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Erin Frank's Photo I'm a volunteer KDHX music writer based in St. Louis.

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Album review: Craig Finn mines the riches of regret on ‘Clear Heart Full Eyes’

Craig Finn
“Clear Heart Full Eyes”
Vagrant

Craig Finn left Brooklyn to record “Clear Heart Full Eyes” in Austin during a four-month break for the Hold Steady. While he arrived in Texas with songs in hand, the actual recording process — including meeting up with producer Mike McCarthy and introductions to musicians Josh Block, Jesse Ebaugh, Ricky Ray Jackson and Billy White — took only three weeks.

This is a short time for most artists, but especially ones who are working with purposefully different material and unknown (to them) musicians. It should also be noted that the musical atmosphere of Austin is a world away from Finn’s Minneapolis roots and current home in New York. However, as the album is named, Finn went in with honest intentions and his own experience, and came out with a straightforward, earnestly-performed album full of rich details to be discovered on every successive listen.

The first track is the spectacular “Apollo Bay.” It’s pensive, conflicted, dripping with spacey lyrics and Catholic guilt, hovering just above all-out weirdness with a throbbing beat that turns it dead sexy just before a keening slide guitar hints at Austin’s alt-country trademark. That slide guitar is a subtle clue ringing out from a psychedelic landscape, a tell that Finn is out of his element but backed by musicians he can trust. Although he recorded on a break from the Hold Steady, he is not at all alone.

Although much of “Clear Heart Full Eyes” has a definite country influence, there are a few tracks that are textbook rock ‘n’ roll. Another one of my favorite tracks is “No Future,” the bleak subject of being dead on the inside punched up by a very Springsteen-esque melody and cheeky declaration that Finn will take advice from no one but Freddie Mercury and Johnny Rotten.

Finn’s flat, narrative voice is too distinctive to leave the Hold Steady completely behind, as is his writing style. He’s still not really a singer, but the more mellifluous vocals he began using on 2006′s “Boys and Girls In America” are trimmed back again for something like occasional spoken word. His songwriting is affected by a similar paring down, something more contemplative and appropriate for a solo project and less so for a rock band. Finn still swims in complicated phrasing and big words, though, wielding his literary references in thoughtful riffs about speed, people he used to know, and Jesus.

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Posted by | February 10, 2012 | Album Reviews | Comment 

Concert review: Heartless Bastards and Hacienda bring new songs and sounds to the Firebird, Wednesday, February 8

Heartless Bastards at the Firebird in St. Louis, February 8, 2012

Kate McDaniel

Hacienda, an impressively-bearded four-piece family band from San Antonio, opened for Heartless Bastards last night at the Firebird. While the bands aren’t labelmates, their styles are somewhat similar and make for a well-paired touring team.

Hacienda is comprised of brothers Abraham (piano), Rene (bass) and Jaime Villanueva (drums), with cousin Dante Schwebel (guitar). Officially, all members contribute to vocals, although Rene Villanueva and Schwebel shared much of the spotlight last night. Rene mentioned that the current tour was the second time the band had accompanied Heartless Bastards on the road.

Most of Hacienda’s set featured tracks from their new album, an as-yet-untitled project recorded in Nashville (a single from the album, “Savage” is already on iTunes). The newer songs sounded polished and produced with a pop sensibility, but a few standouts like “Natural Life” and the “Honaloochie Boogie”-like “Let Me Go” retained the grittier, funkier feel of Hacienda’s previous albums, 2010′s “Big Red & Barbacoa” and 2008′s “Loud Is the Night.” I preferred these selections, the thrown-together feel of the compositions enhanced by dirty keyboards and echoey vocals. It’s a throwback sound popularized by the Black Keys, a band for whom Hacienda opened after Dan Auerbach heard their demos. According to Hacienda’s MySpace page, Auerbach also recorded them at his home studio in Ohio.

Veteran pros from Austin, Heartless Bastards opened their headlining set with “Marathon,” a subdued track from their upcoming album “Arrow,” to be released February 14. It’s a hushed sort of strummer pulled from folkishness by ethereal cymbals and Erika Wennerstrom’s gorgeously raw voice. I hereby nominate “Marathon” to be the next Best Road Ballad, as it far surpasses “Home Sweet Home” in both creativity and not-having-anything-to-do-with-Vince Neil.

Wennerstrom is a soul singer with the veneer of Grace Slick, a tiny powerhouse who can take an audience down a rabbit hole of bluesy psych pop. Wennerstrom looks like Kim Gordon but that’s where the similarity ends; like peers the Duke Spirit and the Black Angels, the Heartless Bastards’ style is rooted in the bedrock of ’70s-era rock ‘n’ roll made surreal by dizzying instrumentals and, last night at the Firebird, a Chinese language-subtitled Bluray disc of “Roadhouse” playing behind the bar.

While Wennerstrom is the band’s founder, songwriter, vocalist and guitarist and therefore commands most of the attention, she never steals focus from her bandmates. Heartless Bastards is a tightly knit group of performers whose skill at playing together is glossed by a sense of comfort and familiarity. And they stick to playing together. There was some subdued stage banter, but chatting wasn’t the point.

The point was Dave Colvin’s marching band drums of “Witchy Poo,” Mark Nathan’s high lonesome guitar on the American gothic ballad “The Arrow and the Beast” and a subtle heartbeat rhythm from bassist Jesse Ebaugh, who was recently tapped to play on Craig Finn’s solo album, “Clear Eyes Full Heart.” And, yes, the tender, smoky, from-the-belt vocals of Wennerstrom on nearly every song, even “Blue Day,” which was drenched in Zeppelin-like feedback without overwhelming the crowd or any individual musician.

The promotion of “Arrow” was the order of the evening, with many of the new tracks enthusiastically cheered by the audience although many of them haven’t been released yet. Seldom is a new album performed with such confidence, but with Wennerstrom in the lead — can you tell I’m a little bit in love with her? — even the more experimental songs featuring maracas, trilling tambourine and one fuzzy tune described as “doom metal” came out straight and true. I sincerely hope the Heartless Bastards’ knack for direction leads them back to St. Louis soon.

Posted by | February 9, 2012 | Concerts | Comment 

Album review: Nada Surf’s return to adolescence on ‘The Stars Are Indifferent to Astronomy’

Nada Surf
“The Stars Are Indifferent to Astronomy”
Barsuk

Ever the ones to ignore music industry convention, Nada Surf is obviously moving in a different direction with “The Stars Are Indifferent to Astronomy.” The album, released by Barsuk/City Slang on January 24, is a snappier, more buoyant effort than the softer, ardent sound that has defined much of the better-known indie corners (Death Cab for Cutie, the Shins, Bon Iver) for the past several years. It’s certainly more upbeat than 2003′s earnest “Let Go” or 2005′s mercurial ”The Weight Is a Gift,” and in a way, this makes the album more reminiscent of the band’s angsty-yet-unpretentious 1996 breakout hit, “Popular.”

The tempo of “The Stars Are Indifferent to Astronomy” rarely relents, though, which lends the feeling of forced amiability. I’m not asking for the perpetual nubbly sweater-wearing whisper of a Death Cab For Cutie record, but a little disaffection wouldn’t kill anyone. Although I kept waiting for a little crunch, itch, or well-deserved lyrical gripe, “The Stars Are Indifferent to Astronomy” is actually pretty innocuous, the crisp guitars and gentle harmonizing in songs like “Waiting For Something,” “Jules and Jim” and “Looking Through” sounding less like a cohesive release and more like a quietly-marketed Goo Goo Dolls/Gin Blossoms/Third Eye Blind project.

The general lyrical theme suggests a nostalgia for carefree, promise-rich youth. Sometimes this is more subtle, as with the repeating phrase “recursive tulips” in “The Moon Is Calling,” and sometimes so obvious it’s silly, as in “Teenage Dreams” or the line “I can’t believe the future’s happening to me” in “The Future.”

Combined with guitarist and lead vocalist Matthew Caws’ forever-young falsetto, it all suggests the juvenile hopefulness of youth but none of the anxiety. I don’t mean to imply that all good music is borne out of misery, but one of Nada Surf’s songwriting gifts has been an acerbic wit delivered with unapologetic directness. I don’t know if the intention was to return to a simpler way to write songs, but the band is cleverer than this, and has been gutsier in the past.

This is not to say there are no bright points. There are a few instrumental saving graces on this album: the mournful trumpet in the otherwise ordinary breakup song “Let the Fight Do the Fighting,” for instance, or the shimmery strings in “When I Was Young.” The constructed distortion of “Clear Eye Clouded Mind” leads off the album, and the other full song standout, “No Snow On the Mountain,” brings a tinge of the disaffection I so badly wanted. Unfortunately, this Hail Mary of a song comes too late and after too much passionless, textureless soft rock.

The name Nada Surf refers to an existential state of nothingness, or perhaps a Buddhist state of non-attachment. It’s about living in a sea of quiet static, I guess, and although fitting to play in the background somewhere, unfortunately, quiet static is how the album sounds. After a nearly 20-year-long career, “The Stars Are Indifferent To Astronomy” is less about stars and more about indifference.

Posted by | January 27, 2012 | Album Reviews | Comment 

Concert review: Rocking, drinking and being merry with Murder by Death, Royal Smokestacks and Strawfoot at Off Broadway, Thursday, December 29

Kate McDaniel

The rigors of touring are not for the faint of heart. The time away from home and loved ones is difficult enough, and when added to bad food, cold dressing rooms and bandmate farts in the van, those endless miles can wreak havoc on one’s soul.

With this in mind, it’s a good idea to develop a set of rules to keep you sane. These rules vary from band to band, but probably at the top of the Ten Commandments of Touring are the following:

Rule #1: Never underestimate the power of a good drinking song.

Rule #2: Especially in St. Louis.

Last night’s Murder by Death show at Off Broadway proved our city’s commitment to the finer art of drinking and appreciation of those who write songs on the topic. St. Louis is a place where the crowd howls at mention of whiskey, and neither Murder by Death nor their openers, local bands Royal Smokestacks and Strawfoot, could disappoint.

Royal Smokestacks played a moody neo-Americana, the kind of music we can’t just call “rock” anymore but it still fits the bill. Their set was mellow, with occasional outbursts of rockabilly vocals, ska inflection, and a swinging cover of “Wooly Bully.”  While I found them to be enjoyable enough, like Van Morrison songs, Royal Smokestacks was pleasant but mostly uninteresting to a sober listener (ahem, me).
                   
A shining example of what happens when the kids aren’t satisfied with just one style, Strawfoot opened their set like gypsy punk hooligans and closed it in a dizzying finale of “Churchyard Cough,” a drinking song given credibility, I guess, with an affected Irish accent and fiddle. If this seems like ADD, then it’s the best possible kind because it afforded the presence of accordion, harmonica, violin, mandolin and an upright bass. It could be that I’m just a sucker for skilled dilettantism, but I thought that Strawfoot played a giddily deranged mess of a set, riling up the crowd for a headliner they were clearly thrilled to support.

Strawfoot’s drinking hymns were all well and good, but they couldn’t hold a candle to Murder by Death’s opener, “Kentucky Bourbon.” It takes a certain kind of confidence to open with a drinking song, I think, and guitarist/vocalist Adam Turla’s polished baritone paired with Sarah Balliet’s mournful cello were, like the song’s namesake, smooth and stoic enough to pull it off.

Murder by Death’s second song, the gruesomely funny “You Don’t Miss Twice (When You’re Shavin’ With a Knife),” was indicative of the style the band has adopted since releasing their first truly country-influenced album, “Red of Tooth and Claw” in 2008. Balliet’s cello kept a gothic beat alongside Dagan Thogerson’s hop-step percussion, and the avant-garde result could fit into the background of a Tom Waits project.

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Posted by | December 31, 2011 | Concerts | Comment 

Album review: The Black Keys push on, full throttle, with ‘El Camino’

The Black Keys
“El Camino”
Nonesuch

In a recent interview with Pitchfork, the Black Keys’ drummer Patrick Carney pissed off half of Canada when he posited that while the band would most certainly want to be remembered as more “awesome” like Led Zeppelin, it was also possible that they were more “annoying” like Rush.

“It’s all relative,” according to Carney, although he conceded that he could be entirely wrong:

“I don’t know — what’s the difference between Rush and Led Zeppelin, other than the fact that one band is awesome and one is really annoying? Maybe we’re like Led Zeppelin — but maybe we’re Rush. Everything is relative. The worst thing that can happen is for you to think that you’re Led Zeppelin, but it turns out you’re Loverboy.”

While I can’t hear any of the feared Loverboy influence in the Black Keys’ new album, “El Camino,” I do hear a hard rock tribute to Zeppelin sprinkled with a few possibly unintentional hints to Canada’s prog rock kings. The album’s leading track, the single “Lonely Boy,” begins with a riff on Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song” and swirls into crunchy guitars supplemented by electronic bursts and a female-heavy chorus of “I got a love that keeps me waiting.”

The electro-pop and breathy-sweet female voices are a continuing theme throughout the album and elevate “El Camino” above the Keys’ previous records that, while impressive in their consistency, seemed more drawn from drinking cheap beer in stadium parking lots (Blackmore, Thorogood, Seger) than the more glamorous denizens of rock history (Bolan, Johansen, Reed). This expansion in taste is partly influenced by producer Danger Mouse and makes “El Camino” a sexier and more upbeat album than its predecessors, something Carney and singer/guitarist Dan Auerbach acknowledged during a recent appearance on The Colbert Report. Even the more stripped-down “Little Black Submarines” contributes to this mood, as it not only switches to a grinding clamor midway through the song, but is also preceded by “Gold on the Ceiling,” a sweaty, raunchy, good-time single driven by handclaps and Moog.

That the most listenable tracks on “El Camino” are the result of the band’s maturation is a statement about the steps they’ve taken; however, their growth has not come by leaps and bounds. Other songs, such as “Run Right Back” and “Money Maker” could have appeared on any of the band’s previous albums (though perhaps most fittingly on 2010′s blues-heavy album “Brothers”). The former describes an addictive sort of woman, the veiled misogyny of the lyrics poorly disguised as sincere yearning. The latter features Auerbach’s wail echoing above a scuzzy 4-chord progression and sloppy, cymbal-heavy drums, all of which fade to a psychedelic pedal effect in the bridge. Both are archetypal American rock songs done in the style mastered by the Black Keys early on.

“El Camino” is an either-or album — you can choose the old Black Keys or the new Black Keys, but the few missteps are the result of trying to combine the two. One example of this is “Stop Stop,” an incongruous and misguided mix of Auerbach’s falsetto, Carney’s quick-stutter drums, staid guitar whine, and is that xylophone? It’s confusing, frilly, and I’m not sure if this was an effort to be more ambitious or remain safe, but it feels like a leftover that should have been discarded for a more defined track.

Following and redeeming “Stop Stop” is “Nova Baby,” a shining example of the confidence required to pull off a new and expanded sound. This is what the band should be doing on every track, because it’s where their true strength lies. The Keys are best at building on the new retro sound they helped to create, one that is more strut than swagger, funky blues bursting through the haze of psychedelia and the birth of heavy metal. The Keys have a lot of material from which to draw, and their ability to create from it all on “El Camino” is something they haven’t done so skillfully since 2004′s “Rubber Factory.”

The closing track on “El Camino” is “Mind Eraser,” which concludes with the lyric “Don’t let it be over.” While this brings to mind a clever mixtape artist (although maybe not so much a clever platinum-selling rock band), it’s still an effective farewell shot for what is ultimately a smart record by a band that could have remained among the dying chords of a by-now old-news rock revival, but chose instead to keep listening, keep learning and to build on what made them good while acknowledging that the ones who came before them — and that includes Rush — could have been better.

Posted by | December 30, 2011 | Album Reviews | Comment 

Concert review and setlist: Mike Doughty with Moon Hooch and MC Frontalot cover all the bases at Old Rock House, Saturday, October 29

myspace.com/mikedoughty

The Old Rock House‘s Twitter feed advertised last night’s Mike Doughty show as a cure for St. Louis’ World Series hangover. What it actually provided was humor, a little good-natured snark and advocation of Internet piracy in the name of music appreciation.

First opener MC Frontalot introduced himself as a “nerdcore rapper from Brooklyn,” and admittedly, this kind of thing sets off all sorts of alarms in my brain. First, there’s the -core suffix, something I don’t always understand to the point of wishing that someone out there would take the initiative to make a chart of all known -cores. Second, there’s the nerd/rapper contradiction, something that’s about as appealing to me as a record store employee who describes a certain kind of heavy metal as “um, kind of mathematical?” Third, the Brooklyn qualifier, a giant red flashing sign of hipper-than-thou status and ironical references.

But these are my problems, and they are easily disposed of when an artist has a sense of humor like MC Frontalot’s. His first song was “First World Problems,” which include misplacing the Ambien, scheduling a root canal, and catching herpes from a celebutante. A later song was “Braggadocio,” in which MC Frontalot admitted to taking liberties with the word in order to rhyme it with “Ralph Macchio.” He advised the crowd that while they could look to him for their nerdery needs, he was not to be relied upon for Italian language pronunciation.

This wry self-awareness combined with a short-sleeved Oxford and checkered tie create a whip-smart Bill Lumberg sort of character who, in “This Old Man,” freely concedes that perhaps he’s too old to prance around onstage as a rapper. His crisis of confidence was bolstered by meaty soul-derived bass and synth instrumentals. If all nerdcore was this funky, maybe I wouldn’t be so afraid of graphing calculators. MC Frontalot closed with the Halloween-appropriate “Goth Girls,” a spook house organ-filled screed about being too afraid to hit on female fans of “horror movies and mope rock.”

Moon Hooch‘s inclusion on the bill was a clear concession to Mike Doughty’s diverse tastes. While MC Frontalot was wordy and enjoyably ironic, Moon Hooch was a 3-piece instrumental jazz ensemble who took the stage playing a saxophone, drums and an octocontrabass clarinet, which, in case you were wondering, was exactly as sexy as it sounds (ahem, very). It was a weird and wonderful experiment of technically skillful jazz and analog house music. So analog, in fact, that at one point, tenor saxophonist (and previously-mentioned octocontrabass clarinetist) Wenzl McGowen stuck a custom-fitted cardboard packing tube into his sax to create a sound I can only describe as a didgeridoo imitating the wreck of the Titanic. Matched with Mike Wilbur’s rapid fire, sometimes screaming sax and James Muschler’s quick, affable drums, Moon Hooch played like the house band for a less goth branch of the Addams Family.

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Posted by | October 30, 2011 | Concerts | Comment 

Concert review: Those Darlins, Wagons and Bunnygrunt get loud and loose at Off Broadway, Friday, September 16

Those Darlins at Off Broadway, September 16, 2011

Kate McDaniel

Those Darlins, Wagons and Bunnygrunt presided over a loud and boozy rock ‘n’ roll party last night at Off Broadway.

Leading off was homegrown favorite Bunnygrunt, formed in the late 1990s by Karen Reid and Matt Harnish and currently a three-piece featuring Eric Von Damage on drums. While I expected a slightly more enthusiastic crowd response from such an established local band, Bunnygrunt played a friendly set full of laughter, personal anecdotes and the ease of a band that genuinely enjoys performing together. Their grasp of rock ‘n’ roll basics tinged with punk’s simple chord structures translates into perfect party songs such as “We Suspect He Was Trying to Spell Monkey” and “Tommy Can Dance the Rerun.” They closed with the infectious “Southtown Famous,” with the repeated line “We’re gonna get drunk tonight” proving a fitting segue for Wagons.

I speak from personal experience when I say that a foul-mouthed quartet of proudly inebriated Australians is possibly the best group of people you’ll ever hang out with, and this is before I saw Wagons. Wagons’ style is a sort of gothic country rock that reveres singers like Elvis and Willie Nelson as well as more theatrical performers like Freddie Mercury, while at the same time elevating the art of drinking like Hank III and Shane MacGowan. Yes, they did all of these things. Yes, it was super awesome.

Lead singer Henry Wagons demanded participation, at turns bellowing like a demented tent preacher and telling charmingly weird stories about facing down a shotgun-wielding farmer while attempting to “take some happy snaps” as tourists driving through Carbondale, Ill. He channeled fellow Aussie Nick Cave during the spookily baritone “Save Me” and “The Secret to Love” and writhed on the dance floor during the insanely great tribute to everyone’s favorite pigtailed marijuana advocate during “Willie Nelson.”

Wagons switched instruments at a few points during the show, once allowing Henry Wagons to sit behind the drum kit while regular drummer Simon the Philanthropist (a Dave Karp-look-alike in a Cardinals cap) emceed over bassist Mark “Tuckerbag” Dawson’s Freddie Mercury-ish harmonizing. Wagons was the kind of supporting artist I like best — one whose bawdy, crazy, balls-to-the-wall performance makes me promise myself I’ll see them again, the next time as headliners.

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Posted by | September 17, 2011 | Concerts | Comment 

Concert review: Kevin Devine and the Features light up the Old Rock House, Saturday, September 10

The Features

thefeatures.ning.com / Marv Watson

The Features stole the show from Kevin Devine and the Goddamn Band last night at the Old Rock House, but both bands turned a potential sound problem into one hell of an evening.

Opener Apollo Mudd took the refrigerated stage at the Old Rock House in silence. I mean actual silence; a sound problem prevented them from starting their set for several minutes and prompted their singer to remark, “This is the kind of bullshit that only happens to me” once the issue was fixed. This wasn’t the last of Apollo Mudd’s list of complaints. In fairness to the staff at the Old Rock House, the “technical problem” that inspired further comments like “I wanna kill EVERYTHING right now” and “This is the worst show we’ve ever played” sounded less like a system failure and more like the frustration of an unprepared band who went heavy on the hair and guitar worship and, unfortunately, also on sloppy rhythms and tantrum-throwing.

Apollo Mudd sounded like a less melodic version of the Strange Boys, a band whose seemingly lackadaisical style is a purposeful front for a tight garage whine and carefully-crafted discordant harmonies. Apollo Mudd hasn’t mastered this cloak-and-dagger move just yet. Their foundation is solid but they aren’t adept at building actual songs or maintaining a stage presence, and despite their proclamations that “We don’t normally sound this bad,” the facial expressions of some staff members and patrons expressed annoyance at the band’s temperamental reaction to themselves.

Thankfully, the Features weren’t deterred by the alleged sound issues that plagued Apollo Mudd’s set. This allowed the Features to steal the bill, masterfully smashing together a typified Brooklyn yowl with good-time Nashvillian barroom dirt. Their sound featured (heh) the kind of Mid-South guitar heard pouring from American-made car speakers in concert parking lots, raspy snare and a trippy organ that created a dizzying, Old-West carnival effect wrapped in swirls of noise. This is something the Kings of Leon (a band with whom the Features have toured several times) once seemed to own outright on early albums like “Holy Roller Novocaine,” but later abandoned in favor of whatever it is that makes them walk offstage mid-concert these days.

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Posted by | September 11, 2011 | Concerts | Comment 

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