PlayRadioPlay -- 'Texas' [review]

PlayRadioPlay! - Texas
Island Records (03/18/08)
Pop / Rock / Alternative / Electronic

PlayRadioPlay! falls into that genre of music that merges hook-filled, pop-ish, alternative music (say, mellower Saves the Day or maybe Straylight Run) with a decidedly electronic background of beats and melody, to create this mish-mash of music that is as much about atmosphere and experience as it is about content (think Idiot Pilot or Postal Service and the like).

The results are pretty enjoyable. Not completely outstanding, but enough to hook you in and entertain. The melodies are simple and catchy, the lyrics are just quirky enough that you’re captivated without rolling your eyes and the vocals are actually the high point of the entire package. Daniel Hunter, who alone initially made up the band—though he has put together a full band for touring, and I did notice, I believe, a female vox in a couple of spots on the album—oozes this faux innocence in his delivery, but is commanding enough to drive each song on the strength of his vocals, meshing with the music.

Blind Melon -- 'For My Friends' [review]

Blind Melon - For My Friends
Adrenaline Records (4/22/08)
Rock

I'm pretty sure that when Blind Melon frontman Shannon Hoon died in 1995, most everyone wrote the band off; even the release of Nico in 1996 seemed more of a final nod to the Hoon family and a gift to longtime fans. And sure enough, the band members shortly thereafter went on to other things and Blind Melon sort of faded away.

But sometimes sleeping bands just can't be left to lie...

Without hearing a note off For My Friends, I wanted to say what a mistake this album was. I was ready to pen a diatribe criticizing the band at an attempted money-grab. Everyone already saw the Behind the Music. Why dig up the corpse that everyone assumed was resting peacefully?

Hell, "Tones of Home" turned me and thousands of other people into fans back in 1992; and we were all equally turned off when "No Rain", a song completely out of character for the band, turned them into a household name. (I was lured back by the intensity of "Galaxy" and "Toes Across the Floor" years later, but Hoon would be dead far too soon from a drug overdose for it to really matter, and the rest is well-documented history.)

But I digress...

I wanted to say no one could fill Hoon's shoes in this band, with this dynamic. I wanted to hate everything for which this album stands. But from the opening notes of the first song on For My Friends, the title-track, I was won over.

The band hasn't missed a beat, still offering up '70s influenced, riff-heavy rock with a modern edge. There's a hint of blues, a southern twang, and down-home grooves that permeate the entire album. And Travis Warren does a great job of sliding into Hoon's spot, emulating him just a bit (almost channeling him for the first half of the album), but giving the band a nice twist and making the vocalist slot his own.

The aforementioned title track is short, simple and really sweet. There's a great melodic riff anchoring the entire track, and it's as if the ghost of Hoon took up the microphone for one last jam with the band. "With the Right Set of Eyes" is a little more fleshed out—a bluesy track that twists around groove and mood while Warren completely commands the proceedings. The same goes for "Wishing Well", while things slow down a little on "Sometimes", which harkens back to a more '70s feel.

It's those times when the band chooses to completely let loose—moments on "Make a Difference", "Down on the Pharmacy" and "Harmful Belly" immediately spring to mind—that really make For My Friends shine. There was never any denying that there was a little bit of magic whenever the four original members got together, and while Hoon is definitely missed, Warren does a fair job filling the void.

Album closer "Cheetum Street", with its slight hint of Lynyrd Skynyrd, is the perfect closer, and one where Warren finally emerges, completely, from Hoon's shadow.

Chalk this one up as one of the year's bigger surprises. Almost 13 years since Soup, and 2008 sees a new Blind Melon release? And to top it all off... it's good? Who would have thought?

a'tris -- 'Lensing' [review]

a'tris - Lensing
Mark Records / Tunecore (2/19/08)
Rock / Alternative

a'tris is one of those bands that seem hard to pigeon-hole into a set genre; hints of Radiohead (without being overly pretentious), 30 Seconds to Mars (without the pop hook), Open Hand (without the crunch) and Deftones (without the metal edge) merge into a music experience.

There are flourishes, there's rock and pop bending together, there's mood and melancholy and joy, and it's all put together in a way that seems brilliant yet simple. That's not to say that this is a perfect album, or one of the best albums of the year. But there's plenty of glimmers of musical magic. The weakness of a'tris lies in its indie-ness, if that makes any sense. The band is so underground, or so non-conventional, that it seems to suffer as a result.

When the band is clicking, Lensing is really good—the grind of opener "Paradise Is a Boxcar", the hook of "Automatic Doors", the flourish of "Selling Oxygen", the beauty of "This Mortal Engine". In fact, the entire first half of the album is pretty much spot on.

Some of the later tracks start to sound a little too much like Radiohead, and the songs become almost uninspired. It's difficult to put your finger on, but these tracks just seem to lack the spark of the album's first half.

This is a good album. The band, or the group of musicians, or whatever a'tris ultimately is (the soul of the outift?), is solid and good at what it does. It's tough to put an album out like this and avoid becoming stereotypical or boring, and the band avoids doing that. It just doesn't seem to live up to the best of what it offers, leaving the listener a mixed bag from which to pick. This is good, but it could be great.

Ashes Divide -- 'Keep Telling Myself It's Alright' [review]

Ashes Divide - Keep Telling Myself It's Alright
Island Records (4/8/08)
Rock / Alternative

Billy Howerdel is probably best known for his collaborative work with Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan in A Perfect Circle, though he does have a fairly lengthy résumé to his name. And with A Perfect Circle now being on hiatus, Howerdel is trying his hand at fronting his own band. The result is a mixed bag of ethereal rock music that pulls influence from a variety of sources.

Ashes Divide sounds more like 30 Seconds to Mars (with a hint of Nine Inch Nails) than A Perfect Circle, but that may be a much due to the absence of Keenan (more on that later) than anything else (though Howerdel's vocals could draw comparison to Jared Leto's).

Ashes Divide has just as much in common, sonically, with the aforementioned bands as it does notable '80s bands of the same vein (The Cure, Duran Duran, et al.), and Howerdel has managed to merge all of this influence to create something that harkens back to a time/genre without sounding dated. (The melancholic “A Wish” could just have easily been released by The Cure in 1988, yet it doesn't sound out of place on the album.) Likewise, something like "The Prey" could just have easily been released by Trent Reznor before he went all "garage" on everyone.

There's a definite ebb and flow to the album—it starts off loud, slides into a more retro groove for a few tracks, gets slower and more reflective in the middle and then picks up the pace again to end with a bang.

It seems Keenan may have been able to focus some of Howerdel's efforts in A Perfect Circle. The song structure seemed more direct in A Perfect Circle, which was a nice juxtaposition for the more meandering, imaginative vocals/lyrics. Here, some of the songs either plod along without direction, or seem to tail off and/or end abruptly, which is not only a disappointment but also calls into question what could have been given a little more effort. ("Stripped Away" and "Denial Waits" seemed to fall into this trap, which is a real shame since they’re the two opening tracks.)

Taken as a whole, Ashes Divide is a nice effort. There's a definite mood to the album, and everything flows very well together. A few times Howerdel seems to let his influences get the better of him, unleashing tracks that sound more like an homage than original effort, but this is a nice start for one of the music scene's harder workers.

PlayRadioPlay -- 'Texas' [review]

PlayRadioPlay! - Texas
Island Records (03/18/08)
Pop / Rock / Alternative / Electronic

PlayRadioPlay! falls into that genre of music that merges hook-filled, pop-ish, alternative music (say, mellower Saves the Day or maybe Straylight Run) with a decidedly electronic background of beats and melody, to create this mish-mash of music that is as much about atmosphere and experience as it is about content (think Idiot Pilot or Postal Service and the like).

The results are pretty enjoyable. Not completely outstanding, but enough to hook you in and entertain. The melodies are simple and catchy, the lyrics are just quirky enough that you’re captivated without rolling your eyes and the vocals are actually the high point of the entire package. Daniel Hunter, who alone initially made up the band—though he has put together a full band for touring, and I did notice, I believe, a female vox in a couple of spots on the album—oozes this faux innocence in his delivery, but is commanding enough to drive each song on the strength of his vocals, meshing with the music.

Air Traffic -- 'Fractured Life' [review]

Air Traffic - Fractured Life
EMI Records (02/05/08)
Rock



From the opening chords of Fractured Life, you'll find yourself trying to put a finger on where you've heard this before.

What is it? Is it The Bends-era Radiohead?

No, that’s not it (but how cool would that be?). You cycle through a couple more bands from the UK, trying to place the voice... Nothing.

Then you focus more on the overall "sound" of Air Traffic, and it hits you. The band is a UK version of The Fray, only more extreme on each end of the sonic spectrum (the rock is harder, the moody stuff is heavier).

After almost a year of availability overseas, Air Traffic's Fractured Life is finally making a debut stateside. The band's piano-driven rock, if it can find an immediate audience, is sure to catch on and be a big hit. This album could find quite the little niche into which to settle. It's not overly garage rock; the piano adds this additional depth to the band's sound, and their considered peers are bigger hits in their homeland than in North America (then again, that might be a bad precursor).

Opener "Come On" builds slowly, opening like a piano ballad and growing into an anthem by the close (you’ll hear the Radiohead influence in the guitar work). "Charlotte" is a short, little catchy rock song with an infectious chorus. "Never Even Told Me", "Just Abuse Me" and "I Like That" are carried by Chris Wall on lead vocals, as Wall also tears it up on the piano. And apropos to its title, "Shooting Star" just soars with airy, driving riffs reminiscent of U2 or Coldplay's finer moments (with some killer soloing mid-way through the song). And the band can slow down and still string together some great music (just listen to "Empty Space" or "No More Running Away").

The first listen of this album was a tough one to get through, just because I didn’t know what to expect. Once you settle in to the band's approach and take everything in (as opposed to trying to figure out where the group is coming from), it's like flipping a switch. Fractured Life is one hell of a rock album, and a fine debut. It's smart, mournful, fun and catchy—sometimes all at the same time. If the band manages to catch on and take off, it could be huge.

Tool -- 'Aenima' [classic review]

Tool
"Aenima"
(Volcano Records)


"... a jagged, brooding nightmare filled with roaring guitars, abrupt rhythm shifts, and jarring sound effects. One of 1996's strangest and strongest alt-metal records."

-- from Entertainment Weekly's review of "Aenima"

"Aenima" is one of those albums that, after release, seemed to yield hit after hit. Each subsequent single seemed better than the one before. From the title track to "Stinkfist" to "Eulogy" to "H" to "Forty-Six and 2" and "Hooker with a Penis," the hits never stopped. Anything that wasn't released, very well could have.

"Aenima" has a fairly sterile feel to it. The production is crisp and the tone undoubtedly foreboding. Whether the band is tackling the destruction of L.A. (on the title track), death ("Eulogy"), drugs ("H") or even the taboo topic of fisting (on "Stinkfist" -- think about it, this song is on national radio since its release to this day), the message is quick and to the point and conveyed with a deadpan delivery. Even the instrumental and other interludes seamlessly flow between the tracks and pull the rest of the tracks into one complete cohesive unit.

The beauty of the Tool sound is that it isn't an in-your-face assault. Rather than the percussive unit, the guitar is the driving force behind the music and the rhythm is what propels the album. Not quite tech-metal, not quite an industrial durge, the focused delivery is what makes this album a classic.

The album and band pulls you in with a hard-hitting assault and then keeps shifting and changing the tempo and direction in such a pure manner that you feel powerless to stop the onslaught. That's the true beauty of the album. You can pull any nugget out and it sits perfectly alone. But it also fits into this complex puzzle of sound. You could never change the tracklist order for "Aenima," but each piece can be enjoyed on its own.