Elliot Schneider - Don't Put All Your Eggs in One Basketcase (2017)

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Written by David Shouse, posted by blog admin

Elliot Schneider’s musical career is, in some ways, a microcosm about the rock and roll experience in the second half of the 20^th century and beyond. Schneider’s talents as a composer and musician are great enough that they earned the attention of luminaries like Les Paul and Schneider’s later musical acts like his band the Pitts played live in seminal venues such as New York City’s CBGB’s and move in the same circles as iconic performers of that era such as Television and the Patti Smith Group. Schneider later followed another path, returning to college and embarking on a teaching career that sustained him until his recent retirement. Schneider, at this point, committed himself to playing music again in a much more public fashion and his fourth album, Don’t Put All Your Eggs in One Basketcase, serves as an excellent introduction for those unfamiliar with Schneider’s skills and a glorious affirmation and elaboration of his gifts for those already familiar with his work.

Many songwriters would love to have written “The Moon Has Flown Away” and the graceful, free-flowing unity of the music and lyrics is so natural that one can easily assume it emerged fully formed from Schneider’s imagination. He has organic, effortless pop inclinations thanks to the ingrained sense of melody he possesses and few songs on this release express those gifts as clearly as “The Moon Has Flown Away”. His love for traditional rock and roll gets a nice workout on “Diehard Killjoy”, but it’s more than just an entertaining raver. The deceptive simplicity might mean some overlook this tune, but that’s a mistake. Everything from the well-placed backing vocals, the transitions between verses continually winding themselves up and straight-ahead rock muscle, and tight interplay between the instruments makes this tune stand out as being far greater than the sum of its individual parts.

He throws some organ into the mix on the nostalgic “Lost on the Radio” and it adds a new dimension to the music that complements his lyrics and vocal style. “Captain Argent” has a more vital contemporary sound than any of the album’s first four songs and the indie alt-rock posturing we hear has a lot of verve and breezy, chiming guitars. Schneider turns in one of his more gritty and engaged vocals. The traditional rock vibe returns with the song “Overruling Neo-Fascists” and it makes for one of the more likable tracks on the album if, for no other reason, the sheer incongruity of bringing this musical style together with the subject matter. You can hear a small, but significant, punk rock influence in the song that gives it at least a little of its expected bite. He wheels out the organ again and some fist-clinched guitar rock attack with the song “Surreal Survivor”, a recut of an earlier song from his career.

The final song on the new album “I Just Don’t Really Know If You Exist” is, arguably, the most unique track on the album. The staggering array of influences in the song Schneider brings together in a cohesive whole are far from easy sells to one another, but coupling some of the sheer musical perversity we know from artists like Zappa alongside pastoral folk song-like melodies with meditative singer/songwriter styled work in the vein of Cat Stevens makes for a potent mix. There are also narrative strengths on the song that aren’t shared by the majority of the album’s tracks. Don’t Put All Your Eggs in One Basketcase is Elliot Schneider’s best work to date.

Kittens Slay Dragons - Big Big Heart (2016)

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Written by David Beals, posted by blog admin

The debut ten song collection from singer/songwriter Sarah Donner’s electronic project Kittens Slay Dragons is entitled Big Big Heart and provides further evidence of her artistic range. Donner’s work usually falls in the singer-songwriter genre and has strong Americana leanings, but she works just as well outside that mode and her voice finds its footing with the same ease it does navigating around traditional instrumentation. While this is a strictly indie affair musically, that never means the production errs on the side of frugality. Big Big Heart, instead, is full of dynamic colors, clearly rendered arrangements, and has a bracing sound that grabs listeners straight away. It explores many of her concerns as an individual but, particularly, her love for animals and the writing makes use of a number of effective literary devices to help make her experiences more real listeners.

The surging opener “Gatekeeper” never relies too much on its electronic backing and, instead, balances things quite nicely between Donner’s voice and the musical accompaniment. The percussion is, naturally, electronic in nature, but everything about this part of the song’s presentation moves with organic energy and genuine warmth. Donner’s emotive skills get a full workout here and come across vividly. She brings the same emotive fireworks to bear on the album’s second song “Castiel”, but it relies a little more on the electronica than what the first song does, but it filters that through a sharper sense of dynamics than we ever heard on opener. The chorus is particularly effective. The talent for dynamics that Kittens Slay Dragons exhibit on the aforementioned song is treated much more expansively on “Smile Pretty” – this is a track with ebb and flow that keeps listeners on the edges of their seats and Donner’s vocal inhabits it with intimacy and dramatic skill.

The title song is one of the album’s unadulterated gems. “Big Big Heart” has a nearly perfect build that crescendos in a thrilling way and the same penchant for crafting memorable choruses in this style sustains Kittens Slay Dragons through this tune as well. The glistening musical textures powering songs like this could be sickly sweet in the wrong hands, but Donner and $hClane! aims its uses in a much more emotional direction that listeners will find impossible to ignore. ShClane!’s skill with laying down beats gets a real exhibition on the song “Symbols in the Sky” and the slightly darker, more intense hue to this song is an excellent shift in gears compared to the relatively bouncy approach of the earlier songs. It has the same effortless stride and energy, however; the urgency filling the album’s ten songs makes it all the better. The finale “Head Down, Heart Up” is a wonderfully stirring closing curtain for Big Big Heart and Donner saves one of her finest vocals for this moment. Big Big Heart is a worthwhile release from first song to last and there’s no escaping the inspiration that obviously gives this work such enormous spirit.

Sarah Donner - Black Hole Heart (2016)

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MUSIC VIDEO: (PHOENIX)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j13Jwyb-AnA

Written by Larry Robertson, posted by blog admin

Sarah Donner’s latest release Black Hole Heart finds her continuing to successfully mine the same rich musical territory that has brought her considerable notice thus far. The twelve songs on Black Hole Heart make use of traditional instrumentation like mandolin and piano alongside the customary acoustic guitar, but she also shows the daring to bring different instrumental voices under her tent like trumpet and organ. Her lyrical talents are well displayed on Black Hole Heart and her ability to marry metaphor with melody sets her apart from a score of her contemporaries. There are no great shows of musical virtuosity here; Donner, instead, concentrates on communicating melodic ideas and creating complementary vehicles for her songwriting. There isn’t a single miss on this album. Donner has created an exquisite work rife with the vulnerability and melodic gifts that have drawn such attention.

“Phoenix” is one of the marquee tracks on Black Hole Heart and it’s obvious why early on. There’s a nice combination of an upward slant to the melody accompanied by a light percussive shuffle that makes for some likeable listening. Her voice is a perfect match for the song’s evolution, picking up more and more energy along the way, and paying off nicely in the end. “Black Hole Heart”, despite its relatively foreboding title, strikes an ultimately hopeful note. In the hands of lesser talents, acoustic guitar can wear out its welcome as a limited melodic imagination will rely on variations of the same two or three phrases. Donner runs no risk of that. She is endlessly inventive with the instrument and has the sort of tastefulness you don’t often find. Her tunes have exactly what they need and no fat to be found.

“Tamsen Donner 1847” is a perfect example of that. The acoustic guitar work provides just enough musical color for enhancing Donner’s lyric. Her writing takes on a storytelling air with this performance and she excels with it every bit as she does with her more common personal and impressionistic style. “Athena” has a light bluegrass/country music influence, but the same pop sensibilities distinguishing much of the album come into play here and there’s some particularly strong vocal harmonies that make the chorus all the more memorable. She brings trumpet and organ into the mix for “The Flood”. The latter adds some discreet color to the song while the former makes for an impressive instrumental break thanks to Mike Batchelor’s fine playing. The breezy shuffle of “The Longest Road” has some sharp and even humorous lyrics that benefit from Donner’s emotional singing. It’s never emotion that leaves you dispirited – there’s something about Donner’s voice that’s gloriously life affirming and makes even the darkest song a healing experience of sorts. “Sinking Ship” is similar to the earlier “Tamsen Donner 1847” in the sense that it is depicts character and narrative. It doesn’t have the same lyrical focus as the aforementioned tune, but it is a fine track nonetheless with condensed lines, well chosen language, and some atmospheric harmonies. Sarah Donner’s Black Hole Heart ranks among her finest achievements and sets the bar higher than ever for any following releases.

Grace Freeman - Shadow (2017)

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Written by Stephen Bailey, posted by blog admin

Grace Freeman’s first solo collection Shadow includes eleven songs largely adhering to Americana and singer/songwriter influences while still taking opportunities to branch out at key points. The two primary instruments on Shadow are acoustic guitar and piano, but the six string is far and away the defining tool for bringing Freeman’s songs to sonic life. It is balanced against Freeman’s singing in a very artful and proportional way – one never gets the feeling that a choice to highlight any one element at the expense of another ever entered into the equations for recording this album. Instead, Shadow has bearing and a satisfying completeness that’s difficult to find in modern releases. Freeman may be very young, but her musical aesthetics and songwriting vision harken back to an earlier era and have mastered the sort of fundamentals required if the work is intended to endure.

It begins in a memorable way with the weighty statements of both “Oliver” and the title song “Shadow”. The former is the first of many acoustic guitar powered tracks and has a dark, mournful air surrounding its guitar work. Freeman’s voice doesn’t opt for doubling down on that mood and, instead, positions herself as a foil to the musical mood with ethereal vocals that will touch all but the most cynical listeners. The title song has a more forceful spirit thanks to welcoming drums and bass for the first time on the release, but Freeman exerts her vocal strength more here than we hear in the opener. “Trying to Say Goodbye” is, arguably, the most commercially minded tune on Shadow, but this isn’t an insult. Freeman approaches this sort of variation the same way she treats any other songwriting – her interests lie with recording the best possible performance rather than groveling for widespread attention.

“Blue-Eyed Boy” visits some of the aforementioned Americana roots you find after digging deep enough into Freeman’s core sound. Freeman delivers one of her most deeply felt vocals for this release and she effortlessly glides through the verses. We are back in nominally more modern settings with the song “Another Long Night” and there’s certainly quite a contrast between the near angelic vocal delivery and Freeman’s despairing lyrical content. It’s one of the album’s loneliest moments. The deliberate and slowly evolving melody of “Muddy Puddles” gives listeners a chance to focus on the song’s lyrical content and relax into the song’s seamless changes. Piano returns on the song “God Forbid” and her avowed influence from singer/songwriter Regina Spektor is obvious, but never painfully so. This remains recognizably Freeman’s song from beginning to end and the frame of reference established by the similarities only serves to make the track more familiar. Shadow is a personal and intensely creative journey that rewards the listener in every song.  

KALO - Wild Change (2017)

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Written by Stephen Bailey, posted by blog admin

Wild Change is the fourth overall release from the Oklahoma-based power trio KALO and marks a new high point in the band’s songwriting and recording career. Led by vocalist and guitarist Bat-Or Kalo, the band has co-opted the sound of electric blues and other American forms like funk and R&B, filtered it through their own consciousness and experience, before re-emerging with tremendous individual flair that many of their contemporaries lack. This is never blues by the numbers. The eleven songs on Wild Change go far beyond merely hitting some customary genre marks – instead, KALO reinvents while paying proper deference to tradition. The band’s voluminous live experience and the bonds forged from touring together over countless miles no doubt contributes much to their presentation, but it’s equally clear that there are musical fireworks innate to this particular configuration and time has only deepened their explosive potential.

“One Mississippi”, “Isabel”, the title song, “Only Love”, and the album’s second to last track overall “Bad Girl” constitute the band’s most outright blues variants on the album. The first song opens Wild Change with a quasi-boogie that swings so hard it’s difficult to believe this lineup has only played together for a short time. The majority of KALO’s efforts in this area are devoted to blazing, loud, and dramatic blues rock originals like “Isabel”, “Wild Change”, and “Bad Girl”. Despite the assertive sound and instrumental attack on these songs, however, you never get the feeling that Kalo and her band mates are overplaying and weighing the material down with excessive baggage. The title track is propelled by a particularly biting, memorable guitar riff while “Bad Girl” underlines the atmosphere of live playing and spontaneity that hangs over the entire album. “Only Love” is the album’s sole concession to slow blues and is pulled off with a lot of credibility and immense stylishness.

KALO ventures off the blues path at key moments. “Upside Down” is an ultra confident strut of sorts with great horn arrangements mingling in very nicely with a more restrained instrumental performance than what we’ve yet heard from the musicians on this album. The later “Pay to Play” goes even further and drops some straight forward funk into the band’s mix. KALO never abandons the guitar entirely, despite its more orchestral role here, and comes brilliantly alive during the second half. “Smile and Blush” covers in part the band’s penchant for more muted, introspective point of view, but it isn’t, unlike the last song :”Calling All Dreamers”, an essentially solo performance. It is the most vulnerable moment on the release, but also the most inspiring and listeners will be grateful she has ended it on this note. Wild Change shows the continuing evolution of one of the nation’s best guitar driven acts, regardless of genre. KALO will likely build to even greater heights than before with this new release.