Q&A with Peter Oren – Upstairs @ Whelans – 5/05/18

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https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2018/01/29/qa-with-peter-oren-upstairs-whelans-5-05-18/

No Age – Snares Like A Haircut – Album Review

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https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2018/01/29/no-age-snares-like-a-haircut-album-review/

Yo La Tengo - Fade

Rock nerds Yo La Tengo released Fade in 2013, and it sees them well into their 'comfortable' phase.  Ohm opens the album with a repeating guitar figure that the band chant lyrics such as "resist and move on" as the music gradually gets rockier.  Is That Enough is equal parts quiet Lou Reed along with a soulboy chorus, complete with strings. 

As alluded to earlier, Yo La Tengo's noisier side is mainly in the past, though Paddle Forward has a decent set of fuzzy guitars.  But the album consists mainly of understated, gentle rockers such as Stupid Things and I'll Be Around.  Cornelia and Jane, and final track Before We Run feature horns, and some of the grandeur of parts of The National's back catalogue.  The quiet, creeping Two Trains is the most stripped-down track here, allowing plenty of room for Ira Kaplan's voice to breathe.  The track also features some exquisitely downbeat "do doos".  The Point of It is a late highlight, with a gorgeously low key clean guitar part.

It's all very tasteful with only the very poppy Well You Better being a little too much for this writer's ears.  A low-key delight.

Calexico – The Thread That Keeps Us – Album Review

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https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2018/01/25/calexico-the-thread-that-keeps-us-album-review/

Wilco - The Whole Love

The Whole Love, released in 2011, saw Wilco return to some of the experimentation that marked 2004's A Ghost is Born.  Never more so than on opening track Art of Almost which sees them go full on Radiohead, complete with glitchy percussion and electronic bleeps.  It's actually really good, though there is a LOT going on.  The track builds gradually to a thrilling, rocky outtro.  

The rest of the album doesn't quite live up to the opener, though it's generally pretty good.  Tracks like I Might, Dawned On Me and the title track are the type of thing Wilco can pull off with minimal effort, a kind of midpaced, rootsy classic rock.  The last of these combines growling guitars with whistling of all things.

There are a couple of moody acoustic tracks such as Black Moon which starts out with a bare picked guitar before being joined by a subtle string part that avoids overpowering the song.  Later Rising Red Lung combines a simple acoustic figure with a bit of pedal steel to great effect. 

Elsewhere?  Born Alone is a pleasant strumalong track with a biting electric lead after the chorus, before a Revolver-style outtro.  The Beatles are never far away on the likes of the pleasant drift on Sunloathe or jaunty Capitol City.

There are tracks where little happens such as the simple, vaguely country Open Mind, yet these deliver just enough to keep you returning.  

They save the best for last with the 12 minute One Sunday Morning.  It's difficult to explain what makes this one so good.  On paper it's a simple guitar and piano tune which doesn't vary much for its twelve minute duration, merely adding a few musical touches here and there, percussion, bells etc.  But try listening to this on a cold, sunny drive, it perfectly encapsulates that feeling of being at peace.  And it feels far shorter than 12 minutes. 

Bonnie Prince Billy - Lie Down In The Light

For Lie Down In The Light, released in 2008, Will Oldham appeared to have loosened up considerably.   It opens with the jaunty, countrified strum Easy Does It.  The album is hardly party central though.  You Remind Me of Something is more typical Bonnie Prince Billy, a dark, folky tune featuring fiddle with a nice backing vocal from Ashley Webber.  The songs here are generally of high quality, So Everyone is a fine duet between Webber and Oldham, and the gently picked guitars of Missing One make it an undoubted highlight.  A little quirky instrumentation can lift a seemingly run of the mill track to greater heights, the clarinet solo in For Every Field There's a Mole is a case in point.  Country influences cone to bear on the laidback duet What's Missing Is and the gentle steel guitar in the background of the electrified Where Is The Puzzle?

But it's not till late into the album that the strongest material appears.  The title track harks back to the simple, skeletal folk of 2003's Master and Everyone, with the piano part in particular acting like a welcome blast of chill air.  Willow Trees Bend crawls along charmingly at a snail's pace, gorgeous sighing guitars seemingly taking an age to not really get anywhere.

So not quite a standout Bonnie Prince Billy album, merely a pretty good one.

The Stars of Heaven - Speak Slowly

The Stars of Heaven released their second album in 1988.  It opens in far more strident a fashion than anything on Sacred Heart Hotel with a big, brash slab of jangly rock and roll, Unfinished Dreaming.  In fact there are a few rockier numbers in the vein of an alt-country Replacements, by way of Green On Red with a little dash of The Cult of all things, notably the track 28.  Little England and What Else Could I Do are like classic IRS-period REM.  The country influence is particularly strong on the pedal steel and fiddle enhanced Paradise of Lies, while despite the prominent accordion,  2 O'Clock Waltz is really rather good. The gorgeous Johnny Marr-style picked and jangled guitars of Leave As You Came might be the best thing here, though moody closer Ghost Cars gives it a run for its money.  There are no dodgy tracks here, tracks like Every Other Day do a fine line in non-cheesy country-rock.  The only snag is currently this album is very hard to track down.

A Year in Music – Danny Venzin (Nite Fields)

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https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2018/01/01/a-year-in-music-danny-venzin-nite-fields-2/

A Look Ahead – Music in 2018

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https://nomoreworkhorse.com/2018/01/01/a-look-ahead-music-in-2018/