Cuddle Magic

Picture

(FYO; US: 9 Feb 2010; UK: 9 Feb 2010)

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Band names hardly come more twee than Cuddle Magic, but then again, few bands sound as genuinely eager to conform to twee-pop conventions as this expansive Brooklyn/Philadelphia ensemble. Its second album, Picture, could have been constructed straight from a twee checklist: an impressive roster of instruments (ranging from any number of strings, horns, keyboards, banjos, and guitars), mingling with unaffected male/female vocals, cutesy lyrics (opener “The Packaging” is a song addressed to a bottle of syrup), and generally listless melodies. It is the latter issue that generally sinks so many entries in this genre, so it is a pleasant surprise when Cuddle Magic manages to construct a memorable tune out of these elements, as it does occasionally here, like on the swaying, heartfelt “Expectations” or in the eerie harmonies that blanket “Anyone”.  Unfortunately, for the most part, the band comes off as far more interested in indulging in the instrumental excesses that clog most of Picture‘s longer tracks, like the bloated ten-minute finale “Brimstone Overture” or the interminable quasi-Latin jazz show-off that links the mid-album song pair of “In So Far” and “Paris/Happydent”, effectively finding the band crossing the line from cuddly to snoozy.

—Jer Fairall

Leif Vollebekk

Inland

(Nevado; US: 5 Jan 2010; UK: Import)

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Leif Vollebekk has one of those voices that you can’t exactly put a finger on. It sways with a callous rhythm à la adult-contempo big-timers such as Jason Mraz and Jack Johnson, but at times, it lingers on the fray with a sort of devilish charm, reminiscent of Blood on the Tracks-era Dylan. However you classify Vollebekk and his subtle, building folk masterpieces, his sound is one that stays with you. Inland, his debut full-length, contains a certain theatrical touch. Songs like “In the Midst of Blue and Green” showcase Vollebekk’s talent as a multi-instrumentalist, with sweeping touches of piano giving the track a home during a rainy montage on the big screen. For all Vollebekk’s adult-pop leanings and movie-ready tracks, he maintains a sense of honesty on Inland, and it’s one existing in the heartfelt tone of the record, which when you break it down, comes out in spades.

—Joshua Kloke

Tetuzi Akiyama and Toshimaru Nakamura

Semi-Impressionism

(Spekk; US: 27 Oct 2009; UK: 27 Oct 2009)

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Tetuzi Akiyama and Toshimaru Nakamura’s collection of three improvisations gets its title partly from an apparant caligraphy mistake, to give the word “semi”, meaning “cicadas”. The incessant buzzing of something you hear but don’t see is in some way the essence of the album, or rather that accompanied by minimalist guitar playing that itself can evoke the natural world at times. The guitar is Akiyama’s, as Nakamura is responsible for electronics that appear often as static, buzzes, or whirs. It’s hard to think about each of these as a “track”, per se, as they’re not monolithic. The sounds meander and cut off, disappear, and then roar loudly from the speakers.

About six minutes into the second track, the cicada-like buzzing gets so loud it’s disorienting, almost unbearable, while the guitar plays behind. The guitar is gentle, but to think of it that way is misleading. It’s either leading us the pain and mystery of noise, commenting on it from a distance, or is right with it, complicit. Acoustic guitar often leads to radio static; witness the joining of the natural and electric worlds. “#3” features a noise at first similar to hip-hop scratching, which soon seems like a random noise, an accident. The way it plays we imagine electronics as random sounds, everything as random sound; electronics as “nature sound”, everything as nature sound. We imagine a mutation of musical instrument to buzzsaw, a mutation of musical instrument to insect swarms, to invisible sound creature.

—Dave Heaton

Jenn Grant

Echoes

(Six Shooter; US: 23 Feb 2009; UK: 23 Feb 2009)

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Soft pop and jilted melodramatic songs characterize Jenn Grant’s latest effort, Echoes. Grant’s moody songwriting and dark, acrobatic vocals bring to mind Fiona Apple, if she hadn’t thrown in the towel, particularly with “I Was Your Woman”. Some light-hearted songs, such as “(I’ve Got) the Two of You”, punctuate the dark lines as well. The lofty, close-knit vocal harmonies mimic the chimes of a guitar. The entire album was recorded on tape, so there is a timeless quality to the sound. Grant’s delicate touch to “You’ll Go Far” against the mellow string section sounds familiar, and the doo-wop stylings of “Parachutes” recall the Angels from “My Boyfriend’s Back”, but the song’s slow build modernizes it.

—Sarah Moore

Screaming Females

Singles

(Don Giovanni; US: 9 Feb 2010; UK: 22 Feb 2010)

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It’s hard to say what qualifies as singles these days. Nevertheless, Singles is the title of the latest from Screaming Females. What comprises this release is more a collection of the band’s 7-inches—the old-school implications may scare away the youngsters who don’t own record players—and the album shows the band in its rarest form. Screaming Females hails from Brunswick, New Jersey and is equal parts Joan Jett, Angry Samoans, and Guided by Voices. Marissa Paternoster, the band’s sole, actual screaming female, possesses a fiery, quavering voice that commands attention; her equally commanding guitar skills render the group meaningful past the recent lo-fi fad faze. Singles includes a pretty rad version of Neil Young’s “Cortex the Killer” and opener “Arm Over Arm” is an epic five-plus-minutes-long song that wallows in song-a-long lyrics. Casual listeners might prefer the more pristine-version of the band via last year’s full-length Power Move, but Singles is a tasty morsel of a feisty young talent.

—Joe Tacopino

InLove

Stories

(Inflamable; US: 2 Feb 2010; UK: 4 Nov 2009)

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Whispery sopranos have options. They can stand at the front of a downtempo hip-hop collective, whispering and cooing their way alongside Portishead (or, at least, what Portishead used to be). They can be disco divas. They can be ironic indie rock frontwomen. They can morph into whatever personality the music behind them requests because their voice augments the music surrounding it, rather than demanding the center of attention.

As such, it’s almost shocking that an album centered on a whispery soprano can be as disappointing as InLove’s Stories. It seems as though DJ Cam, who discovered InLove and produced this, her first solo effort, was overwhelmed by just how versatile a voice like hers can be and just started throwing darts at the wall hoping for a bull’s-eye. The worst part about this approach is that DJ Cam evokes so many artists in such vivid ways as to practically beg for unfavorable comparisons. “Rain” shares a beat with Massive Attack’s “Teardrop”, though it can’t even begin to compare. The smooth jazz of “The Look of Love” tosses a clavinet into the chorus, and suddenly we wish we were listening to Stevie Wonder. InLove doesn’t have the power or confidence to make a disco tune like “Rock with You” an anthem, and the handclaps and “yeah"s of “Winter in New York” just sound silly.

InLove’s voice is fine (despite a proclivity for hard “R” sounds), but that voice is asked to do things it’s simply not ready for much of the time. As such, Stories is a frustrating, disorienting listen bound to make its listeners long for something else.

—Mike Schiller

Matt Gigg and the Intellectuals

Planted

(self-released; US: 3 Oct 2009; UK: 3 Oct 2009)

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For only having played together for a little over a year, Matt Gigg & the Intellectuals sure know a thing or two about making concise indie folk. Planted, the band’s debut, is a romantic and tethering listen full of charm and a relaxed sort of grace. Gigg himself is a witty and literate lyricist, reminiscent of a young Will Sheff. The 10 tracks on Planted employ a communal-like sound, one that would fit just as well around a campfire as well as your local coffee joint. Not only is it possible to sing along to tracks like “Paul’s Song”, a passionate tale of a nomadic rambler, but the rising crescendo that caps off this standout leaves ample room to get some good, introspective thinking done. While the production on Planted lacks, this is still an impressive debut that is as alarmingly visceral as it is cerebral.

—Joshua Kloke

Sub:Stance

(Ostgut Ton; US: 2 Feb 2010; UK: 25 Jan 2010)

In July, 2008, Paul “Scuba” Rose and Spymania Records’ Paul Fowler organized their own night at Berlin’s Berghain, a massive, acclaimed club situated downstairs from Panoramabar. Rose’s live set that evening accompanied efforts from prominent dubstep and UK bass music purveyors Mala, Shackleton, Distance, and others. The since-revered Sub:Stance was born, and if the 68-minute mix is any indication of the powerful-and-eclectic experience the night offers, Berghain regulars are among the most fortunate in the land.

The Sub:Stance mix on Ostgut Ton, the label run by Berghain’s owners, is a mindblower—as anyone who’s ever downloaded a mix from Scuba before might have guessed. For a guy who’s never collaborated with another musician (outside of issuing other people’s records on his Hotflush label), Paul Rose is a consistently skilled sound aggregator as a DJ, blending divergent productions with a scientific sense of cohesion. He appropriately sets things off with a lush, ambient introduction from Hotflush’s Sigha, whose crackling dubstep/techno hybrids appear on Sub:Stance four times. Unreleased efforts from Rose are also here; the impossibly urgent, echo-heavy “Last Stand” is stylistically quite distant from the slick grooves and backward-spiraling trim of Joker’s “Psychedelic Runway”, but through headphones, it’s as if better closure doesn’t exist. Even if you’ve tired of Joy Orbison’s 2009 monster hit “Hyph Mongo”, its role as a vibrant burst of house following the murky glitch from DFRNT, AQF, and Badawi is set in stone—this blend of dark atmospherics and well-lit warmth comprises the set’s finest moments, and outdoing all of Sub:Stance‘s nuanced pairings is no small feat.

—Dominic Umile