ALBUM REVIEWS
Randy Bachman By George — By Bachman UMe
Randy Bachman, founder of The Guess Who and Bachman-Turner Overdrive, lets his imagination run away with 11 George Harrison songs on By George — By Bachman, which mostly succeeds when respecting the Quiet Beatle’s melodies, but sometimes fails to capture the grace and elegance of the originals.
If I Needed Someone has a jazzy feel, while there’s a flamenco-ish rhythm on You Like Me Too Much. I Need You gets a power-pop rebuild and Don’t Bother Me rocks out even further. Something, however, is a supple love song meant to be about “the way she moves,” not the way she plods, and even some hot guitar solos can’t change that. On While My Guitar Gently Weeps, the instrument and the song seem way past the soft cries and closer to a complete nervous breakdown. Oh well.
Moby Everything Was Beautiful, and Nothing Hurt Mute
Moby is back to brooding — magnificently. The musician-producer’s 12-track Everything Was Beautiful, and Nothing Hurt returns us to the orchestral trip-hop he’s famous for.
The album signals he’s postanger, as if he’s entered a stage of profound grief. Many songs offer a fragile and melancholy Moby whispering about human fragility over velvet swells of ambient, orchestral sounds punctuated by drum loops.
The titles suggest we’re in for a bleak affair — The Sorrow Tree, A Dark Cloud is Coming, The Last of Goodbyes and The Tired and The Hurt — but the music is gorgeously gloomy without being depressing.
The album loses some momentum due to self-indulgence, like when Moby sounds more like Enya with The Last of Goodbyes. But the album ends with a brilliant flourish with A Dark Cloud is Coming, reminding everyone he’s a master at creating hypnotic soundscapes.
Joan Baez Whistle Down the Wind Bobolink/Razor & Tie
Nearly 10 years on from her last studio album, Joan Baez delivers another pearl, about the human condition and the state of the world.Baez’s voice is in fine form and if her range now is, unsurprisingly, more earth angel than angelic, it serves to enhance her expressiveness, the depth of the lyrics and the strength of the melodies.
Another World, from Anohni, is one of the most disconsolate tracks — I need another world/ This one’s nearly gone — while The President Sang Amazing Grace, Zoe Mulford’s reflection on the 2015 Charleston church shooting, is one of the most moving.
Baez will be presenting Whistle Down the Wind on what’s meant to be her last extended tour. It’s a strong album for a farewell, as representative of her talents as of the times.