'Gloriously Melancholic, Paradoxically Uplifting Music.'
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MAY 2012 ISSUE MMUSICMAG.COM REVIEWS HOLE BNobody’sEACH HOUSE Daughter [Universal] Bloom [Sub Pop] The first album released under the Hole moniker since 1998’s Celebrity Skin is really frontwoman Courtney Love’sOn their first three albums, Beach House architects Alex Scally and second solo album—co-founder,Victoria Legrand built one of the more recognizable sounds in modern songwriter and lead guitarist Eric Erlandson isn’t involved,indie rock. With the fourth, they don’t change things up so much as nor is any other previous Hole member. So it’s Love andthey three focus and improve them. As always, the songs mix drum-machine ringers on 11 new songs—10 of which Love wrotebeats with with the dizzying slo-mo whoosh of keyboard, echo-rich guitar and collaborators like Billy Corgan,Legrand’s Linda stately,Perry and oftennew unintelligible vocals. It’s a recipe for gloriously guitarist Micko Larkin. (Perry gets full credit on one tune, “Letter to God.”) melancholic, paradoxically uplifting music—especially on “Myth” and Much of the riveting intensity of the group’s 1990s heyday appears to havelead left alongsingle with “Lazuli,” her former which Daniel Jackson center on the fleeting nature of pleasure. 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 suchThe devastating dreaminess effect back (abetted in the day. bythey producer were showcases Chris for harrowingCoady, displays returning of naked from emotion, She spits out her vocals 2010’swith vengeful Teen disdain Dream on “Skinny) gives Little evenLove sounds the loveliest more dispassionate tunes thesean undercurrent days. The production Bitch,” overdriven guitars roiling atop an elastic bassline that doesn’t help—the songs have an airless, sanded-down feel that speeds up as the song ofraces dread, toward asa climatic on “Wild,” pile-up at which the doesn’t finds fi t withLegrand her visceral singing, persona. Courtney“My mother Love’s tumultuous said end. She shifts tempos and attitude on the more contemplative history suggests that she has a compelling story to tell, and “Pacifi c Coast Highway,”to taking me stock that as I’dlayers get of acousticin trouble/Our and perhaps father she does. won’t It’s just come not the homeone she’s ’cause telling on he’sNobody’s electric guitars chug along behind her. Daughter. –Eric R. Danton seeing double.” On “Wishes” she sings, “The roses on the lawn don’t COURT YARDknow HOUNDS what sideA sideyou’re project on,” of effectivelynew offering welcomingsuggested that its listeners creator was intoa few stridesa world closer to Dixie Chicks’ Martie crafting something truly monumental in both musical and social terms. Court Yard Houndswhere everythingMaguire is prettyand Emily but nothingThis cold and is private as it set seems. isn’t it, although –Kenneth that’s probably Partridge 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 ‘Gloriouslywish she stepped to the melancholic, mic more often. Court Yard Hounds paradoxically ably its fi fth album, the L.A.-based band stirs its demonstrates that, whether with their fellow Dixie Chick or without, 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 upliftingFor amusic.’ 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 WAINWRIGHT busier and his sometimes 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 MAY 2012 M MUSIC & MUSICIANS MAGAZINE M3_v10.indd 70 5/14/10 3:37 AM.