The Overtones "Higher" - Album Review

Back in 2002, Busted made the assumption that in the Year 3000 they would see “boy bands, and another one, and another one, and another one”. From the days of Take That in the early 90s to today’s churning out of bands like One Direction and The Wanted, it’s pretty clear to see how they made that visualisation as boybands do seem to always be a big part of British music culture. When picking up five piece band The Overtones new album “Higher”, I was expecting standard boy band tracks which tend to alternate between tacky upbeat pop songs and drippy ballads. To my surprise, it was actually very pleasant to hear a group that seem to have broken down these conventions.

The band were formed in 2010 and all members share an interest in the doo-wop genre of the 1950s along with modern pop and “Higher” really does show off this creative hybrid that the Overtones have adopted and it does seem to separate them from the standardised boy band sound. Despite a couple of slightly cheesy tracks such as the cover of Fairground Attraction’s “Perfect” and the slow ballad “You’ve Got That Loving Feeling”, “Higher” presents an array of colourful styles and even these tracks are much more layered and complex than you’d typically hear from a boy band.

The doo-wop inspiration is something that really shines through on the album and the boys prove it’s an exciting genre that’s sadly been left in the past. “Runaround Sue” and “Reet Petite” are two absolute gems that both expose the raspy vocals of Lachie Chapman in contrast to the more common Bublé inspired voice of Timmy Matley. Along with the input of scat singing and Big Band style instrumentation they create a very tight sound and it’s clear they’re beginning to master a style that they will hopefully continue to develop through their time as a group.

There are a fair few songs to get your fingers clicking on “Higher”, but the soulful five successfully go down the route of laid back blues ballads with songs such as “Unfortgettable” which would certainly have Sinatra smiling from ear to ear and “The Glory of Love” is yet another enjoyable track which really explores how the voice in itself is an instrument.

All things considered, “Higher” is a really pleasant surprise from a bunch of guys who look like Ken dolls in the albums artwork. Don’t judge a book by its cover, it’s much more than it seems.

 http://scan.lusu.co.uk/carolynne/culture/2012/11/16/album-review-the-overtones-higher/

Jack White at the Empress Ballroom, Blackpool

Blackpool; the home of ballroom dancing, bright lights and the wildest hen nights around. It’s a place that never seems to lose its energy and individuality, just like the eccentric music of Mr Jack White, who was warmly welcomed back to the Empress Ballroom stage to put more than just a bounce in the floor.

The Empress Ballroom is an extremely special venue for Jack and The White Stripes after being chosen as the perfect place to film their DVD “Under Blackpool Lights” back in 2004, so it’s safe to say there would be lots of nostalgia and fond memories in many fans hearts. This time round though, Jack was stepping onto the stage as a solo artist, with a helping hand from six ghostly looking girls lined up behind, expanding on the familiar sound of the Meg White’s icky thumps. It was definitely going to be interesting to see if he lived up to previous performances after a long wait for new material.

Jack’s explosive new album “Blunderbuss”, focusing on heartbreak and collapsing relationships after his recent divorce, has received phenomenal reviews from all angles of music critique and there was a part of you that knew that even before that first note was played, the performance was going to be electrifying. The clock struck 9 and the light of the elegant chandeliers dimmed and it wasn’t long before the springs in the floor were shaking as the crowd went mental for all the delicious flavours of Jack’s music. From classic White Stripes numbers such as “Hotel Yorba” and “The Same Boy You’ve Always Known” to the gems of his solo album and some creative covers, Jack really proved his ability to work with pretty much any genre and at the same time make it his own. What was particularly surprising about the set was that the majority of songs were actually White Stripes numbers, with solo hits such as “Missing Pieces” and “Love Interruption” slipped in between, which meant that this carefully constructed set list was able to please everyone, no matter whether they’d been a lifelong fan or had recently discovered White’s talents.
As well as a colourful set list though, the intensity and emotion of Jack’s performance meant that fans were constantly on edge as the insecure and experimental sound of his turbulent love life was mixed with an alternative 60s sound and classic White Stripes garage rock in a performance that left us gobsmacked and only wanting more.

White’s encore included the long awaited “Blunderbuss” favourite “Freedom at 21”, which along with “Hypocritical Kiss” spread around that thrilling bitterness that was the real spark behind his new work. A surprise Hank Williams cover again kept everyone on their toes before finishing with the unforgettable sound of “Seven Nation Army” which despite the switching off of the promenade illuminations, undoubtedly re lit the town. With a lack of audience participation aside, this was a brilliant performance from start to finish and with such an intense presence like Jack’s, words are perhaps really not needed; he injects a fever that is truly indescribable.

 http://scan.lusu.co.uk/carolynne/culture/2012/12/05/jack-white-at-the-empress-ballroom-blackpool-6th-november-2012/

Green Day "Dos!" - Album Review

Releasing a trilogy of albums across a tight six month period is always going to be ambitious for any band, but based on how Green Day managed to courageously change their musical direction completely back in 2004 and effortlessly pull off 9 minute tracks, there was a lot of faith in what the band were going to produce when Uno! hit the shelves. The first album evoked a desire to relive the thrill of their youthful days and bring back that edgy garage band sound we all loved back in the 90s. Unfortunately, Uno! fell short of expectations and a lot of the tracks seemed quite forced and churned out with no real passion behind it; fans simply had to wish that Dos! would tighten up the screws and make some much needed amendments. Disappointingly, the second album of the trilogy seems to have fallen even deeper into a pit of embarrassment. 

Reminiscent of how 21^st Century Breakdown starts, “See You Tonight” is a soft and simplistic start to Dos!, getting our hopes up that this journey will be as gripping as their 2009 album. “Fuck Time” follows the short and sweet beginning and all hope of the album being more engaging than Uno! is completely destroyed with this very awkward number about aggressive sex. Billie Joe, Mike and Tre might be nostalgic and missing their younger and more adventurous selves, but it’s pretty uncomfortable listening to men over 40 sing about sex in the manner that a 17 year-old would having just discovered the act. The song falls into the trap of a group trying far too hard to bring back an attitude they buried a long time ago, as do songs like “Wild One” and “Makeout Party”, both of which are less than wild tunes with uninspiring lyrics and chord patterns we’ve heard so many times before. It can be said that the rebellious three would gain much more from changing their outlook again as they have done so successfully in the past, but when they try to do so with songs like “Nightlife” it’s clear that a new direction may need some more thought, as this RnB and rock hybrid is extremely cringey and really doesn’t suit them. The input of the awkwardly seductive female vocals of “Lady Cobra” might be in keeping with the pop culture of today, but the fans will be hanging their heads in despair when they hear this one.  The songs that come closest to regaining that electrifying edge Green Day once had are numbers like “Ashley” and “Baby Eyes” which both capture the wrath and ferocity we love to hear coming from the band so often. However, an album cannot survive on the reputation of just two acceptable songs. Dos! suggests that Green Day had best conjure up something masterful on Tre!, before we start pointing and laughing.

Commendations

The aforementioned “Ashley” and “Baby Eyes” are an enjoyable and nostalgic pair of tracks, and some other songs on Dos! are not unpleasant to listen to, despite a general inability to really engage with listeners on an emotional level. Once again as always, the album is masterfully produced with immaculate sound quality and the psychedelic artwork is very appealing and eye-catching. It’s just a real shame that the CD behind the cover doesn’t reflect that promised excitement.

Next Steps

It seems that Dos! and its predecessor Uno! have both fallen into the same trap, Dos! perhaps falling a little deeper. They have both expressed that Green Day are strongly missing their youth and that exhilarating thrash they used to have about their sound. While we can appreciate their efforts to dig up the past and rework it, perhaps it’s time to accept that it’s long gone and there’s no point in poking around to see if it might come back to life all of a sudden.
The trio would really benefit from working on some material that relates to the frustrations they’re experiencing now, which we’ve discovered very little about apart from perhaps Billie Joe’s current addiction troubles evoked through the song “Amy,” dedicated to Amy Winehouse. Based on the average turn out of the first two albums of the trilogy, there isn’t much hope for the content of Tre! but let’s keep our fingers crossed that Green Day pull off another brave U-turn and bring their charisma back to life.

First published by : www.puluche.com

Album Review - Green Day "Uno!"

From teenage themes of sex, angst and drugs to frustration with American politics and modern society, the punk rock trio Green Day have never allowed us to forget one moment of their emotional journey as a band. It’s been a long wait of three years since the release of 21^st Century Breakdown, a work that combined both their classic edgy sound with their new politically charged approach. So where does the band take us next? Welcome Uno!, the first in a trilogy of albums being released over a six month period.  
Since the release of American Idiot in 2004, Green Day have made their song writing very topical, focusing on personal frustration with their country’s political system and society. It’s been a fair while since we’ve heard a song relating to youth-like pleasures, explored almost to the tenth degree in the 90s. Uno! is clearly a sign of  the band wanting to go back to their roots and exploring much more simplistic and relatable subjects, such as loneliness, love, sex and generally turning your back on people and things that anger you to the very core. While a couple of songs on the album just about manage to bring back that dangerous sound, most tracks just don’t cut it and some show Billie Joe’s rage-filled lyrics to be quite forced. “Let Yourself Go” is a prime example where it is infectiously catchy in places, especially during the chorus, but the screaming technique Billie Joe uses is not particularly appealing and highlights the struggle the band has going back down the 90s road with this release.
More annoyance is portrayed in “Kill the DJ,” which features a very cool dance-style groove, and “Loss of Control,” which shows the bands tight instrumental ability, but both achievements are really overshadowed by the lyrical inability to grip the listener which Green Day often did so brilliantly on records past. Not all tracks fall short of their purpose though. There are a few gems that involve some extremely attractive hooks and styles that we haven’t heard for a long time. “Nuclear Family” is an absolute firework of a start to kick off an album and is undoubtedly one of the best songs on Uno!. The riffs are very reminiscent of songs like “Welcome to Paradise” and “Nice Guys Finish Last.” Other stand out tracks include “Troublemaker” with its slick and sexy vibe, “Carpe Diem” and “Oh Love.” The later tracks are both brilliantly simple yet transfixing, showing off what Green Day are and have always been best at over the years – effortless immaculate songwriting. Unfortunately, Uno! is more than just one step from the standards Green Day fans have come to expect.

Commendations

Despite Billie Joe, Mike and Tre not quite making the grade in terms of getting their real message across at points, Uno! as a whole is a very well-produced album with a tight and polished sound. There are a number of enjoyable tracks with a lot of attractive melodies with crisp guitar and bass riffs. Uno! proves promising in showing that the teenage edginess and rebellious attitude that Green Day had back in the 90s hasn’t gone and they can still write brilliantly relatable tracks while engaging in personal and societal ones. Furthermore, whether the styles appeal to you or not, it’s great to hear new musical directions the band has gone for, such as the noted new sounds of “Kill the DJ” and “Troublemaker.”

Next Steps

Although there are many pros that can come from an album sounding crisply produced and polished, it can be said that their attempt to return to their roots would have been helped by having some songs a bit less glossed over in order to bring back that garage band jam sound. Green Day would truly benefit from a bit more natural angst and emotion lyrically, as well as revisiting styles that featured colorful instrumentation on tracks like “King for a Day.” This album will disappoint many. One can only hope some of these omissions will appear in Dos! and Tres!.

First published by www.puluche.com

Album Review -"Away from the World" by Dave Matthews Band

It’s been three years since the release of Matthew’s “Big Whiskey and the GrooGux King” and it could be said that a lot was expected of him and his crew when the long awaited “Away from the World” finally hit the record stores. The 2009 album brought to us a pile of feel good, lively tracks that showed the full and heavy sound that the many layers of the Dave Matthews Band can put out there. The question was; can they mix that up with more subtle tracks and still deliver? The answer is, yes they certainly can.

Saxophones and trumpets, violins and guitars, the Dave Matthews Band has an extremely colorful blend of instruments and one of the most impressive features of the “Away from the World” is how the full potential of all these instruments is explored both on their own and as a group. In tracks such as “Belly Belly Nice”, one of the tighter and funkier tracks, we can appreciate the powerful sound that this little big band are able to produce at the same time as hearing the talents of the individuals such as Coffin and Tinsley’s improvisation skills on sax and violin. The whole album continues in this manner, mixing up so many styles but maintaining a stunning sound. “If Only”, “Rooftop” and “Belly Full” are three love sick tracks that follow each other, but despite a similar topic being explored lyrically they totally contrast musically, the theme actually never gets boring. We are taken through Dave’s lonely state of mind within both laid back acoustic sounds and heavier rock sounds, reflecting the mixture of emotions that love sickness brings. It’s not just the music in which Matthew’s has delivered though; the lyrics as usual have not failed to impress.

As well as giving us a fair few love themed tracks which always appeal to a crowd, themes such as the world’s inequality are explored with iconic lyrics that almost become anthem like. In songs such as “Gaucho” the repeated line; “We gotta go much more than believe if we really wanna change things” is simple yet incredibly meaningful, waking us up to the mess of the world, but that we “could do anything under the stars” if we really tried. This follows the equally inspiring lyrics of “Mercy” which again reminds us that we have the power to change things that are wrong.

Lyrically and musically, this is a fantastic work by Matthews, he really expresses the spectrum of genres there are to draw us in. The range and texture of all the instruments that make up the Dave Matthews Band have been much more engaged with and the talents of Rashawn Ross, Jeff Coffin and Boyd Tinsley come to light across various improvised solos that give the album a spark of talented insanity. A particularly iconic track that highlights each and every individual instrumentalist is the final track “Drunken Soldier” which has a long instrumental section before any lyrics come in. Here we can appreciate the all the talents including the work of bassist Stefan Lessard and guitarist Tim Reynolds and of course Dave himself, who stuns us on his guitar as well as in his vocal ability. Let’s not forget Carter Beuford of course, exquisitely keeping the album moving with some flawlessly tight drumming.

It’s hard to say where the Dave Matthews band could take us next after this immaculate work, but what I think what we can say is that we’ll eagerly be on the edge of our seats waiting for yet another pile of surprises, hopefully as impressive as “Away from the World”.

Culture

http://scan.lusu.co.uk/carolynne/culture/2012/10/18/review-dave-matthews-band/

Album Review - "Tempest" by Bob Dylan

When discovering that Dylan was releasing a new album, I was somewhat skeptical. After all, it’s not every day a solo artist releases a 35^th album in their early 70s and it’s hard to believe that he could churn out any more creativity after so many years. Unfortunately this is the case with Tempest, as it fails to impress on a number of levels.
Over the years Dylan has gained a raspy quality to his voice which is hard not to love, but other than that the album is lacking musically in terms of something new. Tempest seems to simply alternate between upbeat county and western songs, such as “Narrow Way,” and more melancholy blues sounds like “Soon After Midnight.” Despite how these are not unpleasant to listen to, it really is the same old Dylan chords and rhymes we’ve heard before.  Lyrically, Tempest is actually quite gripping and emotional at points, exploring themes of love, struggle and death that Dylan has time and again so brilliantly portrayed. Songs such as “Pay In Blood” express much rage with lines such as “Another politician pumping out the piss” and this is only emphasized by his new gruff vocal technique.
Though deep lyrical lines might sound great at certain moments, many are sadly buried by the sheer length of some songs, such as “Tempest” which drags on for 14 minutes about the sinking of the Titanic – it’s a tough one to hang through.  Another let down is the final song of the album, “Roll on John,” about the death of John Lennon. While being sentimental and lyrically clever at times, Dylan has set the bar so high as a lyricist that one may come away a bit disappointed in its outcome.  There are unfortunately only a couple of songs on this album that stand out for Dylan. As the Shakespearean album title may portend, as a whole work this might just be where it ends for the harmonica legend.

Commendations

Tempest is actually a great sounding record and does display the typical Dylan qualities that we all love and appreciate. What can happen to artists so often is that they try and go too complicated when churning out new material, but it’s great that Dylan can still entertain with such simple melodies and arrangements that do stick in your mind. Songs like “Duquesne Whistle” and “Scarlet Town” are probably the gems of the album – one very pleasantly upbeat, the other beautifully dark. As for sound quality, Tempest is one of his best produced modern Dylan albums with everything well-balanced and each individual sound cutting through very clearly.

Next Steps

If Dylan were to miraculously write another album, first thing would be to think about adding more build to the tracks. There’s nothing wrong with writing 14 minute tracks, but it needs to go somewhere and reach a climatic point.  In all honesty, this record will be adored by many simply because of the artist – the rock and roll legend, Bob Dylan. That’s how he should be remembered. If this was his Tempest, so be it with much gratitude.

First published by www.puluche.com