billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - may 20, 2017

So I think it's fairly obvious that we live in uncertain times, and while music critics and cultural anthropologists will debate how much the music that charts will reflect the world around us, I think you could make a case for the Hot 100 being the most unsettled it's been in some time. Because while you could make a story about Katy Perry collaborating with Migos, or the fight for dominance between One Direction members, or that Gorillaz for no discernable reason failed to sell enough to chart this week, the big story is for the third time in three weeks, we have a new #1... and like with the others, there's no clear indication of how long it'll last.

video review: 'from a room: volume 1' by chris stapleton

Well, this will... actually, I'm expecting this to be more controversial than it'll probably end up being overall, but who knows.

But after this... folks, it's Logic after Billboard BREAKDOWN, it's going to get nuts. Stay tuned!

album review: 'from a room: volume 1' by chris stapleton

I remember reviewing Chris Stapleton before he got famous.

And yeah, I know that sounds like such a music critic hipster thing to say, but there is validity to at least mentioning it, because his rise over the past few years has been meteoric and to some extent unprecedented in modern country. Here was a guy - who thanks to a performance with Justin Timberlake - got the sort of commercial boom that led to his debut record Traveler selling millions of albums, spawning commercial copycats on reality TV shows, and helped galvanize an entire indie boom... and he did it without country radio. And sure, this happens in other genres all the time, but country has been tethered to the radio for years, the fact that Stapleton got as big as quickly as he did is nothing short of miraculous, and has been heralded by so many critics as a tremendous achievement. 

And yes, the majority of this is fantastic news... but I can't be the only one who is a little amused that the whole question of Traveler's quality kind of got lost in the shuffle - because again, I reviewed the record months before that starmaking performance, and while it is a very good record, it's not a great one. Sure, there were great songs on it, but it also felt uneven, overlong, and showing some of the hesitant steps that characterize a major label debut. In retrospect, a lot of critics probably wouldn't have put together such a review if they had heard the album in the headlong rush of Stapleton's popularity - especially nowadays - but I stand by it and it led to some interesting questions going into his follow: From A Room: Vol 1, with the second part reportedly coming later this year. Now I was excited for this record - it was reportedly leaner, I liked the song 'Broken Halos' released before the album - although not the single - a lot, but I had the feeling this record was going to face a very different response than Traveler. For one, Mercury Nashville has had no idea how to handle Stapleton's insurgent popularity, so the commercial rollout of this record has been embarrassing and terrible, but for another, now that Stapleton is big, I'm curious how many indie country and mainstream fans will start to push Stapleton towards the backlash zone, even if he's working with Dave Cobb again. So where does this album take Chris Stapleton?

video review: 'a crow looked at me' by mount eerie

This got a way better response than I was expecting... hell, truth be told, I have no idea what I was expecting with this one, but I do think I stuck the landing with the analysis, even if I have no idea if I'll regret the scoring. Eh, fascinating all the same.

Next up, something a LOT more conventional, so stay tuned!

album review: 'a crow looked at me' by mount eerie

There's been a part of me that's been putting off this review. It's been on my schedule for a while, but there was a part of me deep down that was dreading this - and at first glimpse, that shouldn't make sense. This is one of the most critically acclaimed records of 2017 thus far, it's racked up comparisons to Sufjan Stevens' Carrie & Lowell and David Bowie's Blackstar and Nick Cave's Skeleton Tree, all records that I love and actually own on vinyl to this day.

But if you watched my reviews of those albums, you'll know that they are records about processing and dealing with death in a way that was uncomfortable intimate, which was only further intensified for me because I've been a fan of Nick Cave and Sufjan Stevens and Bowie and have had the experience even further enriched by my history with the artist. So with Mount Eerie, the project of Phil Elverum, I was gearing up for the same sort of emotion and feeling by steadily working my way through his back catalog to process and understand him...

And I just don't have the same connection that I do with those artists. I tried, folks, believe me, that's another reason this review took so long to come out, I listened through his discography over and over and I'm not sure what to tell you, except that Mount Eerie might not just be my thing. I can recognize the quality in the writing which is clever and understated, even if I do find his black metal experiments a little odd because the production never quite clicked for me, especially against his vocals... but it never got deeper than appreciation, I probably wouldn't call myself a fan. As such, when you hear his newest album is a very raw record about dealing with the loss of his wife Genevieve to cancer, I had a feeling like I was walking into a funeral for someone I only vaguely know, and I was genuinely worried I wouldn't feel the impact - all the more disconcerting when again, it's one of the most critically acclaimed records of 2017. But I've stalled long enough - how did A Crow Looked At Me turn out?

video review: 'love and war' by brad paisley

So this was a solid release. Not a great one - I wish it was - but a solid one all the same.

Next up, though, time to tackle some old business and it's bound to be controversial, so stay tuned!

album review: 'love and war' by brad paisley

I've been anticipating this album a fair bit more than even I expected. Hell, up until a few weeks ago I wasn't even aware Brad Paisley had a new project put together outside of a few scattered singles.

But the more I thought about it, the more I got intrigued by the possibilities Love & War represented for Brad Paisley, because I do like him a lot as an artist. He's got natural charisma and a sense of humor, he can write great hooks and shred like nobody's business, but most importantly, he's willing to take creative risks when it comes to the direction and subject matter of his material. People rag on albums like Wheelhouse and songs like 'Accidental Racist' for being thoroughly misconceived, but there's a part of me that prefers him taking big swings for the fences, because more often than not he can actually stick the landing. 'Southern Comfort Zone', 'Those Crazy Christians', 'Officially Alive', the collaboration with Eric Idle of all people 'Harvey Bodine', and especially the knockout deep cut 'Karate' show a real sense of wit and humor that might tilt silly, but remain endearing regardless. And when you realize how creatively stifled he felt on the otherwise solid Moonshine In The Trunk - even though for a chilled-out party album he had a fair share of great songs, especially 'American Flag On The Moon' - I was all for Brad Paisley taking time off and coming back hard. Because despite the deep state of confusion afflicting mainstream country, I'm sure he's been carefully listening to the indie scene acts taking big risks and taking copious notes. In other words, even despite being pretty lukewarm on the lead-off single 'Today', I had high hopes for Love Abd War - so what did we get?

video review: 'the source' by ayreon

Honestly have no idea how this is going to be received... the album was great but it really should have been better, so much potential if the writing came through... eh, we'll see if it grows on me.

Next up, though, should be interesting... stay tuned!

album review: 'the source' by ayreon

And now it's time for the big one, folks. The record I've arguably been anticipating the most in 2017, the newest collaboration album from a musical genius and a veteran of progressive metal for the past twenty years. The sort of project that has pulled from dozens of acclaimed metal acts and inspired at least three albums that would chalk as progressive metal stalwarts and one that's a genuine 10/10 classic.

And you all know who it is. Yes, folks, it's Ayreon, the project of Arjen Van Lucassen, who I last discussed in detail when I talked about his side project The Gentle Storm in 2015, and before then when I discussed the Ayreon album The Theory Of Everything in 2013 - which for the record nearly topped my list of the best albums of that year! Now that album did turn out to be a little contentious among some Ayreon fans - the story that felt distinctly separate from the Ayreon universe, the choice to structure the track listing in four mammoth songs each extending over twenty minutes, and a narrative that may have been a tad too abstract for its own good, especially with the ambiguous ending. Now I personally didn't care, but that might have been more because the narrative connected on a deeply emotional level that short-circuited most of my critical analysis: a young man with a neurological condition and complicated relationship with family finds new agency and a quest against a backdrop of theoretical physics, it hit a few too many close notes for me.

But that didn't mean I was inherently skeptical going into The Source - for one, look at that lineup! James LaBrie of Dream Theater, fresh off his own extended progressive metal epic The Astonishing, Tommy Karevik of Kamelot, Tommy Rodgers of Between The Buried And Me, Russell Allen of Symphony X, Floor Jansen of Nightwish, Hansi Kursch of Blind Guardian, Mike Mills of Toehider, Simone Simons of Epica, Paul Gilbert formerly of Racer X and Mr. Big, and even Tobias Sammet of the symphonic metal super-project Avantasia, who the music press has loved to paint as a rival to Arjen before they buried the hatchet in 2008. I haven't seen a murderer's row of talent that loaded since Dave Cobb brought together Southern Family. But The Source was promising more: a prequel album to the acclaimed 01011001 from 2008, telling the haunting story behind the collapse of the civilization behind the mysterious Forevers who have lurked behind so much of Ayreon's narrative. So on the one hand, it made plenty of sense for Arjen to cast the record with so many artists he's already worked with to deepen thematic parallels - or from what I could tell, maybe even play the same character again with Hansi Kursch and Floor Jansen - but on the other hand, prequels are always such a dangerous proposition, especially in a universe like Ayreon's with nine records stuffed full of interweaving continuity, with time travel to boot. But as always, my expectations were incredibly high, especially with buzz suggesting this could very well be Ayreon's best project since The Human Equation - does it live up to those expectations?

video review: 'the navigator' by hurray for the riff raff

Yes, I'm way too late to talk about this, but still, I'm happy it got up the schedule because it was most certainly worth it.

And yet, in something more timely... well, I'm excited. Stay tuned!

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - may 13, 2017 (VIDEO)

I think people who were a lot higher on the Paramore song probably enjoyed this week a lot more than I did... meh, it happens.

But next up, we've got something that's waited FAR too long... stay tuned!

album review: 'the navigator' by hurray for the riff raff

I always feel a little at a loss when talking about Hurray For The Riff Raff. The main project of Puerto Rican-American Alynda Segarra, I was first asked to cover her way back in 2014, and after an extended delay I finally got to dig into the back catalog and their debut on ATO Small Town Heroes, which I may have miscategorized as a major label instead of just being one of the larger indie labels. But to some extent it wasn't an unfair categorization - before Small Town Heroes there was a much more ragged and disheveled character to the production that I found powerfully organic and really charming, the sort of rougher tones that felt potent and authentic in the best possible way, something that the smoother, cleaner pickups didn't quite flatter. And what got frustrating is that it wasn't the ballads that suffered, but the more upbeat songs with greater rollick - which of course wasn't a terrible thing, as the restraint allowed the really strong songwriting to shine through, but it also meant that many of my fonder memories of Small Town Heroes are slower and more melancholic rather than of the real edge Segarra could bring.

And yet that looked to be changing in a big way on The Navigator, an album that has won Hurray For The Riff Raff real critical acclaim for venturing back to the roots - and when I say that I mean Segarra's Puerto Rican roots on a full-fledged two part concept album, both in the sound and writing. Which yes, is a bold step for a record barely over forty minutes, but that could reflect a level of rough tightness that I missed from before she signed with ATO. And when I heard this record was digging more deeply into the social themes that colored 'The Body Electric' and 'Small Town Heroes', I was all the more intrigued... but just like last time, I'm late to the punch with this one. But given that I'm the only person who has ever reviewed this group on YouTube, what did we find on The Navigator?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - may 13, 2017

So I was expecting this week to feel dispiriting. Kendrick falls off the top spot, the aftermath of DAMN. as the chart naturally corrects to a less promising state... but here's the honest truth: despite some absolute trash on the Hot 100 right now, I'm generally pretty pleased with the current state of affairs. Good songs have held enough traction to make a serious shot at the year-end list, I'm seeing promising continuity into the summer, and while there are problems, they feel isolated in comparison with the larger trends. 

video review: 'humanz' by gorillaz

Ohh boy, I can only imagine how things are going to go down with this video... but hey, you never know.

Next up, though - well, an old request finally got to the top and then an album I've been looking forward to all year, so stay tuned!

album review: 'humanz' by gorillaz

Okay, so when I was around my second and third year in university, I hung around a crowd that organized and went to a lot of raves - what can I tell you, I had a trance and acid house phase. Anyway, even though I'd prefer to stick to bourbon and beer instead of pot or ex or psychedelics, I did have several extended conversations with these folks surrounding the culture. And I remember one evening and one statement distinctly: 'if you ever choose to get into drugs, you'll wind up liking a lot of electronic music or a lot of hip-hop - and eventually, you're going to listen to a lot of Gorillaz'. 

Yeah, probably not a fair label to stick to Damon Albarn's most successful side project after Blur by a mile, but there was some truth to it, as the repetitive song structures, deep rhythmic grooves, and ever so slightly off-kilter vibe would probably seem profound to a chemically-enhanced mind. And throw in the trippy cartoon visuals and the sort of extended, convoluted backstory, and I could see the appeal. And even though I didn't and still don't do drugs - shut up, it's allergies - I did get into Gorillaz a fair bit that year. I liked their albums, I really dug the grooves, and once I decoded the message a lot of the post-apocalyptic environmental themes did resonate.

But around the end of 2010, around the time that The Fall was released - although not explicitly because of that record, though it didn't help - I kind of fell out with Gorillaz. Never to the point where I hated them - their singles are still karaoke staples for me, and it's great vibe music that has aged ridiculously well - but I'm not really passionate about the band the same I used to be. Part of it is linked to memories of old friends I haven't spoken to in years due to me unfortunately burning some bridges, but it goes beyond that. Even from the beginning, I was never really impressed with the songwriting - and lord knows the years of post-apocalyptic art has not helped the themes feel any more original or less heavy-handed - but I also had the impression Albarn occasionally was trying for swell and bombast that were just a poor fit for his cast of characters. And again, I long ago stopped caring about the 'narrative' - as I've always said, if you need peripheral materials to explain your album, you haven't exactly succeeded as a storyteller!

But hey, now we're in 2017 and there's a new Gorillaz record, reportedly inspired by pulling thematic suggestions out of a hat and coming up with... a certain someone winning the presidency in the United States - hey, remember when that seemed so impossible? Albarn to his credit scrubbed all mention of him from the record in the lyrics - which I agree with, for the record, it'll extend the album's shelf-life - but it seems like he was going for a repeat of Plastic Beach, with tons of guest stars for the grand comeback. So, what do we get out of Humanz?

video review: 'the ride' by nelly furtado

There's a part of me that feels I put a bit too much effort into this review... but there's also a part of me that thinks it's one of my better ones because I encapsulated so much history and context that turned out quite well. Huh.

Well, next up is Gorillaz, and I'm sure that will be a fun ride, so stay tuned!

album review: 'the ride' by nelly furtado

I'm a little amazed that there were requests to cover this on Patreon - but in a bizarre way, I'm kind of glad I am. And to explain why, I need to explain my complicated relationship with this Canadian pop singer-songwriter, so storytime!

See, back in the early 2000s, the whole prefabricated and super-polished female pop star image was fading out of fashion, but it's not like this style of pop artist was going away, simply just synthesized into a new format. Thus, partially driven by the still-vibrant adult-alternative scene in the 90s, our crop of female pop stars began picking up a little more organic texture and unique personality and detail. It's how Pink became a firebrand, it's how Avril Lavigne broke out of pop punk, it's how Kelly Clarkson earned critical acclaim by going harder, and into all this, barely into her twenties with two fellow Canadian producers, came Nelly Furtado with her debut Whoa, Nelly.

And I hated it. Part of it was overexposure, I'll admit that, given how much Canadian radio will overplay Canadian talent, but for Nelly Furtado it was even worse. I didn't like her voice, her production grated on my nerves, and I despised her artistic persona. See, despite the slightly more earthy style of writing and presentation, it wasn't like the pop polish wasn't there, and Nelly Furtado's quasi-bohemian debut didn't overshadow some really annoying lyrical shortcomings, it felt so phony to me! Now I imagine this makes me sound like Steve Albini talking about Alanis Morrissette or Liz Phair - look it up - but in retrospect it was a more complicated issue: it was a debut that had a distinctive tone and style but Nelly Furtado wasn't refined enough as a performer to fully deliver. That changed on her second album Folklore was a fair bit better... and did precisely nothing in the U.S.. And so, along with so many of her contemporaries in the mid-to-late 2000s, Nelly Furtado decided to 'sell out' - which isn't accurate because she was always part of that system but it's not like the mainstream public understood that - and she hooked up with Timbaland for her third album Loose - and it was the best possible move. Sure, she wasn't convincing in 2000, but six years later with some real stage presence and charisma she released killer singles like 'Maneater', 'Promiscuous', 'Say It Right', and especially the teamup with Timbaland and Justin Timberlake that stands as one of the most defiantly arrogant and kickass mainstream songs of the decade. For two years, it looked like Nelly Furtado had it all figured out...

And then it all fell apart - and believe it or not, I don't really blame Nelly Furtado for this. Sure, probably not the best choice to release an entirely Spanish language album in 2009 rather than perpetuate her momentum, but mainstream pop was shifting to the much more synthetic club boom, and adult alternative was dying a slow death on the charts. Sure, she tried for a comeback in 2012 but by then pop had passed her by, and bad promotion from her label didn't help matters. And so Nelly Furtado did something that took me by surprise but also seemed natural: she went independent, took some time off, and met up with acclaimed indie producer John Congleton through a connection to St. Vincent. And yeah, that gave me a lot of hope going into this project: free of label constraints and old enough to refine her songwriting where she doesn't have to please the mainstream, this could be a new chapter for Nelly Furtado, especially if she remembers the grooves that made her mid-period work so potent. So, where does The Ride take us?

video review: 'jason eady' by jason eady

Yeah, it should be of absolutely no surprise to anyone that I adore this record. Killer writing, great production, so subtle and understated in the best ways possible, and impossibly tight. GET THIS ALBUM.

And after this... huh, this'll be interesting indeed. Stay tuned!

album review: 'jason eady' by jason eady

It's a bit of a trend for indie country critics - and I include myself in this category - to assert that when it comes to Jason Eady, some people should just leave the room. If you're coming in looking for pop country or style or anything to detract from many have deemed some of the purest forms of the entire genre, especially out of Texas, this is not for you. If you're looking for something that might cross over into the mainstream... well, maybe in Texas, but I'm only qualified to say that because the mainstream country scene has no idea what it's doing and throwing everything at the wall to see what'll stick, from Chris Stapleton to Thomas Rhett. And it's not like Jason Eady didn't dabble with softer tones on AM Country Heaven in 2012 that could have possibly crossed over.

Suffice to say, he didn't stick with it, and in early 2014 he delivered Daylight & Dark, a stunning pure shot of fantastic country music that if not for Run The Jewels would have topped my best albums list that year. And while so many lined up to praise Sturgill Simpson and the other indie darlings as the scene inflated over the past few years, Jason Eady seems to slip out of the picture - and yeah, I partially blame myself for that, because when he dropped an acoustic duets album with his wife Something Together in December of 2016, I missed it too. Part of it is country's lousy web presence, but Eady also seems to run just below the radar for too many folks, and some for whom I've played his material can get a little intimidated by his soft, plainspoken, yet cutting delivery - for a lot of people, it's a purer form of country than they can handle.

In other words, this was among my most anticipated projects of 2017, and I had the highest of expectations going in, especially considering his songwriting only seems to be getting more refined with each passing album. So what does he deliver on a self-titled record?

billboard BREAKDOWN - hot 100 - may 6, 2017 (VIDEO)

Man, I'm really proud of this episode. Long one, but a damn great one.

Next up, though... finally getting to Jason Eady, and I'm psyched - stay tuned!