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Albums
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After much anticipation from fans he’s picked up on Myspace or since playing the rather lovable Ceth in John Cameron Mitchell’s raunchy and romantic Shortbus, Jay Brannan’s debut album is finally available. Young, gay, attractive, and ambitious, Brannan’s appropriately titled Goddamned is a mix of humor and misery like a punchy and potent alcoholic drink.  Brannan’s somewhat sardonic approach to solving and speaking of everyday problems or troublesome situations via conversational lyrics is at the forefront of every barebones track. Since one won’t find so much as a drum on the record, it’s lucky for us that Brannan’s voice is sweet and listenable, and that his lyrics, though at times incredibly dense (he could use a bit more breathing room in between verses or individual lines), are quirky enough to cling to. |
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Albums
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What they call shoegazing, with slightly psychedelic undertones, should be enough to describe Holler, Wild Rose!. Ambient rock with a lot of echoing voices and instruments, and a guitar that has submitted its sound to the effects pedal are the main characteristics of the band. John Mosloskie’s vocals are a slightly lower pitch, though otherwise very similar to those of Coldplay’s Chris Martin. Through some notes he is almost indistinguishable from Thom Yorke,  but overall, lacks the emotional involvement of Yorke vocals. The lyrics to those vocals have the same affect, being pretty in some places while never reaching the “beautiful” as they remain to abstract to solidify a feeling. As with some other shoegazing and ambient rock bands, Holler, Wild Rose!’s instrumentation mostly serves to reinforce the vocals or carry out the melody, however, the band does make some interesting choices when they break from those roles. The title track is a powerful song, though largely reliant on driving harmonies. On the bridges during “Theif in our Bed,” one of the guitarists strums out an effect that sounds like a muffled banjo. On “Sun Vines,” my favorite song on the album, there is a significant and distinguishable melody and interesting vocal fluctuations. To contrast the echoing melody, the band adds whistling and a xylophone-like synthesizer to the track, making “Sun Vines” the most well rounded, finished, and distinct piece on the album. Holler, Wild Rose! Is both troublesome and promising. Their songs range from the simply powerful to the instrumentally complex, and they are worth a listen, if not a few listens. -Josh Fish |
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The Brooklyn via Russia, Olga Bell, sounds nothing like you’d expect from her pop songstress looks. This is another one to file under: Don’t judge a book by its cover. She has the range of Bjork or a Shara Worden and often makes you wonder if she knows how to control the volume of her voice, gently serenading you one minute  and nearly blowing your eardrum out the next. Those things make her an interesting bag of tricks and her 6 song EP a hint of what she is capable of. With spacey keyboards and infectious claps “Echinacea” is a nice introduction. Her quirky lyrics like, “I looked to the sun/ But it just makes me sneeze/And no one would bless me,” are cutesy (maybe too much for some), but catchy. “Expanding File” is a drum and keyboard dance song highlighted by the layering of her own vocals, which she does throughout the album. On “Brown Bear” you will want to adjust the volume as she begins in a whisper, but I advise you not to. Halfway through things get very loud as she breaks into a scream about clouds shaped like bears. Although her voice along with the keyboard is pretty, “Miner” doesn’t stand up alongside the other songs. But with “Chunk” she brings us back to her magical little world filled with dreamy keyboards and a slow but steady drumbeat, she sweetly talks about “change” in all senses of the word. The choir at the end of the song help build it to mini-anthem status, but it is Bell’s voice as she takes out with a whisper that is always the focus. - Shannon Carlin
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Concerts
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Giant Panda Gorilla Dub Squad (GPGDS) self-describes their sound as “Relentless Reggae” and “North American Body Music,” and, at their show on Friday night,  relentless body music it was. Sullivan Hall was comfortably packed as the band took the stage a little before midnight, with everyone still dancing well after 2am as GPGDS grooved on. GPGDS is definitely a band that thrives on playing live. As good as the their second album Slow Down is, the two-year-old studio recording certainly doesn’t do them justice. The band live sounds tighter than ever. Songs like “Missing You More” and “Easy Way Out” took on new lives, mostly because GPGDS was abounding with energy deep into the night. Showing incredible dexterity, though, they were also able to taper things off nicely, playing a heartfelt and interesting interpretation of the Grateful Dead’s “Dire Wolf.” It’s been quite some time since I’d left a concert feeling so satisfied. - Erica Block |
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Concerts
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"The pool party is still on," read the website for the McCarren Park Pool Parties on Sunday morning, when severe thunderstorm warnings were levied across the entire tri-state area. "The Hold Steady are not pussies, they can handle this!"  Apparently, the band's fans are not pussies, either. A full crowd showed up and remained through a set by the opening band, The Loved Ones, even as a gentle drizzle turned into a pounding downpour. People hid under swag towels, broke out their umbrellas, stripped down to their bathing suits, but didn't go home. If anything, the weather energized the crowd and the band. "I think it helped us," one of The Loved Ones remarked from the stage. By the time The Hold Steady were ready to begin, besides people wringing out their dripping clothes, all evidence of threatening weather was gone. The crowd looked like they could have been characters in one of the Hold Steady's songs: sexy, but messy. It certainly resonated with the soggy crowd when, towards the end of the set, singer Craig Finn broke into "Hearts and Arms," and reached the lyric, "she ascended into heaven soaking wet." Besides "Hearts and Arms," the band played a healthy mix from its album Boys and Girls in America and its released-only-on-iTunes follow-up, Stay Positive. If the rain had excited the crowd, the band seemed intent on exhausting it, playing its most frantic songs—"Stay Positive," "Stuck Between Stations," "The Swish," and "Your Little Hoodrat Friend"—all right in a row. After a slightly more down-tempo end-of-set and encore, the crowed finally dispersed, damp and disheveled, but smiling.
- Marisa LaScala |
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Since Von and Agaetis Byrjun, Sigur Rós has become increasingly...well, poppy. That's not to say that they're yet ready for radio waves (thank God), but their once severely wistful and sorrow-inducing sound has significantly brightened up. On earlier albums, an icier Sigur Rós icier evoked images of dark and lonely mountainous terrain; now, their music personifies verdant expanses and sunny skies. Takk... had moments of euphoric folk rock and lovely patterns of twinkling chimes and bells; Med Sud I Eyrum Vid Spilum Endalaust carries on in the same gleeful spirit, as if drenched in pure golden sunlight. Of course, their instrumentation is precise, experimental, as well as free-flowing. It's just that their songs now seem to serve a different purpose. "Gobbledigook" begins us on the path toward discovering the brighter side of Sigur Rós. Sounding like a combination of Animal Collective, Yes, and psychedlic folk-rock bands of the '60s, the song is one long and intense moment of joy and freedom, as collective voices scatter and become ingrained within abundant percussion. "Inní Mér Syngur Vitleysingur" is likewise joyful, short and catchy in a brimming and fruitful Polyphonic Spree fashion. "Festival," on the other hand, is both the album's longest track (at 9 minutes and 26 seconds) and it's most ambient, sounding very much like "Untitled 6" from ( ) and harking back to lengthy soundscapes of Sigur Rós' past. The song changes shape halfway through and expands in wide waves, taking on a multitude of instruments and forming a grand composition. Following this, the title track has a swift piano at the core of its warm melody and whimsical undulations. "Ara Batur" also opens with a soft and peaceful piano, as John Thor Birgisson's instantly recognizable voice, fluttering and furtively emotive, carries us through Icelandic lyrics. The wonderful thing about Sigur Ros is that they can cross any language barriers because their music carries the song's emotional and cerebral weight without English-speaking listeners needing to comprehend or analyze the words. The perfect example of this ability occurs on ( ), where Birgisson sings made-up words from a fabricated language, yet the album manages to convey complex and relatable emotions, perhaps in an even more truthful and unadultered fashion. Regardless of literal "meaning," "Ara Batur" is majestic, like a long poem in musical form, opening up to include vast orchestral movements and sweeping choral voices. It becomes an almost spiritual experience. "Illgresi," on the other hand, is simple and plainly organic, with an acoustic guitar. The microphone picks up every slide on the guitar neck, and we, as listeners, feel closer than ever to the otherwise strange, distant, and often grandiose Sigur Rós. -Amy Dupcak |
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