CD Odyssey Disc 1446: Cirith Ungol

This next album is probably not the typical fare you would hear blasting out of a Jaguar, which made doing so even more enjoyable.

Disc 1446 is…. One Foot in Hell

Artist: Cirith Ungol

Year of Release: 1986

What’s up with the Cover?  A Michael Whelan fantasy painting. Apparently, all Cirith Ungol covers are Michael Whelan depictions of Elric (a character in a Michael Moorcock series). Given that I discovered a band called Eternal Champion this week (Elric’s title/destiny) things have come full circle.

I don’t remember this particular scene from the book, but this bug king is a good example of why you shouldn’t eat lunch at your desk. Just look at that mess of bones and filth around the throne! Someone is going to have to call Facilities when the place gets mice.

Also of note, is the pose of our hero. It’s a reminder that when picking a fantasy miniature for playing D&D you want one in a normal “walking” pose. Sure, this guy looks OK here raising his sword all perpendicular and whatnot, but when he’s just in a tavern buying an ale, it’s awkward.

How I Came To Know It: A few years ago I was wandering through Youtube after my buddy Ross had sent me a different band and saw Cirith Ungol. I remembered them from my teenage years, but I’d never owned any back then. I went out and bought “One Foot in Hell” that weekend.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Cirith Ungol albums, this one and “King of the Dead”(reviewed back at Disc 1056). They are both stellar, but I guess I’ll give “King of the Dead” the slight edge. It is close, though.

Ratings: 4 stars

There was a time, long ago, when the only music I listened to was heavy metal. When I listen to Cirith Ungol’s “One Foot in Hell” it reminds me why. It is awesome.

“One Foot In Hell” would have been considered very heavy indeed in 1986 and in 2021 it is still pretty damned heavy. These guys were doing doom metal before that was its own full-fledged thing, then infusing it with the galloping power of Iron Maiden. The result is some serious crunch, and the visceral dread you get from a good horror film. Every song made me want to turn it up a bit louder, and you know what? I did.

While the songwriting is a sliver below “King of the Dead”, Tim Baker’s vocals feel more confident than ever, aided by production values that have stepped up, creating the thickness of sound the songs require to punch you in the solar plexus. Jerry Fogle’s guitars alternate between fell and foreboding power riffs and tasteful and elevated solos that fly over the song’s churning power without ever losing the melody.

There are plenty of great tracks, but my favourite is “Chaos Descends” if only for that killer Fogle riff that dominates throughout. If it doesn’t make your strumming hand want to play air guitar on your steering wheel, then you aren’t listening. Cirith Ungol (named after a cursed valley in Lord of the Rings) love all things fantasy, and they sing their passion. “Chaos Descends” is replete with great sword and sorcery lyrics, like:

“The beasts of hell blacken heaven's eye
We shout our fear to a soulless sky”

That is some great shit right there.

“Nadsokor” starts with a killer Robert Garven drum bit (yes, the song begins with a drum solo) that then forms the underpinning for the entire song. The song is named after a city in yet another fantasy novel. Tim Baker first whispers the name like a warning, then shrieks it out like an alarm, creating a growing urgency. Then the bridge comes along and slows everything down to a ponderous sludge. The whole song is like a beast slouching to Bethlehem, inexorable and terrible.

Not only is “One Foot in Hell” an awesome metal record, it made me want to dig out and reread all my old fantasy novels. With only eight songs and 35 minutes of playing time, it also left me wanting more. My only regret in writing this review is that it means I’ll be moving on to something else.

Best tracks: Blood & Iron, Chaos Descends, Nadsokor, War Eternal, Doomed Planet

CD Odyssey Disc 1445: Blind Melon

For the third time in six reviews, the CD gods have randomly decided I should listen to some early nineties rock. Now, you shall read about it.

Disc 1445 is…. Self-Titled

Artist: Blind Melon

Year of Release: 1992

What’s up with the Cover?  Bee Girl. This same bee girl featured in the band’s big video, but I never got into the whole Bee Girl hype that seemed to sweep the music video world when it came out. I would much rather see an artist’s rendition of what a blind melon might look like. How would you distinguish it from a regular melon? The mind reels…

How I Came To Know It: My roommate in the early nineties (Greg) owned this album and it received a fair amount of airplay in our apartment. I never thought to own it for myself, but recently when my friend Chris was parting with his CDs (as most of the world is currently doing), I obtained it from his collection.

How It Stacks Up: This is my only Blind Melon CD so it can’t stack up.

Ratings: 2 stars

Imagine if a bunch of sixties hippies decided to reinterpret grunge and you’ll have an approximation of Blind Melon. Plenty of guitar crunch and reverb, crossed with the meander of a stoned beach bum looking for a place to sleep off a hard night into the afternoon.

Most of the songs feature a lot of freewheelin’, energetic instruments wah-wahing away in various directions. Despite all that activity, the musicianship is tight. The guitar work is solid, crossing groovy riffs reminiscent of Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil with a messy sixties sound that feels a bit like Jimi Hendrix.

More than a bit, in fact – these guys clearly love Hendrix, on “Seed to a Tree” they even directly borrow a riff, adding a cavalier exclamation of “Jimmy, we need to borrow this for a minute” before playing a small part of what I think is “The Wind Cries Mary”. It’s a gratuitous line (both the lyric and riff) that just draws your attention to the fact that as good as Rogers Stevens is, he’s no Hendrix, and no Thayil either.

The record is overblown in many places, with a kind of fuzzed-out excess. Many songs have solid riffs and promising melodies but end up feeling overly earnest and unfocused. Some of the songs (particularly the final track, “Time”) don’t know when to end, like a lingering party guest who’s had too much but is still wobbling around the kitchen refusing to call a cab.

When Blind Melon does strip it down, such as on “Change” and “No Rain” is when I like them best. Both songs have the band getting their hippie on, lyrically and musically. “Change” has a little harmonica and acoustic guitar, as the aforementioned beach dweller has roused himself, faced his hard life, and decided its time for a change. “Change” also has a solid (and uncharacteristically restrained) guitar solo that grow the song and gives it a little extra emotional oomph right when it’s most needed. “No Rain” is another sad one, exploring depression and ennui, but making it enjoyable with some well-placed finger snaps and one of rock and roll’s great guitar riffs.

Both “Change” and “No Rain” are anthems built to be loved by disaffected Gen-Xers in their early twenties (guilty). Variations of “life sucks, but I’ll fill my day in some semi-useful ways.” They don’t defeat depression and ennui so much as they shrug them off and ignore them. “Keep dreamin’ and maybe read a book if you’re bored” are about the only answers they offer up. For all that, Shannon Hoon’s vocals are so heartfelt that listening, it feels like enough.

In the end, these two songs (plus late album standout “Holy Man”) aren’t enough to make me want to listen to the whole record again. It is all just a bit too sprawling and unfocused to hold my attention.

Because of this, Blind Melon will be leaving my collection only a few short months after I brought it home. I’ll offer it back to my friend Chris, and if he won’t take it, I’ll look farther afield for a good home.

Best tracks: Change, No Rain, Holy Man

CD Odyssey Disc 1444: John Prine

After a long day (first at work, then volunteer work) I am ready to do something for me, like write this music review. I hope you enjoy it as well.

Disc 1444 is…. Self-Titled

Artist: John Prine

Year of Release: 1971

What’s up with the Cover?  Very early, very young John Prine. He must’ve been so broke back then he could only afford furniture made out of hay bales.

How I Came To Know It: My friend Casey put me on to John Prine, and the first song he played for me was “Sam Stone”. At that point I was hooked, and knew I had to check him out. I believe this was the first album I bought, mostly because it had that song and another one I’d also heard, “Angel From Montgomery.”

How It Stacks Up: I have six John Prine albums. I used to have seven but I parted ways with “The Missing Years”. Including all seven, I put his eponymous debut in at #3.

Ratings: 4 stars

This year John Prine’s eponymous debut celebrates its 50^th year. It remains as poignant and perfect as the day it was released. This record is an old friend that you put on when you need something familiar and comforting, knowing that it won’t let you down.

Prine is one of folk music’s great songwriters. He’s so great that his art shines through a voice that – if we’re being honest – is a bit thin and limited. He gets better on later records, so it could just be the album’s tinny production doing him no favours. Whatever the case, Prine makes up for any limits with some artful phrasing and a willingness to completely lose himself in his characters.

There are a couple classics on this record that I prefer performed by other people, but its no slight to Prine. A young Bonnie Raitt singing “Angel From Montgomery” s a classic moment in seventies folk-country. More recently, Brandi Carlile pays tribute to the recently departed Prine singing “Hello in There” from her living room on the Stephen Colbert show. I challenge you to listen to that Brandi Carlile cover and not get misty-eyed. I’ve broken my minimalist tradition with links to both. You’re welcome.

Both singer-songwriters have plenty of their own material, but like so many who have followed John Prine, they are in awe of the songs he writes. Prine may not be the greatest vocalist but his songs have beautiful bones, ready to be dressed up and taken out among the stars whenever they’re needed.

But there are also songs on this record that I can’t imagine being from anyone other than John Prine. “Illegal Smile” starts the record off with a humorous exploration of one man’s effort to retreat from life’s harsh realities with what they called “grass” back in 1971. Or as he opines to the law:

“Ah, but fortunately I have the key to escape reality
And you may see me tonight with an illegal smile
It don't cost very much, but it lasts a long while
Won't you please tell the man I didn't kill anyone
No, I'm just tryin' to have me some fun.”

Prine never spells out the source of said smile, which makes the joke that much more fun.

That is Prine at his most playful, but he can also be serious, exploring a tragic twist on the same theme with “Sam Stone.” It is the story of a war veteran home with deep wounds to both body and soul, who finds solace in a heroin habit that inexorably crushes the life out of him. The subtle changing rhyme scheme (the verses are ABBACCDD, the chorus AABBA) cause your brain to meander, evoking the title character’s drug-addled mind, and the repetition of the pattern as the addition progresses is like a slow circling to the song’s tragic and inevitable end.

Some of these songs feel a bit sing-songy, but that was Prine. Revelling in the silly side of life one minute and exploring the depths of a troubled soul in the next. His voice never had much range, but his stories more than made up for it.

John Prine left us too soon last year, a victim of the COVID-19 pandemic. His legacy was a catalogue of tunes granting insight into every facet of the human condition. To quote the oft-understated Prine: Pretty good, not bad, I can’t complain.”

Best tracks: Illegal Smile, Hello in There, Sam Stone, Pretty Good, Your Flag Decal Won’t Get You Into Heaven Anymore, Angel From Montgomery, Donald and Lydia

CD Odyssey Disc 1443: The Beths

My music discovery for the week is a metal band called Eternal Champion. They are awesome, but the dice decide what album I review next and it has chosen…indie pop. Here is some.

Disc 1443 is…. Jump Rope Gazers

Artist: The Beths

Year of Release: 2020

What’s up with the Cover?  This looks like some cursed relic brought back from the lost tomb of dread Cthulhu. I like to think it binds the taker with a disturbing and faceless doppelganger who appears before you every time you pass your reflection to manifest and kill your loved ones, before returning to the depths of the mirror when the policy come calling for your alibi. As a basis for a horror story, that’s good stuff. As an album cover, it is not the greatest. Good thing for you I was here to provide context.

How I Came To Know It: I read a couple of reviews. I wasn’t sure about the Beths, as their previous album was good, but didn’t grab me enough to buy it. This time they won me over.

How It Stacks Up: I only have one Beths album, so it can’t stack up.

Ratings: 3 stars

Who ordered the indie pop…again? Yeah, that was me. In recent years I’ve become a sucker for a certain sound. Surfer reverb, pop sensibilities and a dash of punk rebellion, ideally fronted by a woman with a melancholy delivery. Welcome straight from far away New Zealand - the Beths! Latest band to feed this obsession.

In my defence, I only buy the good records that meet this description. It all starts with lead singer Elizabeth Stokes. Her vocals have a combination of eighties pop sweetness and the disaffected, slightly flat delivery of nineties pop. She’s also got a compelling falsetto which she deploys just enough to show it off, but not so much it gets tiresome.

The band is solid, particularly drummer Tristan Deck, who has a bit of a later-days Police vibe. Like a jazz drummer being forced at gunpoint to play rock and roll. The guitar has a reverb that is somewhere between sixties surfer reverb and eighties Goth. Put it all together and it sounds like a lot of what I imagine would be good for the radio, if the radio were five times better than it is.

The music has a bit of a wall of sound that takes some close attention to separate, but it is worth the effort. Because of this I liked it more on headphones walking home than in my car. My car stereo is amazing, but there is something intimate and insulated about the record that just needs to be close to your ear.

The album’s opening track, “I’m Not Getting Excited” is the Beths at their most punk. A rock riff flails away frantically, with Stokes singing in both chest and head voice as she holds down the melodic structure so the guitar can just bang away and suggest polite slam-dancing, should the occasion warrant it.

The album calms down from there, causing a few people I knew to say the first track is the only good one. Those people are manifestly wrong. They are also likely to say the band's previous release (and critical darling) "Future Me Hates Me" is the better album. This is also wrong, although I'll grant you it is a matter of taste and that "Future Me Hates Me" is a great title for a record. But I digress...

What I mean to say, is the whole record is solid, and them cutting to a more surf pop sound for the rest of the record is only a problem if you don’t like that. As noted above, I do.

In particular, the title track is lovely, and would be at home on a mid-nineties teen romantic comedy. The Beths, like a lot of modern bands, are a blend of a lot of eras – the result of easy access to any song they feel like listening to. People of my vintage were stuck with our own records, or – when they visited – our friends’. It is a glorious time for music.

Later in the record, “You Are a Beam of Light” strips things down until you almost think it is contemporary folk (it’s not, but it’s adjacent). With the light picking pattern and introspective feel, it feels a far cry from “I’m Not Getting Excited” but the Beths walk you down through tunes that get you there naturally.

The Beths did not crack my recently published top 15 albums from 2020, but they easily could have. They are definitely top 25.

Best tracks: I’m Not Getting Excited, Dying to Believe, Jump Rope Gazers, Out of Sight

CD Odyssey Disc 1442: The Grapes of Wrath

This is the second time in three albums I’ll be reviewing a Canadian rock record released in 1991 (earlier it was Rush’ “Roll the Bones”).

Disc 1442 is…. These Days

Artist: The Grapes of Wrath

Year of Release: 1991

What’s up with the Cover?  A classic early nineties cover, featuring the band wearing “we don’t even really care how we dress because we’re not obsessed with being pretentious rock star” clothes, with expressions to match.

The early nineties were a good time for men’s hair. Lots of long flowing locks like the seventies, except this time we had product to keep it smooth and silky.

How I Came To Know It: This album used to belong to my roommate Greg. Greg and I didn’t share a lot of musical overlap back in the days, but we both loved music. We also loved beer and we were usually broke as hell. In particularly band months, we’d resort to selling our less-loved CDs back to the record store (back in the day a CD could fetch you a cool $7). “These Days” was on of Greg’s albums and in one broke week, he decided he was going to part with it.

I was aghast, as this was one of the records of his that I liked the most. I offered him $9 for it – more than he’d get from the record store, but less than I’d pay for it at the record store. Also, probably all I had in loose change at the time of the transaction. It was a win-win, and he agreed. Thirty years later, it’s still here.

How It Stacks Up: This is my only Grapes of Wrath album, so it can’t stack up. I’ll probably check out a couple more now that the CD Odyssey has reminded me that they exist, but I have no idea how it will go.

Ratings: 3 stars

Much like how you can’t hear your own accent, it is hard as a Canadian to quantify what “Canadian rock” sounds like, but I sense “These Days” is it. The Grapes of Wrath’s third studio album has a rich, rolling groove that is mostly rock and roll but with a hint of Gordon Lightfoot guitar strum and a touch of Blue Rodeo keyboard. It’s got some heft to it, and more than a little of that woe-is-me quality that 1991 was known for, but it’s not aggressive.

That maudlin element was a significant part of my attraction to this record when I first heard it in my early twenties. It was anthemic enough to make your heart soar, but sad enough to also make you pine, and we all need to pine from time to time.

The first element of the record’s success is the way Grapes of Wrath’s vocals blended together. Rarely do you hear a single voice, and the harmonies they lean on are so tight I had to go check some live footage to be sure they weren’t just looping some background vocals back into the mix.

This tight “chorus all the time” also gives many of these songs a participatory quality. You want to join in and sing along because you’d just be another voice in the choir. I did it multiple times in the car, in fact, and to all those looking at me askance at red lights I say this – I regret nothing.

All this ambient sound results in no rough edges, and while this record is apparently more “heavy” than previous efforts, I didn’t find it heavy at all. It is a very light lilt, with a lot of layered sound that lets you sink in and float along. I wasn’t taken with the musicianship, but the songs aren’t constructed to show off a bunch of virtuoso guitar bits. Instead, it’s an orchestral sound without the orchestra.

Lyrically, the album will always have a bigger impact on me because I heard it during a critical and emotional part of my life. I don’t play it nearly as often “these days” but when I do it always takes me back there. The album’s hits and deep cuts are all equally familiar, and sad little ditties like “No Reason” are still just as sad for me as they ever were. Tunes like “Travelin’” with uncertain lyrics like:

“Is this all I've waited for
Or is this just another trip
Away”

“Am I in the best of life
Or am I just a travelin' still?
Away”

Evoke old doubts and make me briefly wonder where I’m at on my journey, until all those years of experience kick in and I remember, “oh yeah, life always feels like this from time to time” and I calm down and just enjoy the trip down memory lane.

While I like the deep cuts on as much as the hits, the album does fade a little in its final three songs, particularly the plodding 6:24 final track “Miracle” which has a very long noodle fade that does not add anything to the record.

For all that, “These Days” holds up well. Thirty years later it manages to still sound fresh, while at the same time being the familiar old friend it has always been.

Best tracks: Away, You May Be Right, I Am Here, No Reason, Travelin

CD Odyssey Disc 1441: Devo

I woke up on the right side of the bed this morning and I’m still feeling filled with happiness to the universe. Hello, universe! You’re probably not listening, but thanks for the music all the same!

Disc 1441 is…. Freedom of Choice

Artist: Devo

Year of Release: 1980

What’s up with the Cover?  Earlier that day, an elderly woman had her purse snatched at a hand model convention by a man wearing a silver suit and a red flowerpot on his head. This was just the cops making sure the police lineup was fair. “Do you recognize any of these hands ma’m?” asked the detective. “Oh, I don’t know officer,” she replied querulously, “every young man’s hands look lovely at my age.”

How I Came To Know It: I was reading a list on Paste Magazine’s site of “Top albums of 1980” and this was on it. I checked it out and had to agree. It kicks ass.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Devo albums. They are both great, but “Freedom of Choice” is the best. #1, baby!

Ratings: 5 stars

I’ve been watching a show recently about the construction of modern music. The process often involves combining a lot of disparate sounds in creative ways. While the results can sometimes be catchy, none of it holds a candle to what Mark Mothersbaugh and Gerald Casale were doing 40 years ago in Devo.

Each of these 12 songs is a perfect piece of craftsmanship, exploring multiple musical notions in an overlapping interlace, chasing the perfect interplay of sounds. Devo usually finds it in three minutes or less.

The album starts with a relatively normal – and very good – guitar riff. “Girl U Want” makes you want to dance around with the frenetic energy that comes from young love and desire. The song stitches in synthesizer, bass lines and some solid vocals into something that could have just been a New Wave crowd pleaser. Devo takes it further, creating a jigsaw puzzle of odd pieces that fit together into a coherent and enjoyable tune. Never has experimentation sounded so good.

This is the theme of the whole record; a latticework of sound clips – sometimes organic, sometimes electronic – combined into beauty. Rap would later do something similar by sampling other music, or the perfect snare drum. Modern pop music does it with expensive equipment and a small army of songwriters and producers. Devo does a bit of both, creating all the sounds themselves and then turning them into high art.

There are a million great moments on this record. That bass line that holds down “Whip It” and the urgent alarm sound that they introduce later to offset it. The synth harmonies on “Snowball” The Clash-like guitar on “Gates of Steel” throwing a little hard rock in with the punk and that answering riff which is either guitar or keyboard (I can’t tell). It all just works.

“Snowball” even pulled me into a philosophical journey. The song is a simple image. A woman takes love, like a snowball, and rolls it up a hill. As it rolls, it gets bigger until it is so big, she can push it no farther, and it rolls back down. It had me thinking of Camus discussing the Myth of Sisyphus. In that moment, the rock rolls down the hill, and before he begins again, Sisyphus is free. In that same moment when the snowball of love rolls away, there’s a deep sadness. Love rolling down a hill is a different animal. Or maybe they’re saying it takes two to roll that all the way up the hill. What I do know is that for such a simple image, the song invites a lot of deep thinking.

On the title track, Devo explores how freedom of choice can paralyze you. Or as they put it:

“In ancient Rome
There was a poem
About a dog
Who found two bones
He picked at one
He licked the other
He went in circles
He dropped dead”

Gotta pick one of those bones, dog. Life’s about choices.

And while you could spend quite a bit of time exploring every song for its onion-layers of meaning, it is so much more fun to just revel in the energy and musicality Devo pull out of a series of simple, carefully chosen sounds. They always know just what they need, like outlaw artists composing sculpture from a junkpile. And the scariest thing is, you could rearrange these songs just a bit into a more traditional format, play them on guitar, and they would still sound great.

When I reviewed “Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo?” back at Disc 1250 I noted that while I loved it, every now and then it got sufficiently weird to lose me emotionally. That never happened on “Freedom of Choice”. I was fully invested and along for the ride from the opening notes to the end.

As for how it achieved the vaunted 5-star rating, it wasn’t just all that philosophy and life advice. The truth is that I listened to this album four times in a row, before reviewing it. After the first listen, I would start again, each time vowing to note which songs I liked the best. But I could never choose. I like them all.

Best tracks: all tracks

CD Odyssey Disc 1440: Rush

It’s been over three years since I last rolled an album by this next band. It was a long time to wait. Why did this happen? Because it happens – roll the bones.

Disc 1440 is…. Roll the Bones

Artist: Rush

Year of Release: 1991

What’s up with the Cover?  A kid kicks a skull. This kid looks like quite the little punk, and when that skull gets reunited with his skeleton, I hope it comes looking for some payback. Or maybe they two of them will become friends and play a friendly game of Yahtzee. The wall behind them provides plenty of dice for it.

How I Came To Know It: I like Rush a lot - enough to buy all their studio albums, and this album is proof positive of my commitment. Keep that love I hold for the band in mind at those times when I say unkind things.

How It Stacks Up: I have 19 Rush albums. I had reserved a spot for “Roll the Bones” at #16 but it just couldn’t live up to its initial seeding. Instead I am going to bump “Presto” up one spot and drop “Roll the Bones” in at #18, second from the basement and barely holding off “Power Windows”.

Ratings: 3 stars but only barely

Rush made some amazing records over their career. “Roll the Bones” is not one of them. The musicianship is still there, but it is often wasted on songs that feel like incomplete notions at times, and at other times try way to hard.

The album starts out strong, with “Dreamline.” It features some solid guitar work from Alex Lifeson (no doubt happy at this stage to be emerging from the band’s deep dive into synthesizer in the eighties). Sure, the way Geddy Lee sings, “We are young” at the beginning of each chorus always makes me think of Pat Benatar singing the same line on “Love is a Battlefield.” But that’s OK; he moves on quickly and besides, I like “Love is a Battlefield.”

Geddy Lee’s voice sounds great on this record, catching him in that later career when artists know exactly how to sing a tune to showcase their strengths, but where they haven’t yet started flailing to reach hard notes. Lee doesn’t hit the stratosphere with his high notes anymore here, but he sings with an easy grace that matches the record well.

When this album came out, I really loved the title track, but I think the reason for this was in large part to the message. Lyricist Neil Peart examines why good and bad things happen. His answer? Stop looking so hard for a reason; the universe is filled with a lot of random shit, and you’re gonna get caught up in it. If his classic “Freewill” is a call to take responsibility for your actions, “Roll the Bones” is the reminder that not everything is a matter of will in life, and sometimes things are just going to happen. Roll the dice and take your best shot.

I still like half the song, but with every listen it is hard to overlook the absolutely terrible section featuring Geddy Lee rapping. Hearing middle aged prog rockers attempt a rap in the middle of a rock song is about as jarring as you can imagine it would be. It is hard to pick a “worst line” from this monstrosity. I think it is a tie between “Jack, relax/Get busy with the facts”, and “Stop throwing stones/The night has a thousand saxophones.” Thankfully the second option does not make good on its threat.

This song is immediately followed by “Face Up” which feels like something Andy Samberg would write if he were making fun of Rush. As an actual Rush song? Gentlemen, you can do so much better.

“Face Up” has some very forced lyrics, a problem on several tracks on the album. The worst of these may be “Neurotica” where Peart seems obsessed with rhyming the song title with various other words (“erotica”, “exotica”), and almost-words, (“chaotica”, “psychotica”). The fact that half the words are real, doesn’t make the exercise any less pointless.

He is still Neil Peart, though, and also delivers some thoughtful messages. One favourite is “Heresy,” a song about the end (at that time) of the Cold War, and the realization that we had lived for decades in fear, with precious little to show for it. Peart does a solid vocal delivery of the message, capturing the right tone somewhere between anger, relief, and weariness.

On “Ghost of a Chance” Peart further explores the epistemological themes of the record, musing about the incredible number of random events that pull us in different directions, and yet despite all that he believes…

“There’s a ghost of a chance?
We can find someone
And make it last.”

It’s an idea that appeals to me. The universe is a big chaotic place, but love could still be just around the corner. Roll the bones and find out. Just don’t rap really badly while you are rolling those bones, guys. Because it sounds bad new, and gets even worse with age.

Best tracks: Dreamline, Bravado, Heresy, Ghost of a Chance

CD Odyssey Disc 1439: Lydia Loveless

The NFL playoffs have started! My beloved Dolphins fell just short of qualifying, but I love football so much I’m watching anyway – game on pause while I get this posted. I’m also a music fan, so let’s return to that topic, shall we?

Disc 1439 is…. Boy Crazy and Single(s)

Artist: Lydia Loveless

Year of Release: 2017 but featuring music from 2011-2015

What’s up with the Cover?  A man walks by a group of women hanging out on the street, who offer up some lascivious cat calls. He doesn’t like it and that’s the message; neither do women.

How I Came To Know It: I was on Lydia Loveless’ Bandcamp page ordering her 2020 album, “Daughter” (which is #8 on my “Best of 2020” list). While I was there, I looked through her other releases. I’d been on the look for this record for a while, so I scooped it up at the same time.

How It Stacks Up: This is another album requiring a ruling. Half of it is a re-release of her 2013 EP “Boy Crazy” and the other half is a compilation of various singles she’s put out from 2011-2015. Does that constitute a true album? Probably not, but it feels like an album, and it isn’t a best of (which would have resulted in immediate disqualification). I sent this one to Appeals Court (also me) and in a shocking 1-0 decision it came back “stackable”. It is in a tie for #2 out of 5 with another album, but since I’m not one to equivocate I’ll bump it down to 3. For now.

Ratings: 4 stars

Given that “Boy Crazy and Single(s)” featuring tracks pulled from multiple sources and projects, it has a surprising consistency of sound. Loveless has grown and adjusted her style quite a bit over the last decade, but that core of “punk country” has always remained, and here it threads a nice line through her body of work.

Loveless has a hurt in her voice you can’t manufacture. That kind of pain is either in you, or it isn’t. She belts out songs with wild abandon, firing her bootless cries to heaven hoping things will work out. In most of her songs, they don’t.

“All I Know” is a song of a love that is unrequited but not unconsummated. It’s a snapshot between booty calls with a character who wants more from the relationship, but for now takes what she can get.

In “Lover’s Spat” you get to see the relationship take a turn for the worse where the booty call goes wrong:

“So don’t go running around naked by the side of the road
Honey, you look ridiculous
With that cut on your eye and your dick hanging out
Why don’t you care about us?
Well, why don’t you stay for dinner or at least a late-night snack?”

Not unlike the cover, there is some surface humour in there, but underneath a troubling exploration of domestic violence. The song’s ending may or may not involve murder. Loveless takes your mind deep within the twisted corridors and damaged psyches that lead people to dark places.

On “Come Over” Loveless’ another hard-scrabble character doubles down, opining to a married man she fancies “I don’t want to wreck your home, but could she have an accident?”

It is edgy stuff, and a big part of Loveless’ appeal is her willingness to go there and say things without fear of judgment or misinterpretation. Life and love are messy (and in these songs, messy to the point of dysfunction) but that makes for good songs too.

One of the happier ‘love’ songs is “Mile High” which I think is about the memory of some quality sex, and some manual manipulation to physically approximate the experience. If you are looking for romantic expressions of true love, this is not the album for you.

The record ends with a couple of covers: Prince’s “I Would Die 4 U” and Elvis Costello’s “Alison”. “I Would Die 4 U” is solid, but the staccato nature of the tune doesn’t mesh well with Loveless’ plaintive style. By contrast, “Alison” is a classic, taking one of rock and roll’s great love songs and removing the one thing that holds it back (Elvis Costello singing it). The Costello version is good, but Lydia Loveless makes it soar.

While the record is an amalgam of previously released content, there is no denying how great it all goes together. This is probably why the judges allowed it to count in the stack – it’s just too damned good to deny.

Best tracks: All I Know, Lover’s Spat, Boy Crazy, Mile High, Come Over, Alison

CD Odyssey Disc 1438: St. Vincent

After a couple of days driving to work (how decadent) I took the bus so I could walk home tonight and listen to this record. I enjoyed the walk, even though it reminded me I haven’t had nearly enough exercise over the last few weeks.

Disc 1438 is…. Actor

Artist: St. Vincent

Year of Release: 2009

What’s up with the Cover?  A Giant Head Cover! This Giant Head belongs to Annie Clark (aka St. Vincent) and is one of my all-time favourite Giant Heads.

How I Came To Know It: I loved 2017’s Masseduction (reviewed at Disc 1206) so much that I started digging into St. Vincent’s back catalogue to see if her earlier records appealed to me more after the passage of time. They sure did.

How It Stacks Up: I have six St. Vincent albums. Of those, “Actor” comes in at #4.

Ratings: 4 stars

I first heard “Actor” the year it came out. I gave it a full listen, found it fascinating but then moved on without a second thought. Now 11 years old, “Actor” remains so innovative it still sounds like it is from the future. As a bonus, my own ear for music has finally caught up to St. Vincent, allowing me to appreciate at least some of what she’s trying to accomplish. I expect I’m still missing plenty.

This record finds St. Vincent only beginning to plumb the depths of sound experiment, and it is already more advanced than most songwriters accomplish in a lifetime. She blends bells, reverb, cacophonous percussion and good old fashioned rock guitar. For those who don’t know, St. Vincent is one of rock and roll’s most gifted and inspiring guitar players. Like Tom Morello, she can tease almost any sound imaginable from a guitar and turn it into compelling music.

Innovation is only useful if it makes beautiful music. Through all the crazy experimentation St. Vincent threads melodies that are equal to any pop hit, and far more interesting to the ear. Pop’s power is usually in its ability to let your ear anticipate where the tune is going to go (this is both pleasurable, and makes you feel clever). On “Actor” I rarely know where these songs will go, but each note still manages to feel just right when it lands.

There are admittedly moments on “Actor” which are slightly weirder than they are pleasant, but that tension of off-putting sounds serves to make the melodies even more inspiring as they rise to the top of the tune. There were times when I wanted things to tone themselves down a bit, but even in those moments, I enjoyed not getting my way.

Due to her skills in manipulating sound and writing mind-blowing tunes, St. Vincent’s voice often gets short shrift. On “Actor” there are plenty of moments where she shows off a sweet and ethereal head voice. She could’ve been content to just sing these songs without all the bells, whistles and thumps, but we’re all lucky she didn’t. On more stripped-down songs like “The Bed” you get a front row seat to her vocal prowess, even as she continues to keep it weird with lyrics full of gun play and hints of violence.

When the sweetness of her vocals and the cyborg-inspired arrangements meet halfway you get brilliant songs like “Marrow”. St. Vincent is well aware of the tension created in “Marrow” to the point of voicing them in the lyrics:

“Muscle connects to the bone
And bone to the ire and the marrow
I wish I had a gentle mind
And a spine made up of iron

“Mouth connects to the teeth
And teeth to the loves and the curses
Honey, can you reach that spot
That needs oiling and fixing?”

When the chorus hits, she turns her guitar reverb into something resembling a trumpet in a robot factory. It is both haunting and mechanical, and above all that, catchy as hell.

It also shows just what a trendsetter she is. The ambient sadness of Phoebe Bridgers and the weird syncopation of Poppy both owe their roots to forward thinking records like “Actor.”

“Actor” doesn’t match the brilliance of St. Vincent’s classic eponymous album, nor the five-star brilliance of both “Masseduction” and “Masseducation” but it comes close, while showing the roots of what was to come. I’m glad I went back for a second listen.

Best tracks: The Strangers, Actor Out of Work, Laughing With a Mouth of Blood, Marrow, The Bed, The Party

CD Odyssey Disc 1437: RVG

I’m back at work, which means the reviews will start flowing again. Huzzah! This next album did not make the Top 15 for 2020, but I liked it plenty all the same.

Disc 1437 is…. Feral

Artist: RVG

Year of Release: 2020

What’s up with the Cover?  My best guess is this is a crab, a camera, and a black wig. Some other random items as well. I really have no idea what this cover is going for but I do know I don’t like it. Focus!

How I Came To Know It: I read a review of this album on Paste Magazine and decided to give it a shot. I liked it!

How It Stacks Up: This is my only RVG album, so it can’t really stack up. RVG put out a record prior to this, but it didn’t grab me the same way.

Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4

If you are feeling a bit too relaxed after a holiday staycation, then fear not: RVG’s second album, “Feral”, has angst to spare. Fortunately, the angst is channelled through melodies that roll and spin through your body and make your soul dance. It will sometimes be a sad dance, but it’ll be a dance all the same.

RVG have a heavy throwback quality to their music. So much so that while they qualify as ‘post-punk’, you’d be forgiven if you thought they were from the mid-eighties edition rather than several decades later. There is a strong Echo & the Bunnymen vibe, both in the dolorous but danceable melodies, and the full round vocals of frontwoman Romy Vager.

The band is incredibly tight and the light reverb in the guitar makes you think of many bands from back in the day (the Cure also comes to mind, particularly when the guitar is chugging out haunting, reverb-laden riffs). Fortunately, RVG plays with an organic, honest energy that keeps things from becoming derivative. They like this sound – a lot - but they’re making their own mark within it. Getting mad at them for staying in their lane would be like refusing to listen to Sharon Jones sing RnB; you’re only hurting yourself.

While everyone in the band is good, singer Romy Vager is the star of the show. She has a rich and full tone which she uses to wrap hurt and heartbreak around every word. Some singers slur or rush their words, or put weird affectations on their delivery, all in the vain hope of creating an emotional effect out of thin air. Vager needs no such tricks. Her lyrics aim straight for the heart, and her voice knifes like a paddle through the dappled arrangements of her bandmates.

As for those bandmates, I love all the soft layering of instrumentation employed to give the songs their restless undercurrent. The record could benefit from trying out a few more paths to the same place, by which I mean a lot of the songs have a very similar sound. A bit of variety in construction would have been welcome, even though they all sound good.

The record’s opening track, “Alexandra” is also its best. The song is a powerful exploration of life as a trans woman and doesn’t pull any punches. Vager explores the very real possibility of dying from a hate crime, and the terrifying rejection of parents. The song is stark, but near the end the narrator shares the acceptance and love of her little sister (the titular character), finding some hope amongst the horror.

It's not all redemption, though, with more than a few harsh breakup songs. Like Lucinda Williams, Taylor Swift and the Chicks’ Natalie Maines, Romy Vager is someone you do not want writing a song about you if things end badly. When Romy applies all that hurt, lines as simple and straightforward as “I used to love you/But now I don’t” gain an extra thump that the words will ever earn on the page.

RVG is an Australian band, so given current circumstances they won’t be embarking on a North American tour anytime soon. I look forward to the day that changes, hopefully in support of a new record; I’m looking forward to where their sound goes from here.

Best tracks: Alexandra, Little Sharie & the White Pointer Sisters, Help Somebody, I Used to Love You