DECEMBER 2010 ISSUE MMUSICMAG.COM REVIEWS HOLE CNobody’sRYSTAL BOWERSOX Daughter [Universal] Farmer’s Daughter [19 Recordings/Jive] The first album released under the Hole moniker since 1998’s Celebrity Skin is Americanreally Idol contestants are often accused of oversinging, pseudo- frontwoman Courtney Love’s second solo album—co-founder,dramatics and the like—and on her high-spirited debut, former Idol runner-up songwriter and lead guitarist Eric Erlandson isn’t involved,Crystal Bowersox sometimes stands guilty of these musical crimes. Still, nor is any other previous Hole member. So it’s Love andshe three explores her own path often enough on Farmer’s Daughter to stake a ringers on 11 new songs—10 of which Love wroteclaim with to a promising recording career. After a feisty opener, the top-down collaborators like Billy Corgan, Linda Perry and new guitarist Micko Larkin. (Perryroadhouse gets full credit rocker on one “Ridin’ tune, With the Radio,” Bowersox stumbles with a ham- “Letter to God.”) fisted cover of Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth.” But she quickly Much of the riveting intensity of the group’s 1990s heyday appears to haverights left alongmatters with with her formera soulful Daniel Jackson delivery of her own poignant ballad “Holy Toledo,” 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 suchan devastatingemotional effect portrait back inof the small-town day. they were restlessness. showcases for Likewise, harrowing displays she relishes of naked emotion,the She spits out her vocals with vengeful disdain on “Skinny Little Love sounds more dispassionate these days. The production Bitch,” overdriven guitarskiss-off roiling atop sentiments an elastic ofbassline the gospel-flavored that doesn’t help—the “Speak songs haveNow,” an airless,a spunky sanded-down declaration 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 andof independenceattitude on the more that contemplative plays up thehistory grittier suggests side that of she her has vocal a compelling talents. story Farmer’s to tell, and “Pacifi c Coast Highway,”Daughter taking stock isas a layers powerful of acoustic introduction and perhaps to shea singer does. It’s who just maynot the well one she’shave telling the goodson Nobody’s electric guitars chug along behind her. Daughter. –Eric R. Danton and the depth to make us forget her TV-contest origins. –Bob Cannon 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 ‘Crystallead vocals (“Gracefully”) Bowersox is so warmly explores affecting that listene herrs may own path 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 that, whether with their fellow Dixie Chick or without, blend of salsa, ska, samba, funk, and hip-hop oftenthese ladies’enough talent runs ondeep. –KatieFarmer’s Dodd Daughter to stake 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 a claimR toUFUS a promising arrangements recording on Rufus career.’ 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

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