CD Odyssey Disc 1924: The Devil Makes Three

This next album has been in my collection a long time, and yet I’ve never rolled it through my random selection process. Or maybe I did once and mistakenly thought, “I’ve already reviewed that one” and moved on without checking. If that has ever happened, I apologize to whatever Gods of Chaos might take offence at such an uncharacteristic rejection of the arbitrary.

Disc 1924 is…Do Wrong Right

Artist: The Devil Makes Three

Year of Release: 2009

What’s up with the Cover? A drawing of an old man.

Minus context I will assume from this man is adept at ‘doing wrong right’, and he’s been doing it that way for a long time. You could ask for details, but I sense from that settled scowl in his expression that this feller would see the question rising to your lips and slap it away before you uttered it.

Better to just mosey along and save yourself a fat lip.

How I Came To Know It: I don’t remember. It was either a) reviewed in a folk magazine I used to buy occasionally (maybe Penguin Eggs or American Songwriter) or b) from a list of “best obscure folk albums you’ve never heard of” or somesuch. I’m a sucker for a list as much as the next online surfer.

How It Stacks Up: The Devil Makes Three has made quite a few records over the past twenty plus years or so, but this is my only one, so it can’t stack up.

Ratings: 4 stars

A mix of old timey bluegrass, folk, and Dixieland, with a side of sin and damnation – that’s “Do Wrong Right”. This trio does up traditional music with a side of nasty.

The first thing that comes across with these guys is how raw their sound is. It feels like they’ve walked in off the back forty, dirt still under their fingernails and laid down a record for $30, a sandwich and a six pack of beer.

The production is so sparse you’ll think at times it was recorded in mono, but you don’t want it any other way. It gives the whole record a “sitting on the porch” vibe that is perfect for songs about regular folks living regular lives.

You won’t find lead singer and principal songwriter Pete Bernhard belting out an aria at La Scala, but his rusty saw of a vocal style is exactly what you want for this kind of music. Bernhard has the kind of voice that is welcoming enough that you’ll sing along with him when the spirit moves you, which is exactly what his two bandmates (Cooper McBean and Lucia Turino) do on many occasions. The effect is to generate a party atmosphere, even though most of the songs are about being poor, drunk, and maybe even ugly. Everyone’s welcome on this porch, but most of the guests stay too late.

There’s a Devil’s Carnival quality to these songs that give them a lascivious sway that reminded me of Tom Waits or the Bridge City Sinners. All those artists are partial to hard lives and bad choices, and the Devil Makes Three are no exception. The record is rife with songs of booze and poverty. Both themes coming together with self-destructive delight on “Gracefully Facedown” which celebrates such unwelcome but natural partners as bottom-shelf bourbon and blackout drunks.

“For Good Again” revisits what it’s like to be starving artists, couch surfing and trying to get ahead. Devil Makes Three’s old school musical approach reminds you this an occupational hazard of the artist as old as civilization itself, even while throwing in modern takes on sin with lines like:

“You’ll never understand the things my friend Aaron put us through
He had this power point presentation about this girl he wanted to do”

Yes, the album’s title is a recurring theme.

The record ends strong with “Car Wreck,” the story of a man who is born restless, cursed to always leave something good in the hopes of finding something better. One day he leaves the love of his life, but the decision haunts him and years later, drawn by the memory of the one thing he can’t shake, he races home to her. Except he dies in a car wreck on the way. The song is tragic and heart-wrenching and full of bad choices (case in point: he’s so drunk when he crashes that car that “whiskey soaks his bones”. One more bad choice transformed into immortality through the power of song.

Through it all, “Do Wrong Right” maintains a frantic energy, careening from one poor soul to another, and making every cautionary tale a toe-tapper of a time. You wouldn’t want to be these folks, but the Devil Makes Three will make you want to hear their stories.

Best tracks: All Hail, Do Wrong Right, Gracefully Facedown, For Good Again, Help Yourself, Working Man’s Blues, Car Wreck

CD Odyssey Disc 1923: Green Lung

I should be getting ready for a spirited game of Ulti on this fine Saturday morning, but it was cancelled and besides, I am not feeling well. So it is a “housing” day for me, starting with the best of all possible in-house activities – enjoying music.

Disc 1923 is…Woodland Rites

Artist: Green Lung

Year of Release: 2019 (although my copy is a 2025 re-issue)

What’s up with the Cover? Looks like some keen young witches and warlocks have headed out into the woods for some dancing and revelry with Satan and some demons. The woods ringing this glade are filled to the brim with forest critters both mundane and magical. Search carefully and find them all! My favourite of these is the owl-demon playing drums in the top left, but the regular owl beside him is also lovely.

The witches and warlocks are no doubt wondering, “will we have sexual congress with the devil?” and judging by the meaningful glance being exchanged between the couple in the bottom left of the dance circle, I am going to say, “signs point to yes”.

What they are probably not wondering is, “at the end of the night will some of us be eviscerated, murdered, and left to feed the creatures of the forest?” Based on those skulls piled up in the lower right corner I’m going to once again say “signs point to yes”.

How I Came To Know It: I got into Green Lung through the release of their third album, 2023’s “This Heathen Land,” and found “Woodland Rites” by plunging into their back catalogue. I’m like a pig chasing truffles once I’ve got the scent of a new band.

How It Stacks Up: I have three Green Lung LPs. They’re due to release one later this year but for now, that’s all of them. They are all great, and “Woodland Rites” is in a dead heat for #1 with the aforementioned “This Heathen Land”. I’m going to side ever so slightly with my first love and put “Woodland Rites” in at #2.

Ratings: 4 stars but almost 5

Green Lung are a riff-driven stoner metal band from England who like to write songs about the devil. A lot. I’m not sure if they like to sing about the devil more than say, Ghost, but they’re in the conversation. Papa V Perpetua be warned – there’s a new antichrist in town.

Well, actually, that new antichrist is not in town, he’s in the forest. As you might expect from an album named “Woodland Rites,” this record is heavily themed to the whole ‘witches cavort in the woods with Satan’ trope. There’s also crossover with “ancient forest demon” vibes that lean into a more non-denominational evil.

OK, so that’s the theme established, but how is the music? Amazing, that’s how. “Woodland Rites” is eight tracks of furious guitar crunching glory. You will have thrown your neck out from moshing by the end side one. Every one of these riffs has a timelessness to it that makes it feel like it could have been on Black Sabbath’s first record or released yesterday. This is horns up, hair down, controlled aggression from start to finish.

Don’t mistake “controlled aggression” for being tame. This is the kind of controlled aggression akin to shaking a can of beer for forty minutes. Pressure rising and rising with explosive energy with nowhere to go, just quivering and ready to go off at any moment.

Vocalist Tom Templar sings in a high head voice with an otherworldly quaver in his tone. It is a bit Ozzy and a bit Rev. Maynard with a “far from the mic” kind of echo to it. His phrasing perfectly matches the mid-tempo thump of the song structures, each word deliberate and loaded with fell and sorcerous intent.

And what does Mr. Templar have to say? As noted above, the record is heavily themed to covens and devil worship. The title track (and the best riff on a record with a lot of great riffs) is about just that. Set on the pagan festival night of Walpurgis, our story opens early with someone approaching an event likely best left alone:

“At the gloaming on Walpurgis night
In the forest you saw our fires alight
The trees were talking, they whispered your name
Darkness was falling as you walked toward the flames”

From here, as you might expect, things get serious. The next track, “Let the Devil In” is about that fell invitation in every tale of this type you’ve likely read or heard around a campfire. The melody (and the best riff on the record…wait, did I already pick one? Damn it…) is triumphant and enticing just like the dark invitation the song describes. Of course, this being Green Lung, poor choices are made and things continue to go south.

At this point I should note that this is all just pretend. A Green Lung record is best enjoyed like a horror movie – delightfully scary and transgressive, but explored from the safety of literary and artistic devices. Of course, if you don’t like the thrill of a horror movie, or you find the very notion of creepy satanic woodland rituals abhorrent (a perfectly understandable response) then this record is not for you. You’ve been warned.

On their later records, Green Lung has explored a broader range of sound and song structures, making those records a bit more dynamic to listen to. I like the evolution of their sound, but while “Woodland Rites” is more of a “singular sound” kind of record it is done so exceptionally well you are happy with forty-two minutes of more of the same.

In an era where a lot of modern metal bands are exploring the genre’s early origins, you can get some very derivative outcomes, but not so here. “Woodland Rites” is a love letter to earlier forms, yes, but more like a flower that has fully bloomed than a copy.

If you’re OK with being a little horrified – or maybe excited by the danger of it all - and you like classic riffs played with exceptional skill, then this record will not disappoint. If songs that “let the devil in” (even for-pretend) make you nervous, best move along and leave that flickering light in the forest for those more brave or foolish.

Best tracks: Woodland Rites, Let the Devil In, The Ritual Tree, Templar Dawn, Into the Wild

CD Odyssey Disc 1922: Gwen Stefani

This next record is a thrift store special. Sometimes that works out and sometimes it don’t but it usually doesn’t cost you much to find out.

Disc 1922 is…Love.Angel.Music.Baby

Artist: Gwen Stefani

Year of Release: 2004

What’s up with the Cover? Gwen Stefani’s so hot she’s melting that throne.

As for this record – is it hot or a hot mess? To know the answer to that you’re going to have to do more than look at the cover, my friends.

How I Came To Know It: This record was culturally unavoidable in the day and was loaded with monster hits. As for actually buying it, that never crossed my mind until last year when I saw it in a thrift store for the low cost of three dollars. Sign me up for that bargain.

How It Stacks Up: This is my only Gwen Stefani album. I also have a single No Doubt record (reviewed way back at Disc 1223). These two albums came out one after the other, but while they both feature Stefani, they’re not by the same band, so there’ll be no stacking up.

Ratings: 2 stars

I find Dance Pop a dangerous genre to court. It lives dangerously in the Land of the Single, where radio play is king, club play is queen, and cohesive records are often an afterthought. Yes, you can find all-round great records in the genre like “Electra Heart” (Disc 1639) and “The Fame Monster” (Disc 747) but you are much more likely to get a loss-leader experience with a couple of killer club bangers at the front end, and a whole lot of filler thereafter.

For this reason, I tend to responsibly engage one full listen before taking this style of music home to meet the wife, but for the low price of $3 I figured it was worth it just for the singles.

Let’s start there, since the record (wisely) does so. While this record’s early oughts dance vibe is very of its time, that doesn’t make “What You Waiting For?” even remotely less of a full-blown banger. This is a song for blowing out your hair, then blowing out your wallet at a club and then blowing kisses out of the cab to strangers on the way home.

What’s this song actually about? Reader, I don’t care terribly. It is a vibe and that vibe is get out there and live a little. Maybe even a little of Stefani pumping herself up for going solo (sorry, the English Literature degree in me made me pay some attention to even these lyrics).

Then we get “Rich Girl” which I wanted to hate, since the song’s main hook is straight up stolen from Fiddler on the Roof’s “If I Were a Rich Man.” Only, I couldn’t. It’s a pretty great hook, and Stefani dresses it up nicely. Also the bridge where hip hopper Eve drops a bar or two of dope raps is a lot of fun. Like most great pop songs, it has a bunch of cool sounds, strung together in a way that makes you like it on the first listen, and then like it even more in the anticipation the third or fourth listen. Is Stefani tricking us here with some empty bubble gum? Reader, she is, but you won’t mind. Shut up and dance.

And then, rounding out our trilogy of underpriced and gaudily packaged goods at the front of the store we get… “Hollaback Girl” – another club banger, built to chant along with friends, while pointing with two fingers on the downbeat and showing off your sexiest sneer. Stefani goes to the deepest well in vacuous but fun pop music with hand claps and foot stomps. Visceral and rhythmic? Sign me up.

But even three songs in, the cracks are starting to show. “Hollaback Girl” opens with empty lyrics that are fun but things start feeling forced. Is this song just playing off Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust”? No – actually you’ll find references to other Queen songs in there as well (I felt a distinctive Highlander vibe, but that’s just me).

I should like it just for that, and I do, but following so directly after our fiddler-adjacency I started to feel a little…empty. Like I’d found a stash of delicious candy and overindulged, and now my mouth felt dry from the sugar dust and my stomach hurt.

After one more hit that I just didn’t like to pad the multi-platinum landing zone (“Cool”) it was a steep cliff to…filler town.

The rest of this record is just a bunch of dance beats strung together with all the artistry of Emily Gilmore on a shopping spree – ruthlessly efficient but lacking all joy.

Sure, Stefani tries on a lot of different versions of vacuous beats but they all just bounce around restlessly, like background beats that clear a dance floor while the DJ takes a bathroom break. A good time to get a drink, or more likely to wish you had left earlier when the buses were still running.

These songs go on without respite or purpose. At each turn you’ll realize Stefani is “paying homage’ to a dance style of yesteryear, but she doesn’t add anything to the experience. The bright and brilliant star of those first three tracks are like a sparkler. Fun at first, and good to move around with, but then later just a burned-out memory that melts the garbage bag when you try to throw it away.

I’m not mad at Stefani. If anything I regret all this late-review shade I’m throwing, which virtually guarantees I will not get invited to the amazing parties I imagine she throws on a regular basis (album aside – Stefani is cool).

But I gotta keep it real, and this record is fast food – good at first, but not good for you. I’m glad I got it on a discount and will be providing the same opportunity to someone else very soon.

Best tracks: What You Waiting For?, Rich Girl, Hollaback Girl

CD Odyssey Disc 1921: Benjamin Tod

I buy a lot of music by a lot of artists, but every now and then something new comes along that I fall for at another level. That’s how it is with this next artist.

Disc 1921 is…I Will Rise

Artist: Benjamin Tod

Year of Release: 2017

What’s up with the Cover? Benjamin Tod walks on the wrong side of the tracks, or at least the wrong side of that fence with a sign that reads, “Keep Out of Rail Yard – No Admittance”.

How I Came To Know It: I discovered Benjamin Tod in 2024 through his album “Shooting Star” (reviewed back at Disc 1789) and I’ve been digging backward through his discography ever since.

How It Stacks Up: I have five Benjamin Tod albums (including his latest, bought earlier today). “I Will Rise” comes in right in the middle at #3.

Ratings: 4 stars

Authenticity is a rare gift, and never more important than in folk and country music. On his first solo album away from the Lost Dog Street Band, singer-songwriter Benjamin Tod is as authentic as it comes.

“I Will Rise” is ten songs that wring every drop of heartache, regret, and anguish of out Tod’s hard-lived experience. While you listen you will both feel connected viscerally to these stories, and at the same time unworthy of them. Yes in one way we live through Tod’s artistry but in another it is only a shadowy reflection on the cave wall of the true event.

Take “Using Again”, where Tod describes falling off the wagon and the miserable self-loathing that emerges from it. Opening with:

“I'm living low down and I am using again
I'm hating my name cause I am cursed like my kin
And if I should see you before I am condemned
I hope you're deceived by the webs that I spin

“I wish I was who I appear
'Cause I despise the man in the mirror”

The song offers no respite from beginning to end, its final chorus a recognition that death approaches, and hell soon thereafter – its final notes an unresolved melody offering no surcease.

Without Tod’s authentic delivery songs like “Using Again” wouldn’t work, but his tortured warble that peals out of Tod like he’s been cursed by the gods to be chained to a rock and forced to shout his doubts and sins into the wind.

The arrangements could not be simpler, with nothing but Tod’s exceptional vocals and a single steel-stringed guitar, played with a heavy pick that twangs and twists through the song’s chord progression. Tod plays like he sings, with a deliberate and profound honesty.

On “I Will Never Be Around” Tod doubles down on hopeless, noting that he “would pick a shallow grave over an empty cell”. Yeesh, and the way he sings it makes you feel like either or both outcomes are imminent. Great stuff, but not exactly Gilmore Girls.

On a record like this, you take your joy where you can find it. There are plenty of songs where Tod’s romantic side comes out. Yes, even here he often comes at his subject matter from a dark place, (“Hungry For You Blues”, “Busted Love” and the classic road-trip argument, “Gasoline”) but at least we find an opportunity to explore the parts of our heart that hurt in a good way.

The record’s final track, “I Will Rise” is an anthem to the downtrodden, and while continuing to pull no punches, the record’s final salvo is one of hope and endurance. Here, Tod brings it all together. He sings of lost love and heartache, of hands shaking from alcohol withdrawal and the weariness of burning the candle at both ends; I expect a nod to the “all-in” approach to his songwriting, which leaves no stone in his troubled soul unturned.

And yet, at each admission of struggle, or depression, almost every other line is the refrain of “but I will rise.” This song is just as dark as any on the record, but we are left with a mantra of stubborn resilience, a call to rise above challenges, no matter how profound. If – like me – you like your messages of hope to be unvarnished and maybe even a little negatively motivated, then this song – and this album – are for you.

Best tracks: Using Again, Out of Babylon, Who I Am Ain’t Who I’ve Been, I Will Never Be Around, I Will Rise

CD Odyssey Disc 1920: Zeal & Ardor

A very long day ends with the review of a very odd record…

Disc 1920 is…Greif

Artist: Zeal & Ardor

Year of Release: 2024

What’s up with the Cover? Behold the legendary Vogel Gryff itself, in all its badassery!

If you don’t know what the Vogel Gryff is, then I encourage you to look it up, where you will also learn about the Wild Maa and the Leu and many other fascinating facts besides.

Or maybe you would prefer to just live in a state of bewilderment over just what Zeal & Ardor are going on about – which would be a perfectly appropriate way to explore this record.

How I Came To Know It: I loved Zeal & Ardor’s 2018 album “Stranger Fruit” and since then I check in on them when they release something new. They don’t always grab me, but for whatever reason “Greif” was able to once again catch my attention.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Zeal & Ardor records and this a distance second in the rankings.

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

Where does something go from strangely compelling to merely strange? It’s a dangerous line that is as jagged as a lightning bolt, and on “Greif” Zeal & Ardor are determined to ride it.

Categorizing Zeal & Ardor is an impossible task. They mix chants, prog, metal and every other damned thing that is remotely jarring into a chunky staccato soup of sound. It’s some of the most fearless music you’ll hear and on “Greif” it challenged me from the very beginning.

The beginning here starts before you hear a single note, with the decision to apparently misspell the album title. Turns out it wasn’t misspelled at all, but (after much internet searching) references a Swiss word for “griffin” and a fascinating festival in the town of Basel. So there you go – not a single note in and already searching the interweb for meaning, are we?

Slightly irritated at knowing none of this on my own, I nevertheless gamely sallied forth to listen to the multitude of sounds, soundscapes and song structures that awaited me on “Greif”.

My journey would encounter Soundgarden like riffs, proggy drum-driven metal that would make Tool proud, and songs that landed somewhere between church hymn and what could be the movie soundtrack for a futuristic take on the Fall of the House of Usher. If you think Zeal & Ardor are embracing their freak flag on “Stranger Fruit” then “Greif” is them flying that flag on Jupiter.

All of which initially led me to this place where I was undecided about the most key consideration – do I like it? Would I recommend it to you, dear reader, with my reputation on the line?

From a purely creative perspective, the critic in me is impressed. This stuff is quite the admixture of styles, patched together like Frankenstein’s monster – deliberate and grotesque. Zeal & Ardor are playing with sound, but like a mad scientist, they want you to see them at their work, and to be appreciated for the mad genius of the result.

The music lover in me had nothing to prove other than to sit back and decide if I was having a good time. Some of this record led me to the negative. It was work to sort through, and the deliberately jarring approach to the songs is consistently up in your grill. Even when I was digging it (which was often) I couldn’t help but feel I was being messed with.

But then other times, I was giddy with the feeling of discovery. Where would this go next? Fortunately, the songs go often enough to melodic structures that draw you in. Sure it’s a “draw you in” of early Red Hot Chili Peppers crossed with Tool, crossed with the Alan Parson's Project, but I like all those bands.

In the end, the record won me over. The playing is tight, the vocals by lead singer and mad creator Manuel Gagneux are rich in tone and highly adaptive (they have to be). And while Zeal & Ardor may insist on mixing a dozen styles and approaches to not just music, but to sound generally, they curate those choices with care. Yes, it is clever, but clever with purpose. The result will have you moshing or tapping your toes – just don’t try to predict when it will happen; just be ready to lean in when it comes.

At no point does this record give you a moment to consider and digest what has just happened. You have to surrender yourself to it and just enjoy whatever whim the ole Z&A brigade are whipping up for these few bars.

I think it would be very easy to hate this record, but like Frankenstein’s Monster, you should reject that instinct. This album is a monster, but it is a monster with a very large musical vocabulary, and the soul of a poet. You just have to close your eyes and listen without judgment, and you’ll find love in your heart for what you hear.

Best tracks: Nope. Not gonna do that this time. It is all one curious mix of “what now?” and picking out individual tracks just doesn’t feel right.

CD Odyssey Disc 1919: Annahstasia

Today was my first day playing Ultimate this year and, well, I’m not as young as I used to be, but it was fun. Music is also fun so having recovered physically (following a two-hour nap) I’m ready to recover spiritually with one of the best records of 2025.

Disc 1919 is…Tether

Artist: Annahstasia

Year of Release: 2025

What’s up with the Cover? Annahstasia channels early Prince with this sultry and shirtless situation.

How I Came To Know It: The boring way – I read a review, checked it out and liked it.

How It Stacks Up: This is Annahstasia’s first and so far only LP and (not coincidentally) the only one I have. All of which is to say that there will be no stacking up.

Ratings: 4 stars

Some folk music is full of jump and jangle and some folk music is about deep thoughts and deeper feelings. Annahstasia’s “Tether” is the second variety, so if you decide to dive into the submerged caverns of her mind, be warned that you’ll likely emerge contemplative and maybe even a little sad.

If I’m going to be subjected to a wallow, I like it to be a good one and “Tether” is a worthy journey. Annahstasia writes with a simple and very subtle melodic style, saturated with rounded notes and layers of sound that make you feel like you’re floating underwater.

Against this backdrop her vocals emerge, breaking the surface tension of the mix with a layered and vibrant sound.

Her voice is low and breathy but full of power, leaving you to wonder how she doesn’t run out of oomph halfway through the bar (she never does). The delivery is husky and full of emotion that is overwrought, but in a well-planned and executed way. These songs could easily turn to maudlin, but because of the strength of her voice that never happens.

I am a big fan of Grace Cummings, and Annahstasia has a similar mix of otherworldly keen and ghostly whisper. In place of the tortured warble that Cummings employs, Annahstasia opts for a more direct lounge quality. She doesn’t equal Cummings’ brilliance, but that is a very high mountain to climb, with no shame in coming second.

The record opens with “Be Kind” which is indicative of the record. It is filled with heavily emotional moments, often pleading with both lover and listener for openness, understanding and above all, kindness.

From here we just dive lower. Light touches of piano, string and the brush-strum of guitar all serve to sink you deeper into the headspace where Annahstasia is waiting for you.

There are places where the musical choices edged a bit too close to jazz flourishes for my tastes, but they always pull away at just the right time. It is more of a deliberate brush with one or two arcane and unexpected notes that pinch you enough to bring you out of deep reverie, but not so hard to wake you from the spell.

On “Overflow” Annahstasia forgoes her whisper fur a full-throated vocal show-off moment. Consider me impressed as her tone warbles and bellows its way through the album’s most triumphant composition.

Even though “Overflow” is a celebration of refilling our cup, Annahstasia can’t resist a twist of saturated poetry that pushes you to a place of uncertainty. Case in point, these fine lines:

“Everybody wants to know
The child prodigy
But who's saving space
For the goldfish in her cage?”

She loses me a bit after this with the spoken word piece “All Is. Will Be. As It Was.” This bit has good poetry and a recurring use of alliteration that would make a Viking skald proud, but the work would be better without the guitar and piano flourishes that take it from basement beat poet joy and into lounge.

Fortunately, things immediately recover with the record’s best song, “Silk and Velvet”. Starting with “lately I’ve been tired/with all this running around” you sigh in relief and welcome the coming sink back into Annahstasia’s unique blend of the wise and the unsettled. Best line, the recurring:

“Maybe I'm an analyst, an antisocial bitch
Who sells her dreams for money
To buy hеr silk and velvet”

I love when a great poet won’t let themselves off their own hook, and here Annahstasia explores the very motives that bring her to create. Personally, I think she’s being way too hard on herself. Yes, all that creativity comes with doubt, but rarely was doubt expressed with such grace and beauty as it is on “Tether”. Quite simply, one of 2025’s best records.

Best tracks: Be Kind, Villain, Silk and Velvet, Overflow, Believer

CD Odyssey Disc 1918: Corb Lund

After four days on holiday with my lovely wife visiting friends, shopping and generally having a great time, returning to work today was a bit of an adjustment. Fortunately there is always music, and something to say about it.

Disc 1918 is…Songs My Friends Wrote

Artist: Corb Lund

Year of Release: 2022

What’s up with the Cover? A cartoon depiction of Corb Lund and all the artists he covers on this album.

Usually at this time I make a joke or engage in a whimsical fantasy inspired by the cover art, but here I am just inspired by great friendship and love as depicted here. So no jokes, just that warm glow of looking at all these friends and being reminded of all the great ones I have as well.

How I Came To Know It: I just saw it sitting there in the record store and, recognizing a few of the songs, I became intrigued at how they would sound performed by Corb Lund. Intrigued enough to buy it, in fact.

How It Stacks Up: I have ten other studio albums by Corb Lund, but I have a bit of common law to rate – but not rank – albums where artists do just cover songs. I could break this rule at any time, of course. But not today.

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

Corb Lund is a likeable fellow to begin with, and the idea that he would take time out of the pandemic to record a bunch of songs by people he admires makes this record particularly easy to love. So, as much as the album cover had given me the warm feelies, the album’s premise had me even more predisposed to the amicable.

For those who aren’t familiar with Corb Lund, he’s a Canadian folk/country singer well known for spinning fine tales and free and easy melodies. He isn’t a vocal powerhouse, but he knows how to use his voice (and lyrics) to tell great stories. I was keen to see what he’d be like with someone else’s words and music coming out of him.

Turns out he does a mighty fine job of it indeed, and if you like the light hurt and natural mosey of Lund’s delivery then you’re going to like this experience just fine.

The record starts with a Hayes Carll song (“Highway 87”) one of two Lund does with his occasional collaborator (the other being “Little Rock”). These are both solid renditions, but don’t add a lot to the songs that is different from the originals. Also, I enjoy Hayes Carll’s voice as much as Corb Lund’s, so I didn’t feel like I was getting a new way of seeing a song I already knew.

Similarly, the two Ian Tyson covers were OK, but not a major shift from the Tyson originals. That was four of ten songs that were all solid, but that had me wishing for more.

Thankfully, more was very much to be found in the deeper cuts, starting with the inspired Geoff Berner song, “That’s What Keeps The Rent Down, Baby”. Berner’s song is a wry and socially aware tale of the impacts of a neighbourhood’s less savoury features on property values. Lund’s version has a great swing to it, and his vocals are a level above Berner’s, elevating the song and story alike.

It is a testament to Lund’s vocal talents that every one of these covers will have you swearing he wrote it if you didn’t know better. He’s got an imitable style that draws you in, and while he doesn’t range through multiple octaves, he sings with an effortless and engaging tone that just makes you believe him.

For example, you may prefer the more nasal warble of Fred Eaglesmith’s original for “Spookin’ the Horses” and that’s an honourable choice. I like it too, and extra points to Eaglesmith for writing the song, which is a masterclass in storytelling. For all that, I just found myself loving the earthier, fireside troubadour quality that Corb Lund brings to the song even more. He makes it his own, which is the sign of every great cover ever.

Lund is also naturally funny when he wants to be, which is helpful on the jumpy and very Canadian “Big American Headliner.” The song, written by Mike Plume, captures the dream held by most small Canadian artist at one time or another: to have a hit across the border. It is tongue-in-self-deprecating-cheek with a hint of painful truth, turning the anxiety of “are we ever gonna make it?” into a story of success (limited though it may be) on its own terms.

Just before sitting down to write this review I took a crash course in all of the original songs, which I am sure Corb would’ve wanted. He didn’t make this record to take away from his fellow songwriters – he made it to celebrate them.

I already knew half the songs, but I discovered the other half, and that was a big part of the fun. I didn’t love every song Lund curates here, nor did I find every original artist inspire me to dig deeper, but the journey was great, and there was plenty to recommend, delivered in a way that more often than not showcased the material in its best light.

Best tracks: That’s What Keeps the Rent Down Baby, Blue Wing, Spookin’ The Horses, Big American Headliner

CD Odyssey Disc 1917: The Mountain Goats

This is my fourth straight review released in 2023 or later. An interesting streak but one that is random, not by design.

Disc 1917 is…Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan

Artist: The Mountain Goats

Year of Release: 2025

What’s up with the Cover? A painting of a fishboat and a lot of words. I spent a summer commercial fishing and can confirm that the folks out on the ocean for weeks at a time work damn hard so that the rest of us can enjoy shrimp cocktail or poached salmon at a fancy restaurant.

When I was a kid a shrimp cocktail felt like the height of opulence. Like you’d really arrived if you could sit in a restaurant and eat a bunch of shrimp out of a tall glass. I still think it’s pretty great.

But I digress…

How I Came To Know It: I have been a fan of the Mountain Goats (aka John Darnielle and friends) for many years. So many, I forget how I came to know them. I suspect it was around 2015 with “Beat the Champ” so by no means an original fan.

Anyway, I tend to give Darnielle a chance when he puts something new out, and that’s what happened here.

How It Stacks Up: The Mountain Goats have released 23 studio albums, and I have 14 of them. Of the 14 I have, “Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan” (hereafter “Through This Fire…”) comes in dead last at #14.

Ratings: 2 stars

John Darnielle and the Mountain Goats love a theme album. I also love a theme album, just not “Through This Fire…” This album I do not love. Let’s talk about that.

I have just over half of the Mountain Goats albums, and I’ve seen them live. When I saw them live I realized there were some serious Mountain Goats fans out there the likes of which I could not match. “Sing along with every word” types that followed them town to town. Very cool, but the sort of thing I might do for Blue Oyster Cult or Frank Turner, but not much else.

All of which is to say I love the Mountain Goats, but not unconditionally. Which brings us here.

When an album begins with an overture, you better strap in tight, because it could get very ‘musical theatre’ very quickly. Darnielle loves themes, and on this record he basically writes a very weird very off-beat record that feels a lot like a musical.

With the exception of Les Miserables and maybe Chess, I hate musicals.

The plot of this particular bit of theatre was hard to unravel. The internet has a bunch of theories, but holding true to my “art should be experienced directly” approach, I quickly clicked away before I learned anything useful. On my limited listens (3) it felt like there was this guy on a fish boat and there was an accident and most of the crew drowned. Our hero lived, washed up and was changed by the experience. It gets a bit confusing in the second half but that might have just been me losing interest.

Darnielle has a talent for taking a hyper-specific experience and finding universal truths in it. He’s done this to good effect for wrestling (“Beat the Champ”), action films (“Bleed Out”) and even Dungeons & Dragons (“In League with Dragons”). I’m not sure he lands “fisherman has epiphany” with the same success.

There is some great imagery for sure. Darnielle is a hyper-talented wordsmith, and can generate a lot of emotional gravitas and complexity with just a few words. My favourite on this record is from “Cold at Night”:

“The first thing you learn is how strong you can be if you have to
And the next thing you learn is how cold it can get at night”

Good stuff, and one of the record’s better tracks, despite the presence of Lin- Manuel Miranda on backing vocals, who generally irritates me. Here he’s OK on the loose harmonies, but back to being annoying when he starts doing a delayed echo thing later in the song.  

Darnielle’s voice, which has a high half-spoken quality that is somewhere between pop star and beat poet doesn’t work for everyone, but it works for me, and on “Through This Fire…” it worked again. No complaints there.

One of the better vocal moments lands with “Your Bandage” which has him at his softest lilt, drawing you in and making a tender moment out of someone reapplying someone’s bandage. It feels a bit out of place here, like it was meant for his 2022 album “Bleed Out”, except it was too soft, but I still loved it and it has one of the prettier song structures on the record.

That said, the melodies on this record overall are a bit stagnant for my tastes. Lots of small flairs and adjustments, which I’m sure to a jazz enthusiast would be welcomed for their subtle math. I am not a jazz enthusiast.

As for the arrangements, it is a mix of synth and strings and other what-not, but it mostly serves to feel like it was meant for an off-Broadway production, not a pop album. It is both overwrought and uninteresting at the same time.

Like I said at the start, I’m not a casual fan of the Mountain Goats, nor am I a zealot. Some records I have passed over without ever buying, and others are cherished favourites in my collection. “Through This Fire…” occupies that rare middle ground – a record I thought I liked enough to own, but upon further review, will be parting my company and going to a home of someone who will love it in a way that I do not.

Best tracks: Fishing Boat, Cold at Night, Your Bandage

CD Odyssey Disc 1916: Poppy

Sometimes I like an artist enough to buy everything they put out and sometimes it is a more of a hit-and-miss affair. This next artist is the latter.

Disc 1916 is…Zig

Artist: Poppy

Year of Release: 2023

What’s up with the Cover? If someone was seeking to capture Poppy, they probably shouldn’t have tied a sharp sword in the middle of her bonds. Not only is she going to find it easier to escape, when she inevitably does get out, she’s going to have a sword handy.

It takes that whole “capture the heroine but keep all their stuff conveniently unlocked in the room next door” to another level of ill-advised. I bet before they left her unattended, our villain went ahead and told Poppy all their schemes in full detail as well.

That villain is so getting a well-deserved stabbing.

How I Came To Know It: I first discovered Poppy through her 2020 album “I Disagree”. I tend to give her new releases a chance. As noted in the teaser, sometimes they’re good enough to buy and sometimes not. This one fell on the “good” side of the ledger.

How It Stacks Up: Poppy has seven full-length records, but as I noted in the teaser, they’re not always my cup of tea. I only have three of them, with “Zig” coming in at…#3. Last place or the bronze medal, depending on what kind of day you’re having.

Ratings: 3 stars

A Poppy record is hard to predict. It might be…poppy (sorry), or it might be more rock or even a hint of metal. It might even try a few outfits on for size on the same record. I tend to like Poppy more when she embraces that harder edge, and on “Zig” she just doesn’t do that enough.

This record is heavy on the bass beats and electronica. The kind of thing you could do on a single synthesizer, but only if you were really good at it. This isn’t Casio-in-the-basement fare, although there is that element in there if you listen for it.

Things start off with a bang. On “Church Outfit” we get the Poppy I like best. The electronic beats underpinning the song are distorted and evocative of guitar. It is catchy, danceable and when it fully kicks in, it’s got a bit of the ole headbang in there as well. This soft/hard/soft/hard internal tension is where Poppy does her best work. We’ve got the insistent dance beat, a mix of sugary pop vocals with some angry snarl mixed in. The lesson – lyrically and musically – you can be pretty and dangerous at the same time.

This is followed up with full-on club banger. “Knockoff” is a song about how high fashion is better than the cheap knockoffs. Saying what the song is about might suggest a lot of deep thought going on, and lyrically there isn’t. It’s a clever and catchy pop tune but saying “I like designer stuff” isn’t exactly ocean-level deep.

There are more than a few tunes on here that feel this way – a concept or image only partially explored. A musical idea that’s compelling at first but doesn’t develop into something greater. It is a testament to how effortlessly Poppy generates a catchy beat that these half-finished thoughts are still a good time.

At other times, she resorts to unneeded gimmickry when the song’s bones are plenty good enough to hold the song together (case in point – “devil voice underwater” effects on “What It Becomes”). It is almost like Poppy gets bored with what she’s doing and wants to throw in some other effect or element just for kicks. Sometimes one fewer kick would be preferred.

This self-possessed confidence is sexy and dangerous in equal measure. Maybe a bit unhinged as well, in a sort of ‘Lost Boys hanging off the trestle’ kind of way. She keens away as the train rattles overhead, and you wonder if she’s in mortal danger or just a vampire having you on. On some songs she soars, and on some she falls, but either way you can’t deny she’s exploring the space.

Near the end of the record we get the sexy catwalk flair of “Motorbike.” This song is fashion, funk, and completely over the top. If ever there was a song that needs to be part of a “Lip Sync for Your Life” on RuPaul’s Drag Race, this is it. Pure fun with a dance beat that demands you dance now or leave the club in shame.

Best tracks: Church Outfit, Knockoff, The Attic, Motorbike

CD Odyssey Disc 1915: Courtney Marie Andrews

Another week, another Friday concert. This means we once again have a two-fer, featuring an album review and a concert review.

Disc 1915 is…Valentine

Artist: Courtney Marie Andrews

Year of Release: 2026

What’s up with the Cover? For the second time in as many reviews (Disc 1903) we encounter Courtney Marie Andrews enduring some sort of mildly disagreeable weather with the sun setting.

Here, on a windswept coastline, a determined but apprehensive Courtney Marie Andrews reaches back and invites a shadowy figure to join her, not realizing that should that shadow walk into the light with her he will, by his very nature, cease to be.

Or is it just another photo shoot where they ran out of light and if so, maybe for the next record everyone should just get started a little earlier. If we keep this up, Courtney is going to catch the ague.

How I Came To Know It: I have been a fan of Andrews since 2016, so this was just me buying her latest release.

How It Stacks Up: Having picked up an early release at the live show last night, I now have seven Courtney Marie Andrews albums. “Valentine” comes in at #6.

Ratings: 3 stars

There’s a thing that happens to most contemporary folk artists at some point if they stick around long enough – they start going for fancier production. This is generally not a welcome development in the CD Odyssey experience, but it can be overcome by great vocals and songs with good bones. “Valentine” is a good example of this eternal struggle of tradition and technology.

Andrews began her “hmmm…what is all this equipment?” phase in earnest on 2022’s “Loose Future”. Four years later with “Valentine” she still has a fair share of playing about with mellotron and synthesizer but is doing a better job of integrating it. 

And as I noted in the lede, if you’ve got great vocals and a solid melody all is forgiven. The record lands its first serious blow to the heart at Track 3 with “Cons and Clowns”.

Starting with an understated but steadily growing guitar strum, the song opens with:

“Don't make yourself small, baby, take up space
I always wanna hear what you have to say”

And then Andrews does exactly that, wasting no time straight from the ‘A’ section into the chorus and showcasing her signature trill. No one can trill the high notes like Andrews: so controlled, so sweet and thoroughly steeped in a tone so spiritually evocative it borders on necromancy.

All this comes after a couple of songs that are good but not great and had me preparing to “meh” all over the record. With “Cons and Clowns” I threw that two-star bias away realized I might just have a legitimately good record on my hands. Not great, but good. (A shout out at this point to my friend Tom who said as much to me a month ago, at a time when he had clearly listened more closely than me).

There are some painful moments (the chirpy squeaking synth sounds (and maybe flute) that lead off “Little Picture of a Butterfly” comes to mind). Despite that “Little Picture…” recovers and becomes a bit of a slow jam at a disco, with great lines like:

“Guess I should have known better
Guess I’m throwing out that sweater”.

Eat your heart out, Meryn Cadell.

By the end I had almost forgiven all the atmospheric squeaking. Almost.

These effects are better deployed on “Outsider” which isn’t as strong a song as “Little Picture…” but does a better job of blending in the futuristic sounds, coming across like a reincarnated ABBA tune. One of those melancholy ones like “The Winner Takes It All” with strangely triumphant chords and atmospheric noises that somehow make it exhilarating to be sad.

The record ends strong with “Hangman” which uses the word game as a lovely springboard metaphor. Say what you will about Andrews’ production choices, she knows how to write a song, and “Hangman” has all the things that makes her great – the thoughtful introspective thoughts, twisted up against a pure resilience like a rising double helix of sound. Andrews writes songs that fill you with resolution and gives you the emotional experience of a runner’s high – weary, breathless, and elated.

And while her vocals do this on every song on the record, they have to compete with the creative arrangements and don’t win out every time. The juxtaposition of her pure folk vocals and those less organic additions generate moments, but as often as not I just wanted her voice and an acoustic guitar. The heart wants what it wants…

Best tracks: Cons and Clowns, Everyone Wants to Feel Like You Do, Hangman

The Concert – Friday, April 10 at the Biltmore, Vancouver BC

This show was a bit of a whim, when I decided at the last minute to take Friday off and head over for a quick overnight show in neighbouring Vancouver with my good friend and fellow music enthusiast, Casey.

I’d been to the Biltmore once before about a year ago (to see the Handsome Family – see review at Disc 1811) so I knew to expect good acoustics and terrible sightlines. We got there early and landed two high stools right in front of the soundboard.

As the floor filled up it became apparent that while the sound in that location was going to be unmatched, the sightlines were as terrible as ever. The Biltmore has a low ceiling and as a result the stage is perforce also low. While it didn’t help that all the tallest people there seemed to choose the angle between me and the stage, even normal-sized humans would have blocked most of the show.

I spent the night focused on listening and occasionally enjoying a fleeting sighting of the singers’ head when the alternating sway of my fellow music fans parted slightly. I suppose I could have crept forward to snap a photo for this blog, but that wouldn’t have been authentic to my experience. So, true to the event, this concert review features no photos.

Lou Hazel

The opening act was singer-songwriter Lou Hazel. Lou was a delightful fellow, and his short set was a good mix of banter and folk songs, ending with an engaging song about his dad that left me feeling like I know the man personally (I don’t).

On one song Lou had a chorus composed of rhetorical questions to which the enthusiastic fans shouted answers. Fun on the first chorus, but tiresome when the antics were repeated throughout.

Courtney Marie Andrews

Andrews came on stage without fanfare and launched immediately into “Pendulum Swing” the opening track of her new album. After a couple more songs from that record, Andrews stopped to confirm my suspicion – she was going to play the whole album in sequence.

As a lover of the full album experience (note: this blog) I happen to love encountering this at a live show. While “Valentine” is not my favourite record I appreciated her doubling down on her newest songs and also making casual fans and dilettantes (which I am not) live the full musical experience they should be seeking out on their own anyway.

As noted in the review above, I was not a fan of “Valentine”s production decisions and hoped that the live version would be more organic. For the most part it was, although Andrews’ and the band still managed to get in a fair share of hum and buzz.

On worst offenders like “Little Picture of a Butterfly” I learned that some of the weird sounds were from a flute (which Andrews artfully switched to and from guitar without missing a beat). It was a bit more organic, but still stubbornly stuck to the new sound.

The final song on the record, “Hangman” is one of my favourites on the record, but live it got a bit overamped and the resulting feedback buzz was, admittedly, an irritant.

As for the overall quality of the show, my “perfect audiophile” location paid off big-time. Andrews’ vocals, so angelic through her career, have lost nothing in either power or tone. The notes that lifted my soul and raised the hair on my neck on her studio records did it again in the live environment, often moreso.

The last third of the show featured a couple of songs off of her previous albums, relatively evenly applied through her discography from “Honest Life” forward. Standouts included “Rookie Dreaming” and “Burlap String” but it was a good selection, although admittedly abbreviated due to the time taken by the full-album approach (which, as noted above, I heartily endorse).

Now a note on the crowd, and since I’m about to share a couple of bad moments, I’d like to lead with love and note that 95% of the crowd were enthusiastic, joyful and respectful of their neighbours. Even all those tall dudes did their best to navigate to a shared space that impacted only a small viewing angle overall. The Biltmore attracts true music fans and there were many there with me, enjoying the music. Love to all of these - the vast majority of attendees.

Of course, there are always exceptions. Two people in front of me talked nonstop through the entire first half of the set before mercifully moving along to Parts Unknown. I couldn’t hear them but remain eternally mystified by people who pay money to attend a live music event and then choose to talk through it.

Worse was someone who, forgoing thousands of years’ worth of shared human understanding of the guest/host relationship shouted an insult directed broadly at America. Andrews and her whole band are from the United States, and while the shout was (thankfully) greeted with a dismayed murmur of disagreement from the crowd, it still landed ill.

To Andrews’ credit, she got through the song, reminded everyone (more gently than was deserved) that love is the way through troubled times and - in a final message on the matter - ended the show with an acoustic rendition of “May Your Kindness Remain”.

No matter what dark thoughts may eat away at us in times of trouble, and no matter how hard a road we may walk, this is always good advice.