Belated Review: My Brightest Diamond - "This is My Hand" (Asthmattic Kitty/Paper Bag, 2014)

This week is the CMJ Music Marathon in NYC (!!!), and so in accordance with the festivities there are no new releases this week (that I know of). So I'll write a belated review of one my recent favorites.

I've been a fan of MBD from the beginning. During my angsty high school Sufjan Steven's craze (which evidently never ended), I learned to explore other artists on Asthmatic Kitty's roster after realizing that Sufjan himself collaborates with almost every artist he signs. St. Vincent, Helado Negro, Lily & Madeline, Linda Perhacs, Sisyphus, and The Welcome Wagon are among my favorites. And My Brightest Diamond, who I argue should have replaced Adele to record that 007 theme. Check out this quirky music video for "From the Top of the World" and you'll see what I mean.

Her artist website describes her truthfully:

Not many people can front a rock band, sing Górecki’s Third Symphony, lead a marching band processional down the streets of the Sundance film festival and perform in a baroque opera of their own composing all in a month’s time. But Shara Worden can.

I view the Detroit native as a classically trained punk goddess. Her debut record Bring Me the Workhorse (Asthmatic Kitty, 2006) was totally hardcore to say the least. Characterized by out-of-tune guitars and loosened drum heads, fronted by theater performer singing about dead birds–no one combines beauty and ugly quite as well as Shara Worden.

But her latest installment This is My Hand is *all* beauty.

It introduces the listener in the best way a record can: with a marching band. The Detroit Party Marching Band, to be exact. A percussion ensemble plays alone for 12 measures or so before the horn and woodwind sections kick in. Shara Worden is here, folks, and she's riding on an audible chandelier. "Mountain on top, a fire below / a pressure grows, pressure". Pressure indeed. She plays with her backup singers and straight-faced guerrilla drummers to achieve a fearsome dance-pop sound that you wouldn't expect. How does the rest of the record sound?

Track five, "I Am Not the Bad Guy" goes proto-punk. "Lover/Killer" is a swirling pseudo-Motown sound (stream below). "So Easy" makes my urban apartment feel like a spaceship. "Apparition" is based upon a ghost story.

And the quality of production on this record is astounding! It's mastered exceedingly well and it has more elaborate instrumentation than any of her previous recordings, but none of her beautiful poetry or badassery or personality that I used to associate with MBD has changed at all–in fact all of that's been enhanced.

This is My Hand is available at record stores now. For all you Michiganders, she visits Grand Rapids on November 13 at the Wealthy Theater. Get tickets here.

Stream "Lover/Killer" below via Soundcloud.

Review: Allo Darlin' - "We Come From the Same Place" (Slumberland, 2014)

 

I was first introduced to Brit-pop after I turned 15–a friend of mine showed me Belle & Sebastian at summer camp one day while I was still bent on Classic Rock as the only genre of music that mattered. He showed me how much more capable of accessing my emotions this music was than anything else I had been listening to at the time (because who can better relate to a high schooler than Stuart Murdoch?). Six years later "Like Dylan in the Movies" is still my Autumn anthem, and has essentially become the new center from which I build almost my entire taste in music. Almost.

Allo Darlin' fits well into this emotional Brit-pop spectrum. The band's third, full-length, delightfully British installment We Come From the Same Place is composed of eleven cheery, uplifting pop songs leaving the listener emotionally bruised and asking for more. The band thoughtfully combines ukulele progressions, catchy guitar riffs, and coffeehouse-style percussive brushes along with witty and heartfelt lyrics to make this record genuinely captivating. According to this insightful Stereogum interview with frontwoman Elizabeth Morris, We Come From the Same Place was recorded live with minimal overdubs, giving the record a somewhat grittier sound. Whereas their 2012 album Europe (Fortuna Pop!/Slumberland, 2012) was more heavily decorated in the studio, Morris explains, “OK, that was a good experience, but we want to try and capture something.” The band's "live" sound in the recordings is refreshing to a close listener. It feels inviting on the listeners part, where the band is comfortable letting the listener hear it without hiding any perceived mistakes or blemishes.

Morris has a way of cracking her honest, demure voice at certain points that really help drive some of her emotional points home, "I never said things would be okay / I'm just trying to make it through another Tuesday". Lyrics become cute and optimistic at other points, "Do you believe in fun? (I sure do!)". Happy or sad, these are phrases that communicate a great deal in a few words. According to Slumberland's website, Morris wrote many of these lyrics during a transitional period in her life.

“So many things have happened since I first wrote the songs that make up this album, it´s difficult to remember back to where it all began. The songs were written very quickly, during a period when I found writing songs very easy, whereas I often find songwriting very difficult.”

Last year she moved to Italy with her husband where spent she time traveling, writing, and contemplating. This record reflects that in her songwriting.

We Come From the Same Place lands at record stores tomorrow.

Stream "Bright Eyes" below via Soundcloud.