Review: Chvrches, The Bones of What You Believe

I’ve made it clear that electro-pop/techno music isn’t my thing.  A lot of it just feels like a guy playing his ipod to a crowd of people, with a severe lack of talent.  However, there are always some really exciting exceptions that make me eat my words.  Last year, the most notable of these exceptions was Chvrches.  I discovered them at a Two Door Cinema Club gig and have been avidly following their career ever since!

“Lies” and “Recover” had both been released prior to their debut album, The Bones of What You Believe.  At such an early stage in their career, their ability to produce strong, catchy songs like these was so exciting!  There was so much that they could have done with this album, so when the 24^th came around, I was pretty damn excited.  The album features “Lies” and “Recover”, as well as 12 songs and 2 remixes.  There are 6 additional songs available, depending on your edition.

The opening song is a break-up anxiety ridden electronic gem.  From here, the songs only get catchier.  “We Sink” has an addicting chorus: “I'll be a thorn in your side, till you die” and “Gun” is the clear single.  It’s upbeat with great lyrics and is just angry enough to get you chanting them (think Robyn meets Passion Pit).  The beginning of “Tether” reminds me of a lighter version of Florence and the Machine; it’s mesmerizing and enchanting.  “Lies” has been re-recorded for the album and I think this new version has lost the raw, authentic, punchy charm that the original recording had. 

The male vocals, provided by Martin Doherty in “Under the Tide” and “You Caught the Light” add a really nice change-up in the layout of the album.  The chorus of “Night Sky” is M83-intense and, like the intenseness of a lot of other songs on this album, masks the inner complexity.

Considering their lack of instrumentals, Chvrches are able to create some really incredible hooks.  Their music proudly represents the emerging electro-pop genre.  It’s innovative with fantastic songwriting and infectious harmonies.  It’s certainly not the most creative or experimental new album I’ve heard recently, yet that allows them to create seamless arrangements.  It’s layered with constant synth waves and high energy.  Having said that, I think they should have stuck with the electro-pop sound.  The slightly more macabre “Under the Tide” and “Science/Visions” seem out of place and don’t match up to the general pop-grandeur of the rest of the album.

Chvrches are a fiery combination of Passion Pit, Depeche Mode and MS MR. Believe the hype and listen to this album!  They’ve certainly got the potential to be one of the best things to hit U.K. pop music in a while!

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Wilder Maker Part 1: Year of Endless Light Review

For the past 2 months, I’ve had Highs on repeat – surprising after my slightly obsessive review, huh?  In timing somewhat akin to fate, I recently discovered Wilder Maker and Highs have acted as the perfect warm-up for them.  Lead singer Gabe Birnbaum contacted me and very kindly sent me a copy of their new LP, Year of Endless Light – is there a better kind of mail to get?! 

A quick read through his bio said that he, like me, is from Boston so I may have had a slight bias when I went to listen the 8-track LP.  At first glance, I was a little taken aback as the tracks range from 4 to 12 minutes!  That’s a bold move, given the emerging ADHD generation.  While people will listen to all 8 minutes of “Stairway to Heaven” there are endless songs that just aren’t compelling enough to convince people to stick them out.

So, in order to prevent myself from completely making my mind up about them before having heard a single note (this is a legitimate problem I have with music!), I moved on to the first track: “Float Us Through the Barroom”.

The song begins with soft guitar and each syllable beautifully stretched out.  A duet soon emerges that seamlessly weaves into the accelerating guitar.  I find Birnbaum’s voice so fascinating as through each song it seems to seesaw between strength and desperation.  Each word is passionate and warm, and it feels like the words are being drawn out by the instrumentals, which results in a very pleasant tone.

The next track, “Wasting my Time” changes up the tone completely!  Suddenly, you’re a fly on the wall in a dustbowl jam session with Woodie Guthrie – Birnbaum’s voice even conforms to the change in genre.  The song finishes with a 70s-inspired guitar riff.  This is the type of song that I picture M. Ward producing if he spent a few years in Alabama!  I’m generally not a big country fan, but this is a great track.

“Hangs Hooks” then darkens the mood with ominous harmonies and is followed by “Song for the Singer”, perhaps my favorite song off the LP!   It’s a little slow, and definitely not the most exciting track off the album.  However, this is the music at its finest for me.  My favorite song of all time is “Uncertain Smile” by The The.  It’s caulk-full of solos leading up to a very longwinded crescendo with the best kind of lyrics: poetic and ambiguous.  While “Song for the Singer” sounds nothing like “Uncertain Smile”, it’s still that type of song and is a win in my book.  However, it could definitely be shortened (it’s 12 minutes and 30 seconds!), not that I felt myself thinking that throughout the 12 minutes.   “Invisible Order” is another one of those types of songs.  It begins with an unexpected saxophone; the first 15 seconds are suitable for a plot change in an Audrey Hepburn movie!  The vocal doubling on the track is really well done and there are some beautiful trumpet and piano solos weaved in.

At first, “Slow Life” reminded me of Bon Iver, but after a few more listens the song is actually very unique.  Usually the easiest way to describe an artist or a track is to compare it to another artist or track… but with this one I really struggled!  It has mesmerizing lyrics, harmonies so strong and passionate it sounds like a full choir and a captivating chorus.  This is the best song off the album, no question.

“Lullaby” preemptively slows you down for the end of the album and for the last song, “Holy Night”.   This is perhaps a slower way to end the album then I would have liked, given the more upbeat beginning.  “Holy Night” is peaceful track, however, calling a song “Holy Night” and including jingle bells makes a little out of place! It’s a great song, but it probably should have been saved for a Christmas album – and this is coming from a Jew!

Year of Endless Light is a music genre roulette wheel where you win at every outcome.  I’ve previously said how I love bands that can venture out into a new genre without losing what they quintessentially are.  Yet, this usually happens across separate albums… not throughout a single LP!  On YoEL, each song literally changes genre, but I never found myself disappointed.  This makes it difficult to know much about the band as I’m not sure I could even place them in a genre (it’s going to take me ages to write the labels for this post!).

As I listened to and experienced a multitude of instruments, vocals and genres, I found that it was all accompanied by a bizarre feeling of understanding.  Even though you won’t completely know what’s happening to you as you hear each track… you’ll just get it.  If that’s not the sign of an impressive musician and lyricist, I’m not really sure what is.

Year of Endless Light was released today!  It can be heard and downloaded here.  I was lucky enough to get to chat with lead singer Gabe Birnbaum and ask him a few questions about the album - all this to come tomorrow!  In the meantime, you've got 8 fantastic tracks to get your hands on.

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Review: Volcano Choir, Repave

In 2009, during the climb of Justin Vernon’s fame, I don’t think anyone could have predicted the formation of Volcano Choir.  Collections of Colonies of Bees just seemed too post-rock to be a good fit with Justin Vernon’s distinctive somber tone!  Then, when Unmap was released, it seemed like those premonitions had come full circle.  The album just didn’t seem all there, and we soon found out why.

Different aspects of the album had been recorded and then sent via email to be compiled.  Does that sound like the making of a Grammy award-winning album? Don’t think so.  There were a few gems, like “Island, IS” and “Seeplymouth”.  But honestly, it sounded like the musical equivalent of writing your dissertation the night before!  The skill was there, but what they needed was a deadline-less period of writing and collaborating.  They needed to figure out how COCOB’s post-rock sound would work without over-shadowing Vernon’s breathy, dreamlike vocals.  They needed to create something natural.  They needed to treat Unmap, as a musical folly and develop!

So that’s what they did.

Repave is the combination of the COCOB and Justin Vernon that we were all hoping for 4 years ago.  Vernon’s distinctive voice is in your face (in the best way possible) and COCOB has a very welcome influence.

The opening track “Tiderays” is a perfect power ballad.  The structure is very similar to “Perth” from Bon Iver, Bon Iver; they both begin with soft yet powerful guitar, which then melds into strong, civil war sounding drums.

“Acetate” is my most listened to song off Repave.  It’s a fantastic song with the perfect flow for endless replays.  In fact, it seems to show a new openness to Vernon, in comparison to his previous work with Bon Iver.  Continuing with the war theme, it leads smoothly into “Comrade”.   This song has a very full arrangement, which is ideal for Vernon’s voice.

The clear single off the album is “Byegone”; it’s a modern folk song for the masses.  “Alaskans” is full of peacefulness and sweetness and provides uplifting lyrics with calming acoustic guitar.  It’s so well composed and a highlight of the album.  Suddenly, the album catches you off guard with a darker twist in “Dancepack”.  Everything is just a little off with this song, rhythmically and vocally.  Suddenly, an album full of uplifting and calming lyrics changes to the sarcastic repetition of “Take note, there’s still a hole in your heart”!

Finally, “Almanac” completes the album with a myriad of synth and guitar harmonies synonymous the to waves that the album strives to create (judging by the cover).  I don’t know how Vernon does this, but each sentence sounds and feels like an inhibited scream!  It’s awesome.

The lyrics throughout this album are unsurprisingly ambiguous.  I’m all for ambiguous lyrics, but Vernon has been known to produce lyrics that are downright ridiculous and don’t match up with the heavy, emotional tone of the instrumentals.  As the listener, this makes it seem like the lyricist is just messing with you and it’s irritating at times.  Regardless, the lyrics generally seem to hint towards the idea of moving forward and not letting previous difficulties hold you back.  In a word, repaving.

This is a difficult album to come to a conclusion on.  I really enjoy listening to it, but not because it’s new and exciting.  I enjoy it because aside from a few aspects, it’s essentially another Bon Iver album.  So on the one hand, it’s a great album.  On the other, it’s nothing new.

Check out: "Acetate" and "Byegone".

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Review: Ludovico Einaudi, In a Time Lapse

Ludovico Einaudi has always been an artist that I could work to.  What I mean is, I struggle to find music that I can study to that doesn’t easily distract me and prevent me from being productive.  If I were to study to Buddy Holly, I would be unable to write more than a few sentences before jumping up and singing every word in a very embarrassing jam session… alone.  In contrast, Einaudi’s compositions form a perfect balance between relaxing and captivating.  Some are more subtle, such as “Divenire”, which is dreamy and some are more captivating, such as his beautiful performance of “Nuvole Bianche” with Alessia Tondo.  With this album, he has successfully continued to captivate his audience and create a stunning selection of new songs.

While attention spans are rapidly decreasing with each generation, it’s impressive when a composer is able to captivate as broad an audience as Einaudi has been able to do.  While I do recognize that he would be sorted into a “Top 40” category within classical music, his compositions still vastly differ from the music that a lot of his audience may typically listen to.  The sole criticism that I can propose for this album is that I feel he may be veering dangerously close to a “soundtrack”.  To be fair, I guess you can almost say that about any song and I would certainly not group him with the likes of Hans Zimmerman, for example.  I think this feeling emanates from the addition of a larger orchestra and a heavier inclusion of the violin.  I’m not sure I could pinpoint exactly why this makes me feel this way, but it feels as though some of the songs have been written for something, i.e. specifically for an emotional climax in a film.

If you’re just going to listen to one song off of this album, it has to be “Run”.  After listening to this album a few times through, this was the song that I stopped to put on repeat each time.  It is a resplendent symphony of piano and violin, which also features the I Virtuosi Italiani ensemble.  The first thing that I noticed about this album was how different it is to his previous work.  While “Run” is classic Einaudi, “Life” allows the glockenspiel and violin to take the lead and “Newton’s Cradle” includes chilling percussion and synthesizers.  These are just two examples from the album, but being an avid Einaudi fan for the past few years I can see a coming-of-age of sorts that I think separates this album from a lot of his previous work.  However, I was pleased that he chose to close the album with “Burning”, which sounds like a musical definition of why Einaudi has achieved such fame.  After the inclusion of so many other exhilarating instruments throughout the album, “Burning” is a consummate piece to finish In a Time Lapse with.

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Review: Jason Isbell, Southeastern

There are a lot of artists whose entire careers are based on their substance abuse.  Sometimes, this is fuelled by media attention after abhorrent behavior and sometimes the fuel emanates from the pain, addition and abuse the artist has experienced to create beautiful, dark-spirited albums.  Or, they get sober and produce an album that tops anything they’d done before.  With that, Jason Isbell presents Southeastern.  What is especially notable about this new album is that it doesn’t sound like a preachy self-help book; it’s a non-preachy, non-self-help inspired reflection of his abusive behavior and his journey to overcome it.

This sometimes is done in a comic fashion, in “Super 8”, which reiterates that he “Don’t want to die in a Super 8 Motel” or in a demonstration of raw emotion like with “Yvette”.  He depicts loneliness in “Traveling Alone”, which leads to misery and desperation.  “Cover Me Up” tells a haunting story of growth, realization and repentance and has some of the most beautiful lyrics on the album (a very welcome change after listening to The Neighbourhood’s, I Love You. last week!).  My favorite songs off of this release have to be “Stockholm” and “Elephant”.  I think these two really demonstrate Isbell’s ability to create stunning music free of fancy special effects or synthesizers.  Rather, these songs use pure emotion, experience and musical talent to create something influential and beautiful.   This is particularly evident in “Elephant”, which is used as a partially arbitrary replacement for the word “cancer”, and tells the dramatic story of attempting to live a normal life under the elephant-sized shadow of the disease.

Isbell uses a significant portion of this album to point out the weaknesses of humankind and explain the drastic changes and effects this can have on a person’s life.  Even more than this, Isbell really demonstrates his versatility on this album.  He portrays an open-mind, whereby he’s able to examine an issue or event from multiple different points-of-view.  Through this he produces a varied album that uses multiple styles of music and presents many different influences, both musically and lyrically.  He creates relatable characters that have the listener immediately hooked on each unique situation that he describes.  Even though he creates such a vast selection of characters, they are all tied together by the theme of regret.

This really is a fantastic album that truly deserves the admiration and recognition that it has been receiving this week.  It’s based around the acoustic guitar and emotionally grabbing lyrics.  Similarly, anyone who was a fan of City and Colour’s Bring Me Your Love from 2008 will likely be a fan of Southeastern, as well!

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Review: The Neighbourhood, I Love You.

The Neighbourhood’s debut album has been blowing up in the young music scene since it’s release in late April (making this review a pretty belated!).  I first heard “Sweater Weather” and was excited to hear the rest of the album.  Before I could, I saw a lot of negative reviews, which surprised me, as even though I’d only heard one song, I liked what I heard.  What I think is really important to note with this band, and why the critic’s ratings have been quite low, is because they’re clearly a teenage band.  Yes, the lyrics are shallow and it doesn’t match up to the classics and even some of the better bands of the moment like Mumford & Sons or The Black Keys.  Yes, they’re trying a little too hard to be edgy, when in reality there’s nothing hugely original about a lot of the songs on this album.  However, they have produced some good songs that I feel are being overlooked.  Before I heard Phoenix’s new album, Bankrupt!, most of the critical reviews that I had read were praising it, but when I heard it I was monumentally disappointed! Clearly, it’s a matter of personal taste.

The album begins with a slightly gothic, synthesizer-based intro, entitled “How”.  After this, “Afraid” demonstrates why their lyrics have been so heavily criticized;  “You’re too mean, I don’t like you, fuck you anyway”.  Okay, not the most creative or intellectual way to get your point across!  Luckily, the album improves after this.  “Female Robbery”, “Sweater Weather”, “Flawless” and “W.D.Y.W.F.M.?” are the highlights off the album and I would recommend downloading these four rather than the entire album.

I have a French friend in Paris who didn’t start learning English until she was 13.  She said there were a lot of English songs that she really liked before she learned English and didn’t hear them again until after she spoke it fluently.  She then explained how she experienced a bizarre form of déjà vu because when she heard them years later she was then able to understand the lyrics.  For me, I think I would like this album a lot more if I didn’t speak English!   For example, I would have had a very different reaction to the song “Float” if I wasn’t distracted by "They show you how to swim / Then they throw you in the deep end"!  Really?  This was the cleverest metaphor for life that they could come up with?

However, this is their debut album and they’ve gone from nothing to a huge success in a very short time.  They’ve still got room to grow and their success from here seems to be limitless in terms of the fan base that they have already accumulated as well as the direction their music can go in.  I think that after this album they will veer away from the indie/hip-hop genre that they’ve delved in towards the mainstream.  True, the Beastie Boys found a happy medium with the genre, but since them no bands come to mind that have been equally successful with it.  Not that The Neighbourhood sounds like the Beastie Boys, but there’s a slight indie/hip-hop influence.  It’s just enough to be noticeable, but I think their work after this will be much more pop-inclined.

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Review: Surfer Blood, Pythons

The release date for this album could not have been better.   Surfer Blood is a quintessentially summer band & Pythons fits this perfectly.  The album is chock-full of catchy, up-beat songs and seems a bit like a continuation of Astro Coast, rather than a progression from it.  I generally don’t focus much on the flow of the album, unless it seems off, but I think they’ve managed it very well here.  When working with nearly all up-beat songs like this, it could easily just sound like a band of cheerleaders.  However, they provide two breaks with “I Was Wrong” and “Needles and Pins”, which help to meld one song into the next and were placed at just the right moment in the album.  The sound is good, the flow is good… but there’s just something about Surfer Blood that will always be average!

That being said, I don’t even know what it is that makes them so average.  I couldn’t tell you that they just need to change this or tweek that.  They’re just one of those bands that will never be described as great because they can’t compare to some of the other music that’s out there today.  Sometimes, when I find a new band or a new album that I really like I tend to act a little hyperbolic.  I’ll listen to them, and only them, for a week or two and subsequently announce that they are the greatest band ever.  But then I revisit some of the classics that I like, such as Radiohead or the Clash or some of my favorite modern bands like She & Him or Local Natives that I had momentarily ignored.  When I return to this band that I had just praised, I suddenly say that they’re just okay!  These comparisons aren’t entirely fair, as the bands I’ve just mentioned are completely different to Surfer Blood, I can’t help but do it.  I guess it’s easy to get caught up in momentum with something new like that, be it an album or a tv show or some must-have shoes.  Regardless, this is the reaction that I’ve seen a lot of people have to Surfer Blood and this is why I say that they’ll always be just okay.  They will never be that classic band that you consistently revisit.

Yet, for the summer season that we’re technically in (I say technically as we’re still wearing winter coats in London!) this album is going to be a nice addition.  The album’s opening song, “Demon Dance”, as well as “Weird Shapes” both sound like punchy progressions from the previous album, Astro Coast.  These, along with “Prom Song”, are the standouts from this album for me. They’re all easy listens and don’t feel overdone.  Even though I like these songs, it bothers me that “Weird Shapes” and “Demon Dance” were the promotional singles that were released prior to the album.  It’s like when the only good parts of a movie are in the trailer, causing you to feel robbed when you pay £8.50 to see 3 funny minutes, surrounded by 87 minutes of crap.  Similarly, these are clearly the best songs on the album, making me feel a little jipped that the rest doesn’t match up.

This album also showcases a new component to Surfer Blood’s sound: emo screaming.  Okay, that’s an overstatement – it’s sort of a pop version of emo screaming.  While I do like the unpredictability of this, I wouldn’t say that it adds anything to the songs.  Maybe this is because it clearly doesn’t match the tone of the band, but I think it’s mostly because it’s used so sparingly throughout the record that it does nothing but throw you off.

Overall, I feel a little biased while reviewing this album (as I’m sure any other reviewers will also feel).  Last year, frontman John Paul Pitts was arrested for domestic battery.  While all charges were dropped, this does not make me want to support the band and I was kind of hoping that this album would suck.

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Introduction to the National + Review: Trouble Will Find Me

Matt Berninger, deep baritone lead singer of The National, epitomizes an awkward-but-cool personality.  He’s tall and gangly, and does not exude confidence by any stretch of the imagination.  This vulnerability is clearly demonstrated in his music and makes him and it easy to relate to.  I think this comes from his late start in the music industry.  He wasn’t a young rock star, surrounded by girls from the age of 18.  Rather, he began with humble beginnings in Cincinnati, Ohio, and became a graphic designer in New York City.  Berninger has explained how this removed a lot of the pressure from the band, as it wasn’t an all-or-nothing situation.  Clearly, this needn’t have been a thought as 10 years on the National are still producing stellar albums.

I hear a lot of people talk about the National being overrated.  I understand this, as they do sound a lot like other indie bands that are around today.  However, what I think makes the National stand out is the relatability aspect.  They aren’t too much of anything.  What I mean by this is that they’re not too cool or too stylish or too hipster or too artistic – they just seem like regular guys who have the same problems in life and relationships as we do.  No matter what you’re going through or what mood you’re in, the National have an album for you.  Their first few albums are simple – calm, relaxing, easy acoustic arrangements.  Slowly they’ve added a larger orchestra and delved deeper into the directions their music can go, without loosing their sound or their roots.

What’s particularly special about their music is tone.  Berninger has stated, “Our songs are about death – but in a really fun way”.  While all of the songs are clearly melancholic, they don’t make you want to sit around waiting for death like the people in the Notebook.  They still retain a pop aspect to them, which makes them catchy and really enjoyable to listen to, despite the depressing undertones.

From a lyrical standpoint, the National falls between brilliant and confusing.  On the one hand, they can be interpreted in a myriad of different ways, making them applicable to a lot of different people and situations.  Regardless of what the artist actually meant when he wrote lyrics (this can often be disappointing, for example finding out that half of Bob Dylan’s lyrics really are just about marijuana), this ambiguity that stems re-interpretation demonstrates the lyrical strength.  On the other hand, and I’m not sure if this is a good of a bad thing, there are a lot of National lyrics that make me do a mental double take: “Can’t face heaven all heavenfaced” (what!?).

The first song on the album, “I Should Live in Salt” appears to be simple enough, discussing the deterioration of a complicated relationship.  It then brings in the idea of rubbing salt in an open wound.  This evokes the metaphor of Berninger himself being an open wound and condemning himself to a life in salt.  While I interpret the song like this, the beauty of Berninger’s lyrics is the sheer agility and versatility of them in their multitude of personal interpretations.  For example, it could also easily be interpreted as a life of guilt, as “I should live in salt” is followed by “for leaving you behind”.

Overall, Trouble Will Find Me is unsurprisingly a fantastic album and worth listening to!  Any fans of The National will not be disappointed with this installment.

My “must-listens” off Trouble Will Find Me are: “I Should Live in Salt”, “Don’t Swallow the Cap”, “Sea of Love” “This is the Last Time” and  “I Need My Girl”.

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Review: MS MR, Secondhand Rapture

I was halfway through making a playlist for this summer when I remembered that MS MR’s debut album, Secondhand Rapture, had been released on the 14^th.  I quickly found it on iTunes with the intention of listening to a few songs to get an idea of what they had done on their full album after their previous few EPs.  After sampling 3 songs I bought the album and have been listening non-stop all day. I certainly will not need my summer playlist – this album is all I see myself listening to for at least the next month!

When I was younger, I remember being elated when a new Avril Lavigne or Green Day album would be released.  I would convince my dad to drive straight to Best Buy the morning of the release and then he would have the pleasure of listening to that and only that for the next 6 months.  With the sheer amount of music that is so readily available now, I don’t get the feeling of being that excited over a band very often.  Yet, MS MR has given it to me once again, and I think they’re going to have the same effect on a lot of other people.

Recently, all of the new music I’ve heard has been one of two things: synthesizer-laden pop music where the listeners are provided the challenge of differentiating between songs or a guy essentially playing his ipod to a stadium full of people.  Yet, throughout Secondhand Rapture, each song does not blend monotonously into the next.  Each song is different, coherent and addicting!  With the similar name and male-female duo, the obviously instinct is to compare MS MR to She & Him.  Yet, about 30 seconds into the first song, their sound is so unique and strong that the resemblance is immediately forgotten.  Still, lead singer Lizzy Plapinger’s voice reminds me of Florence Welch of Florence + the Machine and MS MR do sound quite like a darker version of F+TM.  

While the dark lyrics and tones of each song are what initially draw you in, the unique addition of echoing and heavy drums makes it impossible not to listen to these songs over and over again.  I love the use of drums on “Salty Sweet” and the openness of the lyrics along with the vivid orchestra of “Hurricane”.  While “Bones” and “Hurricane” are the obvious singles off the album, “Fantasy”, “Ash Tree Lane” and “Head Is Not My Home” are also very strong.

With the option of buying only one or two songs, rather than an entire album (thanks to iTunes), bands have been under more and more pressure in the last 10 or so years.  This means that there is less leeway for filler songs.  Clearly, MS MR has not been fazed by the idea of using filler songs and I believe that Secondhand Rapture is the strongest debut album so far of 2013! 

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Review: M. Ward, A Wasteland Companion

She & Him is a band that I’ve followed since Zooey Deschanel’s performance while singing in the shower in Elf.  After obsessing over Volume One and Volume Two, and understanding that I would have to endure a three year wait until the release of Volume Three, I was ecstatic when I discovered that M. Ward (the Him of She & Him) would be releasing his eighth solo album in the mean time, entitled: A Wasteland Companion.

Generally, I tend to steer clear of Christian or any religion-based music. There are many gospel-toned exceptions that I adore, such as Alison Krauss.  Yet, when I’m listening to a song & enjoying it, the often unexpected, and perhaps unnecessary declaration of, “praise Jesus!” can put me off a song.  That being said, I actually found that I enjoyed the pastoral tones of the aptly titled, A Wasteland Companion.

While listening to this album I found that I had conflicting opinions from song to song.  The melancholic tone is hardly surprising, given Ward’s previous work, but the selection of songs seemed to be more accurately described as a series of mood swings.  Through this every song seemed to embody a plethora of emotions, with the listener being assigned the role of sorting through them all to determine the true, buried meaning.  While I like the challenge that accompanies this, I also feel that Ward’s vagueness acts as a downfall, particularly with this album.  When I listened to the first half of the album, I thought that this would be one of my favorite M. Ward albums to date.  However, I felt that some of the later songs were used as filler, and didn’t quite match up to the quality of the earlier ones.

Overall, there doesn’t seem to be anything that M. Ward can do wrong, in my mind.  As Conor Oberst put it: “M. Ward for president!”

Check out the newly released video for Me And My Shadow!

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