November/December, 2006                                      By Doug Cornell

John Biz - The Happiest Days of My Life
Grade: B+

Even though The Lemonheads were all over college radio in the 90's, they really didn't inspire many bands to create music in a similar power-pop vein.  But upon listening to the first couple of tracks on John Biz's new CD, The Happiest Days of My Life, it's hard not to think that Biz was true fan of Evan Dando and friends.  Packed with 11 fun guitar/bass/drum/vocal tracks, Happiest Days is a fun and lite romp.  Biz has a great voice, and the songs pack a decent punch, especially on tracks like the rocker "Heavy Bag.  Sometimes Biz echos a bit of Weezer ("Maybe There's a Way"), and he's not afraid to try the odd rock instrumental track ("We Saved Each Other's Lives").  This album is expertly recorded and stands up to repeated listening.

Rodrigo Y Gabriela
Grade: B+

There hasn't been much acoustic flamenco music on my stereo until this CD from Rodrigo Y Gabriel arrived. Now I find I'm rather fond of this mixture of acoustic finger-picking and subtle percussion.  Rodrigo Sanchez, a heavy-metal rocker, and Gabriela Quinero (guitar and percussion) are from Dublin, yet they play with the fire of Latin America.  "Diablo Rojo" is a stunning piece that features blistering finger picking and a gorgeous melody.  "Vikingman" and "Satori" demonstrate a percussive style that still relies on beautiful melodies.  The cover of "Stairway to Heaven" is a blast, as is the lesser known Metallica track "Orion."  Rodrigo isn't always the most subtle player, but he demonstrates plenty of passion and a true love of this unique genre.

The Ivy Lines
Grade: D

Crunchy guitars and strong drumming will carry anyone a long way, but sometimes the singing is annoying enough to wreck even the best songwriting.  Such is the case with San Francisco's The Ivy Lines.  Lead vocalist Patrick Coleman has thin tenor voice that just doesn't quite fit, even though it's not actually terrible.  I wasn't able to make it all the way through this one, because when Coleman entered the falsetto range, my dog began to cry.

Bad singing is often endearing (Neil Young anybody?), but sometimes it just grates on your nerves.

The Kimballs - Number One
Grade: A-

There should be a place in every music collection for quirky pop/rock like Spoon or Cake.  The Kimballs fuse whacky synth sounds with crunchy guitars on this 12 track album.  Music-box sounds evolve into fuzzy guitar leads in the almost-glammy sounding "Miss Fancypants."  Then the band switches gears and rocks out in a slightly punky fashion in "Ronkonkoma."  "Lonestar" is a treat, it has the sort of gritty charm that was found on early Dream Syndicate songs.

Number One is good fun, perfect for those times when you just want to put down a beer and relax.

Doren - Twisted Garden
Grade: C+

Ahhhh...female rock, a vastly underrepresented genre.  When you mention "chick rock" to most people, they always seem to conjure up the most annoying female-fronted band in history: Heart.

Doren is not annoying.  Twisted Garden is a hard-rocking affair that is the mastermind of guitarist and songwriter Stephen McKnight.  Doren has a strong, likeable voice, and  when she rocks hard on tracks like "My Skin," she's easy to like.  Sappy ballads like "Soldier of Mine" are easily skipped for the solid six-string playing and bongo-driven  track "To Lie" or the guitar-centric tune "Paper Heart."

There's a noticeable  lack of innovation on Twisted Garden, but for a basic female-fronted rock album, it's better than anything I've ever heard by Heart.

Joelle - Pillar of Stone
Grade: B-

A lot of CD's arrive in the HitSession mailbox every day.  Most days, I can look at the cover and decide if the artist is someone I'd listen to if I didn't have to.  After pegging Joelle (from western Canada) as one of the zillion female pop singer CD's that I've done my best to ignore, I was mistaken.  This lady is a forceful singer who blends a dance-pop sensibility with heaps of thunderous guitars.

Studio magicians trick out Joelle's voice with some standard pop-vocal chops on "God Forgive Me," but a blast of chunky guitars during the chorus gives the track a firm kick in the ass.  "Undercover Girl" comes off like a female version of one of Michael Jackson's rockier tunes,.and the straight-ahead rocker "Pillar of Stones" will be familiar to fans of the band Garbage. "In Your Dreams," while expertly executed, plays it safe in familiar pop-rock territory.

Pillar of Stone is about half unique.  There's just too much predictability, and in these music-saturated times we live in, Joelle's going to have to try harder to get noticed.

The Alice Rose - Phonographic Memory
Grade: Incomplete (need to hear more)

Vocalist JoDee Purkeypile has a bit of the John Lennon vibe in his vocal style.  Singing just slightly off-pitch, his voice is memorable and endearing.  The band, who call Austin, Texas home, are a solid guitar/bass/keyboards/drums outfit.  The two tracks that are available on MySpace are both mid-tempo rockers.  "Light Up" does an excellent job capturing real emotion - JoDee's voice blends well with the suitably jangly elecric guitars, while subtle keyboards accompany solid bass and percussion.  The first moments of "Save Me" are reminiscent of late-period Beatles, but the song will also be ejoyed by fans of jangle-pop artists The Posies or Canadian rockers Sloan.

From what little I have heard, I'll say that the Alice Rose are potentially a very good band

Andi Rae Healy - I Guess I Am a Sinner
Grade: B+

This New York City girl has a touch of Nashville in her voice.  She'd make a terrific double-billing with Brandi Carslile - both ladies have unique voices that stand out from the crowd.  The music on the samples I heard from her new album I Guess I Am a Sinner would be familiar sounding to fans of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.  There's an earnest American music strain that runs through the arrangements as electric and acoustic guitars, piano, organ, and percussion provide texture for Healy's vocals.  The slow burning track "Little Flame" (no pun intended) is stunning, as a swampy acoustic guitar and fiddle play counterpart to Healy's suitably angry voice.  "Rising" has faint resemblance to Petty's "Refugee," with its driving organ intro, solid percussion, and a straight-ahead guitar melody.   The ballads "Return to Me" and "Ooh Ah" slide by a little too effortlessly, leaving little impression upon the listener.

Healy is fortunate to possess a voice of her own and strong songwriting and arranging skills.  She's one to watch.

The Bird and the Bee - Again and Again and Again and Again (selected tracks)
Grade: D-

The Bird and the Bee would never be found in my personal collection.  The four songs on this sampler are dance pop, full of blips, bleeps, and throbs. There are no guitars to be found on this sampler  The first track, "Again and Again" is remotely similar to the twee pop sound of Belle and Sebastian, except without guitars.  "I'm a Broken Heart" is a forgettable mid-tempo pop tune that features decent vocals by Inara George.  The last two tracks, which are two different versions of a song called "Fucking Boyfriend," are annoying beyond belief.  The first version repeats the line "Won't you be my fucking boyfriend" over and over and over and over again.  The second version is a remix by Peaches, which still sucks but has added studio trickery.

Do not send HitSession this kind of music.  Ever.

Arden Attitude - Waiting for the Fatwa
Grade: B+

Sometimes it's necessary to offend people to sell a few records. More often than not, musical insults are subtle enough to make it into the mainstream, but Arden Attitude aren't interested in subtlety.  Instead, they gleefully take on Islam, Jews, white trash, politicians, and even kids and dogs. Nothing is sacred to this band.

All of this anger is hidden within a fairly mild musical context.  Simple (and intentionally amateurish sounding) guitar and keyboard patterns are melded with straight-forward percussion on most tracks.  The vocals which alternate between male and female singing, are strangely up-front in the mix. Perhaps the band wanted to make sure that no-one misunderstands the lyrics.  After all, who would want to miss lines like "Like to drink my beer 'till I'm totally smashed" ("White Trash") or "You're a bitch, you're a bitch, you're just a stupid f***ing bitch" ("Gentle Tone Poem of Love").  It doesn't get any better than this.

It's refreshing to hear an indie release that doesn't care about any known musical conventions. Waiting for the Fatwa is completely unique sounding without being annoying.  Time will tell if this one has any lasting value, but for here and now, it sounds all right.

The Burden Brothers - Mercy
Grade: A-

Mercy, the second album from Texas rockers The Burden Brothers, is packed full of riff-heavy high-quality rock. The suitably powerful lead vocals are handled by ex-Toadies singer Vaden Todd Lewis while the percussion is driven home by Taz Bentley, formerly from The Reverend Horton Heat.  The album has a very workmanlike guitar-driven sound, as these guys use their wealth of experience to put together a record that will be familiar sounding to fans of The Foo Fighters or Everclear.

Standout tracks include the AC/DC riff infused "Shine," "Still," which features a guitar melody that sticks with you for days, and the title track, a slow-burning rocker with impressive vocals by Lewis.

Mercy is a rarity in today's disposable pop world. It is an album that needs to be absorbed in it's entirety, not as a $.99 single on your iPod.

Scissors For Lefty - 4 Song EP
Grade: A

There's always room in the pop-rock world for kazoos and whistles.  Mix these quirky sounds with guitars, bass, and drums and you have the oddball act Scissors for Lefty.  Sounding like Weezer mixed with Bowie, SFL are a unique concoction of poppy sounding indie rock.  The songs aren't humorous in the They Might Be Giants sense but the beats are steady enough to excite fans of Panic! At the Disco.  "Ghetto Ways" pumps along with a disco bass beat, blippy synths and plenty of cheeky fun.  A guitar that sounds like a kazoo kicks off "Lay Down Your Weapons," a melodic track that also features a nice Weezer-esque guitar solo.  "Mama Your Boys Will Find a Home" finds the lead vocalist floating effortlessly between falsetto and Bowie mode, while leaving plenty of room for a whistle melody.  This almost like the Strokes if they didn't take themselves so seriously.

Scissors for Lefty should find a comfortable niche in the modern music scene. Hard rock fan boys won't like this band, but those who like to hear strange and refreshing sounds will find SFL a joy to behold.

Thunderbirds Are Now!  - Make History
Grade: A

Once there was a young man who got in a lot of trouble as a kid.  This boy had more energy than his parents could handle, and after years of trying to slow him down, they finally found some personal peace by directing the boy's activities towards music.  During the teenage years, this young man spent every waking moment learning to play guitar.  For some young fellows, the six string electric guitar represents everything they need in life; there's nothing quite like strapping on a sweet slab of wood and swinging it around like a huge phallus.

Our young hero stumbled upon a few more fellows who shared his love of loud, high energy music.  They didn't care that they weren't virtuosos, for it was enough to create jagged shards of guitar chords, sizzling synthesizer solos, and lighthearted vocal melodies for their songs.  Calling themselves Thunderbirds Are Now!, they released a record and an EP and hit their stride with a unique slab of Y2K modern rock called Justamustache.   Oddly, as they grew older,  the band found themselves able to concentrate on their music and as a result, they crafted a very consistent sounding and substantial record called Make History. The music is still heaps more fun than a pocket full of gerbils, as tracks like "We Win (Ha Ha)" prove that there is still a hint of originality left in the rock genre.  It is nearly impossible to relax while listening to the driving beats, slashing guitars, and anthemic chorus of "Open Us Up" or "Sleeping In the Lion's Mouth."

Thunderbirds Are Now! aren't for your little sister, your mom, or your wife.  Most people just aren't intelligent enough to appreciate a band like TAN. They are your band, and if you "get" them, consider yourself lucky.

White Whale - WWI
Grade: A+

Listen to the first 30 seconds of this album.  If the stunning application of slamming guitar, melodic piano, frenetic percussion, and perfect singing don't grab you, you're hopeless.  WWI is a top contender for record of the year on many lists, and with damn good reason.  The album is a literate concept album about sailing the high seas.  The band uses grinding guitars, bass loops, wall-of-sound choruses to compliment the story-telling lyrics of Matt Suggs, an indie rock veteran who really knows his way around the studio.

"O' William, O' Sarah" builds to an amazing crescendo, then falls apart into a turgid well of sonic despair before re-forming once again to create a rock and roll epiphany.  Cheesy sounding synths are used to great effect in the rousing "What's An Ocean For?"  The band switches gears into Ray Davies (Kinks) folk-rock mode in "We're Just Temporary Ma'am." White Whale demonstrate the effectiveness of dynamics in the haunting and stunning tale of redemption, "Forgive the Forgiven."

Records like WWI come along much to infrequently.  WWI will be a record that you'll listen to over and over to for months, always discovering something new each time you listen to it.

The Killers - Sam's Town
Grade: A

Long time fans of HitSession may wonder why I'm bothering with a review of The Killers sophomore major label  release, Sam's Town.  As a fan of rock music, I've been reading a lot of reviews about this album that are really not accurate.  The chatter in the press is that the record is overwrought an overdone.  But historically, the best rock records take chances and often go way over the top. The Killers could have played it safe and put out an album that was just a rehash of their debut, but instead they reached for the sky and came up with the ambitious and very rewarding Sam's Town.  The band cranks everything up to 11 on this one, especially the guitars.  But it's not all bombast, as the boys from Vegas know when it's time to bring things down a notch.

Tracks like "When You Were Young" are full-bore melodic wonders, full of raging guitars and synths and a chorus that is designed for a stadium sing along.  The obnoxiously titled "Bling (Confessions of a King)" turns out to be one of the best songs on a very good album, as  an unexpected spaghetti western beat drives the rhythm while all sorts of cool sonic clutter is combined to to create a song that can be enjoyed over and over.  Another stunning track is "The River is Wild."  Electric guitars cruise upon a steady 4/4 beat played at 160 BPM, while lead vocalist Brandon Flowers combines odd vocal quirks in the refrain ("I never did get along with myself") with a majestic, soaring chorus that wouldn't be out of place on one of Bruce Springsteen's later albums.

So don't skip out on Sam's Town just because writers in the mainstream press think they are too cool like it themselves.  I suspect a lot of critics are secretly playing this CD.

The Decemberists - The Crane Wife
Grade: A-

The Decemberists are an anachronism. If time travel were possible, they could be a group of 17th century musician/sailor/soldiers who find themselves suddenly living in 2006.  The Crane Wife, which is the band's first major label release after 2 well-received indie CD's, offers us a clever collage of folk rock, sea chanteys, Irish jigs, and even progressive rock.  Fronted by the forever nasal-sounding Colin Meloy, the band hails from the Portland, Oregon area.  Meloy based this album on a Japanese folk tale.  The songs don't actually make a lot of lyrical sense while listening casually, although the 10 tracks on this record are each very enjoyable.

In the 12 minute epic, "The Island: Come and See/The Landlord's Daughter/You'll Not Feel the Drowning," the band uses every trick in their arsenal.  The track opens with a bluesy instrumental track that wouldn't be out of place on a Jethro Tull album.  Meloy's voice is placed front and center in a melancholy melody as he describes "The Island" with a clever, antique prose: "In the lowlands, nestled in the heat
A briar cradle rocks it's babe to sleep / Its contents watched by Sycorax And patagon in parallax / A foretold rumbling sounds below the deep."  You won't here these lyrics on a Foo Fighters album.  "The Landlord's Daughter" section features an insistent progressive-rock keyboard riff and some of Meloy's best singing, especially as the song builds a head of steam from beginning to end. Ending the sequence is "You'll Not Feel the Drowning," which is a pleasant folk track punctuated by lovely acoustic guitar picking.

The Crane Wife won't be everyone's cup of tea.  Some may find Meloy's voice and literate lyrical style a bit much to take.  The musicianship on this album is second to none, and worth the price of admission on its own merit.

So It Goes - Histrionics
Grade: B+

Quirky pop-rock saw quite a revival this year with Franz Ferdinand, The Kaiser Chiefs, OK GO!, and Panic! At the Disco all gaining a fair share of public consciousness.  Four guys from Minneapolis have been paying attention, and they are called So It Goes.  Their new CD, Histrionics, does a very, very good job duplicating the edgy new-wave guitar-disco sound that made the previously mentioned bands popular.  Tracks like "No Guns No Love" and "Robots Are Dead" are packed with dance floor energy as the guitars slam power chords sideways against the vocals, not unlike the nearly-famous early 80's New Zealand outfit Split Enz.  Sometimes the off-kilter time signatures are intentionally jarring ("Propaganda"), but this album is mostly just good clean fun.

Histrionics will be right at place next to your Hot Hot Heat or Clap Your Hands Say Yea CD.  Play it when caffeine isn't doing the trick.

Airspace
Grade: A-

Not enough Spoon, Radiohead, or Muse in your collection?  Snag this new 7-song Airspace disc and you'll be satisfied for at least a little while.  Blasting out of the speakers with distorted piano, chugging guitars, and a cool falsetto voice, "Angel Unleashed" is a stunning opening tune.  Stuttering guitars are cranked up a notch on the mid-tempo rocker "Line," then the band from Memphis demonstrates their ability to duplicate the U2 ballad with "Candle."  The guitars are unleashed to great effect on "Baby, Don't Let Me Down," which channels Muse and The Bends era Radiohead.  Another rocker ("Misspelled") shows off Alyn Stuart's impressive vocal range.  The CD closes with nicely executed acoustic balled called "Breathe."

After listening to this excellent (but short) record, one wishes the band had fleshed it out a bit.  The songs are over in a flash, and you will be left wanting more.