Short Attention Span Record Reviews April 2020, Vol. II

THE LOUDER STUFF

CIRITH UNGOL – Forever Black
Epic doom metal like it’s still 1985, hilariously stupid and amazingly entertaining at the same time. (8)

DANZIG – Sings Elvis
We all knew this was going to happen one day, didn’t we? But he should’ve done it in the 90’s, his voice is now gone for good. (6)

DOOL – Summerland
Second album by Dutch dark rock hopefuls is even stronger than the debut – imagine a more goth Devil’s Blood (with whom they share a couple of members) and you’re halfway there, even though their female vocalist sings more like Geddy Lee than like any of her contemporaries. “Ode To The Future” is probably a conscious semi-rip-off of Patti Smith’s “Dancing Barefoot” but we won’t hold that against them. (8)

KATATONIA – City Burials
Nowadays I stay away from all social and metal media so I have no idea what people are thinking about this one, but I do know what I’m thinking: It’s top-notch goth-prog and their best album since their masterpiece, 2003’s “Viva Emptiness”. (9)

SPARTA – Trust the River
Jim Ward (ex-At The Drive In) returns with the first Sparta album in 14 years infusing his trademark post-hardcore attack with more mid-tempo melodic tracks than expected, and it’s great. (8)

THE PACK A.D. – It Was Fun While It Lasted
Grungy Canadian garage rock duo say farewell with another entertaining album. (7)

ULCERATE – Stare Into Death And Be Still
Apocalyptic death metal at its best, like Gorguts but better. (8)

WITCHCRAFT – Black Metal
It’s not black metal. (6)


THE OTHER STUFF

COWBOY JUNKIES – Ghosts
Like always a bunch of distorted sad songs, sort of like Mazzy Star meets Crazy Horse. (7)

DREAM SYNDICATE – The Universe Inside
Not what you’d expect from the Dream Syndicate, which is exactly what you should’ve expected from the Dream Syndicate. This is essentially an hour-long trippy psychedelic jam, equal parts early Floyd, kraut rock, and “Bitches Brew”-era Miles. (8)

FIONA APPLE – Fetch The Bolt Cutters
She just keeps getting weirder and weirder and better and better. (9)

FRANK TURNER & THE SLEEPING SOULS – Live In Newcastle
This unplugged live set proves the guy’s a great songwriter and the between-songs confessional banter is usually entertaining, but I miss the electricity of the authentic tunes. (7)

LAURA MARLING – Song For Our Daughter
She’s only 30 and this is already her seventh album and it’s stellar once again, Marling is probably the true heir to Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen both. (9)

LUCINDA WILLIAMS – Good Souls Better Angels
The 67-year old Queen of Americana is back with the angriest, snarliest, bluesiest album of her long career, in places sounding more like a pissed-off female Tom Waits than anything else. (8)

MARK LANEGAN – Straight Songs Of Sorrow
It’s a Mark Lanegan record, by now you should know you’re getting some solid American Gothic. (7)

SIR RICHARD BISHOP – Oneiric Formulary
A guitar hero like no other, Bishop covers the ground between acoustic balladry and electric avant-garde. (7)

SKYLAR GUDASZ – Cinema
If you’re a Joni Mitchell-influenced female singer/songwriter, you shouldn’t be releasing your album a week after Laura Marling does. (7)

WATKINS FAMILY HOUR – Brother Sister
Gentle acoustic folk from sibling duo better known as members of Nickel Creek. (7)

Short Attention Span Record Reviews, April 2020

THE LOUDER STUFF

CONCEPTION – State Of Deception
The best Queensryche album in quite a while. (8)

ME AND THAT MAN – New Man, New Songs, Same Shit, Vol. 1
Behemoth’s Nergal invites his friends (Corey Taylor, Ihsahn, Matt Heafy…) and has them sing country/blues/americana. Best moment is Mat McMerney (Hexvessel/Dodheimsgard/Beastmilk/Grave Pleasures) doing his best “Satanic Hank Williams” impression but the basic takeaway of the album is this, what we always suspected: Every metal singer singing anything other than metal ends up sounding like Nick Cave karaoke. (7)

NINE INCH NAILS – Ghosts V: Together / Ghosts VI: Locusts
Two new instrumental albums simultaneously released, V is more tranquil and VI more disturbing, both closer to Reznor’s soundtrack work with Atticus Ross than to proper NIN records. (7)

OLD MAN GLOOM – Seminar IX: Darkness Of Being
The usual awesome heavy experimental doom, the main difference this time around being that the tragically deceased bassist Caleb Scofield has been replaced by his Cave In bandmate Stephen Brodsky. (8)

PEARL JAM – Gigaton
From the garage rock of “Superblood Wolfmoon” to the Talking Heads-esque angular white boy funk of “Dance Of The Clairvoyants” to the Who-like attack of “Never Destination” to the ballad-heavy second half of the album, Pearl Jam defy expectations on their best release since “Riot Act”. (8)

PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS – Viscerals
Best band name ever, and don’t call them “stoner rock” – this is a far messier, sludgier, more fun affair. (8)

TESTAMENT – Titans of Creation
The all-star thrash lineup shreds, but the songs just chug along and drag on and on and on without a single hook really standing out. (6)

TĒTĒMA – Necroscape
The zillionth Mike Patton project is one of the weirdest and most cacophonous, certainly on the left of Mr. Bungle. You have been warned. (7)


THE OTHER STUFF

BRIAN FALLON – Local Honey
Gaslight Anthem frontman and Springsteen disciple Fallon on personal, mostly acoustic set of songs. (7)

CHILDISH GAMBINO – 3.15.20
Overrated. (6)

JAMES ELKINGTON – Ever-Roving Eye
Drawing from a variety of sources like British folk and 60’s psychedelia, Elkington’s second album is a small triumph. (8)

LILLY HIATT – Walking Proof
Country rock singer/songwriter’s fourth album is more laid back than 2017’s “Trinity Lane” and features lots of guests like Amanda Shires, Aaron Lee Tasjan, and dad John Hiatt. (7)

PHISH – Sigma Oasis
Virtually unknown outside the US of A but on home turf Phish is not just a band, it’s an institution, a cult almost, with rabid loyal fans, and they just surprise-released an album of songs they’ve already been playing live for years but had never properly recorded in a studio. If you can stand the Grateful Dead, you’ll probably enjoy this. (7)

STEFANO BOLLANI – Piano Variations On Jesus Christ Superstar
I’d never heard of this Italian jazz pianist before but obviously he has an unhealthy obsession with the music from “Jesus Christ Superstar” so I started liking him before I even listened to this, a fantastic track-by-track reworking of the epic rock opera for solo piano. Labors of love like this one is what’s it’s all about, folks. (10)

THIEVERY CORPORATION – Symphonik
Downtempo/chillout pioneers revisit 11 of their best known songs with a full classical orchestra. It works much better than Metallica’s “S&M”. (8)

WAXAHATCHEE – Saint Cloud
Katie Crutchfield moves away from grungy indie rock towards folk/Americana on her new album that most critics are absolutely ecstatic about. Can’t understand why – it’s good, but in no way spectacularly better than at least a dozen or so other 2020 albums by folky singer-songwriters. (7)

YVES TUMOR – Heaven to a Tortured Mind
Sorry but I just don’t get this modern, overproduced, deconstructed/reconstructed “pop”, what’s wrong with having some SONGS for a change? (6)