Staff Picks for April 2020
April 30, 2020
Marking the start of a period of prolific output, The Will to Death took a more minimalist turn than Frusciante's previous two albums (though not as harshly lo-fi as his first two), and resulted in one of his most coherent and least meandering solo recordings. Collaborating with his future RHCP seat-warmer, Josh Klinghoffer, Frusciante makes simplicity a virtue on aching cuts like "A Loop," "Far Away," and the title track.
April 29, 2020
As the title alludes, nearly every song revolves around a cruddy office job, getting sales reports together and drinking too much at the office. It really seems like (capital) ROCK & ROLL is Fountains of Wayne's only escape from their "Office Space" existence, until the band launches into a '70s AM radio pleading with the diner waitress to bring more coffee or a dead-on honky tonk weeper that should have been written in Nashville 50 years ago.
April 28, 2020
Building on the guttural impact of the Human Waste EP, the Long Island death metal kings took things to the next level on their full-length debut. "Liege of Inveracity" is credited for inspiring the entire slam movement, and how many bands can boast about creating a whole scene with a single riff?
![The Saint [Original Soundtrack]](https://fastly-s3.allmusic.com/release/mr0002766213/front/400/va_WFspdMlj30gWPCX-MlypQg_7iAU1wjqLgK_xGXts=.jpg)
April 27, 2020
Original Soundtrack
While the film of Val Kilmer's take on James Bond/Mission Impossible was mostly uninteresting, the soundtrack hit a pivotal point in mainstream electronic music's growing popularity. Daft Punk, Moby and Underworld offer perfect snapshots of what was happening in studios around the world, and the soundtrack pulled together some sharp remixes of tracks by Sneaker Pimps, the Chemical Brothers and a sparse, groove-laden Luscious Jackson mix.
April 26, 2020
The debut album of New York musician Evan Shornstein's quasi-electronic project was inspired by both nature and technology, and how they overlap in this era of climate change and social-media reliance. It's fitting, then, that he employs analog and digital as well as natural and synthetic sound sources, relying to varying degrees on field recordings, samples, acoustic instruments, synthesizers, and computers for his compositions, some of which are simply songs. For its somewhat lofty inspirations and complex construction, the album makes for a fun listen, one full of whimsy and musicality.
April 25, 2020
A band clearly comfortable with observing the collapse of the culture from their barstools, Protomartyr are arguably the most important group to emerge from Detroit since Jack White reminded people the city existed. 2017's Relatives in Descent balances brains and brawn with remarkable skill, and Joe Casey's lyrics introduce beat poetry stream of consciousness to articulate noise rock like Captain Beefheart pretending he's Delmore Schwartz.
April 24, 2020
Mostly using the pedal steel guitar and the recording studio as instruments, Johnson manages to assemble a labyrinthine journey through light, twilight, darkness, and emotional states of being to offer musical images of the physical world.
April 23, 2020
On paper, the pure pop overload promised by this supergroup from members of Cheap Trick, Smashing Pumpkins, Fountains of Wayne and ...Hanson(?) should be teeth-sweatingly clean and sweet, but in reality the album bites and soars with screaming guitars and snarky, sneering harmonies. If summer ever comes, this is a great album to hear blasting out of car windows.
April 22, 2020
Critically-derided for its hopeful pop direction (even by yours truly), this bittersweet set ended up being the final chapter in the band's story with the late Chester Bennington. Three years later and as genre boundaries have been further blurred, the album benefits from hindsight and the fact that it's one of the last chances to hear Chester's voice. This isn't to say it's great, but given the current state of the world, it's worth a revisit.
April 21, 2020
Harpist/songwriter Joanna Newsom took enormous leaps in terms of ambition from one album to the next, moving from the theatrical beauty and fantastical string arrangements of 2005's Ys to the incredibly dense emotional chronicle that was her third album 2010's Have One On Me. With a daunting running time of more than two hours, each of the album's 18 songs stretched out in its own way, from head-spinningly complex arrangements to head-first lyrical dives into vulnerability and raw emotions..
April 20, 2020
The former Fairport Convention singer's excellent third solo outing sees a continued shift toward the American folk-rock style that was a hallmark of his previous band's early sound.
April 19, 2020
Various Artists
Smithsonian Folkways released this collection of nature sounds interpolated with the music of Central Asia, combining the sounds of streams and wind with the droning otherworldly compositions of the inhabitants of Tuva and Sakha. The last full song on the album, "Chiraa-Xor," offering a terrific example of the guttural, whistling, cyclical Tuvan throat singing performed by Huun-Huur Tu.
April 18, 2020
The liner notes for Amp's contribution to Darla's Bliss Out series state "Careful how far you let yourself drift -- we have encountered difficulties 'returning' from this one." No kidding. These four 20-minute improvisations, recorded in a single, rainy day, are like music hovering on the very edge of human consciousness, torn between impulses of heading towards the light and coming back down home to earth. Unfathomably deep listening.
April 17, 2020
Hamiet Bluiett was the widely regarded baritone saxophonist in the World Saxophone Quartet and the Oliver Lake Quartet. This set, recorded live in Basel in 1991, was Bluiett's second solo date on record (the first being 1978's Birthright): solo meaning no rhythm section, no other horns, no piano, nothing. This album is just the man and his horns playing his highly individual compositions -- and improvising upon them -- for nearly an hour.
April 16, 2020
Released by Mango in July 1980, this was Black Uhuru's first internationally issued album. Although the group was nominally a trio at this point -- consisting of Derrick "Duckie" Simpson, Michael Rose, and Sandra "Puma" Jones -- in effect, this was a solo album by Rose, who wrote all the songs and sang lead vocals. In addition to his writing and singing duties, Rose can be credited for bringing in the production team and rhythm section of Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare, whose Taxi Gang provides the consistently distinctive musical tracks.
April 15, 2020
If you're stuck at home with lots of time on your hands, when better to get to know this notoriously long and diverse album? Sandinista! is eclectic to a fault, with its mix of punk, reggae, hip-hop, and anything else that struck the Clash's fancy, and they clearly didn't know how to wrap it up. But there are lots of brilliant tracks here; here the Clash threw every idea they had into the pot, at a time when they had enough good ideas that they could almost make it work.
April 14, 2020
Miranda Sex Garden vocalist/fiddler Jocelyn Montgomery and director/renaissance oddball David Lynch reconstruct the music of 12th century abbess Hildegard von Bingen, offering stark and echoing celebrations of the female voice coupled with Black Lodge-style sound constructions. At times beautiful and haunting, this is the perfect listen for an overcast spring morning.
April 13, 2020
On their fourth effort, the band abandoned the Asian and Indian influences from their prior album in favor of more traditional Western melody, as well as science fiction and religious imagery. Keyboards come to the fore in the album's centerpiece, "Have You Heard/The Voyage," a Mike Pinder tour de force and a wonderful piece of progressive psychedelia.
April 12, 2020
Guitarist David Torn, bassist Mick Karn, and drummer Terry Bozzio play more than 20 instruments in this far-reaching musical experiment. Led by Torn's fractured melodies, these ten tracks present a tribal jazz ambiance and astonishing, near-constant guitar and bass dialogue from the guitarist and bassist. Bozzio's expressionist percussion stylings are also world-class to carry the Polytown sound beyond the noodling and self-indulgence most supergroup recordings indulge.
April 11, 2020
Producer Maurice Fulton and vocalist Mutsumi Kanamori have made one of those albums where the song titles ("Let's Get Sick," "Destroying Human Nature," etc.) provide some indication of what to expect. And yet nothing short of complete knowledge of Fulton's background could prepare you for this lunatic jumble of electro-punk, left-field house, and flat-out noise. Lovers of smooth, pure deep-house should duck and cover.
April 10, 2020
The songwriter's last significant recording includes ten of his best-known compositions, including standards "Georgia on My Mind," "Skylark," and "Lazy River." What's unusual about these sessions is that he's accompanied by an 11-piece all-star jazz group and that his voice takes its turn with trumpeters Harry "Sweets" Edison and Don Fagerquist, altoist Art Pepper, and pianist Jimmy Rowles. The match -up works quite well, for Hoagy's songs have long been viable devices for jazz improvising.
April 9, 2020
Released in 1967, The Byrds' fourth album found them augmenting their signature folk rock jangle with more jazz-inflected and psychedelic styles. David Crosby was particularly adventurous with his songs on the album, getting into a sweetly hushed place with "Everybody's Been Burned" and a more indulgent headspace with "Mind Gardens."
April 8, 2020
Taking the cold synth feel from New Order and incorporating live drum tracks (reminiscent of their geographic neighbors Tortoise), Midwest Product's debut bloops and grooves with a unique hybrid of electronic and organic sounds. Alternating between glitchy and funky, the presence is unobtrusive and atmospheric enough to be background music but complex and textured enough to reward listeners on headphones.
April 7, 2020
A hi-fi classic with some fantastic playing, Martyn's 1980 release offers terse, honest songwriting that reflects on the end of his marriage backed by a tight band that includes Phil Collins on drums.
April 6, 2020
It's 1978: Neil Young hears about punk rock, decides he likes it, and sets aside the country rock of Comes a Time for the subsequent tour. He records a few shows, and the result is Rust Never Sleep, with five tracks of acoustic Neil at his most quietly impassioned, and four electric tracks with Crazy Horse loud enough to make the Sex Pistols seem quaint. My my, hey hey indeed.
April 5, 2020
There are dozens of compilations by Cameroonian saxophonist Manu Dibango, who brought the sound of his trademark "Soul Makossa" to Europe, the United States, Asia, and beyond. This one is unique. Its 17 previously unreleased tracks, recorded in France and New York between 1971 and 1975, were written and recorded for soundtracks and library recordings, and offers the many sides of one of Africa’s and the world’s most diverse musicians at his very best.
April 4, 2020
Twenty years on, saxophonist Mark Shim's Turbulent Flow still crackles with an inventive artistic energy. A vibrant improviser whose soulfully architectural sound builds upon Wayne Shorter and Joe Henderson, Shim has recorded with brainy heavyweights like Vijay Iyar, Luis Perdomo, and Rez Abassi. Here, on his third Blue Note release, he offers a textural, hard-swinging set featuring pianist Edward Simon, vibraphonist Stefon Harris, bassist Drew Gress, and drummer Eric Harland. His rhythmically kinetic reading of Henderson's "Recorda Me" perfectly showcases his ability to rework his influences. However, it's his originals like the propulsive "Survival Tactics" that stick with you.
April 3, 2020
This throbbing gem is a highlight in an already top-shelf discography, the closest to full-on glam that the electronic duo have managed to date. As Alison Goldfrapp drapes her painfully sexy vocals atop Will Gregory's pulsing production, the best of the pair's dance-loving sides shines on neon earworms like "Ooh La La" and "Ride a White Horse." Beyond the singles, check out deep cuts "Slide In" and "Satin Chic."
April 2, 2020
Longtime oldies radio staples with songs like "Remember (Walking in the Sand)" and "Leader of the Pack," The Shangri-Las also released a healthy selection of lesser-known teenage symphonies to God that should not be missed. Highlights include the charming and bittersweet "Train from Kansas City" which was covered by Neko Case and the surprisingly soulful "I'm Blue" (originally recorded by The Ikettes).
April 1, 2020
Recently reissued, Vladislav Delay's 2000 Chain Reaction full-length is a remarkable set of abstractions, morphing from glitchy, half-melted dub to insectoid techno. The vast, 22-minute "Huone" is the most danceable track here, pointing the way towards his more refined work as Luomo, but the true beauty is in how utterly strange and alien pieces like "Viite" sound. Up there with the immersive, sprawling Anima as his best work.