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He’s
So High
Spiritualized
Amazing
Grace (Sanctuary)
For nearly the last 20 years, J Spaceman (Jason Pierce) has
been at the forefront of mind-bending, drugged-out rock, melding
the shoegaze of bands like My Bloody Valentine and Jesus and
Mary Chain with the traditions of ’60s underground rock. With
his first band, Spacemen 3, Pierce and co-Spaceman Sonic Boom
fed heavily off the vigor and pump of garage bands like the
Stooges, as well as the exploratory nature of psych bands
like 13th Floor Elevators. They also fed heavily off psychedelics
themselves, and what resulted was a dangerously trance-inducing
rock & roll sound, epitomized by their ethos that would
also title their fifth LP, Taking Drugs to Make Music to
Take Drugs To. When Spacemen 3 split up in 1991, Pierce
took everything Spacemen 3 (sans Sonic Boom), i.e., the band,
their drugs and circular reasoning, to form Spiritualized,
which have since been the vehicle to perfect and indulge his
sonic craft—with more instrumentation, more studio perfectionism,
more drugs, more repent, and more longing for the psychedelic
experience (all this was realized on 1997’s Ladies and
Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space).
Spiritualized’s latest and fifth LP, Amazing Grace,
has been described by Pierce as a “back to basics” rock album.
Inspired in part by the multiple-year project of scoring and
recording 2001’s Let It Come Down with a full-piece
100-plus orchestra, a gospel choir and subsequent tour, Pierce’s
desire for simplicity is certainly understandable. Pierce
is perhaps the only rock musician who even unadorned requires
sleigh bells, a dulcimer, and an 11-piece brass and string
section. By comparison, Amazing Grace is a bit more
economical, especially when you examine method rather than
just form. Pierce reportedly gave his band a single day to
learn and record each song, cutting off the chance for the
more complex embellishments that characterize previous Spiritualized
efforts. Rather than sounding rushed or amateurish, that decision
yields an immediacy that hasn’t been heard or even suggested
since Spacemen 3 days.
The
sequencing of Amazing Grace follows what has become
the perfected Spiritualized formula, common to all their albums
and most of their songs: get high, hang out, and come down
slowly. The two start-off cuts, “This Little Life of Mine”
and “She Kissed Me (It Felt Like a Hit)”—the latter paying
homage to the Crystals’ “He Hit Me (It Felt Like a Kiss) in
name only—rock the “Stooges for airports” tag as hard as Spiritualized
ever have and likely ever will. After cruising through several
blissed-out, midtempo rockers, a swelling free-jazz composition
appears, “The Power and the Glory,” to start bringing us all
back home. But before he lets it come down fully (which he
does amazingly with the lullaby-on-ecstasy “Lay It Down”),
Pierce treats us to the frolicking “Cheapster,” an adaptation
of “Bob Dylan’s 115th Dream” updated with synths for the forthcoming
“digital garage rock revival.”
This album comes comfortably close to typical Spiritualized
fare; many songs sound like rewrites of older material or
several older songs strung together, but in the best possible
way. While some fans might await a return to the raw economy
of Spacemen 3 days (nowadays a live show might have to do),
Amazing Grace embraces a pure rock & roll aesthetic,
something Spiritualized have never cared much for.
—John
Suvannavejh
Joe
Henry
Tiny
Voices (Anti)
The ninth album from singer-songwriter Joe Henry finds him
traveling farther down the path set forth on his 1996 album,
Trampoline. He started out nearly 20 years ago performing
narrative-driven Americana, or “alt-country” as it came to
be known several years later. These days, he’s creating a
different type of Americana; one that incorporates jazz, soul,
folk, rock and just a little bit of sonic chaos. Tiny Voices
is his first record for the talent-heavy Anti imprint, and
finds him following a skewed parallel to new labelmate Tom
Waits. However, while Waits is all boozed up and pointing
at shadows on the wall, Henry is more like a red-wine-sipping
Willy Wonka, taking you on the journey of a lifetime in just
over 60 minutes.
A master narrator and character actor whose lyrics often play
out like novelettes, Henry explores themes of love, loyalty
and mortality with a wit and vocabulary rarely found in today’s
rather shallow talent pool. As with several of his previous
efforts, he opted to record this album almost entirely live,
which requires an expert cast of musicians. In the past, he’s
enlisted such top players as Don Cherry, Ornette Coleman,
Brad Mehldau, Chris Whitley and the Jayhawks. This time out,
his peer group includes keyboardists Patrick Warren and Dave
Palmer and drummer Jay Bellerose. Henry’s production treatments
make these 12 songs sound as if they could have been recorded
at any time in the last 60 years, rendering Tiny Voices
an equally edgy and inviting collection that will likely sound
just as fresh 60 years on.
—John
Brodeur
Allen
Toussaint
The
Complete Warner Recordings (Rhino Handmade)
From 1972 to 1978, Allen Tous- saint recorded three albums
for Warner Bros. Already a well-established New Orleans-based
songwriter (including “Holy Cow,” “Working in a Coal Mine,”
“Fortune Teller” and “Brickyard Blues”), he came to the label
that was then among the most supportive of a wide variety
of singer- songwriters such as Randy Newman, James Taylor
and Van Dyke Parks. However, Toussaint failed to make any
commercial inroads. Which is not to say he didn’t find financial
satisfaction: Herb Albert’s recording of Toussaint’s “Whipped
Cream” was used as the theme song for The Dating Game,
netting him extremely comfortable returns during its run on
television.
The 43 songs collected in this beautifully designed hardbound
set include the aforementioned three albums as well a single
and a bevy of previously unissued live tracks. Coupling his
scant touring with an absence of airplay, the albums found
favor only in his hometown and with other fans of the Crescent
City’s vibrant music. For the most part, these offerings are
free from the production excesses of the era and sound fresh
today. Toussaint’s own version of “On Your Way Down” (also
recorded by Little Feat) makes it clear why Lowell George,
the Band, Bonnie Raitt and others sought Toussaint’s talent
as a writer and arranger. Rooted in tradition, he fearlessly
soaked in the contemporary world around him. Surprises abound,
whether in the combining of instruments, the overlay of rhythmic
push and pull or vocal arrangements. Listen to “Electricity”
and hear a restless explorer; on “Last Train,” a funky and
dramatic ringleader; on “Southern Nights,” a poetic heart
unafraid to filter his vision through the possibilities found
in a recording studio.
—David
Greenberger
Quasi
Hot
Shit (Touch and Go)
With all apologies to the white Stripes, Sam Coomes and Janet
Weiss—collectively known as Quasi—have been doing the divorced-couple-as-art-damaged-indie-rock-duo
thing a lot longer, and with more gusto. Their sixth album,
Hot Shit, finds them moving a few more footsteps away
from the fatalistic tone of previous releases toward a fitter,
happier, more productive sound. Heck, this time around, they’re
celebrating “Good Times” and “Sunshine Sounds,” a far cry
from earlier tracks like “It’s Raining” and “I Never Want
to See You Again.” Don’t be fooled, though; the dichotomy
of dour lyrics vs. shiny happy melodies still reigns, but
the topics here are less personal, leaning more toward social
commentary and third-person narrative. The shadow of the Bush
administration looms large in “Seven Years Gone” and “White
Devil’s Dream” (“Bombs fall across the sea and every day we
get less free”), and one would assume that Coomes is placing
his close friend and frequent collaborator, the late Elliott
Smith, under the microscope for another round of examination
on “Drunken Tears.” While not as eerily prescient as 1998’s
“Poisoned Well” (“You won’t live long, but you may write the
perfect song”), “Tears”—written well before Smith’s suicide
in October—is still touching in its unfailing empathy toward
a friend who was clearly headed down the wrong path. “Tears”
also acts as something of a centerpiece for the album. This
is where the pop and art rock visibly collide, its groovy,
George Harrison-esque choruses interspersed with blasts of
sheer cacophony. You bet it’s Hot Shit.
—John
Brodeur
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