September 26, 2006

Music

CD Reviews

GRIZZLY BEAR

Yellow House

(Warp)

Grizzly Bear have emerged from Horn of Plenty's den of hibernation into the warmer, sunlit corners of the foursome's Yellow House, a permanent residence for freak-folk aficionados.

The scratchy static of Grizzly Bear's debut album is long gone, but in its stead are Yellow House's hallways furnished with Animal Collective's wilderness paintings and the maladroit portraitures of Van Dyke Parks's surreal American songbook. Grizzly Bear's melancholic vocals are now a little more on the lighter side with harmonic hat tips toward Beatlesque balladry and Beach Boys' Pet Sounds.

Grizzly Bear's Edward Droste had sketched the shaky post-breakup retrospectives of Horn of Plenty from his Brooklyn bedroom, but much of the new album was recorded in a makeshift studio in a yellow house on Cape Cod. The pastoral qualities of that time and place are captured on Yellow House with spotless composition and orchestration, making the former album seem like a demo in comparison.

"Easier," opens the disc with a sunrise of brass and rustic ragtime piano, transitioning into Jim O'Rourke–inspired acoustic guitar and the chimes, fluttering flutes, and meandering banjo of Sufjan Stevens's Michigan. "Lullabye" affirms Grizzly Bear's new attitude with an urging chorus of "chin up, cheer up," while "Knife" cuts into satirical bubblegum-pop vocals.

History is gracefully resurrected with "Marla," an adaptation of a waltz written in the 1930s by Droste's great aunt. Rambling across the mountainsides of "Colorado," Grizzly Bear finish Yellow House with a haze of vocals and earthy percussion gorged on the foraged fruits of psychedelic folk. KATHY F. MAHDOUBI

Grizzly Bear play Wed Oct 4 at the Showbox.

CAPTAIN BEEFHEART

Doc at the Radar Station

Ice Cream for Crow

(Astralwerks)

The Lester Bangs quote that accompanies the final two albums from Don Van Vliet's maddening discography states that "Beefheart is the most important musician to rise in the '60s... his music is a harbinger of tomorrow." Sure thing, but we still haven't reached said tomorrow, with only small pockets of folks like Pere Ubu and Deerhoof even getting close to emulating the man's irregular and exemplary rhythms. His Trout Mask Replica remains one of the most-cited, least-listened-to rock albums, but it's a relief to have these LPs available domestically once more.

New wave revitalized the good Captain on his penultimate album, 1980's Doc at the Radar Station, after he made a failed attempt at mainstream success in the mid-'70s. Beefheart's voice was shot from coke abuse, and that jittery, scattered, razor-cut feel pervades the music itself. Still obsessed with the war of the sexes and the habits of human animals, he conjures a prodigal body comprising "Hot Head," "Ashtray Heart," and "Dirty Blue Gene." All the while, the Magic Band (guitarist Gary Lucas, future Pixies collaborator Eric Drew Feldman, and drummer John French) capture Van Vliet's "shiny beast of thought" here by moving like a broken clock: toothy gears and coiled springs bounce out at odd angles, regardless of time.

About to quit music to take up painting full-time, Beefheart issued 1982's Ice Cream for Crow, a slapdash, paint-splattered delight. The title track gallops along at a giddy clip, while "The Witch Doctor Life" squeaks and bounces playfully. His voice irreparable now, Beefheart shades more toward hoarse, coarse, surreal spoken-word moments ("Human Totem Pole," "Hey Garland") and instrumentals that still sound otherworldly in their beautiful illogic: "Semi-Multicoloured Caucasian," "Evening Bell," "Light Reflects Off the Oceans of the Moon." Perhaps in this new century, the Captain's musical prophecies will finally be heeded and take root. ANDY BETA

MAKE BELIEVE

Of Course

(Flameshovel)

Although they debuted in 2003 as the "rocking" side project for the touring members of Chicago art-emo crew Joan of Arc, Make Believe have since become a real touring band themselves, with two full-lengths and an EP to their credit. But as anyone weary of Joan of Arc's willfully obtuse, generally hit-or-miss output will attest, Make Believe haven't just grown beyond their originating band, they've also blown it out of the water.

Of Course, which follows up 2005's equally idiosyncratic (and brilliant) Shock of Being, finds core members Tim Kinsella (vocals), Sam Zurick (guitar), Bobby Burg (bass), and Nate Kinsella (drums) in top form, their complex, fractured playing sounding accidental only because they've mastered it. Much like the Magic Band—or U.S. Maple, depending on your perspective—the quartet reject rock's 4/4 heartbeat for a skittering, nuanced rhythmic flow that's rich with danger and surprise; and like those bands, they've also developed a new language in the process.

The emo albatross may be to blame, but it's remarkable Zurick and Nate Kinsella aren't being celebrated by every guitar and drum magazine on the planet. While the terminally cracked, poetical vocalizing of frontman (and Nate's cousin) Tim adds its own layers of distinction to standout tracks such as "Another Song About Camping" and "Pat Tillman, Emmitt Till," the former pair's playing takes Of Course to another level. Zurick's deft finger tapping and nontraditional riffs (he often seems to be playing chords in reverse) collide with Nate's stuttering, weirdly accented rhythms in ways that are simultaneously empathetic and paradoxical. More importantly, though—and this is where Make Believe really take a welcome turn from their parent band—they're consistently, legitimately exciting. AARON BURGESS

EYEHATEGOD

In the Name of Suffering

Take as Needed for Pain

Dopesick

(Century Media)

The seemingly impossible has happened with doom metal becoming hip and, gasp, almost popular within recent years—witness the bizarre "crossover success" of post-Melvins cranks like Khanate and Sunn O))). New Orleans's Eyehategod were one of the first bands to twist (the) Melvins' slow-low-and-ugly template into something new and dangerous, and they haven't gotten the same props. Century Media's recent reissues of their first three albums provide an overdue reminder of what made them great.

Eyehategod debuted in 1992 with the crusty, very lo-fi In the Name of Suffering, but the real EHG emerged on their follow-up, 1993's Take as Needed for Pain. Incorporating a toxic swamp-rock element that was equal parts Black Sabbath and Lynyrd Skynyrd, the band established a sound that singer Mike Williams, in his hand-scrawled liner notes, terms "southern hardcore blues." It's an apt description, and there are some absolutely colossal riffs on this album, with standouts "Crimes Against Skin," "White Nigger," and bonus track "Serving Time in the Middle of Nowhere" rating especially high on the air-guitar scale.

Williams calls Take as Needed their best album, and while that's tough to argue with, my vote goes to album three, 1996's Dopesick. It's basically a sequel, but the production (thanks to studio wiz Billy Anderson) is stronger, and there's a bit more variety to the band's attack. "Peace Thru War (Thru Peace and War)" shows they could play fast when they wanted, and "Dixie Whiskey" features another titanic blues-metal riff that's up there with anything in their catalog. All three CDs feature bonus tracks, new liner notes, and extra photos to go along with the (more-or-less) original artwork. These are classic albums in the realm of scuzzball post-Sabbath/post-Melvins underground metal. WILLIAM YORK

BEACH HOUSE

Beach House

(Carpark)

When autumn approaches, I always find myself meditating on wistful memories of blissful moments long past—a final kiss from a departing lover, a solitary afternoon in the woods with the sun beaming through the trees, a humid evening on the playground with childhood friends—moments so poignant, yet mildly heartbreaking as their transience becomes apparent in the changing of the seasons.

When an album comes along that touches each of these memories at once, fishing them from their depths to pang our hearts with formerly encased emotions, it seems like pure magic. The self-titled debut from newly signed Carpark duo Beach House accomplishes exactly this. Inspired by 4AD's roster of early-'90s shoegazers, as well as the quiet folk of forgotten '70s songstresses like Bridget St. John, the record wafts through a precious nine songs with a wispy beauty that sustains long after its final notes.

The organ drones, tambourine shakes, and slide-guitar strokes employed by Alex Scally and Victoria Legrand also find root in Mazzy Star's dim gothic filigree. However, while Legrand's voice can be as lulling as Hope Sandoval's, she also manages moments of impeccable brightness and strength. On "Auburn and Ivory," Legrand dips into an eerie drawl that recalls the punk-cabaret stylings of Celebration singer Katrina Ford.

As programmed drum patterns fleck the group's languid keyboard and organ melodies, the album feels eternally affixed to an emotive dreamscape. But in this perpetual stasis, the peaks of shimmering beatitude achieved by Legrand's vocals make Beach House's debut possibly the prettiest record I've heard in years. STEVEN SAWADA

WATER KILL THE SUN

Water Kill the Sun

(waterkillthesun.com)

1/2

Water Kill the Sun's latest endeavor begins with a quiet and steady foot stomp and the gentle ringing of slow, somber piano notes. New vocalist Ian Schuelke rings in with a subtle sense of misery: "Have another drink on me before it's too late/Everybody's come to see the one that they hate/Gotta get away from here before I can move on/Gotta get away from myself before I can go," and for the next four minutes, you wonder if he's going to make it out of this song alive, or if he's going to willingly stop his own breath before the end.

But the record doesn't collapse into indisputable depression, as one might suspect from an opening track as somber as "Chinese Laundry." The remaining 11 songs maintain a familiar, morose disposition, but also successfully portray varied outlooks.

With its haunting guitar and soft electronic chimes, "An Innocent Man" sounds like an eerie, simplified version of Radiohead's "My Iron Lung," especially due to Schuelke's crooning; the tone is still slow and steady, but not desolate. "Sexless Beings" gets a little louder and faster, and Schuelke even lets his voice reach a breaking point in the moody (in a psychedelic Dark Side of the Moon way) "Young. Die. Good."

Water Kill the Sun are an old band, but they're back with a new trick (and new vocalist), and they're finally showing signs of hitting their stride. MEGAN SELING

Water Kill the Sun play the High Dive Sat Oct 7, 10 pm, $6, with Head Like a Kite, the Trucks, and Speaker Speaker.

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