Local Cut » Cut of the Day

Rauelsson, “Debutantes,” La Siembra, la Espera y la Cosecha (Hush)

Michael Mannheimer — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 20:17:48 +0000

Raúl Pastor Medall didn’t grow up in Oregon. In fact, until recently, the Spanish singer—who records under the name Rauelsson—lived full-time in his native homeland. But the sounds of the Pacific Northwest, and Hush Records in particular, are all over Rauelsson’s latest, the gorgeous and very winter-y “Debutantes.”

Rauelsson recorded the core of his new record—everything but the vocals, really—at Type Foundry studios in the fall/winter last year with the help of friends and producers Adam Selzer and Dave Depper (Norfolk & Western), and you can hear the seasonal touch. La Siembra, la Espera y la Cosecha is a mostly acoustic album, and “Debutantes” even forgoes percussion (except for a little sleigh bells in the background) for atmosphere. The light touch, then, is supplied by Rauelsson’s expansive voice, one that’s so pretty that you don’t really care that he’s singing in a foreign language.

And how’s this for lore: Rauelsson retreated back to Spain to concentrate on his lyrics and record his vocals in an ancient stone-walled house in the Mediterranean countryside. Supposedly the the natural reverb seeped its way into the recordings, but maybe he just needed some solitary confinement to hit on something so wonderful. It’s his bold and fluttering voice that propels “Debutantes,” and, at least on this track, it reminds me of Sigur Ros singer Jónsi Birgisson. Not bad for someone who just movedt to town.

Download audio file (Debutantes.mp3)

Download “Debutantes”

Links:
RauelssonSpace
Hush Records

Photo courtesy of Rauelsson

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Swim Swam Swum, “Belly Aches,” Circumpolar Westerlies (Self-Released)

Michael Mannheimer — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:19:14 +0000

Yeah, our Cut of the Day tab still isn’t working. That doesn’t mean we can’t post some new tracks we love.

Like most great pop songs, Swim Swam Swum’s “Belly Aches” is rooted in the past. From its opening crunchy guitars to the buzzing keyboard that’s barely audible in the background, almost everything about the song screams 1997. But instead of simply aping the sound of so many past indie rock giants, “Bell Aches” captures the spirit of what made so many of those bands so great in the first place.

Though I’ve enjoyed Swim Swam Swum in the past, the excellent Circumpolar Westerliesis just what I need to hear in month when Weezer released an album with a song called “The Girl Got Hot.” SSS leader Matt Taylor has crafted a hooky, immediate record that’s filled with standouts, but it took me a good four listens just to make it past the fantastic opening track. Yeah, it has some obvious touchstones—love those Return of the Rentals synths floating in and out of so many tracks—but songs like “Belly Aches” aren’t that easy to classify. Taylor’s voice is still yelpy and urgent in all the right ways, but something else is different. It could be the lineup change (drummer Adam Draper has been around for two years, but bassist Courtney Sheedy’s a 2009 addition) or the way so many tracks shift in unexpected directions. Listen closely, because there’s a moment about 2/3 of the way through when everything drops out of the mix except Taylor’s acoustic guitar that just blows me away. For anyone still in denial about Raditude, “Belly Aches” makes everything okay for three minutes.

Download audio file (BellyAches.mp3)

Swim Swam Swum release Circumpolar Westerlies on Friday at the Artistery with Deer or the Doe and Point Juncture, WA. 8 pm. $6. All ages.

Link:
Swim Swam SwumSpace

Photo courtesy of Swim Swam Swum

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Neal Morgan, “Birch Bark Boat in Space,” To The Breathing World (Self-released)

Casey Jarman — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 00:55:31 +0000

The cut of the day section is still being fussy, but here’s another one for ya anyway.

With Neal Morgan’s new disc, To The Breathing World, one gets more than just the eight songs advertised. Each cut—opener “Birch Bark Boat in Space” included—is a few songs packed in one, like different movements in a piece of classical music. And upon diving into the disc, it gets a bit tough to keep track of just where you are. But it’s more like getting lost under blankets than it is getting lost in the desert. This is, after all, a record recorded with limitations that feel familiar. Morgan uses his kit and his voice and nothing else (my listing for his release show incorrectly stated that he used some loop pedals and effects, but I jumped to a false conclusion—the truth of the matter is that he just four-tracks this stuff, layering one segment on top of another. In performance he wails on the skins and sings.).

Download audio file (birchbarkboatinspace.mp3)

“Birch Bark Boat in Space” impresses with melody first, as Morgan’s voice jumps out in punches over his crunchy, in-the-red drum freakouts. But it’s the structure and composition of the song that makes it so cool: The punchy intro melds into a airy chorus of oohs, then Morgan starts to pull the composition back into form with more traditional vocal lines that sound like from Whitman or Thoreau: “Out here in the day/ The sun and a comet sharing the sky/ In the red dusk/ On the riverbank/ In the land where I was born and raised.” “One day my brains will break down,” he continues, and the percussion breaks and fades with him. Suddenly his failing brain is a broken record. “I’ll be, I’ll be, I’ll be,” he stutters. “Fresh as a newborn.”

Because the percussive elements have to carry so much weight here, Morgan’s gotta be really smart about using them tactfully, and he’s pretty masterful at it. He paces the song, and the record, to tease our attention and underscore certain lyrical and vocal elements (the sentiment of which is often very abstract but very pretty) that he wants us to catch. I’m reminded of Olympia’s Kickball, one of the only other experimental pop bands I can think of that uses these musical hesitations. One’s far more likely to find tricks like Morgan’s in post-bop jazz. But Neal’s actual voice reminds me more of another area group in Scott Garred’s Super XX Man.

This is where Morgan is special. It takes more than the nerd-next-door who majored in music theory to make complex experimental pop music that can keep a listener’s intention. Great pop, no matter how limited its resources or complex its structures, has to have some real heart at its center. Or at least that’s what makes me dig it. Morgan has heart in spades.

Neal Morgan plays Artistery this Saturday, Oct. 24 with Why I Must Be Careful and ASSS. All ages.

Links:
Neal MorganSpace
Where “in spades” comes from (one cannot, technically, have ‘heart in spades’ in the game of bridge. But I’m green-lighting it for my corner of music criticism).

Photo courtesy of Mr. Morgan.

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The Mean Jeans, “Born on a Saturday Night,” Are You Serious? (Dirtnap Records)

Casey Jarman — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 21:01:02 +0000

Our “Cut of the Day” section is busted at the moment, but here’s one for your enjoyment.

My first thought, upon hearing the Mean Jeans, was that the group reminded me a lot of the Ramones. That was probably your first thought, too.

Download audio file (bornonasaturdaynight.mp3)

But “Born on a Saturday Night” is even more Ramones than the Ramones. All the usual adjectives for the classic New York punk quartet apply doubly to the Jeans: Fast? Check. Bratty? Check. Adolescent? Check. Catchy? Check. “Born on a Saturday Night” is all those things and more—it kick-starts without warning and runs full speed, like its protagonist, from the cradle to an early grave. One can imagine basement and bar crowds exploding into chaos just as fast.

But the Mean Jeans new disc, Are You Serious?, integrates the feeling of other groups as well as the Ramones: It has a Toy Dolls hyperactivity and traces of Screeching Weasel harmony. The Jeans give a nod to CCR on “Case Race,” (singing “Hey tonight!” alongside handclaps and furious chords), and they get self-referential often, talking about jeans with the frequency that most bands talk about love. “Slime Time” contains the album’s weirdest departure: A sudden transition into what sounds like a bootlegged Vietnamese karaoke disc.

But most impressively, this disc (out early next month) sounds impressively vintage. Lots of bands sound like the Ramones, but not a lot of bands really nail sounding like the Ramones right down to the oh-oh harmonies. That’s what gets me about these dudes. The Mean Jeans take the challenge of sounding like their biggest influence seriously, but they’ve got a spirit all to themselves.

The Mean Jeans play Slabtown Friday with Pure Country Gold, Jail and more. Then they play East End on Monday with Davila 666.

Links:
The Mean JeanSpace
Dirtnap Records

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Federale, “Starvation Creek Trail,” Devil in a Boot (Revolver Records)

Jenny Booth — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 01:35:12 +0000

Here’s a cut from a band playing Dante’s tonight with Michael Dean Damron (and not playing with the pulled-out Richmond Fontaine. Portland spaghetti westerners Federale brought out their second disc mere weeks ago, telling a whole new story in their inimitable soundtrack-without-a-film style.

Enjoyed best while reading the plotline in the liner notes, you can still get the gist from song titles like “the Hanging”, “Bring on the Whores”, and “War Cry.” This pick, “Starvation Creek Trail”, is a short scene-setter, but easily sets up the Kill Bill atmosphere, in a tale where our protagonist Jack is left for dead twice (once buried alive) and spends the rest of his time seeking almighty vengeance.

How much does this song make you want to track down a Westerns box set? We’ve got the galloping cavalry with their horns, eerie desert whistling and a deep male chorus auguring who know what disaster, in a perfect snapshot of the album, Devil in a Boot.

The bands says it’s here “to make Westerns cool again,” and I can’t help wondering why on earth they’re not already.

Download audio file (starvationcreek.mp3)

Links:
FederaleSpace

Photo courtesy of Federale

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Loch Lomond, “Wax and Wire,” Night Bats EP (Hush Records)

Michael Mannheimer — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 17:26:35 +0000

To say it’s been a good year for Loch Lomond would be an understatement. The chamber pop group—now a nice and neat quintet—have toured with the Decemberists and Blitzen Trapper, played a rousing early morning set at Sasquatch, released a 7-inch and free “getting to know us” EP, and somehow managed to get tighter as a band. Nowhere is this more evident than on “Wax and Wire,” the first tease from the group’s Night Bats EP and a perfect combination of baroque orchestration and real pop songwriting.

From all indications, “Wax and Wire” is a bit of an aberration from the rest of the five song record, which skews singer Ritchie Young’s distinctive voice—which flutters between a deep baritone and lovely, fleeting, and almost androgynous falsetto—into a set of songs that recalls early-R.E.M. more than Peter, Paul and Mary. Produced by the band and mixed by buddy Tucker Martine, the song is immense both in hi-fi and with a pair of good headphones, where you can hear every delicate instrument in the mix. It also sounds like Loch Lomond have learned a thing or two from its tourmates: instead of just merely floating along on its pretty melody and tempo changes, “Wax and Wire” has a genuine build-and-pull that recalls the best work of Colin Meloy and Co. Still, this isn’t Loch Lomond rocking out or anything. It’s the work of a band that knows what it does best, only this time, it might have done it better than ever.

Download audio file (Waxwire.mp3)

Links:
Loch LomondSpace
Hush Records

Photo by Alicia J. Rose

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Bobby Birdman, “Only For a While,” New Moods (Fryk Beat)

Casey Jarman — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 21:30:34 +0000

Though Bobby hasn’t lived in PDX for a good while, it would be a huge miss not to share his new single with y’all. “Only For a While” is classic Birdman: Half bootie jam and half tender ballad. He hits the sweet spot between the two zones with a tune about finding oneself in a perfect moment, but reflecting on the transient nature of fulfillment. It’s some straight up zen dance club action, and the entire album, New Moods (which, fittingly, sounds like a throwback crooner’s album title) is an ABSOLUTE BEAST that’s been #1 in my rotation for almost two months. I can’t wait for you all to hear it. It drops on Portland’s own Fryk Beat Records later this year. Meanwhile, just put this on repeat. It does not get old. Birdman is a genius, and E*Rock’s a genius for putting his records out. I’m confident that this new record will not only find an audience, it’ll blow up big.

Links:
Bobby B-space

Image: Cover-in-progress of New Moods, courtesy of E*Rock

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Quixotic, “Intoxicated Conscience,” Self-Titled Album (Self-released)

Casey Jarman — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:11:13 +0000

I think live band hip-hop is one of the hardest genres to make work. To underscore that point, think of how many hip-hop bands have gained national attention. The Roots and…the Roots? Unless you want to count rap-rock outfits like 311 and Rage Against the Machine, it’s a reasonably slim field.

So Quixotic—a group of New Mexico/Minnesota imports that play dark, rock-leaning live hip-hop—has its task cut out for it. MC Nate Larsen clearly pours his heart out in rhyme (and occasionally, some Anthony Kiedis/Scott Weiland-esque singing), and the band chugs away at everything from blues riffs to melodramatic soundtrack fare and all-out riffage. The range is impressive, even if it doesn’t always work for me, personally. I say this because, while I haven’t seen Quixotic live just yet—and this problem may be alleviated in the live setting—but for me the bass and the drums are too low in the mix throughout much of Quixotic’s self-titled disc. If you’re playing live hip-hop, the rhythm section has to pop pretty hard to recreate the boom of a drum machine or affected beat, and while the drums and bass are both quite well-played on Quixotic’s disc, I can’t always feel them the way I need to.

But that isn’t a problem on “Intoxicated Conscience,” a more melodramatic, moody piece that breaks into a pretty sweet guitar solo and some well-placed horns. Larsen is all worked up here, in fashion that’s probably more likely to affect Korn fans than the Jay-Z faithful. But the fact that he is feeling his lyrics is still a refreshing antidote to a lot of the complacent hip-hop that shows up on my desk.

Download audio file (intoxicatedconscience.mp3)

Quixotic plays Club Calabash (835 SW 2nd Ave.) tonight with Qwel & Maker, Kable Roc and Rocket One. It’s only $3 and the new Qwel & Maker ish is sounding quite good.

Links:
QuixoticSpace

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St. Frankie Lee, “Very Last Blues” (Self-Released)

Michael Mannheimer — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 20:35:04 +0000

Portland is a town that’s littered with large ensemble folk bands. It’s an easy aesthetic to get behind: take a tender song, add lots of chamber instrumentation and orchestral flourishes, and storm the stage, group style. Often, though, all the extra bells and whistles (violin and trumpet, most likely) only serve to distract from subpar songwriting. That’s not the case for St. Frankie Lee, a ramshackle collection of local musicians led by Chelsea Campbell and Derrick Martin.

“Very Last Blues” is almost a misnomer for the group, a quiet and easy folk number from a gang that loves to lead a crowd through a good ol’ Americana romp. Campbell takes the lead vocal on the track, and it’s a great vehicle for her sultry voice. I especially love how she repeats the words “very” and “ever” on the inviting chorus, something that Phoenix’s Thomas Mars does to great effect on my favorite album of the year, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. With her voice at the center, the song can stretch out a bit—bits of piano drift in and out, and the banjo keeps the song somewhat grounded. St. Frankie Lee seem more likely to rise from a swamp in the South than the damp Northwest, but I’m happy that its chosen to call PDX home.

Download audio file (lastblues.mp3)

St. Frankie Lee plays tonight at Holocene with Michael Hurley and Sallie Ford & the Sound Outside. 8:30 pm. $7. 21+.

Links:
St. Frankie LeeSpace

Photo courtesy of St. Frankie Lee

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The Unified Theory, “Versus,” The Project for the New American Century (Paragraph Records)

Jenny Booth — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 01:08:10 +0000

“The Project for the New American Century is hip-hop, youth, art, freedom, and funk.”

Download audio file (versus.mp3)

So says the Unified Theory, in response to a neo-conservative think tank of the same name. The dynamic duo, ADM and MC-Delta-T, brought out this beat-laden, fast-spittin’ hip-hop album last month (now available in digital and physical form on CD Baby). And I was going to pick out one of their killer tracks like “Breaks For Breakfast” or “I Wish,” which mix up any and all instrumentation, breaks, beats and shit hot word-play.

But you’ll have to get the album for that. It’s Monday night, we’re tired and what we clearly need is a battle between the two MCs—one pinned on the end of the album, by which time tempers were obviously flared. This is actually one of their older tracks, ADM reports, but it’s fun to hear Portland getting it’s dues. Hang on ’til the end (no, it’s not a 13 minute long tirade) and you also get a fresher cut, the album’s hidden track.

Armed with a Ruby Skull that imbues the holder with “the power to rock a thousand mics without growing tired or old,” the Unified Theory could be in for a big year. Check the website and blogs too, because there’s way more over-the-top promotional goodness where that came from.

Links:
The Unified Theory
The Unified TheorySpace

Photo courtesy of The Unified Theory

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