CD Odyssey Disc 1521: Bob Dylan

This is my third music review in less than a week. This is chiefly because I’ve been on my annual US Thanksgiving mini-holiday with more time on my hands. I don’t celebrate US Thanksgiving, but I do appreciate all the football games they put on, so I like to take the Thursday and following Friday off each year and get in some football and a bit of quiet "me" time before the hectic holiday party schedule kicks off.

Disc 1521 is….  Nashville Skyline

Artist: Bob Dylan

Year of Release: 1969

What’s up with the Cover? Bob tips his hat to the audience. This is the happiest picture of Bob Dylan I can recall, and he looks genuinely excited about playing that guitar he’s hefting and singing us a few tunes.

How I Came To Know It: I have been a Dylan fan for a long time, and had this record most of that time, so I can’t remember all the specifics. I believe this was just me drilling through his catalogue back in the day.

How It Stacks Up: I have 19 Bob Dylan albums. He’s done a lot of great ones, and Nashville Skyline had to work hard to elbow its way up the list. I rank it at #13.

Ratings: 4 stars

If you know anything about Bob Dylan you know that Bob does what Bob wants. In 1969 Bob wanted to explore country music. The result is “Nashville Skyline”, a record that is still very much in Bob’s folk wheelhouse, but that features the sights and sounds of American country music as well, as Bob expertly melds the two traditions together.

The most immediate and striking thing about “Nashville Skyline” isn’t the countrified elements, however, it is the quality of Bob’s voice. It is as though for this one record only he’s taken advice from a vocal coach. The nasal quality we associate with Dylan’s singing is significantly toned down, morphing into a slight warble. He clearly wants to capture the country crooner aesthetic and for the most part, he succeeds.

Part of this is the production work of Bob Johnston as well. Dylan albums can be sharp around the edges - purposefully so, but still sharp. On “Nashville Skyline” the album has a much rounder and fuller sound. It reminded me of later efforts like “Oh Mercy” (produced by Daniel Lanois).

This sound is prevalent throughout the record, but never more beautifully executed than on “I Threw It All Away,” a heartbreaking song of regret and lost love. Bob’s vocals on the tune will make you wonder if that is Bob at all, as he falls fully into the emotion of the song. There are none of the clever rhymes or lyrics you might expect from him, just simple heartfelt storytelling. The guitar work is round and gentle with a Spanish flair. The whole thing will make you want to have a good cry, or sing along, or maybe both.

Bob’s exploration draws him to timeless melodic structures. “Girl from the North Country” had me convinced it was some old country traditional that’s been floating around for hundreds of years. But no, while it is inspired by traditional English ballads, it is a Bob original. The tune is sung as a duet with Johnny Cash, as he and Bob were in the throes of a bromance at this time. Bob holds his own with Cash, which is a formidable feat.

My favourite song on the record was also the biggest hit. “Lay Lady Lay” is a five-star masterpiece of a song, and one of the great, “stay the night” songs ever written. Bob has never crooned better than as he invites his lady to “lay across my big brass bed.”  

While the record isn’t perfect (I could live without the pandering rollick of “Peggy Day”) for the most part Dylan plays it straight and delivers songs that sound so timeless you are sure they are covers until you remember that, oh yeah, this is Bob Dylan – he writes classics.

If you currently just listen to Dylan’s greatest hits, you’ll already know “Girl from the North Country” and “Lay Lady Lay,” but if you only listen to Dylans hits you are nevertheless an idiot. He is one of music’s greatest gifts, and while Nashville Skyline isn’t the first record people mention when discussing his brilliance, it is brilliant all the same. Do yourself a favour and check it out.

Best tracks: Girl From the North Country, I Threw It All Away, Lay Lady Lay, One More Night

CD Odyssey Disc 1520: Laura Stevenson

Welcome back! Today I am feeling full of energy, likely because I’m about to enjoy a four day weekend. Yeehaw! To get things started, let’s start with some music!

Disc 1520 is….  The Big Freeze

Artist: Laura Stevenson

Year of Release: 2019

What’s up with the Cover? Giant Head Cover alert! This one features a fur cap, so we must assume that either the picture was taken in a very cold studio, or Laura Stevenson’s head was very warm.

How I Came To Know It: I liked her 2021 self-titled release and decided a dig into her back catalogue was in order. This was as far as I’ve gotten, but I am still on the hunt for two earlier records.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Laura Stevenson albums and if you’ve been reading along, you already know which two. I bought them both at the same time, and I haven’t given the more recent record as much of a listen, but I vaguely recall liking this one better. On that flimsy evidence, I’m putting “The Big Freeze” in at #1. All of this could change when I either a) review my other record or b) get even more. For now, #1.

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

“The Big Freeze” is not an easy record to get to know, the lyrics are dense and the songs have complex structures that do not inspire toe-tapping or sing-a-longs around the campfire. However, once you put in the time (I recommend a minimum of three listens) Laura Stevenson’s singular brand of genius will reveal itself to you.

Like a lot of modern indie artists, Stevenson’s style is hard to pigeonhole. It has elements of many styles and will flip from a thick rock mix to a sparse folk sound from song to song; sometimes within a single tune.

It can also take on an anthemic quality, as it does on one of the standouts, “Living Room NY” which is a song about the breathless joy we get just anticipating we’ll be with the one we love soon. “Living Room NY” also shows how deliberately restless Stevenson’s music is. It starts with a light guitar trill that makes you feel like you are trying to rush to get somewhere but stuck in traffic, which then gets intimate and quiet, before swelling into that aforementioned anthem to close things out. My favourite line is “I want to fall asleep with you shifting by my side”. You know you love someone when you don’t mind them shifting around while you’re trying to sleep.

It also mirrors the shifting style of the tune, where Stevenson demonstrates that she is equally adept at frenetic anxiety numbers and quiet confessionals. Style is never a barrier.

All of the songs have thoughtful lyrics, and I found myself flipping through the CD booklet unable to pick a single favourite from such a great selection. In the end, I settled on two. First these opening lines of “Hum”:

“Cease all your wandering set down your wine
I’ll be the burden you stumble upon
So draw back the curtains on stolen time
You are only the burden you set in your mind.”

And second, these ending lines from “Hawks”:

“Can we go back to the minute we circled to land
Ebbing graceful and careful like terns in the sand
When the thought of an ending was too much to stand
Remind me when my mind it starts to go.”

It is inspiring stuff, and reminded me of my wife Sheila’s poetry, in that it is emotional, flows like water, and makes me wish I could write poetry half as well. Both “Hum” and “Hawks” also benefit from being quieter songs that make it easy to focus on the joy of all those wonderful words.

Unfortunately, two things stand in the way of the record’s greatness. The first is Stevenson’s delivery, which when she plays it straight, is full of hurt and anxious wonder. Unfortunately, she sometimes adds a bit too much affectation in the delivery, like she begrudges the greatness of the language and wants the listener to have to pay even closer attention to follow along.

The second is the production not entirely to my liking. I can pick out individual brilliance on the musicians, but not as crisply as I tend to prefer. Like the lyrics, I have to dig to hear it. While it is usually worth it, it is also work.

However, while some of the choices in delivery aren’t exactly the way I want them, the bones of these songs are strong and on each listen they will draw you deeper inside them. I recommend Laura Stevenson, but only if you’re willing to give her some quiet space and a couple of listens to let her work her magic.

Best tracks: Living Room NY, Hum, Rattle at Will, Hawks, Big Deep, Perfect

CD Odyssey Disc 1519: Phoebe Bridgers

It’s been a long day, and as Leonard Cohen once sang, I just want “to get lost in that hopeless little screen.” But my wise and caring wife reminds me that getting lost in the written word is likely to be much better for what ails me. So here I am…and here we go.

Disc 1519 is….  Punisher

Artist: Phoebe Bridgers

Year of Release: 2020

What’s up with the Cover? Behold, the red planet Mars! Where the dead cavort among the broken stones and dream of vengeance!

Does this dread spirit have some power to destroy music? Because as I listen to the record the sound is all wrong, as though possessed by some terrible spirit…[insert 20 minutes of Logan testing various connections to the point of panic].

And…I’m back. Whew! I thought for a moment that my headphones (which I fucking LOVE) had finally given up the ghost. But no, it was just a broken cord, making the record sound garbled. Thankfully I have a spare and I’m back.

Also, it’s just Phoebe in a skeleton suit, no undead horrors from outer space. That was also a false alarm.

How I Came To Know It: I loved Bridgers’ first solo record “Stranger in the Alps” (Disc 1410) and also her work with Conor Oberst as part of Better Oblivion Community Center (Disc1292). In fact, both those records got 5 stars, so buying “Punisher” seemed like a no-brainer.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Phoebe Bridgers albums, and although this one is amazing, I still have to put it in #2.

Ratings: 4 stars

“Punisher” is a breathy confessional that will wrap itself around you like a swirling fog; cold, comforting and possessed of a churning energy underneath. This is a stark and honest record, with Bridgers stitching together relatively simple imagery to generate surprisingly complex emotions.

For an album that will blow your mind, this honesty starts a bit too literal, with “DVD Menu/Garden Song”. You know that ambient, circular quality the music has on your DVD menu? The kind that lets it start again from the beginning every couple of minutes with minimal disruption to the flow? Well…that’s how this song starts. It isn’t bad, but it did make me want to get on with the movie.

Fortunately, that is the last time the record seriously disappointed me, and the “DVD” portion of the song only goes on for a minute, before Bridgers launches into “Garden Song,” lilting her way into your heart with her dreamy head voice. Some breath singers let that sound become an affectation, but Bridgers vocals have an easy power and clear enunciation, even as her ethereal delivery makes you certain elves are nearby.

After the relatively sleepy beginning, Bridgers launces into “Kyoto”. With its galloping tempo and wistful, “I’m spinning pixie-like around lamp posts” melody it makes you feel energized and thoughtful at the same time. It is almost meditative the way she can take all those layers of sound, and then plot your course through it so you never lose touch with the story she weaves. The song was destined to be a hit and, for once, radio America got it right. Well, it broke the Top 40 anyway, which for thoughtful indie music is a win.

I have a lot of favourites on this record, but “Halloween” is particularly beautiful. I’ve always loved the effect Halloween has on people, and its ability to make us feel safer in our truth when protected by the psychological armour of costume. Or in the context of the song:

“But I count on you to tell me the truth
When you’ve been drinking
And you’re wearing a mask.”

The song could be the contemplation of a crime, or just a couple that have had too many, but determined to dance the night away in honour of the titular holiday. Maybe something else besides. All I know is it evokes a sense of sad but celebratory excess.

While all the songs have the same atmospheric alternative pop quality, Bridgers shows subtle range and artistry dressing that sound up in different styles. “Graceland Too” could be an alt-country classic with different production decisions. The violin and banjo featuring prominently would be a giveaway regardless, along with lyrics like:

“She picks a direction, it’s 90 in Memphis
Turns up the music so thoughts don’t intrude
Predictably winds up thinking of Elvis
And wonders if he believed songs could come true.”

Here Bridgers has managed to write a song about someone thinking about country music, while thinking about something else, all the while writing a song that is country music, while also being something else. I’d say it’s clever, but that would imply it wasn’t also beautiful, and the truth is, it is both.

Speaking of that violin, it is played brilliantly by none other than Sara Watkins (Watkins Family Hour). The record also features guest vocals from Lucy Dacus, Conor Oberst and a host of other musicians I generally love, all of whom serve the song first.

And before I conclude, I would be remiss to not point out just how awesome the CD booklet is. Not only does it contain all the lyrics (I encourage you to follow along for maximum enjoyment) but also a series of black and white drawings by artist Chris Riddell that are both whimsical and provocative. Thank you, Phoebe Bridgers, in the midst of this digital-only wasteland, for still making the physical medium a treasure to buy and won.

I ranked Bridgers’ first album my #4 record for 2017, and I put 2019’s Better Oblivion Community Center at #2. I put “Punisher” in at #6 for 2020 as Phoebe Bridgers once again hits one out of the park.

Best tracks: Kyoto, Punisher, Halloween, Chinese Satellite, ICU, Graceland Too

CD Odyssey Disc 1518: Alanis Morissette

I’ve mostly broken my bad habit of buying albums for purely historical interest or completionism. Mostly.

Disc 1518 is….  Alanis

Artist: Alanis Morrisette

Year of Release: 1991

What’s up with the Cover? Alanis’ Giant Head. It looks like she’s holding her head up with one arm or maybe she’s voguing, as was the fashion at the time.

How I Came To Know It: I knew a single off this album from seeing the videos on MuchMusic but never considered buying the record. However, last month local record store Lyle’s was going out of business and had a 50% off sale. This record is hard to find, and I decided to buy it on a whim for…purely historical interest.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Alanis Morrisette albums. Of the two, this one is a distant second.

Ratings: 1 star

Let’s not mince words; this is not a good record. And while honour compels me to explain just why I think this, I do not plan to be excessively cruel on this review. Instead, I’ll start by noting that Alanis Morrisette was 16 years old when she recorded it. When I was 16 my biggest claim to fame was winning a high school trophy for best drama student. While I was doing that, Alanis was winning a Juno and selling 100,000+ copies of her debut record. While I don’t usually go in for biographical context, I think that bears saying.

OK, back to the ‘honour compels me’ part of the experience. This record is painful on multiple fronts. Let’s start with this genre, which I think is late eighties/early nineties dance pop. This form of music doesn’t lend itself to excellence to begin with, and here I found it unfavourably reminiscent of bad Paula Abdul (i.e. all of it) or most backing tracks played at fashion shows. Put simply, this is not my jam.

For one thing, the production of this era is atrocious, and this album is a poster child for the problems typical of the age. The drum machine is artificial, but not in that vibrant and urgent way that New Wave manages. It just feels cheap, and emotionless, like it was produced on a Casio in someone’s basement. And like an old dog won’t hunt, the thin bass won’t thump. The whole thing feels tinny.

There are some passable melodies buried in here, but they are buried deep. It is too bad because just going full pop would’ve helped, but with all the excess dance-track stuff going on, everything gets lost in a jumble. There are horns, strange synth sounds and on “Walk Away” a sample of some guy saying, “we gonna do a song that you never heard before.” After my first listen, I kept desperately hoping it would be true.

Alanis’ vocals are good although – again – unfortunately submerged in the pea soup of an over-taxed mixing board. Her vibrato delivery that would be so compelling a few years later on “Jagged Little Pill” is here, and it maddens me, because I love that vibrato, and this record gives it short shrift. Her ability to sing heartfelt emotional content is one of her strengths as an artist, but the artificiality of this record never gives her a chance.

There is one song (“On My Own”) where the Soulless Record Execs let her get ‘natural’ but a lot of that track is her straining to sing in a smooth pop style that does her no favours. It feels like they are trying to take the dynamic brilliance of her vocals and shove it into a square hole. It just doesn’t fit. Let Alanis be Alanis, SREs!

Lyrically, I never expect a lot from dance music, but as modern bands like Confidence Man demonstrate, you can have clever lyrics without giving away anything on the “danceable” front. I don’t mind that a lot of these songs are from the perspective of a teenage girl; that’s who Alanis is at this point. I do object to strained rhymes and imagery that feels jumbled together to serve the rhyme.

This includes the hit single “Never Too Hot” which is an undeniable earworm, but just what…

“Always too hot, never too cold
You make your best shot too hot to hold
Never too young, never too old
You gotta go for gold”

…is all about, I have no idea. I’m going to go out on a limb and say “not every much”. That said, when this song came on at the club back in 1991 there is a good chance I got up and danced to it. It is cheesy as hell, but it is danceable, and decades later if you quote a line from that chorus at people, they’ll quote the next line back at you. This damned dance song may be vacuous but it gets in your head and stays there, which is the main mission of most dance music.

So kudos for that, Ms. Morissette, but you’re still just getting the one star. That and the Juno.

Best tracks: Feel Your Love, Never Too Hot

CD Odyssey Disc 1517: Lyle Lovett

Today is Remembrance Day, and after I write this review I’ll be heading down to the cenotaph to pay my respects to Canada’s veterans and war dead. For someone like me, who has never experienced war first-hand, the horrors our veterans faced to preserve our country is unfathomable. I read a lot of military history, however, which if I am fortunate will be the closest I, or my loved ones, will ever have to come to a battlefield.

I recommend to you John Keegan’s “The Face of Battle” and “The Price of Admiralty”. These books describe battles across many centuries both from an organizational and strategic overview, but also from the gritty perspectives of what it would have been like for those individual soldiers in the thick of it. These books are harrowing accounts of just what people endure so that we can sleep safe and sound in our soft beds each night.

Disc 1517 is….  Lyle Lovett and His Large Band

Artist: Lyle Lovett

Year of Release: 1989

What’s up with the Cover? In the days before digital cameras sometimes your best picture from the party was also a bit blurry.

How I Came To Know It: “Here I Am” was the first Lyle Lovett song I knew as I was getting into his music. It was on this record, making purchasing it an easy decision.

How It Stacks Up: I have 11 Lyle Lovett albums and put this one in at #8. That bumps a few earlier decisions, but we’ll catch up on all that when I’ve reviewed them all (three to go). For now, if you see anything #8 or lower in a previous review, mentally bump it down one spot. I could have put “…and His Large Band” as high as #6, but let’s keep the depth chart disruption to a minimum, shall we?

Ratings: 3 stars

“…and His Large Band” represents a departure for Lyle, as he blended his blues/country croon with a big band sound for the first time. Lyle has kept elements from this new sound through the rest of his career, including a second big-band record almost twenty years later (2007’s “It’s Not Big, It’s Large” reviewed back at Disc 1331). However, 1989 was his first foray and the results are…mixed.

At this point I should note that “…and His Large Band” was a critical darling and even won a Grammy. Long-time readers may know the disdain I hold for the Grammys (seriously, put the Steely Dan records down Grammy voters) but I do recognize why critics liked this record.

First of all, the musicianship is tight as hell. Throughout his career, Lyle has shown a preternatural talent for finding the best of the best and he’s done it again here. Further, the band is as ‘large’ as advertised, and with so many more instruments there is even more pressure on everyone to be tight. I listened multiple times and didn’t hear a single note missed. More importantly, the feel of the record has the alchemy great records do, with everyone playing their individual best, while never bumping the elbow of their fellows.

This is only Lyle’s third record, and his vocals benefit from the combination of youth, and increased production values. Lyle is a natural crooner and is able to maintain personality and emotion throughout his range where a lot of lesser crooners just sound like they’re doing vocal gymnastics to prove they can.

There are plenty of good examples of this, but I was drawn to his cover of Tammy Wynette’s “Stand By Your Man.” The song’s natural plaintive quality is made for Lyle’s delivery. It has always been thematically complicated, given its dubious suggestion that all men are worth standing by, where some are plainly douchebags not worthy of the sentiment. Having Lyle sing it adds an additional twist – is this the man in question, appealing to some kind of external authority that his woman not leave him, or just a romantic notion sung into the ether of a world less complicated than the real one? It isn’t clear, and Lyle sings it so straight-up as to give you no clues.

In some respects, it is Lyle’s complicated yet simultaneously idealized vision of love. This is a theme that threads through all his work. On this record we have songs like “I Married Her Because She Looks Like You” where the singer extolls all the virtues of his wife that his ex did not possess, but as the title suggests, he doth protest much too much.

Lovett’s wry humour is on display as well, with the (relatively) famous “Here I Am” which has one of the finest mixtures of comparison logic and poetry I’ve heard with:

“If Ford is to Chevrolet
What Dodge is to Chrysler
What Corn Flakes are to Post Toasties
What the clear blue sky is to the deep blue sea
What Hank Williams is to Neil Armstrong
Can you doubt we were made for each other”

If it seems like gibberish, read it again, because it is sneaky brilliance merely disguised as random ravings.

Where the album lost me was on the jazzier elements. The record opens with “The Blues Walk” which I can assure you is not a Blues Walk, but very much a jazz walk, which is not a walk I tend to enjoy. Starting a record in such a way might have been new and exciting for Lyle, but it was annoying for me. Later on “I Know You Know” has a lounge singer quality that was supposed to put me in a slow and sexy sway, but just had me nodding off around the time the saxophone kicks in.

This is my second review in a row where, due to a lack of free time, I ended up listening to much longer than I would have wished. The previous time (Dry Cleaning’s “New Long Leg”) each listen became progressively more annoying. This time, I liked the record more on each new listen, which is always a good sign.

Best tracks: Here I Am, Stand By Your Man, If You Were to Wake Up

CD Odyssey Disc 1516: Dry Cleaning

A few weeks before I reviewed this next album my friend Randall texted to ask me if I’d heard it (at that time I’d bought it and given it a single listen). He texted back later that same evening to say he’d been listening to it a bit more and he’d decided he didn’t like it after all. I assumed at the time he was crazy, but as it happens, he was absolutely right.

Disc 1516 is….  New Long Leg

Artist: Dry Cleaning

Year of Release: 2021

What’s up with the Cover? Up close, this looks to be nothing more than “look how long my shadow looks in the late afternoon sun.” But no, Dry Cleaning has included two additional photos – maybe so we could contemplate if those would have made better covers? The top photo is a close up of some kind of machinery smashing concrete. The bottom photo is a wide shot featuring a backhoe digging in a deep pit.

Would either of these covers have been better than the shadow picture? No. Was it worth including them for some other reason? No. All this cover proves is that when you are in a hole, you should stop digging.

How I Came To Know It: I read two reviews of this album, one on Paste Magazine (8.2/10) and one on Pitchfork (8.6/10). Both these reviews were much too effusive in their praise but as we will see, initially misjudging this record is easy to do.

How It Stacks Up: This is my only Dry Cleaning album (they have a couple EPs, but I don’t have them) so it can’t stack up.

Ratings: 2 stars

“New Long Leg” is the musical equivalent of seeing an interesting looking person at a party that you don’t know. This person is sitting alone on the couch, and there is something weirdly wonderful about them. Maybe they’re wearing an incredibly large belt buckle or staring at the host’s art a bit too closely. Maybe they’re drinking a Zima in a casual way that suggests they have no idea it’s been extinct for years.

You go up to this stranger (since no one else seems to be doing that) and they engage you with a bit of dashing repartee. They appear to have a quick wit they’re easy on the eyes as well (if we’re being honest, this is another reason you braved the stranger-danger in the first place). The problem is that after 10 minutes of conversation you realize those two or three witty rejoinders are the sum total of their depth, and while they are indeed weird, they are weird in a very boring way. You spend the next 30 minutes (if you’re lucky) trying to extricate yourself from the conversation, until some other poor fool approaches who doesn’t know them and you slip away and back to your friends.

Not unlike Paste, Pitchfork and my friend Randall, I was initially smitten with this record. It features groovy basslines, eighties style guitar riffs and the magnetic deadpan spoken word delivery of singer Florence Shaw. The combination is a post-punk potpourri of sound you don’t always hear together, and your ear enjoys the novelty of it all.

The opening track (and single) is “Scratchcard Lanyard.” It has a quirky electronic drum beat and a delightful bass riff, and a churning groove that makes you think, “this is good, and I would like a lot more of it!” The record then proceeds to give you lesser versions of the same formula, and for a while you like that as well. It is all just so new!

On repeat listens, however, this novelty quickly wears off. Shaw’s vocals are hypnotic, her English accent is delightfully noticeable, and she just generally sounds too cool for school. However, spoken word poetry has to be more than a delightful drone; it needs to have something to say. At the very least, it needs some kind of continuity of imagery. With Dry Cleaning, things that seem deep and evocative initially quickly reveal themselves as idle stream of consciousness.

As for the riffs, like I said they are solid. No complaints. But over time you realize they are never going to advance. They’re just going to cycle about pointlessly. It’s the kind of music is pleasant enough to do housework, but that never develops into anything. It just hums, gurgles and circles around like a washing machine.

For some these irritants might be a feature rather than a bug. However, since my busy week trapped me with the record for multiple listens, I found them progressively more annoying. Even the lyrics, which initially felt whimsical, began to grate. There is a bit of “stoner music for dummies” going on here, like that party guest is also high and under the mistaken impression they are saying something profound.

As for the critical acclaim, I get it. Like professional music critics, I hear a lot of new music in a year, and when you hear something like “New Long Leg” the newness of the sound is intriguing. The band plays tight, for a debut record they have a clear sense of who they are, and the production has an appealing layering to it. After a while though I wanted it to stop its pointless idle musing, get up off the couch and do something.

Best tracks: Scratchcard Lanyard, New Long Leg