'These Guys Can Leave Their Cover-Band Days Behind.'
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SEPT/OCT 2010 ISSUE MMUSICMAG.COM REVIEWS HOLE TNobody’sHE BAD PLUS Daughter [Universal] Never Stop [E1 Entertainment] The first album released under the Hole moniker since 1998’s Celebrity Skin is Onreally its first album of all original material, the Bad Plus—bassist Reid frontwoman Courtney Love’s second solo album—co-founder,Anderson, pianist Ethan Iverson, and drummer David King—makes the songwriter and lead guitarist Eric Erlandson isn’t involved,transition from gimmicky hipster jazz act to legitimate contenders. The nor is any other previous Hole member. So it’s Love andtrio three lets it fly right from the get-go: Opening track “The Radio Tower ringers on 11 new songs—10 of which Love wroteHas with a Beating Heart” is a shimmering, explosive number. For the most collaborators like Billy Corgan,part, the Linda songs Perry andaspire new to an almost epic sound. (We are talking about a guitarist Micko Larkin. (Perry gets full credit on one tune, “Letter to God.”) group of guys who have offered up avant-jazz renditions of bombastic Much of the riveting intensity of the group’s 1990s heyday appears to haverock left alongnumbers with her such former as Rush’sDaniel Jackson “Tom Sawyer” and Bowie’s “Life on bandmates, but there are fl ashes here of the snarling Too often, though, the slower songs trip her up. While once fury Love deployed to suchMars.”) devastating The effectpiano back melody in the day. of “Neverthey were Stop” showcases leaves for harrowing a lasting displays impression, of naked emotion, She spits out her vocals with vengeful disdain on “Skinny Little Love sounds more dispassionate these days. The production Bitch,” overdriven guitarsand roiling “You atop Are” an elastic features bassline a that layered doesn’t piano help—the riff songs that have could an airless, have sanded-down been culled feel that speeds up as the song races toward a climatic pile-up at the doesn’t fi t with her visceral persona. Courtney Love’s tumultuous end. She shifts tempos andfrom attitude a Radiohead on the more contemplative tune. “People history Like suggests You” thatand she “Snowball” has a compelling are storybeautiful to tell, and “Pacifi c Coast Highway,”ballads taking stock that as layers feature of acoustic Keith and Jarrett-likeperhaps she does. piano It’s just melodies,not the one she’s suggesting telling on Nobody’s electric guitars chug along behind her. Daughter. –Eric R. Danton these guys can leave their cover-band days behind. –Jeff Niesel COURT YARD HOUNDS A side project of new offering suggested that its creator was a few strides closer to Dixie Chicks’ Martie crafting something truly monumental in both musical and social terms. Court Yard Hounds Maguire and Emily This cold and private set isn’t it, although that’s probably due more to [Columbia] Robison, Court Yard personal circumstances than anything related to talent. Wainwright Hounds delivers wrote All Days Are Nights while his mother, Kate McGarrigle, was much-anticipated dying of cancer, and there is a quiet, complex sadness even in its insight—both musical and personal—into the sisters who have less autobiographical material. There’s nothing here except piano for so long ceded center stage to Chicks singer Natalie Maines. and vocal, and Wainwright doesn’t project his words in the way Though steeped in familiar instrumentation, the album offers little we’ve come to expect from him. Instead of serenading the person of the barn-burning brashness that made the Chicks famous (save in the farthest corner of a packed theater, he’s singing to himself in perhaps the gutsy “Ain’t No Son”). Instead, its delicate folk-pop an otherwise empty room. –David Styburski prettiness perfectly suits Robison’s more-than-capable voice and the jumble of emotions, sunny and melancholy, that emerge in a song Ozomatli’s music has been called a collision cycle inspired by her 2008 divorce. Maguire’s weeping fi ddle and OZOMATLI of styles, a cultural mash-up, and a 20-car seamless harmonies are welcome as always, and her one turn on pileup of genres. It’s also some of the most lead vocals (“Gracefully”) is so warmly affecting that listeners may joyfully energetic music you’ll ever hear. On wish she stepped to the mic more often. Court Yard Hounds ably its fi fth album, the L.A.-based band stirs its demonstrates‘These that, whether guys with their fellow can Dixie Chick leave or without, their blend of salsa, ska, samba, funk, and hip-hop these ladies’ talent runs deep. –Katie Dodd in ways few groups could conceive. Imagine Fire Away tossing the English Beat, Herb Alpert and the For a dozen years, the [Mercer Street/Downtown] Tijuana Brass, Caetano Veloso, and Sly and RUFUS arrangements on Rufus the Family Stone into a magical blender and Wainwright’s albums got you get some sense of Ozomatli’s eclectic approach. High points cover-bandWAINWRIGHT busierdays and his sometimes behind.’ on their latest, Fire Away, include “Are You Ready?,” a horn-and- All Days Are Nights: Songs naughty, occasionally percussion-driven blast of salsa-fl avored ska; “Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah,” for Lulu angry declarations of gay an exultant Latin pop anthem fi tted with shrieking sax; and “Gay Vatos [Decca] pride got louder. Each in Love,” a rockabilly-tinged tune with a soaring chorus. Even when 70 MAY 2010 AS SEEN IN: SEPT/OCT 2010 M MUSIC & MUSICIANS MAGAZINE M3_v10.indd 70 5/14/10 3:37 AM.