Mary Roos

Amour Toujours: The French Song Collection 1972-1975

(Bureau B; US: 10 Nov 2009; UK: 2 Nov 2009)

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In the 1970s, German pop singer Mary Roos attempted a career in France, playing Michel Fugain’s girlfriend in a film musical, Un Enfant dans la Ville and releasing two French-language albums, Mary Roos (1972) and Direction l’Aventure (1973). Amour Toujours, which incorporates 11 tracks from her first album and 10 from her second, is a summary of her sortie. The tone is optimistic, cosmopolitan, and her voice has the intimacy of mainstream pop, as if the singer is saying, “I trust you. I am your clearest, most easily understood self and am willing to confide my loves and disappointments.” Her songs are designed to be heard once and wiggle themselves into your brain. “Bing Bang Holly” and “Viva” have choruses that you can hum along to. The words je t’aime are uttered but in a jaunty way, not breathy, not agonized, as if love is never a source of torment. It’s charming music Kylie Minogue might have been making if she’d been born years earlier in Europe.

—Deanne Sole

Farmer Dave Scher

Fast Forward to the Good Times

(Kemado; US: 18 Aug 2009; UK: 18 Aug 2009)

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Unless you sell sausages or grow crops, putting “Farmer” at the beginning of your name probably isn’t the best idea. It isn’t clear whether Farmer Dave Scher has a green thumb or stock in the pork industry, but it’s rather evident that he is an avid lover of psychedelic-pop music. How else could you name an album Flash Forward to the Good Times? Denim overalls and corn-husking aside, his debut album is one part Pet Sounds-era Beach Boys, one-part Neil Diamond, two-parts UK psych, and a dash of sand, sun, and waves, dude. That makes for some seriously fun, catchy nostalgic pop tunes to momentarily cure those autumn blues for all of us not living in Southern California. Sure, tracks “Our Love is a Wave” or “Feel Me Baby” are as ridiculous and subtly humorous as their titles suggest. But damn, how his lush and dreamy sound makes you yearn for a summer make-out session down by the boardwalk. Way to “hang loose”, Dave.

—Saxon Baird

Rod Piazza & the Mighty Flyers Blues Quartet

Soul Monster

(Delta Groove; US: 16 Jun 2009; UK: 26 Oct 2009)

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After winning the prestigious Blues Music Award for Band of the Year no fewer than four times during the group’s 29-year history, Rod Piazza & the Mighty Flyers face the challenge of keeping its music sounding fresh and exciting. That’s just what the west coast harp player and singer, along with his wife Honey on piano, drummer David Kida, and guitarist Henry Carvajal, succeed in doing with style on Soul Monster, its third outing for Delta Groove. Led by Piazza’s innovative harmonica style—a surprising bag of tricks throughout, whether he’s coming on like a soulful locomotive blowing low-slung, grinding notes on the funky instrumental title track or joining ranks with the two guesting tenor saxophones on the swinging cover of Jimmy Liggin’s “That’s What’s Knockin’ Me Out”—, the Mighty Flyers touch base with the past as Honey’s left hand takes flight on a rocketing boogie-woogie rendition of George “Harmonica” Smith’s instrumental “Sunbird” and a reworking of “Blues In ‘92” as “Tell Me About It Sam”, a tribute to late friend Sam Myers. Best of all, however, is when Cavajal takes lead vocals on the suave teen-cruiser “Talk to Me”, a hit for Little Willie John back in ‘58.

—Alan Brown

Toto La Momposina

La Bodega

(Astar Artes; US: 10 Nov 2009; UK: 10 Nov 2009)

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Listening to “Tembanddumba”, a song in which Totó la Momposina lets her voice stoop thrillingly and then snatches it up again like a dropped hankie, reminds that Mercedes Sosa died not long ago. Sosa was an Argentine, and Momposina is Colombian, but both have championed the folk music of their respective countries and have possessed strong voices. Their voices are not brutal but provide the steady power that could pierce a wall. If you wanted a boil-it-down nickname for the Afro-Indian music Momposina likes to sing, you could call it drum ‘n’ flute. The flute ( kuisi) is husky. The drumming is vivid stuff: rapid, rumbling, and stormy. She loves cumbia and mixes things around a little, keeping the flavor local. The violins are perhaps a step too far in the direction of cosmopolitan smoothness, contrasting uneasily with the indigenous instruments. Though it lacks the the rougher style 2002’s Pacantó, La Bodega proves la Momposina is one of those rare musicians who would have to work at being anything less than good.

—Deanne Sole

Shelley Short

A Cave, A Canoo

(Hush; US: 13 Oct 2009; UK: 13 Oct 2009)

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In a lot of ways, Shelley Short fits into the female singer-songwriter mold pretty well. She plays a quiet acoustic guitar, and her voice is sweet, hushed, and seemingly confessional. But hold on before you paint her into that corner because A Cave, A Canoo has some subtle surprises and noise play that distinguishes it from the pack. During the verses in “Familiar”, guitars buzz, notes drop in off-key and off-time, and strings squeak in complaint, but the chorus is all shimmering haze. Pedal steel, soaking in reverb, creates a wide space about the sinister, playful hiss of Short’s vocals. “Hard to Tell” rests on the laid-bare buzz of accordion. On “Tap the Old Bell,” a huge space exists between Short’s far-off guitar and her up-front vocals, making for a haunting lullaby. At their core, these may all be contained folk songs, but Short, never quiet, comes at them from the same angle, moving away from a simple guitar/vocals construction and, in the process, creating an album that seeps into the skin, that refuses—despite all its quiet—to let you dismiss it as something you’ve heard before.

—Matthew Fiander

Boys Named Sue

Greatest Hits Volume Sue

(Phantom Sound & Vision; US: 15 Sep 2009; UK: 15 Sep 2009)

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How’s this for a gimmick: Four Dallas yahoos call themselves Boys Named Sue and play roadhouse crowd-pleasers in beer-soaked classic-country mode. They are: Sue-ah on “lead vocalizin’ and pickin’”, Snakebite Sue on “bangin’ and harmoneez”, Bobby Sue on “sawin’ and lady killin”, and Dub Sue on “slappin’ and drinkin’”. These guys are renowned for facilitating bar bashes in Texas to loyal crowds of hooters and hollerers, and now the band has committed its reverent but goofy blend of outlaw archetypes and alt-country songwriting to a new studio record, The Hits Volume Sue.  Thankfully, these guys can write and play well enough to transcend their wisecracking personas, and they aren’t faking their love of ‘70s country, as on “Lost My Mind”, the most Waylon-y song in years.  Sue-ah can’t sing well enough to hold his own with his honky-tonk heroes, but that’s hardly the point on songs like “Light Beers Away” and “Whiskey Talkin’”, both catchy and fun sing-alongs that sound better the more you take the band’s advice. The album is front-loaded with the Sues’ best songs and eventually runs out of good ideas, and while a studio release from a party band can’t compete with its shows, this record ought to satisfy folks who still dust off their BR5-49 albums once in a while.

—Steve Leftridge

Groupshow

The Martyrdom of Groupshow

(~scape; US: 28 Apr 2009; UK: 27 Apr 2009)

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Is this a joke? It certainly sounds like a joke (not that that’s necessarily a bad thing). Jan Jelinek, Hanno Leichtmann, and Andrew Pekler—all names with individual pedigrees in experimenting with electronics—get together and record that most wanky conceit of rock ‘n’ roll: a jam session. The Martyrdom of Groupshow consistently betrays its jam origins; tracks live or die by the quality of the loose riff that emerges from the opening timbral salad. Do this for two to three minutes, rinse and repeat 12 times, and there’s the record. It’s not an ethos for recording that has to end badly, but for Groupshow, more often than not the result teeters on the precipice of gelling into a compelling idea.

Maybe the length is the issue here. Some of the greatest psychedelic jam bands found riff nirvana through tireless repetition—see Can’s “Halleluwah”. Groupshow sounds too impatient to fully see these through. When it does work, as on the decayed surf twang of “The Future Looks Bright… Super Bright” or the lo-fi grit of “Physical Therapist”, it becomes clear why this collaboration was such an interesting idea to begin with. It’s possible that Groupshow is a sight to behold when the band goes at it live, and that the abrupt sequencing nonsequiturs of Martyrdom would be rectified in such a setting. As a recorded document, however, the album is frustratingly good at being almost there.

—David Abravanel

Mario Adnet & Philippe Baden Powell

Afrosambajazz

(Adventure Music; US: 15 Sep 2009; UK: 15 Sep 2009)

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The “Afro Sambas” refer to the work of the legendary Brazilian guitarist Baden Powell, who released a number of solo and collaborative works under this title from the mid-1960s through to the 1980s. Notable among these releases was his partnership with songwriter Vinicius de Moraes, which resulted in the album Os Afro Sambas in 1966. Baden Powell was influenced as much by jazz and classical composition as he was by the sounds of samba, bossa nova, choro, and the Afro-Brazilian candomblé and umbanda, so it makes perfect sense to hear jazz arrangements of pieces such as “Canto de Xangô”, “Lamento de Exú”, and “Pai”. Guitarist Mario Adnet has previously released jazz versions of other Brazilian giants such as António Carlos Jobim and Moacir Santos.

On this release, he collaborates with Baden Powell’s son Philippe, an accomplished pianist. Their instruments are complemented by brass, woodwind, strings, a variety of percussion, and occasional vocals. The result is a triumph, as the two musicians produce large group arrangements that do justice to the original songs while also adding new layers of richness and complexity. As well as covering the original “Afro Sambas”, some of Baden Powell’s unreleased work is aired for the first time, including the beautiful “Canto de Yansan”. This is a wonderfully paced and orchestrated release with broad appeal.

—Richard Elliott