HOT NEW RELEASES, EDGE,
Doom Lover, Daylilies, Juliana Hatfield offer hot new releases
Looking to give your ears a scorch? Sizzling new releases from Doom Lover, Daylilies and Juliana Hatfield will rock you in all the right ways. If Doom Lover spent the three years since their last LP only creating the song “Make a Knot,” I would be satisfied. The six-minute epic of harmony vocals, strings and guitar climaxes sound like a sunrise, a sunset and a breakup that happens in the first five minutes of a 12-hour drive through the desert. But their new album, “Outside Voices,” has more to it than this mini-masterpiece. Recorded as the band shifted lineups, “Outside Voices” has an indie rock “Rumours” energy to it. The songs feel like they were fed by change and conflict. The six-piece begins with a big, broad rock ’n’ roll song (“Bounds”) powered by thumping drums and an arena rock chorus. But as Doom Lover tramps through the record, things get both more beautiful and more chaotic. Half a minute of serene strings open “Grieving Rights,” then Nikki Dessingue’s and Geoff Smith’s vocals combine over a long, droning crescendo. The guitars of Smith, Jeffrey Vachon and Sam Toabe team for a one-two-three punch on the fast and heavy “Involunteers.” The smart, passionate rock constitutes an emotional workout. Thankfully, it ends in an earned catharsis: “The Beggar,” a kind of hymn that wraps you warm and snug in Dessingue, Smith and Vachon’s huge harmonies. Oh, there’s also a massive crescendo. Hey, it’s Doom Lover, would you expect less? ••• Remember when rock was weird? Not weird and selfimportant like Radiohead or Muse, but legit weird like Talking Heads at CBGBs or the B-52’s at an Athens house party or Mission of Burma at the Rat. You do! Great, so do the Daylilies. The selftitled debut EP from the Daylilies, who play the Burren on Jan. 27, lives up to the members’ impressive resumes. The quartet of Laura England Klain, Ad Frank, Matt Klain and Mike Quinn have logged time in Mistle Thrush, Reverse and Lifestyle (to name 10 percent of the acts these four have worked with). You can hear those bands over these six songs. The Daylilies can go from dreamy shoegazing to roaring in two bars. (Listen to “Scrawl.”) But nothing from their collective past will prepare you for how smart and visceral this stuff is. “Fire Sea Free Me” could be a sea shanty for kids raised on Belle and Sebastian. “Stockholm Syndrome” fits in that sweet space between punk and new wave. ••• Juliana Hatfield has grievances to air on her new album “Weird.” The Boston singer-guitarist has sand on her Popsicle on the power pop gem “Broken Doll.” She’s “Staying In” because she can’t keep her face from inviting unwanted looks. Her brother bothers her by questioning the lack of romance in her life in “It’s So Weird.” Explorations of threats from the outside world fill up “Weird.” And Hatfield sets them all to her expected, absurdly consistent hooks and bright, tight melodies. She has written plenty of personal songs in 30 years (nearly 30 albums from half a dozen bands), but this one shines in the hot spotlight of intense intimacy. Sometimes over sad chord changes, more often over sparkling indie pop, she sings about wanting to be alone, the comfort of a solitary life. After a master class in catchy choruses and introspection, Hatfield closes with the record’s most upbeat track: “Do It to Music.” The song celebrates the glory of rock and still manages to get in a devotion to solitude singing, “When I wanna block out the world/I do it to music/Just a set of headphones and a girl.”