Matthew Gurewitsch on Renée Fleming

"In 'Verismo' … she concentrates on the 'young school' of Italians who followed in the wake of Verdi. Balancing 7 tracks by the grand master Puccini … are 10 thoroughly unfamiliar selections from composers remembered as one-trick ponies. Pietro Mascagni is represented not by 'Cavalleria Rusticana' but by 'Iris' and 'Lodeletta'; Alfredo Catalani, by an aria from 'La Wally' but not the familiar one. A risqué showstopper from Riccardo Zandonai’s 'Conchita' wins out over his swooning 'Francesca da Rimini.' Ruggero Leoncavallo, of 'Pagliacci' fame, is heard from in excerpts from his 'La Bohème' and from 'Zazà.' The scene from 'Zazà,' running some 10 minutes, is the album’s most extended and unusual offering. Zazà, a music-hall performer, calls on her lover only to discover from his little daughter … that he is two-timing her as a happily married family man. … Fallen women loom large in verismo, and in the minds of many opera fans their music cries out for sobbing, heart-on-sleeve emotionalism. Instead Ms. Fleming ennobles it with her cool classicism. … 'I just work by hook or by crook,' she said" ("Curiosity Spurred the Singers," New York Times, 10/25/09).

Jonathan Tasini on Neil Young

"Cheers and Jeers: … You're taking on Kirsten Gillibrand in next year's special election in New York. … On the issue page where you address the economy, you write: 'What happened to the idea that some day every one of us could reach an age when we could sit back … without worrying about whether we had money for food and rent?' … What's your answer? [JT:] … Our society can only work well when we treat people fairly, particularly in their retirement years. … We’ve been told that the 'new economy' means people change jobs a lot more which means business doesn’t have any responsibility to its workers. But that new mobility is not out of choice. … I favor a national pension system, funded largely by the businesses that choose not to offer their own pensions. [C&J:] What kind of music makes you feel invincible to the GOP horde? [JT:] Rock and Roll, Neil Young, Bob Marley. I challenge your readers to name a better list of four consecutive songs on one album than Live Rust’s Powderfinger, Cortez The Killer, Cinnamon Girl and Like A Hurricane. I could put those on one loop and be happy" (Bill in Portland Maine, "Cheers and Jeers," Daily Kos, 11/23/09).

Jesu: Opiate Sun

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Contents: Losing streak — Opiate sun — Deflated — Morning light.
Personnel: "All instruments, vocals, recording, production and lyrics by Justin K. Broadrick at Avalanche May/June 2009" (container.)
Artist website: http://www.avalancheinc.co.uk/
According to the website: "Two traditional sequenced albums, Jesu in 2004, and Conqueror in 2007 plus an album length song, Infinity, in July 2009 have been intertwined with a numbe rof EPs. In 2008 Jesu issued one EP, Why Are We Not Perfect? and contributed to two more split EPs with other bands. Opiate Sun is the only Jesu release in 2009 aside from 'Infinity.'"
"After conquering grindcore (Napalm Death), industrial metal (Godflesh), and dystopian dub (Techno Animal), musical omnivore Justin K. Broadrick found melody and formed Jesu. On this EP, the band continues its brilliant voyage to rock’s outer limits, setting Broadrick’s elegiac vocals against a wall of fuzzed-out guitar" ("Playlist," Wired, 11/09, p. 61).

The Flaming Lips: Embryonic

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Contents: 1. Convinced Of The Hex 2. The Sparrow Looks Up At The Machine 3. Evil 4. Aquarius Sabotage 5. See The Leaves 6. If 7. Gemini Syringes 8. Your Bats 9. Powerless 10. The Ego's Last Stand 11. I Can Be A Frog 12. Sagittarius Silver Announcement 13. Worm Mountain 14. Scorpio Sword 15. The Impulse 16. Silver Trembling Hands 17. Virgo Self-Esteem Broadcast 18. Watching The Planets
"[Ivan:] Whatcha doing? Y'know what I'm doing? I'm vibrating! [Natasha:] Cool! Like a quantum vibration or are you just hyper? [Ivan:] Neither! I've been listening to Embryonic, the new elpee from the Flaming Lips! It's bent my consciousness! It's affecting me on a molecular level! They're the Pink Floyd I've never had! Natasha! You have to hear it for yourself! It's a double elpee loaded with trippy, expansive tracks that flood the mind and float the soul! Wanna run deep into the woods, run up to the top of the hill, and listen to it in its entirety while we watch the sun sink into the horizon?" ("Stripwax," New Haven Advocate, 10/22/09, p. 32).

Nirvana: Bleach (Deluxe Edition)

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Contents: Blew — Floyd the barber — About a girl — School — Love buzz — Paper cuts — Negative creep — Scoff — Swap meet — Mr. Moustache — Sifting — Big cheese — Downer; live bonus tracks: Intro — School — Floyd the barber — Dive — Love buzz — Spank thru — Molly's lips — Sappy — Scoff — About a girl — Been a son — Blew.
"Hot on the heels of Live at Reading is this dolled-up 20th-anniversary (!) edition of Nirvana's debut, which barely hit the radar on its initial release but whose resonance ballooned. … Now, its near-greatness is plain, most clearly on 'About a Girl,' in the abraded Lennon-McCartney chord changes, and in the existential grunge howl of 'School.' The bonus live tracks, also pre-Dave Grohl — from Portland, Oregon, February 9th, 1990 — include both songs, plus revelatory takes on 'Been a Son' and the Vaselines' 'Molly's Lips.' Beginning with a feedback overture and ending with full-on instrument destruction, the live set is a snapshot of a menacingly feral band about to become a beast" (Will Hermes, "Bleach: Deluxe Edition," Rolling Stone, 11/12/09, p. 74).

Alex Ross on Meredith Monk

"The Times once dispatched a committee of music, dance, and theatre writers to assess her. … Perhaps I'm biased, but music seems to have become Monk's true home. Since the late seventies, when she convened her own ensemble to perform 'Dolmen Music,' a hugely influential study in extended vocal techniques, she has increasingly positioned herself as a composer, relying on music to create contrapuntal effects that she formerly drew from the equal interaction of sound, image, and movement. Back in 1991, the Houston Grand Opera presented her opera 'Atlas,' and in 2003 the New World Symphony, under the direction of Michael Tilson Thomas, introduced her first orchestral work, 'Possible Sky,' a freewheeling sonic fantasy. Her two most recent recordings for the German label ECM, 'Mercy' and 'Impermanence,' have instruments dancing actively alongside voices. Perhaps most important, Monk no longer needs to be present for the execution of her music: the singers of M6, a group based in New York, have devoted themselves to learning and reinterpreting the Monk repertory" ("Primal Song," New Yorker, 11/9/09, p. 84).

Mike Ragogna talks to Jerry Harrison and Chris Frantz

"MR: How would you rate Stop Making Sense with the rest of the Talking Heads catalog? JH: I would say that if no one had heard of the Talking Heads, it would be the first thing I would point them to. … That being said, thinking back, I think Remain In Light will probably go down as the most original album we ever did. I think it changed the way people thought about making music. … CF: … Talking Heads was really remarkable in many ways, especially in the fact that we sort of rewrote what a rock band should be like. Great rock bands before us were like The Beatles, The Who, The Rolling Stones—bands that were a great influence on us. But we felt like those guys had already done such a great job at that, there's no way we can outdo them at what they do. So we came at the rock band thing from a different angle. Thanks to that, a lot of normal kids from the suburbs feel like they don't have to dress up in leather clothes and stuff like that in order to get their message across. Also, we were one of the few bands who could have artistic credibility and commercial success at the same time. We could really kind of have our cake and eat it too which was remarkable" ("Stop Making Sense," Huffington Post, 11/5/09).

Allan Kozinn on Alicia de Larrocha

"In a career that began when she was a child … Ms. de Larrocha cultivated a poetic interpretive style in which gracefulness was prized over technical flashiness or grand, temperamental gestures. But her approach, combined with her small stature … was deceptive … she could produce a surprisingly large, beautifully sculptured sound. Even so, it was in music that demanded focus, compactness and subtle coloristic breadth that Ms. de Larrocha excelled. Her Mozart performances … were so carefully detailed and light in texture that even as public taste shifted toward the more scholarly interpretations of period-instrument specialists, Ms. de Larrocha’s readings retained their allure. … Her approach to Mozart also served her well in larger works. … Ms. de Larrocha’s most enduring contribution, however, was her championship of Spanish composers. Although Arthur Rubinstein played some of this repertory, few other pianists outside Spain did, and none with Ms. de Larrocha’s flair. She made enduring recordings of Albéniz’s 'Iberia' and Granados’s 'Goyescas,' and helped ease those works into the standard piano canon" ("Alicia de Larrocha, Pianist, Dies at 86," New York Times, 9/26/09).

Jesse Kornbluth on Mark Knopfler

"'I'm writing too many songs, and then I have to put them out — I'm sorry,' Mark Knopfler said at the start of what seems like our annual phone call. But if Knopfler is going to make CDs like Get Lucky, he can call me every few months — these eleven songs are completely original short stories and character sketches, set against music by one of the planet's greater guitarists. That the quality is uniformly high is no surprise. What did take me aback — and what will make fans of Dire Straits and Knopfler's previous solo releases shake their heads — is that Knopfler seems to have assembled this CD without regard for the commercial marketplace. Nothing that says 'automatic Top 10' jumps out at you like 'Punish the Monkey (Let the Organ Grinder Go)' from Kill to Get Crimson or 'Boom Like That' from Shangri-La. The likely result: The guy whose band sold 120 million records has made a CD that will be appreciated mostly by the smallest cohort of music lovers: smart, literate grownups who can read without moving their lips. … An unwillingness — or is it an inability? — to compromise. A curiosity, at 60, about songwriting that explores new personal territory" ("Mark Knopfler," Huffington Post, 9/14/09).

The Nation on Marvin Gaye

"Here's a question whose answer might surprise you: what American songwriter penned the most-listened-to piece of environmental protest music of all time? Somebody with an acoustic guitar? John Denver? The answer, almost certainly, is Marvin Gaye. 'Mercy, Mercy Me (The Ecology)' appeared on What's Going On, the album he released in May 1971, which went straight to the top of the charts, even though Motown boss Berry Gordy thought it was too political to sell. 'I realized that I had to put my own fantasies behind me if I wanted to write songs that would reach the souls of people. I wanted them to take a look at what was happening in the world,' Gaye said later. The Vietnam War, protested in the album's title song, was part of that story, and so was drug abuse — and so was 'oil wasted on the oceans and upon our seas,' and 'radiation in the ground and in the sky,' and 'fish full of mercury.'
"'Where did all the blue sky go? / Poison is the wind that blows / From the north, east, south and sea'" (Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr. and Bill McKibben, "People, Let's Get Our Carbon Down," The Nation, 9/28/09).

Journey: Revelation

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Contents: CD 1. Never walk away — Like a sunshower — Change for the better — Wildest dream — Faith in the heartland — After all these years — Where did I lose your love — What I needed — What it takes to win — Turn down the world tonight — The journey (Revelation); CD 2. Only the young — Don't stop believin' — Wheel in the sky — Faithfully — Any way you want it — Who's crying now — Separate ways — Lights — Open arms — Be good to yourself — Stone in love. Besides the discs, a fold-out "family tree" chart is included that traces the band's history through 14 incarnations starting in 1973 and their interconnections with other bands going back to 1964.
Personnel: Journey: Neal Schon, guitars, vocals; Jonathan Cain, keyboards, vocals; Ross Valory, bass, vocals; Deen Castronovo, drums, percussion, vocals; Arnel Pineda, vocals. Produced by Kevin Shirley.
Artist website: http://www.journeymusic.com/

Anthony DeCurtis on Steve Earle

"'It is a form of channeling at its best,' said Mr. Earle, who recorded most of the album in his Greenwich Village apartment. 'What I tried to do is sit in a room by myself for 12 of the 15 tracks and play them as close to the way I remember [Townes Van Zandt] playing them.' Van Zandt classics like 'Pancho and Lefty,' 'To Live Is to Fly' and 'No Place to Fall' sit comfortably next to worthy, if lesser known, songs like '(Quicksilver Dreams of) Maria' and 'Where I Lead Me.' Completing a generational journey, Mr. Earle and his son Justin duet on “Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold,' the dense, troubled gambling story-song that Mr. Earle performed nearly 30 years ago to impress Van Zandt the first time he saw Mr. Earle perform. Like the album itself, it’s a tribute that demands respect from its subject. 'Townes’s inability to promote himself and put his dukes up for his own art failed him over and over again,' Mr. Earle said. 'But none of us is whole. We all do some things better than others. As a songwriter, you won’t find anybody better. I hope this record will make it a little more apparent just how good these songs are'" ("Freeing a Mentor from His Mythology," New York Times, 5/10/09).

Phish: Joy

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Contents: Backwards down the number line — Stealing time from the faulty plan — Joy — Sugar shack — Ocelot — Kill Devil Falls — Light — I been around — Time turns elastic — Twenty years later.
"It's no surprise that the new Phish disc—the quartet's first studio album in five years—features songs that are meant to be played live. For this megapopular touring band, the real magic happens on the road. On Joy these hippie dudes are happiest when stretching out their musical limbs in extended jams that leave plenty of room for solos. Just check out 'Backwards Down the Number Line,' the festival-ready single that should come with its own Hacky Sack, or the bluesy 'Stealing Time from the Faulty Plan,' where frontman Trey Anastasio sings, 'Got a blank space where my mind should be.' But you have to wait until the penultimate track for the centerpiece, 'Time Turns Elastic,' a winding epic that clocks in at 13 1/2 minutes" (Chuck Arnold, "Music," People, 9/14/09, p. 55).

Ariston Anderson on Peter, Bjorn & John

"The band, which has now been together for ten years, is back and bigger than ever with their fifth album, Living Thing, which releases on March 31st. Last week, the band performed an exclusive set in New York City, part of the W Hotel's Wonderlust Live tour. The series … will be documented at each stop by legendary photographer Mick Rock. They played 90% of songs from the new album to a ballroom full of fans, and finished the night with a special performance of 'Young Folks.' With three upcoming tours, we can tell they're going to be the soundtrack for many an upcoming dance party. It's good old-fashioned, drink champagne, clap your hands, stomp your feet, get down and dance pop. The band proves once again they're a master of indie samplers. Their new single, 'Nothing to Worry About,' which Kanye West premiered on his blog, has a surreal childlike chorus backing the head-bopping hit. Living Thing is a staple record for the spring because it doesn't take itself too seriously. It's able to incorporate the fun Swedish undertones of their old work, but is also something entirely new" ("Q&A with Swedish Pop Trio Peter, Bjorn & John," Huffington Post, 3/25/09).

Allan Kozinn on Joel Fan

"The pianist Joel Fan took over Le Poisson Rouge on Monday evening to celebrate the release of 'West of the Sun,' his new collection of music of the Americas for Reference Recordings. It was a chatty performance, as concerts at Le Poisson Rouge tend to be. … [H]is playing was the picture of textural clarity in Ernesto Nazareth’s 'Vem Cá, Branquinha,' which he played with the sparkle and rhythmic suppleness of a jazz improviser. He brought similar qualities to two works that quote folk themes, Villa-Lobos’s Chôro No. 5 ('Alma Brasileira'), with its gauzy bass and gracefully singing melody, and Margaret Bonds’s 'Troubled Water,' a set of bravura variations on the spiritual 'Wade in the Water.' … The program’s highlight was the New York premiere of William Bolcom’s 'Nine New Bagatelles,' a set of aphoristic, vividly drawn character pieces, including painterly evocations of playing children and chirping birds. Mr. Fan gave it an agile reading, with delicacy and heft carefully balanced. And he closed the concert (except for a light Piazzolla encore) with a muscular, rich-hued and at times uncommonly lyrical account of Alberto Ginastera’s Sonata No. 1" ("Music Review," New York Times, 4/15/09).

Bob Dylan: Christmas in the Heart

Copy at Case Memorial Library
Contents: Here comes Santa Claus — Do you hear what I hear? — Winter wonderland — Hark the herald angels sing — I'll be home for Christmas — Little drummer boy — The Christmas blues — O come all ye faithful = Adeste fideles — Have yourself a merry little Christmas — Must be Santa — Silver bells — The first Noel — Christmas Island — The Christmas song — O little town of Bethlehem. Recorded in Santa Monica, Calif., 2009.
Personnel: Bob Dylan, vocals, guitar, harmonica, electric piano; with accompanying musicians.
"In the era of Internet music and the death of the major labels, it can sometimes seem as if big rock records don’t exist any longer. They do. … Weezer, which started as a college-rock favorite and has strayed closer to arena-rock territory, returns with 'Raditude' (DGC, Oct. 27), and Bob Dylan will confound both his fans and his detractors with 'Christmas in the Heart' (Columbia, Oct. 13), a collection of traditional holiday songs that will benefit the hunger charity Feeding America" (Ben Greenman, "Pop Notes," New Yorker, 9/14/09, p. 38).

Matthew Gurewitsch on the Vivaldi Edition

"On an upper floor of the Biblioteca Nazionale Universitaria di Torino, in metal cabinets behind a fireproof door, is Vivaldi’s personal archive of clean autograph copies of music never published in his lifetime. … What good are scores locked in a vault? In the late 1990s the musicologist Alberto Basso, who had cataloged the Vivaldi holdings, sold the French label Opus 111 on the utopian proposition of recording the entire collection on some 100 CDs. … Before the Vivaldi Edition took off, Opus 111 sold to Naïve, another boutique label, and there it has flourished. … From the start the Vivaldi Edition caught the music media’s fancy and began receiving prizes. Even the album covers played a part: eye-catching portraits by the French photographer Denis Rouvre showed models, mostly female, in a severe high-fashion style. … The momentum of the Vivaldi Edition has grown to the point that the big names too want in. Though Jordi Savall, renowned master of the viola da gamba and conductor, has a highly successful label of his own in Alia Vox, he asked to reissue his recording of Vivaldi’s opera 'Farnace' on Naïve and is on board for a second opera" ("For Vivaldi, Many More Seasons," New York Times, 8/23/09).

Andy Battaglia on Phoenix

"Phoenix has always been less a great rock band and more some sly, sensitive, clever-but-not-coy enthusiast's idea of a great rock band. Part of that owes to their being French and thus born slightly outside the rock margins, but more of it owes to their uncanny command of the form—their soft touch with everything. … Everything on Phoenix's fourth album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix, is highly mannered, to be sure. But none of it is ever forced or fussy—or, worse, less than geekily thrilled to be so carefully arranged. The single '1901' bursts with brightness from the start with a weave of ringing pop guitars and the candy-licked voice of Thomas Mars singing 'fold it, fold it, fold it' as if the act of folding something (maybe a relationship) could be a carnival ride. 'Fences' follows in more mellow fashion, with a slow-spinning disco lean that moves into the even mellower Air/Tangerine Dream-influenced 'Love Like A Sunset.' That range marks the borders of the album as a whole, and laced throughout all of it are generous, wide-eyed melodies of a kind that makes for swooning sighs and curious feelings of instant nostalgia" ("Music," A.V. Club, 5/28-6/3/09).