with Primal Scream for some production work - not the first nor last time he'd work with British acts, if you're familiar with one Damon Albarn's work in the 2000s - but he was still working with underground hip-hop acts as well... Which takes us to Del The Funky Homosapien. The cousin of Ice Cube, he struck some commercial success in the very early 90s, but he wanted to go in a weirder direction with his second album... which despite some well-deserved critical acclaim promptly tanked, which saw him not release another solo album until 1997, which he mostly produced himself. But it was around this time he joined the hip-hop collective Hieroglyphics, who carved out their own critical acclaim in 1998 with 3rd Eye Vision, which I honestly hoped to cover before this as it's been on the voting block for some time now. But in the year 2000 in San Francisco, Del teamed up with Dan the Automator and DJ Kid Koala for a one-of-a-kind album that stands as a defiantly unique entry in underground hip-hop, even today. And while I expected I would cover this later rather than sooner, might as well tackle it now: so here we go, this is the self-titled album from Deltron 3030, and this is Resonators!
And that should be the last of my vacation footage - special thanks to Hoodie Allen for showing a quick cameo at Reading Festival, he was certainly cool to let me film the review in front of him and the conversation afterwards was illuminating. For an act still running the independent hustle, I've got a ton of respect for his refinement. In the mean time... no idea where to go next, we'll see - stay tuned!
And here we go - honestly, I was preparing to bucket this with another review in a vacation review structure, but I honestly just had way too much to say - enjoy! Anyway, next up... frankly, I've got no idea - stay tuned!
Am I the only one who feels like Frank Turner can't really win these days to save his life? And yes, I'm fully aware that a chunk of that statement comes from me being a fan of the guy - hell, I was actually kinder to his 2018 album Be More Kind than pretty much everyone, a project balanced on the precipice of hopepunk and existential emptiness that sadly didn't have nearly as much of an edge as it really needs to secure that balance - there was a wonky stiffness and cleanness to his production and delivery that really hampered that project as a whole. But throughout the majority of the 2010s it's been hard for me to shake the feeling that for as much as Turner is trying desperately to do the right thing artistically, he's either stuck chasing past glories or is facing an increasingly unpleasable audience with sky-high expectations - most of the time both. And while I've been feeling this to some extent since at least Tape Deck Heart, it really came to bear with the backlash to Be More Kind, where Turner was trying to provide hope both to his audience and himself and it didn't seem like he pleased either... mostly because with the exception of the furious and potent '1933', the songs themselves were not his strongest by a long shot. So I had to hope that No Man's Land would click this time - but again, it did seem like Turner was setting himself up to fail. A folk rock project full of songs celebrating the famous and forgotten women of history on the surface seemed like a winning idea, especially in this climate with his recruitment of plenty of women behind the scenes, but a more cynical 'progressive' audience already seemed to have their pitchforks on standby for his audacity to tell those stories - hell, from what I can tell the backlash to this was even stronger than to Be More Kind, it's his worst-reviewed project to date! So yeah, I was expecting the worst with this... and yet how was No Man's Land?
Hmm, I'm a bit surprised this hasn't been received as being more contentious than it is... funny, that. Anyway, I really think I have to give Frank Turner a full review next, so stay tuned!
I want to stop overanalyzing Taylor Swift. I mean, in theory it should be easy as hell - she makes mainstream-accessible pop music that shouldn't require or demand such in-depth analysis, it shouldn't be difficult to do so. And yet when I reviewed reputation in 2017, it wound up one of my most lengthy, overwritten pieces that still wound up as inconclusive on the album - and what's frustrating is that upon revisiting reputation, I still feel that way. I still think the flaws are too glaring to ignore - it's too long, it's self-indulgent without feeling truly self-critical, the sequencing is terrible, the bad songs are among the worst in her career - but at the same time there's depth and complexity that can't really be ignored. And yes, a huge part of it is bigger than the music and can't really be extricated from the artist. Hell, if you want to make one of the most striking examples for never separating the art from the artist, it is Taylor Swift - the emotional power comes not just from the personal details and the relationship to her life, but then how they can translate to the every girl, or at least an increasingly broad representation of what that is. It's one big reason why both she and Drake have translated to a massive audience this decade - the detail and the personal vulnerability that anyone might connect to is what hooked the audience, their flaws and humanity are on display to the point where you wind up as the villain in your own stories where your moral justifications are increasingly flimsy, and the fact that despite all your control, your image becomes so big that it can be anything to anyone means that you're heading for a crisis of self. For Drake it's been the paranoia that has consumed his work since 2015 but especially on Views and Scorpion and for which there hasn't been a proper correction, for Taylor Swift it was the heavy subtext of alcohol abuse and trying to build an emotionally resonant story out of quicksand that was reputation, which is one reason I find that project so fascinating. But you don't have to steer into the skid, and with the change in labels and slight adjustment in pop sound that came with the new singles - especially with the stark self-awareness that characterized 'The Archer', I had the hope that she had corrected - hell, I had the biggest hope in the longest of times that I might really like a Taylor Swift album, especially with the producers and guest stars behind her. So how about it, what did we get on Lover?
And we're back on somewhat normal schedule. I do have a few reviews that will be shot in vacation format, but I think I might get to Taylor first... stay tuned!
Not to get hyperbolic about it, but it seems like the entire purpose of the Billboard Hot 100 charts this year has been to get me to look stupid. Sure, we got another new #1 this week that I predicted, but everyone has been calling that for weeks if not months, and yet just as soon as I was musing that this year has been quiet on the album bomb front, here comes Young Thug with a proper album leaving the Hot 100 in disarray. And yes, to get in front of this now, album bomb rules are in effect and will probably will remain in effect if Taylor Swift does the same next week, we'll have to see - I just got back from vacation, I have a ton of catching up to do, just hold tight on this one.
So, lengthy episode, but I am happy I got to it all the same - good stuff! Next up... well, I'm on vacation, so I'd venture over to my instagram to keep up to date on what's coming, so stay tuned!
You know, I should just give up making these sorts of predictions one of these days. Here I go thinking that we wouldn't get much of an impact this week, that things would slow down, some of it even based on the evidence that the last time Drake reissued a project - that being So Far Gone - it didn't hit the charts that strongly. And yet apparently just enough time as passed to get a sizable compliment to hit the Hot 100, along with a bunch of assorted pop country because Billboard wants to make my life difficult before I go on vacation - go figure.
Okay, here we go - this is one of those reviews I can imagine will be controversial... but eh, we'll see. Next up is a really meaty episode of Billboard BREAKDOWN and then I'm venturing off on vacation - stay tuned!
Alright, let's try this again. So, Bon Iver, the primary venture for singer-songwriter-producer Justin Vernon and a rotating cast of players, and one of the critical darling acts that has never quite won me over. Don't get me wrong, for the most part I like this project, especially the more propulsive, windswept indie folk side that was instrumental in partially jumpstarting that movement in the late 2000s, but the more Bon Iver has ventured towards synthesized electronic music, the more I've been torn on them, respectful of the ambition but rarely satisfied with the results. I do think it's unfortunate that the first time I was talking about Bon Iver I was covering the project's worst album thus far by a considerable margin - that being 2016's 22, A Million, a project that wrapped itself in a lyrical tangle trying to parse the larger divisive world before scolding the audience for trying to understand it, along with some of the most scattershot, fragmented production yet - because I think it may have given off a more negative impression... but that doesn't mean I'm going to mince words here either. Hell, I was probably too nice to 22, A Million in retrospect. And yet seemingly out of nowhere we had a new Bon Iver project, released three weeks early online and with Justin Vernon describing it as his most 'honest' and 'adult' album to date. What caught my attention was not only more producers allowed in the room, but also collaborators like James Blake and Aaron Dessner and even Bruce Hornsby - the latter shouldn't be that much of a surprise, given that he has worked with Vernon in the past, but still! And you know what, I really was hoping this would turn into something special, so what did Bon Iver deliver this time?
Okay, this was a bit of a letdown and I'm already seeing the backlash creep in... though I don't think I'm wrong with this one, just saying... Anyway, I've got my meaty challenge cut out for me next: Bon Iver. Stay tuned!
I'll be very honest, I thought Ty Segall had run out of ways to surprise me. Granted, for a guy who cranks out as many albums as he does, I was open to the possibility, but even with the return to form that was Freedom's Goblin last year, I really thought that was testing the boundaries of how far Ty Segall was going to venture out of his comfort zone: ground himself in garage rock scuzz, tack on some added instrumentation venturing into other subsets of proto-punk, early metal, and even glam around that era, but likely not venture much further. I thought he'd probably stay in this territory, maybe tighten up the writing and production, and he'd have enough fertile ground to harvest for... well, given how quickly he releases albums, another three years or so. So I'll admit when I heard that his newest album First Taste was ditching guitars altogether... well, it reminded me at first of when news broke the Mountain Goats were leaving guitars behind for Goths, but even then singer-songwriter material like that had proven ground to expand, whereas I'm not sure I can count many garage rock acts that don't have a guitar lead! So I had no unearthly clue how he was going to tack on strings and keyboards to make this work, but I definitely wanted to hear it - so okay, what came out of First Taste?
Well damn, this came right the fuck out of nowhere! Great project, absolutely worth hearing, make time to check it out! Next up... honest to god, not sure, I'm going to be out of town this weekend, so we'll see what happens soon - stay tuned!
