album review: 'sunshine & whiskey' by frankie ballard

Let's talk - again - about bro-country. Because at this point, its prevalence in mainstream country is starting to really get on my nerves. And not for the reason you might think - as I've said in the past, bro-country is a qualifying term and not immediately a denigrating factor; just because something is bro-country doesn't immediately make it bad. But since it's everywhere, it immediately colours my expectations when it comes to certain debut acts. I mean, I can take a look at the album cover, that one hit single that gets popular, and the track list overloaded with Music Row's songwriting machine, and I can make a snap judgement on the genre.

But now I'm not so sure that holds up anymore. Both Eric Paslay and (to a lesser extent) Jon Pardi surprised me by being more than just their hit singles and actually being promising country artists when I delved into their albums. In other words, I'm not quite sure what to expect going into acts like Frankie Ballard, who recently released his second album Sunshine & Whiskey. And on the surface, this looks like an archetypal bro-country album: he has only one writing credit on this record, you have a selection of Nashville's 'finest' writing for this guy, and his lead single 'Helluva Life' fits directly into the softer 'bros-trying-to-be-sensitive' brand of country that's popular right now as bro-country tries to show it has variety and staying power. And considering he was yet another male country star with an underwritten Wikipedia page and was introduced to the world via a contest run by Kenny Chesney, I had no high hopes this album would be very good.

But I've been surprised in the past, and I went into this record with the slightest hope that even if it was bro-country, it'd be listenable. Was I right?

video review: '†††' (crosses)' by ††† (crosses)

Okay, my schedule got busy in a hurry, but I wanted to get this out. 

Next up... well, Cynic, Beck, and Frankie Ballard. Not quite sure about the order, but stay tuned all the same!

album review: '†††' (crosses)' by ††† (crosses)

Let's briefly talk about nu metal. Born in the early 90s but exploding in the latter half of that decade, it was a genre I only happened to listen to in retrospect years after its popularity crashed, taking its rock-bottom reputation with it. Widely considered by metal purists to be a mainstream sell-out branch of 'real' metal, it's a genre that tends to inspire a lot of negative comparisons - and while there is some material of quality if you look for it, there isn't much. And while I tend to be more forgiving of nu metal than some critics, the lack of authenticity and texture in their instrumentation combined with atrociously whiny lyrics and a meatheaded attitude tended to set my teeth on edge. At least when hair metal or crunk got sleazy and borderline misogynist it sounded attractive and fun, while nu metal was content to wallow in misery - and since I never had an 'angry white boy' phase, I can't take it remotely seriously.

And the depressing fact is that I think it might be coming back. Though I didn't review Of Mice And Men's most recent album Restoring Force (I didn't feel I knew enough metalcore to give the band an objective opinion, but overall I was meh on it), I definitely heard plenty of the hallmarks of nu metal on that album. And combined with new acts like Emmure and Hollywood Undead, and the popular revival of acts like Korn and Staind and Limp Bizkit (God help us all), I get the unpleasant feeling we haven't seen the last of this genre.

But here's the somewhat ironic fact: nu metal's worst critics tend to be former nu metal artists, and this takes us to Deftones and lead singer Chino Moreno. Deftones has a better reputation than most nu metal acts, mostly because they were a bit more abstract in their lyrics and they jumped off the bandwagon faster towards the alternative metal/post-metal scene. I've never really been a Deftones fan, but the critical acclaim the band has received was enough to get me to look into the debut album from Chino Moreno's side project Crosses, with promises that it was melodic and thoughtful in comparison to his work with Deftones, leaning instead towards electronic rock. Did those promises follow through?

video review: 'the outsiders' by eric church

Well, this is going to be fun. :) 

Okay, next up is Crosses, then Beck, then Cynic. Stay tuned!

album review: 'the outsiders' by eric church

Here's a fun observation about mainstream country music: despite the dominance of male country acts, there aren't a lot of acts that focus on the darker edges of country music. You know the songs: the ones about kicking ass, drinking whiskey, playing hard and raising hell. And while you get some acts who try to talk about these subjects on mainstream radio, the majority of them aren't convincing, mostly because the instrumentation is so polished and clean and overproduced that none of the rough instrumental texture carries in to support the lyrics about crime, hard living, and the vast number of nastier topics most country musicians won't touch.

Yes, I'm talking about outlaw country, a genre that started in the 60s and lasted for a few decades before fragmenting into smaller and smaller scenes within country music, the majority of which doesn't get mainstream airplay. And believe me, that pisses me off, mostly because outlaw country is probably my favourite subgenre within country music, partially because I've always liked grimy Westerns, partially because I love murder ballads (and outlaw country is really one of the best genres for that type of song), and partially because there's a raw, potent authenticity to the music that just works for me. And what's so surprising - and ironic in a twisted sort of way - is that more bro-country acts don't even come close to utilizing the outlaw formula. After all, it's a subgenre focused on being badasses (at least on a superficial level) and I'm sure there are bro-country artists who would be attracted to the ubermasculine power fantasy of it all.

And on that note, let's talk about Eric Church. Now he's not a bro-country artist - hell, I'd have a hard time calling him a country act on some songs rather than Southern rock - but he definitely has his eyes fixed on outlaw country, a rarity for a successful country act in the mainstream. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen a country act try as hard as Eric Church does to be an outlaw - and what's all the more tragic is that he hasn't quite pulled it off. Maybe it's his voice not quite having the grit or texture on those first three albums, maybe it's his instrumentation which really comes across as trying way too hard to sound rough and impressive and ends up sounding stunningly inorganic, or maybe it's the fact he's just not a great songwriter in the tradition of Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, or Merle Haggard - either way, it's not quite clicking. 

Now don't get me wrong, Eric Church is by no means a bad artist, and I respect the hell out of him for trying as hard as he does, across the board. You're not going to find many mainstream country acts who put this much effort into their instrumentation and sound, especially when doing so could mean a loss of mainstream success. But maybe it's the clumsiness in the songwriting or the fact that Eric Church seems to be taking everything way too seriously, but every time I listened to his last album Chief, I was always struck by how little he was getting for all the effort. The sadly ironic thing is that on the looser tracks where Eric Church wasn't trying as hard and seemed to be having fun, the music was a lot better. 

Unfortunately, the early buzz surrounding Church's newest album suggested that he wasn't about to stop trying way too hard to be an outlaw. And now, we have his newest album titled The Outsiders, a title so on the nose that I can't help but raise an eyebrow and make comparisons with the S.E. Hinton novel that we all read in junior high (the one that was adapted into the film directed by Francis Ford Coppola and had Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe, Tom Waits, and C. Thomas Howell). But as much as I'd like to make jokes the entire review, I will endeavour to take this album as seriously as Eric Church: does he strike gold here?

video review: 'sun structures' by temples

Well, this was a welcome surprise. Man, this was a phenomenal album.

Next up will probably be Crosses... and then Eric Church. Strap in, folks, it's going to get interesting.

album review: 'sun structures' by temples

It's common practice in today's age of ubiquitous marketing that whenever there's a new movie coming out, the actors in that film pull double duty and appear on the talk show circuit to promote the film, whether it be great or terrible. And at this point, I'm honestly bewildered at why anyone would buy into that style of promotion - not only is it blatantly direct marketing, most of the actors involved seem to be exasperated to be doing it (see Bruce Willis' breakdown on live British TV regarding A Good Day To Die Hard - and having seen that POS, it's not hard to see why). I mean, the actors have a stake in the film, why the hell should anyone buy into their assertions that the movie is worth seeing instead of, say, the critical press?

But let's take this a step further: what happens when you get celebrity endorsements for acts where there's no connection between them whatsoever? Well, to place stock in that sort of endorsement, I'd argue that it'd come down to the expertise said celebrity brings to the table. For instance, I got a comment when I reviewed Young The Giant's Mind Over Matter that my opinion was somehow invalid because Morrissey liked that album - and on the face of it, it's a hard argument to beat. Morrissey is a critically-acclaimed musician with decades in the industry, so why shouldn't his opinion be held higher than mine?

Well, I could easily point out the long list of things Morrissey likes that are garbage and the even longer list of things Morrissey hates that aren't worth hating, but instead I'd like to take the high road and talk about a debut album endorsed by a member of The Smiths I can tolerate. This brings us to Sun Structures by the band Temples, a psychedelic rock act that has been acclaimed by Johnny Marr and Oasis frontman Noel Gallagher as one of the best new bands in England. Now that's high praise from two of the most influential names in English rock in the past thirty years, but even on that note I was skeptical. Celebrity endorsements might be indicators of quality on a roughly defined scale, but everyone has different tastes, and I'm not going to be a hypocrite and parrot the praise of legends without giving the band an evaluation myself and discovering why I might like or dislike the band outside of additional press. So, what did I think of Sun Structures by Temples?

video review: 'eric paslay' by eric paslay

Man, this was a great surprise. Really dug this album, I must say.

Next up... not sure yet, we'll see. Either way, stay tuned!

album review: 'eric paslay' by eric paslay

I've got the sinking feeling that bro-country isn't going away.

No, despite Kacey Musgraves winning the Grammy for Best Country Album for Same Trailer, Different Park - a well-deserved win, I might add - it doesn't mean the country music paradigm is going to change overnight, and some of the bigger bro-country acts aren't just going to evaporate. Like in the aftermath of the club boom of 2009-11, the b-listers are the ones that fall away in, leaving the heavyweights behind. 

But that's not to say that bro-country is going to stay in the same form, and if you take a look at the hits from Luke Bryan, Florida Georgia Line, and Blake Shelton, they've opted to move away from the summer time party anthem to mid-tempo relationship songs, with mixed results. For Blake Shelton it's an easy shift, he's been making this material for over a decade, but Florida Georgia Line's 'Stay' is clumsy, overwrought, and really hard to take seriously, and it's becoming apparent that band might not have a lot of staying power.

But maybe I'm even wrong about that, because there are still acts looking to hop on the good-time bro-country bandwagon, which takes us to Eric Paslay, another country singer with a criminally underwritten Wikipedia page. He struck a hit with his song 'Friday Night', which is clearly trying to jump on the trend, but he doesn't strike the image of the typical bro-country act. For one, he's older, 31 at the time of this review, and for another, he has major writing credits on all of his songs. He doesn't quite look the part of a bro-country singer, and if that wasn't convincing, his collaborating work with Amy Grant of all people might be indicative that we're dealing with someone different. And while I thought 'Friday Night' was played-out and not that interesting, I had a feeling there was more to this guy, so I checked out his debut, self-titled album: how was it?

video review: 'after the disco' by broken bells

Damn, I wish I could have liked this album more than I do. Gah.

Next up will probably be Eric Paslay. Stay tuned!

album review: 'after the disco' by broken bells

It's hard to know what you'll get when you have two acts choosing to collaborate - because believe it or not, you don't always get success.

Yeah, I've covered a number of great collaborations - Run The Jewels, Step Brothers, half of Within Temptation's last album - but you don't always get success when you put together artists that have differing musical styles. Now you don't always get disasters either - the odds of getting a Lulu (Metallica/Lou Reed) aren't likely because true catastrophe albums are pretty rare (and they tend to be hastily edited by the label into something salvageable unless the artists have too much clout for their own good - see here). More often than not you either get wildly incompatible styles and a lack of cohesion that doesn't quite damn the album but doesn't save it either, or you get a fusion in between that's agreeable, but doesn't fully embrace either acts' strengths.

And it's in the latter category where I originally placed Broken Bells' self-titled debut album. James Mercer of critically acclaimed indie rock group The Shins and acclaimed producer Danger Mouse came together to form the Broken Bells project, and at the time, I mostly liked the results. The Shins have always had a taste for blissed-out psychedelia and old-fashioned pop that made their first three albums infinitely listenable, and combined with Danger Mouse's eclectic brand of production and Mercer's painfully honest and emotionally effective lyrics, Broken Bells had a lot of catchy, effective charm, even if it was a bit lightweight in terms of subject matter and it never really came together into something special. In other words, it wasn't indicative of both men's best work, and when James Mercer went back and made a new Shins album in 2012, I didn't expect to see much from this project again.

Turns out I was wrong, and James Mercer and Danger Mouse have gotten back together to release a new album titled After The Disco under the Broken Bells name. How did it go?

video review: 'salute' by little mix

Got a lot of requests to cover this one, so I did. Nice how that works, especially when the album is actually good.

Next up will either be Eric Paslay or Broken Bells. Stay tuned!

album review: 'salute' by little mix

Let me explain a bit how my schedule works. At the beginning of each month, I go through the lists of albums to be released and choose the ones I want to cover. Throughout the month, I make sure to go through the list multiple times to update it, if by some chance I miss an album or someone surprises me (hi, Beyonce!). And when it comes to albums with release dates that are different for international audiences, I tend to be ambivalent on which date I choose - if I the month is busy, I'll typically choose the later one.

That's the main reason why I didn't cover Little Mix's album Salute when it came out late last year. I rationalized that since it had an American release date in February and given my nightmarish schedule in October and November, I figured a delay until 2014 was fine. But even with that in mind, I wasn't really excited to cover this record. I've said in the past that I'm not ashamed of my liking of boy bands or even acts like S Club 7, but I've had mixed luck with girl groups. My favourite is probably still Girls Aloud, but that was more for the phenomenal production work of Xenomania rather than the girls' individual performances. And while I'm mostly ambivalent to positive on The Spice Girls (they've got some great singles, but the albums are the furthest thing from cohesive or all that solid), I really couldn't stand Destiny's Child, who I always thought was the poor man's TLC and never really grew beyond being a jump-off platform for Beyonce (because that's what the band was). 

And maybe that was the reason I was a little reticent against approaching Little Mix's second album, because the band made it clear they were moving away from the 'club-dance' scene towards R&B-flavoured pop, and while I don't dislike the genre, it's not something that always interests me, particularly when it's backed by Simon Cowell's record label. And that's the other problem - Simon Cowell has a bad reputation among music circles over the past decade for making sterile copies of what's popular in pop music rather than innovating, and he proved that last year with the insane overproduction on Little Mix's label mates Fifth Harmony, another girl group that never really resonated with me. In other words, I didn't have a good feeling about Salute; was I wrong?

video review: 'transgender dysphoria blues' by against me!

That came together fairly quickly. Not sure I'm thrilled with the video, but eh, I honestly didn't have a lot to say. Punk albums are good that way - they get to the point.

Next up... hmm, well, there's no releases I care about until February 4, so it's time to tackle some old business. Stay tuned!

album review: 'transgender dysphoria blues' by against me!

It's a fairly well-know fact in punk music that if you stick around in the scene long enough, you will get sick of punk music. As much as I love punk, it's a genre that has a certain instrumental simplicity in its purest form, which means many acts will stop playing punk fairly early in their careers and move in different instrumental directions. Some go towards mainstream pop, some go towards folk, a fair chunk gravitate towards metal or hardcore, and of course you have the post-punk scene. And as the genre changes, the songwriting topics tend to change as well, and thus you'll end up getting all manner of cries of 'sellout' the second the band opts for a different sound.

And really, I don't think that's entirely fair - the set of punk 'ideals' and songwriting topic have always been nebulous and hard to define, and there have been punk acts like Green Day who have held onto decidedly punk sensibilities lyrically while exploring arena rock and other genres. I'd only be inclined to brand an act a 'sellout' if the songwriting took a notable dip in quality, and say what you will about Green Day, but their shallow and hyperbolic lyrics have been a consistent factor throughout their entire career (you know it's true).

But then we have Against Me!, a punk act that sprung up in the early 2000s with serious songwriting chops, a knack for great hooks, and a lot of instrumental talent with real punk flair... and yet after those first two albums, it'd be hard to argue that they didn't 'sell out'. From Searching For A Former Clarity onward you could see the changes across the board, with the grime and instrumental texture slowly being scraped away, the ideals and wry self-awareness that characterized their early work falling away, and the songwriting only coming across as more conventional and painfully mundane (still good on a technical level, mind you, but not nearly as interesting). The band still had a knack for great hooks and catchy material, but by the time White Crosses was released in 2010, I'd have a hard time calling the band a 'punk' act rather than your standard arena rock crowd-pleaser, which lyrics that were shallower than ever and a seeming complete lack of self-awareness. And look, I like earnestness, but Against Me!'s early appeal for me was in the balance between razor-sharp insight and self-aware populism. And by White Crosses, that was almost entirely gone, leaving behind a pretty solid but not particularly interesting 'arena punk' band.

But I have to admit, I was curious about their newest release Transgender Dysphoria Blues. The title was inspired by lead singer Laura Jane Grace coming out as a trans woman in 2012 and her struggles with gender dysphoria that she's endured her whole life (and in retrospect, come up a surprising amount on early Against Me! albums). In terms of an album topic, you just don't see many albums discussing trans issues, and coupled with the fact Against Me! were now on their own label and were returning to their rougher sound, I was really interested in what this record would put forward. So how did go?

video review: 'hydra' by within temptation

Well, this was fun. Next up will probably be Against Me!, but it'll take a little more time for me to completely cut through their discography, so stay tuned!

album review: 'hydra' by within temptation

I've mentioned in the past that when I leaped from pop music into symphonic metal in my teens, I primarily listened to acts like Blind Guardian and Nightwish, at least initially. But it wasn't long before I discovered the act that was often considered Nightwish's primary competitor in the realm of symphonic metal, as they both started in the same year and had uncannily similar album release schedules. 

That band was Within Temptation, a band I've consistently liked for the past decade and one that I've always held up as the necessary rational counterpart to Nightwish's turbulent insanity. Where Nightwish dove into wildly imaginative yet bloated excess, Within Temptation toed the line a little closer to the mainstream with tighter lyrics and riffs, Sharon den Adel's beautiful vocals, and a sound that would be more easily accessible from the crowd that took the wary step away from Evanescence into something heavier (and eons better).

And yet, as much as I like Within Temptation's consistent high quality, they aren't a band that has ever surprised me, and they've only had moments of pure transcendent awesomeness. Don't get me wrong, all of their albums are definitely worth your time, but as a band I wouldn't quite say they've stepped out of their comfort zone - heavy enough to be considered metal, but not too heavy or weird enough to be inaccessible to a casual fan. In fact, if you're looking for a great entry point for symphonic metal, Within Temptation would be a fine start, but on the other hand, while lead singer Sharon den Adel might have begun her career collaborating with Arjen Lucassen (of Ayreon), her most recent release prior to this was an album of metal covers of pop and rock songs that included David Guetta, Bruno Mars, and Enrique Iglesias.

And thus, I was skeptical going into their most recent album Hydra. I did like their previous major release The Unforgiving, an attempt at a pulpy urban fantasy tale than worked more often than it didn't, but the delays and bizarre list of collaborators on this album gave me a fair bit of pause. And while some were saying Within Temptation was returning to their 'heavier' roots and showing 'the many different sides of their music', I had to wonder that at what point would Within Temptation lose all their unique personality altogether. I prayed for the best, but I expected the worst - what did I get?

video review: 'daylight & dark' by jason eady

Damn, this album was great. In case you need more incentive after my review, GET THIS ALBUM.

Next up... well, things might get heavier up in here. Stay tuned!

album review: 'daylight & dark' by jason eady

I've recently come to a realization about my own musical preferences that is both unsurprising and a little exasperating: I tend to prefer interesting or powerful songwriting over grand musical experimentation at points. It's one of the reasons I've long been reticent about covering a lot of material with growled or screamed vocals - or, on that note, covering a lot of R&B - because the actual words on the page don't quite matter as much as the way they're delivered with that style. To me, presentation isn't always enough, which means I tend to be harsher on underwritten indie or hard rock in comparison to some critics or kinder to acts with more narrative ambition in genres like country. Now obviously there's more to it than that - I love good melodies, solid production, and sheer epic music as much as any, and my favourite music combines all these elements, but if I were given the choice between endlessly catchy earworms but lousy songwriting or riveting lyrics with quieter or less interesting instrumentation, I'll usually take the latter.

So it always puts a smile on my face when I find country acts like Jason Eady, a critically-praised singer-songwriter who is easily one of the strongest songwriters I've seen in a while, with an uncanny knack for great melodies and original lyrics with a ton of detail and flavour. I wouldn't say he's the greatest singer in the world and the basic building blocks of his songs are reasonably conventional by country standards, but the details are what knocked him into my good graces. The first album I took a look at was 2009's When The Money's All Gone, a rough-edged, incredibly organic record that wasn't afraid to go into the bleak, lurid details that you didn't see hit mainstream country radio in the same way. It was dark, it went for emotional gut-punches, it was brilliantly framed thanks to Jason Eady's expressive delivery, and if I had been reviewing five years ago, it would have had a solid shot at my Top Ten list that year.

Eady followed that album in 2012 with AM Country Heaven, which proved to be a small mainstream breakout and a critical success, but I have to be honest and say I didn't quite like the album as much. Oh, the songwriting was still great and songs like 'AM Country Heaven' were perfect barbs launched at the increasingly sterile country music establishment, but at the same time I felt the production and instrumentation weren't as varied or interesting. Some of the texture had been sanded away and the instrumentation had a more accessible vibe (which was inevitably why the album was successful), and while that was fine, his previous album just stood out as more unique and closer to the grimy outlaw country that I've always loved. So when he released his newest album Daylight & Dark, I wasn't sure what to expect. The songwriting was likely to still be there, but would he move towards an even more polished and accessible sound, or return to the roughness of his earlier work?

video review: 'strong feelings' by doug paisley

Yeah, it's late. Don't care, glad I got this out.

Next up... hmm, not sure yet. Got a few discographies to churn through. There's some stuff I definitely love, and stuff I know will get me a roughly analogous reaction to the Switchfoot review. Fun stuff, so stay tuned!