Soundtrack for a New America
Listen to Otis Redding "A Change is Gonna Come"
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Casual Listening Halloween Extra!
Casual Listening
Extra!
Halloween Special!
This week, my mother-in-law and I decided to pick the scariest new release we could find to share with you. By consensus between us, this week’s scariest music is:
Kill the Client – Cleptocracy
You’ll understand when you hear it.
Listen to Kill the Client “Divide & Conquer”
Casual Listening -- Susan Tedeschi, Black Milk, Snow Patrol
Casual Listening
a review of cool new music
by Jeff Pinzino
! Susan Tedeschi – Back to the River (blues)
Susan Tedeschi owns what is arguably the best blues voice to be found anywhere. The album is a sometimes funky set of blues-rock and soul that showcases her vocal pyrotechnics. If you’ve never heard of Tedeschi, you need to listen to this immediately.
Listen to Susan Tedeschi “Talking About”
* Dozan – Introducing Dozan (World)
A small ensemble of strings and voices that presents the beautiful sound of Jordanian music. Choral harmonies deliver expressive, heart-tugging songs over a background of oud and hand drums.
Listen to Dozan “Ya Jarati”
Bloc Party – Intimacy (rock)
A rhythm-heavy ball of static electricity. Layers of samples capped with frenetic vocals. Nine Inch Nails fans will feel at home with this one.
Listen to Bloc Party “Ares”
Black Milk – Tronic (rap)
Black Milk creates a powerful, fresh soundscape for his rhymes. Seriously heavy backbeats with accents of trumpet, organ, and outer space electronics. Lyrics never stray far from creative self-promotion.
Listen to Black Milk’s “Give the Drummer Sum”
Snow Patrol – A Hundred Million Suns (country)
Rock backdrops support subtle songcraft. A basic lineup of guitar-bass-drums-and-sometimes-piano is doused in reverb, with an understated vocal finesse that sets it apart from other bands in this style. Snow Patrol is radio-ready, but likely to wear better than the majority of what’s getting airplay these days.
Listen to Snow Patrol “Take Back the City”
In the blog: Halloween Special – this week’s scariest new release
* highly recommended
! highest recommendation
Check out the blog at http://casuallistening.blogspot.com . To subscribe or unsubscribe, or just to say hi, send an e-mail to jeffpinzino@gmail.com.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Casual Listening - Aterciopelados, AC/DC, Hank Williams III
Casual Listening
a review of cool new music
by Jeff Pinzino
! Aterciopelados – Rio (Spanish rock)
Aterciopelados play a sort of acid rock en español – artsy, psychedelic, and immensely hip. Guitar, bass, drums, and tenor-range vocals are refracted through a prism of sonic effects, and augmented with everything from tabla and ocarina to Tuvan-style singing. This one will split your mind open.
Listen to Aterciopelados “Gratis”
* Bohren & Der Club of Gore – Dolores (New Age)
Breathe deeply and empty your body of tension with this cycle of slow, atmospheric pieces. Electric organ, vibraphone, and spare drums characterize the sound. Bohren & Der Club of Gore has invented a new genre that is the opposite of heavy metal: weightless metal.
Listen to Bohren & Der Club of Gore: Schwarze Biene (Black Maja)
* Eleanor Murray – For Cedar (folk)
Simple as it comes – a sweet-voiced woman with a guitar. Solitary, melancholy, beautiful.
Listen to Eleanor Murray’s “For Cedar” here
AC/DC – Black Ice (rawk)
This legendary guitar rock combo has been scoring high on the bombast-o-meter for decades. Their newest album is true to form. Shuffle it on your iPod, and you’d mistake the songs for deep cuts from earlier albums. This is a worthy AC/DC record, although I’d skip the trip to Wal-Mart and listen to it for free on their website:
Listen to AC/DC’s Black Ice here
Hank Williams
Serious country with a raw edge and attitude. His foul mouth dressing-down of the Grand Ole Opry is classic. This is alternative country in the same sense that his grandfather was an alternative to the highbrow country of his own day.
Listen to Hank Williams
* highly recommended
! highest recommendation
Check out the blog at http://casuallistening.blogspot.com . To subscribe or unsubscribe, or just to say hi, send an e-mail to jeffpinzino@gmail.com.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Casual Listening - Buena Vista Social Club, Little Big Town, Lucinda Willimas
Casual Listening
a review of cool new music
by Jeff Pinzino
!
A decade after the fact, you can finally hear what all the fuss about BVSC was about. The pristine production of the original studio release made these masters of Cuban son sound like a museum piece instead of a dance party. The concert recording has the hot sound and live energy that characterize the roots of salsa. If BVSC is still on your “I should listen to that someday” list, listen today, and listen to them live.
Hear the difference yourself!
Here’s the studio version of “El Cuarto de Tula”
Now listen to the live version of
* Little
Hipster bands have capitalized on some pretty unusual influences, but I never thought I’d see the day that someone could make Fleetwood Mac sound cool again. Little
Listen to Little Big Town “Evangeline”
An all-star
Listen to
Lucinda Williams – Little Honey (rock)
Williams’ unpolished vocal style has a love-it-or-hate-it appeal; I’m definitely in the love camp. A solid album of literate honky-tonk, including a duet with Elvis Costello and a random AC/DC cover
Listen to Lucinda Williams “Tears of Joy”
Shugo Tokumaru – Exit (world)
A quirky gem of Japanese pop. The instrumentation is expansive – xylophone, harmonium, steel drum, recorder – and the vocals are breezy. I can guarantee you that you haven’t heard anything quite like this before.
Listen to Shugo Tokumaru “Green Rain”
Martin Sexton – Solo (folk)
Sexton is an artist who takes the singer part of singer-songwriter seriously. He has a resonant voice moves freely from bluesy to sensitive to falsetto. The album is a live set from a recent tour of folk festivals.
Listen to Martin Sexton “Diggin Me”
Armin van Buuren – A State of Trance 2008 (dance)
Two hour-long mixes of swirly electronic sounds. Put on a strobe light and dance yourself into another state of consciousness.
Listen to Armin van Buuren “A State of Trance 2008 CD2”
* highly recommended
! highest recommendation
Check out the blog at http://casuallistening.blogspot.com . To subscribe or unsubscribe, or just to say hi, send an e-mail to jeffpinzino@gmail.com.
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Casual Listening -- Pretenders, Bob Dylan, Juana Molina
Casual Listening
a review of cool new music
by Jeff Pinzino
* Pretenders – Break Up the Concrete (rock)
Forget the three songs you’ve heard in endless rotation on classic rock radio. Pretenders have rediscovered the jagged soul of rock & roll and etched it into this record. They’ve traded in the Hall of Fame for the garage, and pumped up their sound with strong shots of blues and country. Possibly the best work they’ve ever done.
Listen to Pretenders “Boots of Chinese Plastic”
* Bob Dylan – Tell Tale Signs: The Bootleg Series Vol. 8 (folk)
Bob Dylan’s outtakes are better than 99% of other songwriter’s best. This series covers the period from 1989 to the present, when most agree he resumed making excellent music. It’s mostly simple and straightforward songs, some solo, others with a band, but with the singing in the spotlight. He’s at a point in his life where he’s got something to say and nothing to prove, which makes for some powerful music.
Listen to Bob Dylan “Red River Shore”
Eccodek – Shivaboom (world)
A global mosaic of beats, vocals, drums, and instruments ranging from piano to kora. Serious influences from
Listen to samples of Eccodek here.
Juana Molina – Un Dia (experimental)
Trippy. Molina’s repetitive patterns of affected vocals and percussion have a hypnotic quality. Her music has a global sensibility that seems to emanate from a parallel universe.
Listen to Juana Molina “Los Hongos De Marosa”
* highly recommended
! highest recommendation
Check out the blog at http://casuallistening.blogspot.com . To subscribe or unsubscribe, or just to say hi, send an e-mail to jeffpinzino@gmail.com.
Friday, September 26, 2008
Casual Listening: TV On The Radio, John Adams, Thievery Corporation
Casual Listening
a review of cool new music
by Jeff Pinzino
A ridiculously good week for music. 18 reviews – 6 here and 12 more in the blog.
! TV On The Radio – Dear Science (rock)
Dense, exquisitely produced rock, with soul elements. I've heard critics recently compare TV on the Radio to a dozen different bands, and they're all wrong. This is one of few groups that deserve the "original" moniker. Fuzzed electronics, several different vocal styles, stray saxophones. This is one of those albums that words don’t do justice to, so do yourself a favor and go listen to it.
Listen to TV On The Radio “Golden Age”
! Rudresh Mahanthappa – Kinsmen (jazz)
Two saxophonists, one Indian-American adding new wrinkles to the jazz tradition, the other reinterpreting South Indian classical music through his horn. They come together on the common ground of improvisation, and the results are ear-opening. The musical back-and-forth between these masters is dizzying, gorgeous stuff.
Listen to Rudresh Mahanthappa “Congergence (Kinsmen)”
! John Adams – A Flowering Tree (classical)
The premiere recording of a new opera by one of
Listen to John Adams’ “A Flowering Tree: Act 1 – Kumudha’s Prayer”
! Beto Villares – Beto Villares (world)
A brilliantly fresh take on Bossa Nova. Lush harmonies and easygoing tunes backed with acoustic guitar, and some electrified elements. This vibe of Villares’ music is all joy.
Listen to Beto Villares “Aboio”
* Thievery Corporation – Radio Retalliation (electronic)
A global gumbo set to dance and dub beats. Thievery Corporation takes Indian, Jamaican, Nigerian, and other transnational sounds, artfully remixing them for the benefit of the dance floor.
Listen to Thievery Corporation “Mandala”
* Jazmine Sullivan – Fearless (R&B)
Sullivan’s vocal virtuosity shines over a soul backdrop that’s something old and something new. She’s equally at home singing about heartbreak over strings, reggae, and breakbeats. Jazmine taps a deep musical vein of inspiration and emotion.
Listen to Jazmine Sullivan’s “Need U Bad”
In the blog: Blitzen Trapper, Old Crow Medicine Show, Soul Stirrers, and much much more!
* highly recommended
! highest recommendation
Check out the blog at http://casuallistening.blogspot.com . To subscribe or unsubscribe, or just to say hi, send an e-mail to jeffpinzino@gmail.com.
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