Heard
Here
Modest
Mouse
Everywhere and His Nasty Parlour Tricks
Sometimes,
and this is pretty rare, there comes a band that does not degenerate
with time. A band whose sound continues to expand without ever going
through a complete transformation to something with very little
semblance to what we know and love. A band whose albums you can
pick up at random and still feel that warm glow of familiarity.
A band that feels like home. Modest Mouse is such a band. As if
the release of The Moon and Antarctica was not enough to leave us
twitching in a pathetic heap of ecstasy on the floor in front of
our stereos. As if the limited (and now out of print) release of
the Night On the Sun EP featuring unheard tracks from the Moon and
Antarctica sessions was not enough to send us into fits of uncontrollable
glee. The fun doesnt stop there. Oh no. These boys wont
stop until they have completely obliterated their entire fan base
by means of spontaneous combustion.
Last Tuesdays release of the Everywhere and his Nasty Parlour
Tricks EP features the four tracks from Night On the Sun, including
Willful Suspension of Disbelief, an uncharacteristically
mellow, floaty, almost ethereal (by Modest Mouse standards) tune.
Additonally, the album features a remake of I Came as a Rat
(Long Walk Off a Short Dock), as well as four new tracks,
including the noteworthy The Air, a trippy, almost electronic
amalgam of countless other Modest Mouse songs.
One of the brilliant elements of The Moon and Antarctica is that
its really Modest Mouses first album that flows, in
an almost Abbey Road-esque manner, from one song to the next. There
is a sense of unity that wasnt necessarily lacking in the
past albums, it just wasnt a priority. Although the new EP
could easily stand alone as an amazing supplementary entity, it
fits with the Moon and Antarcticas flow so well that it makes
you wonder why the tracks werent originally included on the
full length.
Everywhere and his Nasty Parlour Tricks is like an introductory
Modest Mouse mix youd make for that friend you just know would
love the band as much as you did if they would only give them a
listen. The EP is an accessible, diverse, mellow and absolutely
beautiful collection of eight amazing songs that serves as an add-on
to the Moon and Antarctica, or a to-the-point bait for the Modest
Mouse rookie or maybe its just a conveniently packaged reminder
of why we love them so much.
-Natasha Uspansky
Bob
Dylan
Love and Theft
Bob
Dylan, now 60 years young, has done it again: he has changed his
voice. On Love and Theft, his 43rd album and the first since 1997s
Time Out of Mind, the-artist-formerly-known-as-Robert-Zimmerman
cheerfully growls his way through 12 new tracks that do no less
than take the listener on a full-scale tour through the history
of the American song in all its burlesque majesty. Dylan navigates
through country, ragtime, rockabilly, vaudeville, cocktail lounge
cheese and his own 60s-tinged version of the blues as he explores
the vibrant and colorful musical landscape that has shaped his unique
musical identity.
His voice is sounding as crazy and seductive as ever, but here he
sings with a confidence and imagination rarely seen earlier in his
career. Dylan switches deftly between carefree, romantic crooning
for slow tunes and a rusty, ragged authority for harder blues numbers,
selling lyrics so effectively that Sinatra would be jealous.
Whats most refreshing about Love and Theft is its tone. Often
in the past, Dylan has followed up a critically acclaimed album
with some phoned-in tripe (if you dont believe me, check out
Under the Red Sky which followed 1980s Oh Mercy or Knocked
Out Loaded, which followed 1985s Empire Burlesque). Here,
he does not try to willfully destroy his reputation, but rather
seems freshly energized by the challenge of following up Time Out
of Mind. On that album, he was worrying about treachery, age and
mortality in sweeping, desolate tunes. He is still preoccupied with
those matters, but no longer is he lamenting the state of things;
hes turned it into a cosmic joke. Everything now has a sneaky,
lighthearted feel. It takes some getting used to, but Love and Theft
is even kind of funny. Its got corny puns that would make
a first grader groan, such as the line in Po Boy
where he sings, Poor Boy in a hotel called the Palace of Gloom/Called
down to room service, says send up a room.
In Bye and Bye, one of several surprisingly sweet numbers
on the album, Dylan blithely says, The future for me is already
a thing of the past. Throughout Love and Theft he sings like
a man who is so drunk on the past that he is neither scared nor
impressed by what the future might hold. At 60, Bob Dylan is content
to enjoy the ride. If youve got half his vitality at that
age, consider yourself lucky.
Jacob Adams
Juvenile
Project English
Well,
Juvenile has certainly done it again. While I would expect nothing
less from this dynamic bunch of head-busting, platinum-rocking thug
prophets, the irrepressible Cash Money crew has effectively updated
their distinct brand of stripped-down outsider art with yet another
sublime joint. Full of stuttering drum beats, hypnotic bass grooves
and subtle synthetic textures, Project English is an innovative
musical composition that slams with the aural intensity of a million
shotgun blasts.
Lyrically, Juvenile and his motley horde of rhyme donors stick to
their traditional themes of drug abuse, violence, anal sex, bling
and the people who front on them. While some critical folks have
suggested that the Cash Money crew attempt to substitute senseless
polemics, unwarranted bravado and a superficial obsession with monetary
gain for true poetry, these jealous haters are simply
missing the essential message. In studying Juveniles flows,
a listeners attention should not be on the rappers expressed
opinions, but on his unique authorial process. In breaking down
a listeners assumptions about form and language, Juvenile
manipulates typical notions of narrative structure to the point
where concepts of truth, emotive feeling and realism are replaced
by textual texture and linguistic nuance. As Jacques Derrida explains
in his 1967 work Of Grammatology, writing raps is not the creation
of meaning, but, in fact, the mental process of producing language
that can be actively deconstructed by a thoughtful listener
preferably while tipping back a freshly cracked forty-ounce.
In short, Juvenile is raw as hell, and so is Project English. Its
comforting to know hell be around for at least another 15
minutes, slinging text like bud and dicing language with the flick
of a well-oiled switchblade. Move over Foucault, and make way for
this new heat-packing purveyor of post-modernism, New Orleans style.
When Juvenile hollers I got new dubs on my ride cause Im
flashy / Ice in my grill / Classy? on the bumping track Get
Your Hustle On, you know that he is on the (un)real. Are there
any so-called socially-relevant hip-hop heads who can
possibly compete with Juveniles post-structural meditations
on the Dirty South aesthetic? Mos Def? Nope. Jurassic 5? Please.
The Roots? Give me a break. Shit. Slice open a Philly, stuff it
with stinky green and cut the motherfucker loose in true hipster
fashion with this dazzling new platter from Juvenile.
Andrew Simmons
|