snap reviews
Album: Sound City: Real to Reel Artist: Various (Roswell/Sony)
A record about making records — that might be a little “inside baseball” for the mass audience, but it’s your buddy Dave Grohl captaining this homage to the analogue mixing console that created the ’70s. The album follows the highly-praised documentary film, and manned by a zany crew — Krist Novoselic, Pat Smear, Trent Reznor, Josh Homme, Lee Ving, Rick Nielsen, Corey Taylor — over half of these grunge-metal jams reveal as much stitching as talent: you can see where the seams are. Exceptions? McCartney’s Cut Me Some Slack, Stevie Nicks’s You Can’t Fix This is fully song-like, and the real highlight is The Man That Never Was, a terrific rocker fronted by Rick Springfield. Mainly, Dave reminds us how important he was to Nirvana (Nevermind was recorded at Sound City). Could you ever imagine Cobain doing something like this? No. Grohl was the glue, and he’s assumed his Rock Ambassador status with energy and aplomb. Mark Lepage, Montreal Gazette
Album: Old Sock Artist: Eric Clapton (Bushbranch/Surfdog)
He’s the guitar Boy Who Lived, long enough to go from God to gawd, is he still making these albums? If that seems like apostasy or disrespect, rest assured that Eric Clapton doesn’t care whether you or the music world particularly needs to hear him shufflin’ through cosy versions of vintage Peggy Lee and All of Me. He assembles a ridiculous coterie of senatorial sidemen (McCartney, Taj Mahal, Winwood, Jim Keltner, etc.), takes a trip to de islands for Further on Down the Road and wafts through various styles that predate his era of greatness. If the brief crackle of new song Gotta Get Over is excitement enough, this is for you. Personally, I wish he’d bid Goodnight Irene. Mark Lepage, Montreal Gazette
Album: People, Hell and Angels Artist: Jimi Hendrix (Experience Hendrix/Legacy)
Like its 2010 predecessor, Valleys of Neptune, this latest collection of previously-unreleased studio tracks by Jimi Hendrix changes nothing, one way or the other, about the highly-influential guitarist’s place in the pantheon. There’s not much here you haven’t heard — more than once — in different versions. People, Hell and Angels does, however, bring more joy to the musical landscape. To hear an unadorned take of the wonderful Earth Blues — with Buddy Miles’s original drum track and without the Ronettes overdubs — is to be happy it’s out there. Like Valleys, this feels less like an album than 12 random snapshots of a restless innovator in search of the perfect band and the best way to present his latest material. During these sessions, recorded between March 1968 and August 1970, he is mostly working out and discarding ideas for a followup to the epochal Electric Ladyland, the third and last studio album released during his lifetime. First Rays of the New Rising Sun, released in 1997, is the closest we can come to knowing what a fourth album would have sounded like (although its contents had already been released in other guises over the decades, scattered over albums of varying quality.) But that doesn’t make it any less fascinating to hear the title of that album pop up here in the lyrics of Hey Gypsy Boy, with its highly experimental guitar solo, and again in the torrid blues rocker Izabella, where Mitch Mitchell’s muscular drumming swings and rocks — no mean feat. Similarly, to hear one of Freedom’s defining riffs foreshadowed in a bass line from Crash Landing — released for the first time without the posthumous overdubs that drew criticism in 1975 — is exhilarating. You wouldn’t choose People, Hell and Angels to introduce a visitor from another planet to the Hendrix oeuvre. And yes, a merely casual fan might have drawn the line on the endless rough drafts long ago. But if you are among the many who think each variation of every song, solo or riff is as important as an outtake by Miles Davis, you’ll want this fly-on-the-wall vantage point to witness the creative process of one of rock music’s most important artists. Bernard Perusse, Montreal Gazette
Album: Woman Artist: Rhye (Innovate Leisure/Loma Vista)
The definition of Rhye: the electronic Sade. Rhye, the new duo made up of musicians Mike Milosh and Robin Hannibal, channel the veteran soul singer on their debut, Woman. The album is full of smooth and soothing vocals on top of beats that are dreamy and danceable. The 10-track set is electronic-flavoured silky R&B and plays like a warm jazz session, as Milosh sings softly about love and life. He kind of sounds like a lady. And we love it. Rhye’s sound also echoes Quadron, another duo where Danish-based Hannibal works as producer and vocalist Coco O. is front and centre. It’s hard to resist Woman, especially songs like Last Dance, which is both bold and jamming with lyrics like: “Tell me lies and lullabies, but don’t tell me to change.” This here is a winner. Mesfin Fekadu, Associated Press
Album: Chelsea Light Moving Artist: Chelsea Light Moving (Matador)
The debut album from Chelsea Light Moving is the third record headlined by Thurston Moore since Sonic Youth started an indefinite hiatus. Depending on how long that drags out, this lively rocker might tide you over. The newest side gig for the 54-year-old Moore picks up where Sonic Youth started drifting toward in the 2000s: tighter albums, less screwing around. That doesn’t mean Chelsea Light Moving is a showcase in maturity. Moore dumbs down his guitar chops in the punk ditty Lip while Fbombing his way through every verse and chorus. Alighted and Frank O’Hara Hit drip with an easy sludge that most rock bands eventually outgrow. But it’s nothing to cringe at. The effect isn’t angst, but instead comes across as Moore dusting off his amp following his 2011 acoustic solo album and last year’s interminable collaboration with Yoko Ono. It’s no Sonic Youth but a serviceable stopgap. Paul J. Weber, Associated Press