Miscellaneous ‘90’s – ‘00’s
This page is pretty much the same deal as my “miscellaneous classic rock” page, in that you’ll find reviews here for artists I don’t have close enough to the full discographies to do a full page for, and in that some will eventually get their own pages. There’s a few differences, though. First, whereas the reviews on the classic rock page will most likely be OVERWHELMINGLY positive, since you’ll find the most well-known albums from famous artists I happen to not be acquainted with there, on here there’ll be some fun negative ones from time to time I’m sure. This is because I have a bunch of crappy mid-90’s “alternative” records lying around by bands like Silverchair I bought when I was a young moron. At some point, many of them might just get reviewed here. Also, if some artist is being splurged over by the critics at the moment, I might just download their album and trash it for fun (unless ofcourse I like it for some reason, in which case I wouldn’t). Because music critics suck. Well, not online ones. They’re fine. I mean “professional” critics. They’re the ones who suck. Anyhoo, onto the reviews.
Albums Reviewed:
At The Drive-In:
Live:
Oasis:
(What’s The Story) Morning Glory?
Our Lady Peace:
Happiness…Is Not A Fish That You Can Catch
Wilco:
Wolfmother:
At The Drive-In:
Relationship Of Command (2000)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “Invalid
Litter Dept.”
I’m probably gonna
catch some heat for this rating, but I honestly don’t care, because the next snowflake
I see fall will probably cause me to “pull an Artest”
and just swing randomly at a group of innocent bystanders. Try living in a tiny summer cottage with no
central heating at the bottom of a steep, winding, uneven, nearly-unplowable (and completely unshovelable)
driveway in the middle of winter. It
SUCKS MY ASS. I’m paying like $1,000 a
month for this goddamn thing, my pipes have frozen twice, I’ve run out of hot
water like two or three times, the driveway’s ridiculousness means it costs
about $300 to plow the thing every damn time (and it’s not like I have any
money! Hooray for tiny private school
intro-level salaries for teachers straight out college with no experience
whatsoever!), so fuck it, which means I’m back to walking up Mount Driveway
every goddamn day at 7:15am in 20 degree weather having eaten no food at all to
drive my 2-wheel-drive no-snow-tires Honda to school and teach little rich kids
LATIN. I actually like the teaching part. The kids love me, for some reason, except for
the occasional shit who doesn’t do any of their work, but fuck those
people. But it’d be nice if I had, you
know, A NORMAL FUCKING APARTMENT and didn’t feel like Grizzly Adams all the
fucking time. You know I actually have
to go outside to go to the bathroom? That’s a fun time at 3am in January, let
me tell you. The blizzard we had last
month was brilliant, too. Nothing like
waking up in the morning to find a three foot snow drift BLOCKING YOUR BATHROOM
DOOR. But it’s no big deal, because the
thriving cultural epicenter that is
No,
seriously. We have a sushi restaurant,
so we’re clearly all about the culture.
I swear I don’t spend my weekends driving past Billy Joel’s compound on
Center Island to the apartment of my only
friend on the entire island to watch foreign DVD’s, drink Newcastle, and
generally act pompous with him because we consider ourselves the only two
people who aren’t vacuous morons within a fucking 20-mile radius. One more year down here, this school’s Latin
program will have gone from a total disaster to relatively strong (no,
seriously, I’m actually good at my job), and I’m heading the fuck back to
And that, ofcourse, brings me to At the Drive-In, the precursor to
both The Mars Volta (reviewed elsewhere on this site, and a superior band to At the Drive-In) and
And I can definitely see the similarities between ATDI and the Mars Volta, from Cedric Zavala’s wailing vocals (which here are actually more in the “scream really loud and tunelessly” vein than the “Geddy Lee if he were less nasal and sounded like a human being” vein of his Mars Volta work) to Omar Rodriguez-Lopez’s frenetic guitar blasts to the fact that this album’s main flaw is its lack of focus, something that made De-Loused in the Comatorium an occasional chore to sit through, but I’m gonna claim that the music on that one is actually more melodic and interesting than the music here. Why’s that, you ask? Well, the Mars Volta lacked focus, but that’s because all their songs were like ten minutes long and they were clearly trying really, really hard to be Yes for the new millennium (but with balls instead of fruity fairy wings). Moments of that record were some of the most exhilarating and creative music I’d heard in years, and it was only the guys’ lack of ability to harness that brilliance into something immediately memorable within five seconds of hearing it that prevented them from a rating higher than 8. HERE, on the other hand, instead of making stuff long and multi-parted and elaborate, most of the songs are simply AS LOUD AND IN-YOUR-FACE AS THEY CAN POSSIBLY BE, and while this is just as exhilarating as the Mars Volta when you can find the focus and the guitar lines and melodies are immediately memorable (see “One Armed Scissor” and “Rolodex Propaganda,” among others), just as often the music here is a sonic assault without enough focus, structure, rhyme, or reason to make me even give a shit, let alone enjoy the song after digesting it (see “Mannequin Republic” for possibly the worst example of this).
And the thing is, there are some really creative and interesting guitar lines and sound effects scattered throughout the record, but the band too often chooses to rely on their visceral power (which is good, but it’s not like this is the Stooges we’re talking about…though Iggy Pop provides a guest vocal on “Rolodex Propaganda”) and declines to arrange their songs very well. Please proceed directly to “Go” and collect $200 if you can figure out that my favorite song here is “Invalid Litter Dept.,” a slow, meandering six-minute proggy epic that sounds exactly like something the Mars Volta would do. I like the intro parts to “Enfilade” too, with the bongos and shit (I generally like bongos, y’know), but while the closer “Non-Zero Possibility” is an effectively moody almost gothic-type ballad, the remaining song that does something else besides confusingly bash you over the head, “Quarantined,” sounds disappointingly like some random nu-metal ballad from a band like the Deftones or something. Other than the last 3+ songs I’ve mentioned, everything here is played FAST, LOUD, AND FRENETIC, which, as I said before, is good when the band can focus its energy, and admirable yet annoying when the band can’t.
By the way, is anyone else REALLY excited for the new Mars Volta album this March? Even if it sucks (which I think it might), I’m just psyched that a marginally-popular band (I saw their video on MTV2!) is such a group of unabashed seventies prog-fiends. There’s a song on there that’s THIRTY MINUTES LONG! Come on, you know that’s bad-ass.
In conclusion,
Joe Federico
writes:
I think I enjoyed your
Joe Federico
writes:
Not that the review was bad.
Nick Collings
(crawlaway@lycos.co.uk) writes:
I nearly choked when I saw
your low 7 rating for Relationship of Command - that's one of my favourite albums of the past 5 years! I like the
energy and conviction to the music, the likes of One Armed Scissors are top
draw hardcore songs which caught the band at their peak. I hear so many bands
influenced by this record since, it's starting to get
tiresome.
Live:
Throwing Copper (1994)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “White, Discussion”
I was at work today, tallying and editing away (I work for the Cue Guide, which is essentially the book here at Harvard that tells you what courses blow goats and what courses rule ass…so BOW DOWN BEFORE MY AWESOME RED POWER!!!!!!!!!!!!), and I put this baby into the ol’ computer for the final “pre-review” listen, all intent on giving it an 8, and by the time the album was done, I just thought, “what the fuck was I thinking? 8? EIGHT!!!????? My ASS!!!!!!!” You see, I realized that Ed Kowalchljkdfhjsdfhjdhfdf reminds me just enough of Bono in his persona and attitude to absolutely terrify me (not that I dislike U2, they’ve put out some damn good stuff, it’s just that they’ve sucked for a decade and yet still get fellated as the best band in the world despite being donkey-raping corporate whores…that’s all), and I also realized that “Lightning Crashes” (you know, the one with “placenta” in it) annoys me to NO END, and that about four or five other songs on here really have absolutely no reason to exist. And so I downgraded to the 7. And it’s not even close to an 8, either. I mean, solid 7, solid album, three or four songs that most definitely give me a boner, but…8? What was I thinking?
Anyhoo, one problem I have with this record is the religious/spiritual/social conscience overtones all over the place, which U2 does also, but they’re a far superior band (or WERE), so they do it much more cleverly, without resorting to vomit-inducing lyrics like “Yeahhhh, now we won’t be raped, yeahhhhh, now we won’t be scarred like that” (from “Selling The Drama,” which is otherwise a good song, actually), and that “placenta” bullshit in “Lightning Crashes” that makes that fucking song one of the most annoying hit singles of the past decade. There’s stuff about god in here, too, trust me (I did say “religious/spiritual,” didn’t I?), but I can’t give you anything specific right now, because I’m a lazy fucking jackass douchebag prick.
There ARE some superb songs on this record, though. “I Alone” and “All Over You” were both very deserved hit singles, and the two “epic” songs at the end of the record really tie this puppy together. “Pillar Of Davidson” is sort of country-ish, maybe, but I think it’s superb, and that “the shepheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerds!!!!!!” thing in the chorus really gets my gander up. “White, Discussion,” then (yeah, with the fucking comma in it…assplugs), is an EXCELLENT song and by far the best on the record. The energy! The anger! That cool pseudo-echoey guitar tone! “LOOK WHERE ALL THIS TALKIN’ GOT US, BABY!!!!!!!!!!!” Good stuff, it is. There’s a bunch of other solid tunes around here somewhere. “The Dam At Otter Creek” is an effective sort of moody opener thingy. “Iris” is OK. I quite like the “Top,” actually, even though it’s in the middle of the “bullshit stupid songs interrupted by ‘All Over You’ to lessen the impact” section of the album. The untitled hardcore-country-sounding song at the end is nice, too, for some reason.
But, ohhh, is there some shit. This thing is so far from being an 8, I REALLY don’t know what I was thinking. Besides “Lightning Crashes,” most of it comes together after “All Over You” finishes. “Shit Towne” is a perfect example of something I HATE, which is when the verses and chorus sound like they’re from COMPLETELY DIFFERENT SONGS. Like, Ed’s crooning on about mailmen or something, then the song just stops and goes “Gotta live gotta live gotta live…in SHIT TOWNE!!!” Bullshit, it is. “T.B.D.” (an abbreviation for “Tibetan Book of the Dead,” because Ed Kowalcauoyrashrjhajfhdsfhsadhf is a loser) is boring and goes nowhere. “Stage” is an AWFUL near-punk number that shows why U2 never tried to do any punk songs. “Waitress” is one of those songs whose “opening” makes you think you’re already two minutes into the song instead of at the start (you know what I mean), and has ridiculously inane subject matter (“Come on baby leave some change behind, she was a bitch, but I don’t care…”). Crap. Fucking uber-crap. This stretch isn’t enough to drag the album any lower than a 7, because there’s still plenty of good material, but the fact I was ready to give this album an 8 just proves, once and for all, that I am an idiot.
Now, I’d like to pass along a funny story. I currently have this album on mp3 (and burned CD), but I used to own the actual CD. That is, until it was STOLEN. Seriously. In middle school, I was in some bullshit English workshop or something (I really forget what it was), and the kids would usually take their discmans or walkmans or whatever to the computer lab from the English classroom when we were gonna type something. I took my discman and a different CD (there’s about a 50/50 chance it was Nevermind, I’d guess, being middle school), and left this CD in the room in my bag with like two or three others. So, I came back to class, and the CD had been STOLEN! But the other ones were still there! This confused me, and it still confuses me. I think I had like Green Day or Soundgarden in there too, or at least something with more commercial cache than this album. Weird. I wouldn’t think Live fans would be petty thiefs, but eh.
Funny story, huh? I guess you had to be there.
BITCH.
Oasis:
(What’s The Story) Morning Glory? (1995)
Rating: 8
Best Song: “Don’t Look Back In Anger”
I have no problem with imitations and recycling of other bands’ styles. The Smashing Pumpkins are one of my favorite bands, and I’m not gonna stand here and pretend they were that original. Kurt Cobain himself all but called Nirvana “The Pixies Jr.” But, you see, I DO have a problem when such an imitation takes on a life of its own, and an entire band’s philosophy, look, and attitude are a purposeful and admitted ripoff of another band. If that “other band” is the Beatles, then I’ll admit the band in question has picked a pretty good model. But do the lead singer and guitarist REALLY have to grow moptops? Does the lead singer REALLY have to try to sound EXACTLY like John Lennon whenever possible? Do you, Liam?
I’ll answer for you, Liam. No, you don’t, and the only reason I give this record an 8 is that a lot of the songs are reallllllly good, despite my general contempt for your band’s, ahem, “philosophy,” i.e.: “to rip off the Beatles whenever possible and then brag about it.” I also don’t like the fact that, unlike your pretty nice brother and lead songwriter Noel, you, Liam Gallagher, are a whiney, drunk, asshole piece of SHIT. I SAW your “Behind The Music” episode. I couldn’t understand a goddamn word you said your entire interview, you alcoholic mother-FUCKER. “Mumble mumble mumble” is not a valid answer to a question. And sitting in the balcony while heckling your brother and drinking a beer is NOT a valid way to spend an Oasis concert, since YOU’RE THE LEAD FUCKING SINGER, you cunt!
But enough about how Oasis are a bunch of fucking ripoff ass pirates, because for this album they’ve written some pretty damn good songs, and I, reluctantly, shall recognize this. Personally, I can’t find too much of a difference between too many of them, but shit like “Roll With It” and “Some Might Say” are damn good, catchy, and memorable, even if Liam Gallagher is a dickwad. The bombastic, helicopter intro to “Morning Glory” I could do without, though, even if it’s not a bad song, because, remember, Oasis have about as much originality as my left toe, so there’s no need for such things, nor is there need for such thirty-second filler tracks as “Swamp Song (Version 1)” and “Swamp Song (Version 2),” because they’re just a fucking Beatles tribute band. If you object to that, always remember, THIS IS WHAT THE BAND THEMSELVES SAY.
But if they continue to write such wonderful songs as the two hit singles (“Wonderwall” and “Don’t Look Back In Anger”) I will temporarily look the other way and sing along, because those are GREAT songs! I remember “Wonderwall” was absolutely HUGE in 8th grade for me. One day about half of my first period homeroom class held a roundtable discussion on “Wonderwall.” There was a math lesson going on as well, but none of us really paid much attention. I can’t believe such a fucking blatant ripoff band as this can move me, but “Wonderwall” really does. And “Don’t Look Back In Anger” (despite the first five seconds being a direct carbon copy ripoff of “Imagine”) moves me even MORE. To its credit, after those first few seconds, it turns into something that sounds not a whit like “Imagine,” and is a truly awesome song. I wuv it very much.
The other song I especially enjoy (besides the two hit singles) is the long closer “Champagne Supernova”(hey…I like the three most popular tracks the most…I guess I’m even more of a ripoff than the band themselves! Oh well.). Even if, like the stupid helicopter thing, it is completely and unnecessarily pretentious for a band such as this (why are there WATER NOISES?), it’s not like Creed doesn’t act a billion times more pretentious, and they, in addition to being as much of a ripoff as Oasis, can’t even write a fucking good song, so I’ll allow it. The water sounds actually give it sort of an epic feel, and instead of being JUST acoustic or JUST electric like everything else here, the Gallaghers manage to stick both versions of an Oasis song (no piano, though) into it (they’d better, it’s seven minutes). I do love the “na na na”’s at the end over all the guitar solos. That’s pretty cool. Even if Liam Gallagher is a big, fat dick who thinks it’s cool that he rips off the Beatles.
But,
besides all the Beatles-ness, one thing bothers me about this record above all,
and that is the title. If you took off
the parentheses, it’s “Morning Glory?” with a question mark. That’s a good question, Liam. It could use a verb, though, you fucking
alcoholic asshole bitch.
Our
Lady Peace:
Clumsy (1997)
Rating: 8
Best Song: “Superman’s Dead”
In my continuing quest to review all the random nineties rock albums I have lying around that I bought during my awkward middle and high school years (not to be confused with my awkward college years, because, um…I’m in college, now, I guess…yes, my roommate is one of my best friends from high school…no, I haven’t suddenly become a pimp…yes, I’m still studying Latin all the time…yes, my dorm room is a twenty minute drive from my house…yes, my sister is now at the same college I am…as well as five other high school classmates…not counting my roommate…yes, I still make dumb sports jokes for two hours a day with the Moonman…yes, I still look exactly the same as I did five years ago, except for a different haircut…CAN WE JUST FUCKING DROP IT!!!!!?????? IT’S DIFFERENT, I SWEAR!!!!), I dug this baby up out of my CD pile a few days ago. I remembered liking it a good bit, and thinking there were a bunch of awesome jerk-my-chicken songs combined with a few half-assed tunes near the end. And, though my attitude towards many of my old favorites has changed over time (since I discovered fucking E.L.P., dude! *WEIRD DOODLY SYNTH NOISE!!!!*), I can safely say I feel the same way about this record as I did five-odd years ago, back when my sporting endeavors consisted solely of intramural basketball. Ah, good times.
Oh, wait, the only sport I play NOW is intramural basketball. FUCK. OK, let’s move on…
Anyhoo, what strikes me about this record is the sequencing. Like, if you wanted to write a blueprint for a mid-late nineties “alternative” rock record, just look at this baby. You first must have TWO singles, a hard-rocking energetic one (“Superman’s Dead” (you know, that “the world’s a subwaaaaay” song…oh man, DOUBLE FUCKING PARENTHESES!!!)), and a slower, softer, almost-ballad-but-not-quite, “sorta makes you think” song (the title track). The faster one must be placed as the album’s leading track and released as the first single, while the softer one is to be placed midway through the record (preferably breaking up the “half-assed song” sequence which inevitably takes over the second half) and released as single #2. Following said leadoff energetic single, place several (between two and four, in this case three) songs that sound like they COULD have been singles (“Automatic Flowers,” “Carnival,” “Big Dumb Rocket”), but aren’t QUITE as good as the lead track, and so aren’t. After this string of near-first-tier-but-not-quite songs, the token ballad (“4 A.M.”) must be placed. This song’s percussion must kick in AFTER chorus #1, and BEFORE verse #2. Adding a second instrument (guitar added to organ, guitar tone #2, etc.) right at start of chorus #1 is recommended. The creepy, atmospheric, overtly arty closer that doesn’t make any goddamn sense with the rest of the album (“Car Crash”) must then be placed at album’s close. A time signature other than 4/4 (3/4 or more complicated if the band is able…in this case, 3/4) is recommended. In between token ballad and atmospherically arty closer, place as many half-assed songs as needed to make album total forty-five minutes (remembering to intersperse mellow single #2 to lessen effect of so many half-assed songs in a row). If you follow these simple instructions, my friend, YOU TOO can have a hit nineties alternative rock record!
Yeah, I still gave it an 8, though. So you can bite me. The fact remains that even if the sequencing and types of songs on a given album are REALLY predictable, that doesn’t matter if the songs themselves are good. And the songs here are! “Superman’s Dead” is a FANTASTIC single, and so is “Clumsy.” The “doo-doo-doo” (MY THING!) opening and only-organ-and-drums beginning sections of “Automatic Flowers” rule. “Car Crash” is neat, and Raine “The only singers with a voice more nasal than mine are Geddy Lee and Billy Corgan” Maida hits this ultra-high-pitched note near the end that always gives me chills. And, except for one (“The Story Of 100 Aisles”), the half-assed song sequence is not bad at all, with the other three (“Shaking, “Hello Oskar,” “Let You Down”) coming in as decidedly un-annoying. I mean, this album’s not a slam-dunk 8 or anything, and I debated “8 or 7? 8 or 7? 8 OR FUCKING 7???????” for a while, but the fact that I’ve had a copy of this thing since I was like 15 and I remember a random music video show that came on Channel 38 at like 2am playing “Superman’s Dead” EVERY FUCKING WEEK for a while pretty much wins out here.
Plus they’re Canadian. So that’s always cool, eh?
Oh, random comment time. FUCKIN’ A, did these guys sell out recently. I mean, this album sounds like fucking Tool or something compared to that “Somewhere Out There” song. Have you heard that thing? Give Raine Maida some hairspray and pink spandex pants and he might as well be Bret fucking Michaels. God, that song is bullshit.
Mike Noto
(thepublicimage79@hotmail.com) writes:
I fucking hate this band like
the plague. Raine Maida has the worst voice of
any human being on the planet. It grates on me beyond anything. Yes. Even
beyond Geddy Lee. Do you fucking hear that? I'd
rather listen to an a
capella CD of Geddy Lee
huffing glue than these hacks. None of the riffs are
any good and Maida's just...awful. It's beyond comprehension how bad this
fucker's voice is.
Sorry, just wanted to get that off my chest.
Happiness…Is Not A Fish That You Can Catch (1999)
Rating: 8
Best Song: “Annie”
You
know, I think I’m beginning to like this band more than I thought I would. Right near the end of this past school year,
one of my buddies in the band (the marching band, not a REAL one, I’m a dork,
remember) sent a mass band mailing saying he had a bunch of old CD’s that he
didn’t want anymore and was giving away.
I saw this one on the list, so I snatched it up, never figuring it would
be any better than the other record by these four hardy Canuck Nordiques I’ve reviewed above. Shockingly, it WAS! A
And the main reason is the SOUND. These guys, on this record, have a GREAT sound worked out. That’s why I loved it so much when I first listened to it. The SOUND, man. Goofy little synth touches battling with neat spiky guitars, usually unorthodox melodies, and superb, full production. Awesome. And Raine Maida has harnessed that goofy, nasal, cracking voice of his much more than on Clumsy, where, occasionally, he was just annoying. It’s weird how he sings nasally, like Billy Corgan or something, for a certain range, but then, at like a fixed point, he switches to this odd falsetto. Very interesting voice. And, like I said, he knows what he’s doing with it now! Like on the chorus to “Happiness And The Fish,” for instance. Where he sings “Boooooooored AGAAAAAAAAAAIN!!” and cracks it on “again.” I LOVE that. I think his voice fits PERFECTLY this sound the band’s worked out. Better than the more generic-sounding last album, at least.
So, now
that I’ve raved about the sound so much, why isn’t the rating higher than
8? Well, therein lies the rub. Once I worked my way past how much I absolutely
ADORE the sound and production on this album, I was able to actually
concentrate on the songs themselves, and see which melodies were indeed
unorthodox and whether any generic crap songs had slipped by me on that first
listen or two. Turns out, a few
did! Thus the lower rating. I mean, most of these songs still rule. “One Man Army” has a weird melody for a single,
but it’s good stuff. I love “Annie” more
than the rest here just because of the piano they use in the chorus, and
because THAT melody is even weirder than the one in “One Man Army.” I already mentioned “Happiness And The
Fish.” Raine
really works the soaring falsetto chorus there, as he does in “Blister,” with
that “what if I waaaaaaaaas…there?” thing. Again, I REALLY have to admire him here. With such an unorthodox voice and mannerisms,
he could easily fuck up the songs, but here it just first
PERFECTLY in with the song, the sound, etc.
Good stuff.
Most everything on here is good, but
there ARE a few stinkers and near-stinkers. “Waited” reeks of stale genericism
and blows a fat goat until it spews salami lava into the henhouse (and, no, I
don’t understand what I just typed either…just sort of popped into my
head! I’M DISTURBED!!!!! DOOBLEDY-DOO!!!!!!!!). Nothing except the closing track blows as
much as that tune, but “Thief” and “Lying Awake” don’t do so much for me. GOD, does the closer, “Stealing Babies,” SUCK
ASS PELLETS, though. See, throughout the
album there’s this weird wannabe-art rock vibe going on, although the band
never really goes beyond regular song structures (just using the neat sound
they’ve worked out and which I’ve fellated so much to let us know that, um,
they’re serious artists now, y’know), but
for “Stealing Babies,” here, they attempt to actually DO a multi-part art-rock
suite-type song, and it BLOWS. The song
gets jerked back and forth between these super-fast sections and these other,
PAINFULLY slow “moody” sections that just don’t work at ALL and sound hideously
out of place. Shit, it is. Fucking piece of crap way to end an otherwise
excellent album on, too.
I dunno,
maybe it’s a Canadian thing, eh?
Wilco:
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (2002)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “Heavy Metal Drummer”
OK, I don’t get this one. Critics splurged all over it like they were masturbating to a picture of Heidi Klum taking one doggystyle when the thing got released, calling it like “heartfelt singer-songwriter-ship crossed with Kid A” or some shit (and, if you compare ANYTHING to Kid A, that’s sure to get my gander up, y’know). Plus, there was that whole “their original record company wouldn’t release it, so they switched companies (or just fought really hard or some shit, fuck if I remember) to get it released, and if a record company ass-clown doesn’t like it, it must be good!” thing. So I’ll admit, I was curious. I didn’t know dogshit about Wilco, but I went and downloaded the thing, expecting to find it both achingly beautiful and curiously odd. Just like Kid A is, really.
Alas, it is neither of these things. First, it’s not really all that odd. All the band does is intersperse weird guitar noises or keyboard things or just general odd noise in the songs at often-inappropriate times (sometimes they just put fucking stupid noises in for whole last 30 goddamn seconds of a song). That’s not “experimental!” The song structures are still normal! I could write normal songs and put weird noises that sound like crap in them! Fuckers. And, about being “achingly beautiful?” Well, maybe it could be. If it didn’t have all those stupid noises in it. So what you’re left with is just to look for catchiness, melodies, and songcraft, no longer trying to find the life-altering experience the critics told you to expect.
And these things are HARD to find, mind you, because the band made everything so “atmospheric” (they really can’t do atmosphere…it just comes out sounding boring whenever they try). When I first listened to this thing, I thought, except for a handful of upbeat, catchy, fun songs (that STILL had dumb atmospheric noises in them no one wants to hear), it was just, like, the MOST BORING fucking thing I had ever heard, and I was gonna give it a 5. Yeah, a fucking 5. Then I listened to it a few more times, decided “hey some of these songs are pretty cool, though half of it still doesn’t do much for me,” and thought it worthy of a 6. Then I listened to it a few more times, decided “hey, you know, except for like 2 or 3 tunes, everything here is pretty solid and well-written,” and thought it worthy of a 7. Then I listened to it a few more times. And it’s still worthy of a 7. It’s not going any higher. I’m rating the goddamn Our Lady Peace album higher. So now you know where my biases lie, I guess, huh?
But back to the music, and that “god, everything is so goddamn boring” impression is partly the sequencing’s fault, as the band decided to put the two most useless songs OF ALL TIME (“I Am Trying To Break Your Heart” and “Reservations”) at the start and end of the record. They’re just NOTHING but atmosphere. And I already told you what happens when this record goes for atmosphere. It SUCKS, that’s what. “Ashes Of American Flags,” placed RIGHT in the middle of the album (What, to be a “crushing centerpiece?” My ASS!), has this same problem. Give me something to grab onto! I can NOT grab onto 5 or 6 minutes of useless, atmospheric, melody-less dicking! NO ONE can!
There are 8 more songs on the album, though, and, after many repeated listens, ALL of them have something tasty to offer in the melody department. Thus I begrudgingly offer up a 7 to a record I’m not even sure I like all that much. My favorite is “Heavy Metal Drummer,” mainly because the weird noises in there actually ENHANCE the song, instead of taking away from it. There’s this weird mid-‘70’s prog-sounding synth loop thing that repeats a bunch of times for no reason, and I think it’s fucking superb. “I’m The Man Who Loves You” SHOULD be the best song here. The chorus is EASILY the catchiest thing on the record (not even close), and it has these awesome horn and piano parts throughout, but the main musical basis of the song is this UGLY, ULTRA-distorted, and, above all, HIDEOUSLY UGLY guitar line that just makes me want to throw up. I mean, it doesn’t RUIN the song or anything, but I really wish it would go away. Let me sing along! Stop FUCKING IT UP! Ugh.
The rest is solid, but some have the same sort of “added atmosphere = shit” problem. I don’t much like that violin line in “Jesus Etc.,” for instance, though I DO enjoy the keyboard (?) things in “War On War.” “Pot Kettle Black,” which is more or less lacking in the strange noises department, though it’s got a few subtle things in there, just reinforces my opinion that these guys should LAY OFF the fucking atmospheric shit and, you know, WRITE SONGS. They write good ones! Hell, even the songs like “Radio Cure” that have about as much energy as a sloth on marijuana have a pretty melody line that pops up now and again amid the slow, boring slop. Whoever’s idea it was to try and “be like Radiohead” or whatever should just be shot. Seriously. No one wants to listen to “Ashes Of American Flags.” Just go away.
Apparently, Wilco’s other albums are normal, though. Or so I hear. Maybe I’ll check ‘em out. If you stripped the atmospheric dicking off this record here, I’d heartily recommend it. Alas, I can’t, however. Because of the dicking. The DEEP, DEEP, DEEP dicking.
Oleg
Sobolev (dima@aspol.ru) writes:
After listening to Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot a lot of times (15 or something,
like that), I still can't remember a single song (apart from "Heavy Metal
Drummer" and "Jesus, etc."), but, man, is this album (surprise!
surprise!) atmospheric and beautiful. If I could write songs like "Ashes
Of American's Flag" which haven't got melody, but still fucking rules, I
would consider myself a REALLY great songwriter.
o.hugues@wanadoo.fr
writes:
Hi. I agree with Oleg (which
is a sort of scoop :O). The album is beautiful. But since you're a Zephead, you really should listen to "Being There"
and "Summerteeth", they will be more
listenable to your ears, I think - "Summerteeth"
is a *real* masterpiece.
Justin Nierenhausen
(jhausen@gmail.com) writes:
Just got done reading your
review of Yankee hotel foxtrot and I just
wanted to say that you could not be more on. Listening to the record
a few months back I was thinking the same thing; this album is fucking
boring, and layering a bunch of noise on top of a basic song structure
does not equal experimentation, it is just really stupid. Repeated
listens have only increased my dislike for this album unlike you, but
I think I am in a minority about that album any way.
Also I thought hot fuse was better than you say it is. I understand
were you are coming from though, and I would probably classify it as a
guilty pleasure. Since there is an anonymity here I does not matter
if I admit to you that I like this album, but I will probably never
say that to anyone I actually know.
Wolfmother:
Wolfmother (2006)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “Love
Train”
Another hot new band Al likes and sends me the album of, another 7 I slap on a hot new band Al likes and sends me the album of. Wolfmother are from Australia and are really neat and fun in theory in that their singer has a giant white man’s curly brown afro, they have naked chicks with big tits popping out of the ocean on their album cover for no reason, they make no attempt to be hip, indie, emo, or any other such thing, and they think it’s actually 1975 and you’re still allowed to make Led PurpleSabbath metal rock with organs and a Jethro Tull-esque jazz flute solo without being ironic about it (news flash: YOU CAN’T!!! DOUCHE!!!! *Kills self*). That being said, I feel that most of the time I’m getting an imitation/regurgitation of some pretty bad-ass pothead guitar god longhair influences from this record than I am a relatively new-ish sound that kicks smokin’ ass (see the first Secret Machines record for an example of a “relatively new-ish sound that kicks smokin’ ass.” That album owns so hard!). They’re fun, though.
Oh, you know what else you should probably toss into the Led PurpleSabbath stew here? The White Stripes! If I had to describe this band as one thing in a quick little soundbite, I’d say “the White Stripes crossed with Led Zeppelin.” Obviously, such a characterization would lead you to believe this band was one of the greatest bands on the face of the earth in their ability to combine the massive awesomeness and pure hard rock brilliance of Led Zeppelin with the charming lo-fi blues-rock variety of the White Stripes, and you’d be right if they had come up a set of songs as good as either one of those bands, but alas they have not! Except for one that totally kicks that I’ll get to in a bit, these songs are good, but they’re not great, and that comment I made in the first paragraph about being a regurgitation of good influences seems to become more accurate every time I listen to this album. This is a band that enjoys using BIG, LOUD, HEAVY, SIMPLE, yet CATCHY guitar riffs and repeating them ad nauseum with their pounding Led Zeppelin drums and wailing androgynous afro-ed lead singer with tight pants until they stick in your head and you think you’re in 1975 listening to the first half of Physical Graffiti or something, but the guitars are also (mostly) pretty gruff and grimy, to the point where they sound like they come from a White Stripes record, only one with a little better production than normal. The pounding hammer of the gods drums, while not Meg White retarded, are simple and follow the guitar riffs a lot (just like a White Stripes record!), and the aforementioned wailing androgynous lead singer guy with tight pants uses an upper register that sounds not like Robert Plant but like…Jack White! From…the White Stripes! If Jack White was Australian, thought it was 1975, didn’t care about being cool, looked like an extra from Dazed and Confused, and wasn’t as good of a songwriter as he is, he would totally be in this band.
Look, this
is an album that contains lines like “Purple haze is in the sky!” and “Go and
see the sorcerer and look into the ball!”
If you don’t like Zeppelin, Sabbath, Purple, Hendrix, etc., there is no
way in hell you’ll like this, and if you do you’ll probably just think it’s
neat. But it is! It’s neat.
“Woman” has this great driving riff and is one of the few songs that
decides to book along at a speedier pace instead of being as fucking heavy as it wants to be (like
“Colossal,” which might have like four chords in it but is fucking heavy and kicks! Oh,
and then it goes into a totally mediocre fast section that makes this
parenthesis completely worthless. Go
me). The spiraling guitar riff thing in
“The Joker and the Thief” is pretty sweet, and “Apple Tree” is actually crap
(and I probably should have started a new sentence with it). This band may be White Stripes-influenced, but this is the only time
where they sound like a White Stripes tribute band for an entire song, and it’s
something they should probably avoid doing.
You know those fast, sloppy “Fell in Love with a Girl”-type songs the
White Stripes always do? Picture that
type of song, except horrible. Now you
know what “Apple Tree” sounds like. Good
times, eh?
Oh, they’re not just brainless
headbanging potheads.
Their influences weren’t, so why would they be? They’ve got all sorts of tasty organs and
crap in songs like “Mind’s Eye” like Deep Purple used to use back in the day,
and “Tales” actually sounds like the Beatles circa-1966 (or, more accurately,
Jet covering the Beatles circa-1966)
before being hijacked by another crap White Stripes tribute song that’s almost
as bad as “Apple Tree” but not quite.
Other influences! Otherwise,
though, the influences you’d expect filtered through the lo-fi
instincts of the White Stripes with a singer who sounds a hell of a lot like
Jack White. Except “Love Train!” That song’s awesome. It grooves so good with all these auxiliary
percussion doohickies, the riff is a danceable,
ultra-butt-shaking masterpiece, and the singer guy’s relatively restrained
vocals (“what did you see, girl, on the love train?”) are a perfect fit. It’d be a fantastic song for one of those iPod commercials where the outline of a person dances
against a brightly-colored background, which is fantastic because it was! So you’ve probably heard “Love Train” before
on an iPod commercial. Doesn’t it kick?
This is a fun little band, and
I’m always supportive of groups that clearly find Led Zeppelin to be god, but
they need a few more “Love Train”’s and a few less slavish
White Stripes ripoffs before I give them anything
higher than a 7. I bet they’re awesome
live, though. They just seem like they
would be. So I’d recommend seeing a live
concert of theirs, though I wouldn’t necessarily recommend purchasing their album
unless you’re predisposed to enjoy this type of music. Somehow, this makes perfect sense to me.