Review - Karma - NDV

A nice little album with some really nice songs. Add another one to the stack of albums for another listen!

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There's an old saying passed around by the old-timers that loosely translated becomes "Beware solo albums." The older village old-timers pass around an even older saying: "Beware solo albums by drummers." Fortunately, there's an even older saying quoted by old-timers on their death beds that when taken literally involves the ingesting of large amounts of guar gum, but the meaning behind this ancient wisdom is that if the music is really good, you can ignore the previous two sayings. While he calls the band Spock's Beard his home, Nick D'Virgilio, the man behind Karma, has beat the skins for bands ranging from Sheryl Crow to Tears For Fears to Genesis. On his debut solo release D'Virgilio presents himself as a talented multi-instrumentalist, playing just about every instrument, and singing, on an album full of songs that cover a wide spread of genres. Progressive rock, blues, fusion, pop, funk, country, alternative, jazz, and all kinds of things in between… they're all here and all done amazingly well. While many solo albums suffer from the "look at how technically proficient I am at all these instruments you never knew I played" syndrome (patent pending), NDV again keeps perfect time by presenting eleven exceedingly well-written songs packed with memorable hooks and melodies, all cloaked in such a broad array of styles that music lovers don't stand a chance of escaping Karma's seductive tendrils. As if this weren't enough to make any musician jealous, D'Virgilio is also an accomplished studio guru so the arrangements are top-notch and the production is crystal clear.

The treasures inside this jewel case are many. "The Game", co-written by deceased musical genius Kevin Gilbert, is a pure aural treat. Pianos and bongos explode into brilliant, melodic vocals with powerful drums in a genre halfway between a power ballad and pure rock. The title track consists only of layered vocals and percussion yet is so full and complete that you'll never miss the guitars, mostly because the chorus will haunt your every waking hour with it's chanting tribal rhythm and lyrics of "You can't hide when your karma follows you." The first three minutes of "The Waters Edge" contain overtones of Queen with solo piano and plaintive vocals but then the cello enters with powerful vocals and an amazing chorus that I would give my left buttock to have written, and you know you're a goner. Feel like a little jazz with your pop? "Dream In Red" fits the bill. For a soul fix try the ballad "Will It Be Me?" or "Come What May" for a classic piano ballad. Pure rock with heavy drums and a thick guitar riff so textured you can almost feel it on your tongue? That would be "Anything", third aisle on the left, right next to the gnarled mass of distortion marked "Forgiven." If progressive power-pop is what makes your life worth getting out of bed, there's "The River Is Wide" or the three-part "Paying The Price" which comes complete with attachments by Yes, Pink Floyd, Kansas and early King's X, all for one low price.

While it's not the greatest thing since pre-cooked pimento loaf, this album does so many things so well that it belongs in eight homes out of ten. Well-crafted, catchy songs backed with solid musicianship and flawless production… to put it simply, this is good stuff!

This review first appeared in WhatzUp, January 2002.

Review - Transatlantic - Bridge Across Forever

I like this one better than their most recent but both are still better than any album by Marvin Suggs and His Amazing Muppephone. Almost.

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Here's a good idea: take four musicians from critically acclaimed but widely unknown melodic progressive bands and make a "supergroup". Now put out an album with only four songs, two of which are almost thirty minutes long. Commercial suicide? Probably. Good eats? Definitely! The suspects in question are multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Neal Morse of Spock's Beard, Flower Kings guitarist Roine Stolt, Marillion bassist Pete Trewavas, and Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy. Last year they released their first album, SMPTe, which received the expected critical acclaim, ensuring this year's follow-up Bridge Across Forever. As a fan of melodic progressive music (as opposed to those bands which only want to show off their technical chops and the song be damned) I held my breath as I spun the CD, hoping for the former but fearing the latter. What I found is a nice amalgam of classic progressive rock and modern pop/rock, lots of memorably, hooky melodies, all presented with astounding musicianship cloaked in the guise of a good song. Actually, to this corn-fed Hoosier, the songs all have the indelible fingerprints of Morse on them (making the album sound quite a bit like the best albums by Spock's Beard) but with everyone sharing the vocal responsibilities, giving some nice variety to the mix. The entire album is very symphonic in it's structure. Each song is made up of a variety of recognizable melodies that cross-pollinate to other tracks, giving a nice cohesion to the album. For instance, the first track opens with a moving, melancholy, Morse-ish orchestral string section that develops into the "motherless children" theme that appears later in the second track. Elements of Dark Side Floyd surface later with the addition of sax and a gospel choir, which are later revoked and replaced with an aggressive rhythm and some really spicy guitar tones. The second track, at a puny thirteen minutes long, has a very "Abby Road side 2" feel about it and is literally brimming with hooks. The title track is a somber respite from the grandiose aural assaults of the previous tracks with Morse singing against piano and strings. The final track, "Stranger In Your Soul" begins with the same string passage that opened the album, albeit in a different key. After many musical changes, drawing from Supertramp to Gabriel-era Genesis to straight ahead 70s arena rock, the song, like the opening track, ends with an overblown, dramatic finale which to my ears sounds a bit overdone: a small Achilles heel for an otherwise remarkable project. As far as I'm concerned, any album that leaves it's songs in my head for days after last vibrating across my eardrums is a winner and this one has plagued me for weeks with it's astounding musicianship and catchy powerprogpop melodies. Now if only the voices would stop.

This review first appeared in WhatzUp, November 2001.

Review - Marillion - This Strange Engine

Maybe I should give this one another chance. It's been eleven years, after all. But then I'd have to relisten to The Flower Kings, another band I "should" like but whose music just doesn't click the ol' gears.

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Friends recommend albums. Sometimes you buy these albums they've so enthusiastically raved about. Sometimes you like these albums. Sometimes you wonder why these people are your friends for making you waste your money. Marillion is a UK prog-rock band with quite a history and many albums under its belt. On This Strange Engine, the British boys pare down the "prog" element to a point where it is barely noticeable. You won't find astounding feats of technical prowess, twisting irregular time signatures, or sprawling, complicated compositions. About the only "prog" element left is a hefty use of keyboard and the residue of musical influences. The first four tracks are homogenous to the point of sounding almost alike... acoustic guitar pop with keyboards. Still, "Man of a Thousand Faces" is the best of the lot and quite possibly the best on the album. There's a hint of Trevor Rabin-era Yes in the layered vocal harmonies and some very nice piano soloing embedded in the somewhat catchy chorus melody. "An Accidental Man" is also quite good, sounding like a cross between early Police, later Rush (if they used a bevy of keyboards), and early 80's Yes. Again, the song is saved by some blistering organ soloing and this little keyboard flourish that reminded me of Styx and managed to follow me for the better part of a day. But it goes downhill from there. Most Marillion fans were eager to hear of the lengthy title track which turned out to be an autobiographical fifteen-minute mess with the band not having a clear picture of what they wanted to say or how to say it. "One Fine Day" is a five and a half-minute song that stole large parts of the 70s song "Dreamweaver", and not always the best parts. The worst song, or best if you like cheese, is "Hope For the Future" that opens quite promisingly with a moody, bluesy guitar riff that exactly one minute later turns into the ugly stepbrother of the Lionel Ritchie hit "All Night Long." The worst sin in these songs is that there is no soul, no feeling, no burning passion... just bland pop carried out in a very efficient manner, almost as if they were recorded on automatic pilot. In short, this is not my cup of tea. This review first appeared in WhatzUp, June 2001.

Review - Andrew Peterson - Light for the Lost Boy

I probably sound all sappy on this review but I don't care. This album blows me away like a twister in Kansas.

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It’s been a long time since I’ve come across an album like Andrew Peterson’s Light for the Lost Boy. The ten songs enchantingly capture the marvel of childhood, expressed through the melancholy eyes of a father who is watching his children grow up and lose their sense of wonder through the hardships of life. Sadness flirts with joy. Hope mingles with loss.

“Come Back Soon” opens like the dawn, full of hope and apprehensive promise, spouting forth picturesque lyrics of “We awake in the night in the womb of the world / We beat our fists on the door / …. Are we alone in this great darkness?” “The Ballad of Jody Baxter” is quiet, sung in whisper with appropriate rural instruments that accompany this retelling of The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings while the hushed “Shine Your Light On Me” captures a day when Peterson was “sixteen with a broken heart in bloom.” The reassuring “Rest Easy” springs forth with the hopeful line “You are not alone” and builds to a cathartic bridge of “You work so hard to wear yourself down” before providing rest and affirmation. Inspired by a family trip to the Kensington Gardens of Peter Pan fame, almost the entire song of “Day By Day” is a memorable quote. Indulge me a few: “We just can’t get used to being here / Where the ticking clock is loud and clear / Children of eternity / On the run from entropy” and “Everybody’s so surprised / When right before your very eyes / Your baby’s in the second grade / You blink and it’s her wedding day.” Add a gentle rock beat and a sticky melody and you’ve got pure pixie dust! In “You’ll Find Your Way” Peterson writes to his too-quickly growing son “I wanna go with you / But I can’t follow” through life, lamenting “Your first kiss / Your first crush / The first time you know you’re not enough / The first time there’s no one there to hold you.” If this isn’t an apt expression of early teen years then I don’t know what is. The final song, which incorporates an expensive Peter Gabriel influenced sound, explores the topic further with “But every little boy grows up / And he’s haunted by the heart that died.” However, far from being a depressing album, Peterson sprinkles each song with light through a desire for hope through faith.

Too often a band’s lyrics are negligible. Very rarely does an album fire on all cylinders. By focusing so much on the lyrics I don’t intend to downplay the music as it is excellent. Somewhere in between “Americana” and “Roots rock”, these mostly acoustic songs are peppered with a judicial amount of progressive electronic sounds and a dollop of experimental production. Take these away and you still have superb examples of top-notch songwriting. Such music allows expression of things mere words cannot and when the words and music come together, as on Light for the Lost Boy, the result is pure magic.

Review - Tin Hat - the rain is a handsome animal

I like pinto beans.

I’m not sure why I even bought the rain is a handsome animal, the latest album by the multi-instrumentalist cabal that current goes by the name of Tin Hat. At first blush it sounds a lot like the kind of music they play on NPR as they take a commercial break, if you know what I mean and I think you do. And then there’s the fact that the album is based on poetry by the avant-garde poet e.e.cummings, a man so creative that he refuses to capitalize his name. I’ve got nothing against the man or his poetry, it’s just that I never find myself sitting in front of a warm fire, my favorite pipe firmly in hand and a burning desire to read me some e.e. cummings poetry ensconced in my brain. However I’ve enjoyed past albums by Tin Hat and so I forked over the credit card and listened and listened and listened some more. handsome animal is certainly not as playful or as dark as past albums. And instead of being mostly instrumental this beast is mostly vocal, thanks to violinist Carla Kihlstedt tackling the carefully constructed lines of cummings.

Just about the time that I’m ready to write this one off it starts to reveal itself to me. The classical-meets European folk melodies begin to shine through and what I once thought of as excessive use of the bass harmonica now seems appropriate. It also doesn’t hurt that I’m a non-polka accordion fan and this album is packed with exceptional squeezebox bravado, especially “a cloud on a leaf” where Rob Reich evokes images of accordion virtuoso Piazzolla. Clarinetist Ben Goldberg joins the accordion in “2 little whos” to make a romantic afternoon in Paris, forming gauzy atmosphere in the likes of an impressionistic painting. A funeral arrangement of horns fills “buffalo bill” with a somber spirit, giving Kihlstedt ample room to mourn and flex her expressive vocal cords. Acoustic guitarist and founding member Mark Orton more than holds his own amongst these musical maniacs. “sweet spring” is a beautiful song featuring Orton’s impeccable talents, graciously allowing the silences to say as much as the notes played. And as always Kihlstedt’s violin prowess is on full display, never more so than on the crazed violin solo in “enormous room,” frantically careening about on silken slippers. These songs are definitely slow growers but they appear to be paying rich dividends.

I was originally planning to pan this album but dangit if I didn’t instead discover why I bought the rain is a handsome animal: Tin Hat never fails to surprise and never fails to please the ears.

Review - Classical Accordions

Ahh.... my very first music review!

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Like most people, I spent the formative years of my life associating accordions with the cult formerly known as the Lawrence Welk Show (I still wake up at night screaming, images of dancing bubbles ricocheting through my head). It was not until I heard the tasty, melodic strains of accordion skillfully blended into the music of They Might Be Giants that I changed my tune (yes, that was intentional and yes, I am deeply, deeply ashamed). Now, as a proud owner of a Scandalli piano accordion, I join the ranks of thousands of people whose musty accordions sit horribly underplayed in some remote corner of their abode. This is all to say that when I saw the CD "Duos for Classical Accordions" sitting all alone on the music store rack, the guilt of my near-abandoned Scandalli was too great and I was powerless to resist.

I wasn't sure what to expect when I started up the disc. The two major pieces on the CD are Stravinsky's "Petrushka" (the 1947 version), and Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an Exhibition", popular for spawning not only an ELP album but for providing music for the bluest little has-beens in the land, "The Smurfs". The versions on this CD were arranged by the two "classically trained" accordionists James Crabb and Geir Draugsvoll (should be household names any day now). The Mussorgsky piece being an old favorite (it was the third classical album I every owned), I skipped the disc to the opening "Promenade" theme and sat back to subject my ears to the horrible sound of strangled geese. Though sounding a bit "reedy" at times, the music was far from horrible. Actually, it sounded more like an organ duo than anything else. The music is so true to the original and the playing so precise that about five minutes into the piece, I had forgotten that I was listening to accordions and instead was enjoying the music. Though not as familiar with the Stravinsky piece, it too seemed to lack any of the horrible corniness that I hoped would be present on this album. Stravinsky's angular, boxy melodies actually seem ready-made for the transition to accordion, as though they had been waiting since 1947 for this moment. Though perhaps not for everyone, the strong of heart and ear will find that "Dues for Classical Accordions" presents a new twist of these familiar and popular works.

EMI Classics Debut : Duos for Classical Accordions James Crabb and Geir Draugsvoll

This review first appeared in WhatzUp, May 1998.

Review - Daniel Amos - Songs of the Heart Deluxe

Songs of the Heart is the album that got me back into DA. I had a longish commute (for me, at least... 25 minutes) and I was able to listen to the entire album driving there and back, an album that I had previously written off. But it got it's hooks in me and these hooks haven't left yet.

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Back in 1995 everyone's favorite oddball alternative Christian band (well, mine anyway) decided to record a concept album, Songs of the Heart, detailing the last vacation of Bud and Irma Akendorf before Bud passes away in his sleep. As if the subject wasn't enough of a guarantee to ensure a "big hit with the kids" they decided to use unconventional instrumentation and arrangements and the vocalist often spoke the part of Bud. For further confusion they used an album cover from a 60's gospel album (not the one above), resulting in their album often being placed among Sandi Patti, Bill Gaither Trio and their ilk. It all seemed like a good idea at the time.

Even for many diehard fans this album had an unusually long warming period, myself included. But once it hits, it hits hard with rich stories of the blessings and sufferings in their lives, all presented in a kind of movie soundtrack. The instrumentation, while unorthodox, does usually revolve around the typical rock band setup. Except "Get Back Into The Bus, Aloha" which uses a trombone to play the bass part… and "The Glory Road", which is about Route 66 and is built in a very angular rhythm and an accordion part so luscious and hip that it encouraged me to learn that very instrument… and a few others. But I digress. Once one gets past the initial shock the different musical tone colors only serve to make repeated listens more enjoyable with new textures and parts being discovered each time. Personal favorites are legion but include the bittersweet, nostalgic, near a cappella "Donna Nietche and Her Super Race of Kick Boxing Uber Parrots" and "Sins of the Fathers", a song in which Bud faces his own mortality in a roadside diner by reflecting upon the young "counter kid with the insufficient moustache." Lines such as "I could offer the boy some kind of words of wisdom… Tell him about unrealized expectations … But you can't teach these young dogs new tricks" poetically portray Bud's past as well as his hope for the future. The final song, "My Hand to God" finds Bud with his sleeping wife of forty-seven years beside him in bed, his body in the grips of a heart attack, knowing his time has come and yet hesitating to offer a prayer for his wife that "You know I love you, sweetheart / See you again soon." As strange as some songs on the album have been, here the music is a perfect compliment to the beautiful lyrics that often manage to pull tears from deep within me. In addition to the many lyrical and musical gems on this album one can also hear the insane musical ramblings of bassist Tim Chandler and the kind of guitar parts that can only sprout from the mathematical mind of Greg Flesch, who by day is a real NASA scientist. I've heard thousands of musicians in my life and these two approach their instruments in such an off-kilter manner than I've yet to hear their equal.

This album has been reissued in a most unusual and fitting format. First there is a sixty-page book that includes notes on the original recordings and a lengthy story where this last vacation is fleshed out and given more depth. A second disc contains a stripped-down acoustic version of the album with the songs presented in a somewhat more coherent order. Presented with only piano, drum kit, and acoustic guitar, the lyrics are allowed more of center stage and reveal previously hidden nuances of the songwriter's craft. The final CD includes band leader Terry Taylor reading sections of the story, an interview with him about the album, and two new songs that bring further elements of the story to life.

For those willing to take on this exhilarating Americana adventure down Route 66, cruise over to www.danielamos.com. Be sure to tell them Bud Akendorf sent ya!

This review first appeared in WhatzUp, July 2002