Changing Times for Iron & Wine

It’s often hard for well-established musicians to find balance later in their careers. Sam Beam has left his minimalist roots far behind with Ghost on Ghost, his fifth full-length album as Iron & Wine, pulling from many often unexpected influences.

Songs like “The Desert Babbler” exhibit a melodic quality reminiscent of many long-gone musical styles, creating a pseudo 70’s funk-inspired sound that’s almost a little difficult to identify. It’s Iron & Wine, there’s no doubt about that, but the variety of the album poses a problem.

Artists at the point Iron & Wine reach are often accused of ‘betraying’ fans by skipping gears and moving on to a sound drastically different from what they are used to. It’s difficult to argue that Beam’s musical direction hasn’t taken a very drastic leap. The junkyard-rock of The Shepherd’s Dog was a wonderful break from his usual style, and Kiss Each Other Clean expanded the sound further.

At this point, the question is whether Iron & Wine should have stopped the expansion there.

Instead of the simple sounds of acoustic guitar from The Creek Drank the Cradle, Iron & Wine fills the space of Ghost on Ghost with a jazzy collision of horns, violin, keyboard, heavy drum use, and an occasional Doors-esque organ sound.  One of the only songs on the album that is easily recognizable as Iron & Wine, “Winter Prayers,” still features very little of the original guitar sound at all, relying on Sam’s voice almost entirely.

The album lacks a clear destination, like the radio-weary lite-rock it harkens back to, but there exists a saving grace in the end. “Lover’s Revolution,” the second-to-last track, begins slowly, plodding along, but eventually picks up tempo and flies headlong into a burst of jazz horn and drums. Unfortunately, this fades into “Baby Center Stage,” a slow dance ballad of piano and slide guitar that quickly becomes simple background music to the listener.

Ghost on Ghost is not a bad album, that’s not the point. It’s simply confusing and hard to get a real grasp of. There’s so much happening in and between songs that it’s easy to lose interest. It’s an easy listen, but not one that’s easy to pay attention to. The sound quality is great and the songs are all beautiful, but they unfortunately lack a necessary hook. –Jordan B. Frye, Contributing Editor

http://www.ironandwine.com/

Dylan Struggles On

Possibly one of the most easily identifiable voices in the music world, Bob Dylan has created a legacy that will endure beyond his time on this earth, spanning over fifty years of songwriting. Dylan is to folk and blues what bands like Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones are to rock n’ roll: the unavoidable backbone of a broad and far-reaching sound. While he can often be viewed as a relic of a past generation, his music continues to hold a presence to this day.

Dylan can write music—that goes without saying. However, with the release of his most recent album Tempest it becomes apparent just how long Dylan has been doing all this. To put it simply, he sounds old, tired, and a little worn out. Some of the original fire that made him a legend from the start is lost and absent from the sound. His voice sounds more ragged than it ever has, bound by a rasp that makes his words sound more forced than anything.

The opening track “Duquesne Whistle” features a voice that is now reminiscent of Louis Armstrong. It’s tough to approach because while the sound isn’t bad, it also isn’t necessarily great. He abandons his initial vocal sound and returns to the more familiar sound for the remainder of the album, but there is still an edge to his voice that does feel forced.

Some of the content that makes his songs resonate with the hearts of average people is still present. “Pay In Blood” features lines like, “Come here, I’ll break your lousy head. Our nation must be saved and freed. You’ve been accused of murder, how do you plead?” The struggles we face every day, the adversity created by the people who lord themselves over us, those are the topics that often make a Dylan song a Dylan song. While it’s comforting to know that topical torch is still there, some of it lacks the subtlety and expert craftsmanship that he’s known for. Many of the lines feel plain and stripped-down.

Tempest isn’t a bad album. When I picked it up I listened to it the whole way through while driving out of Knoxville one night. It was fitting, and I enjoyed it. However, since then, I haven’t had much of an urge to pull it back out and listen to it more. There are good songs on here, it’s true, but as a whole, the album fails to live up to the standards that many have come to expect of a Bob Dylan album.  –Jordan Frye, Contributing Writer

Beige Like Folk: America Sings the Mumford Hymns

Late September 2012, the headphones blew up with bliss for a new ear-candy kiss. Listening to the new release since before dawn, I prayed over the computer keyboard and wrote on Facebook that I was drinking my Mumfords and listening to my morning coffee. The mixed-up metaphor did not require correction. Mumford and Sons make us all feel connection to a power greater than ourselves. The sophomore album Babel stands out in a season of great albums to sustain community, explain self, and maintain spirit.

That first week of Fall, I couldn’t walk anywhere on the college campus where I work without someone asking me about the new Mumford disc. The students were excited to share these epiphanies with me, knowing I was a veteran of five Mumford shows: two Bonnaroos, one Ryman, a Railroad Revival in New Orleans, and most recently, Gentlemen of the Road in Bristol. Stuck at the top of the charts as the best-selling record of the year, Babel brings the wild news that folk is once again the new pop and that these Brits are the best American band.

Recent drops by native sons Avett Brothers, Band of Horses, or Old Crow Medicine Show no- doubt dial-in to the same Americana revival at the intersection where folk meets rock and pop and country, but in some strange turn that’s similarly brought us Beatles, Stones, and U2, the United States of Listening Sensibility hinges on the rustic banjo sting of how an American idiom gets interpreted by inspired imports. When the pseudo-hobo train-hopping meets the prep-schooler’s chart-topping, the popular culture gets soaked in sepia-tinted photographs and earth-toned authenticity. Not dayglo but khaki, not shimmery sheen but olive green, not sky blue like jazz but Carhartt beige like folk. Plain but filled with platitude, not ashamed of gratitude.

A common conversation on Twitter and Facebook confirms the conviviality and convergence of our Mumford moment. Our ears and spirits reconnect as our souls get drenched in rocking banjos and redemptive blood. The Mumford mania soaks folks in biblical imagery, but an audience doesn’t mind spiking the communion grape juice or spicing the faith journey with ferocious f-bombs. Mumfords make postmodern hymns as dusty as Dylan but as dangerously contemporary as anything hip hop or techno could hope for.

The backlash against Babel has been thankfully confined to the crustiest snarks inside the rock critic intelligentsia whose cries of boring conservatism cannot put a dent in our boisterous sing-alongs, infectious memes circulating and myths percolating from campus dorm shaking to car stereo shouting. The record by no means condones or upholds the ubiquity of Babylon; rather, it humbly confronts the greed and the pride of walls that will either crumble of their own weight or be torn down by hands like ours.

The Mumford formula finds strength in weakness, finds voice in “grace and choice.” This isn’t Top 40 gospel; it’s the gospel gathering enough acoustic confidence to occupy the Top 40 with a holy cup of folkster fury. This isn’t the stuff of superficial sin cities but sinners confessing sins and setting out “to serve the Lord.” These whispers in the dark are screaming at dawn: this isn’t your only chance, but by gosh, the Mumfords suggest, don’t blow it. Forgive but don’t forget. Live and love for today. Don’t burn out or fade away.

For a pop culture perched atop imaginary towers of narcissism, Mumford and Sons offer a vigorous valley of profound patience for the people bred towards impatience and instant gratification.

Kneel. Wait. Touch the ground. Forgive. Tweak your head to touch your heart. This is holistic hootenanny for the fragmented and fractured. Sure, it’s not the return of the 70s “freak folk” as the Brit-crits blithely badger the sons of an evangelical revival, but this summer-camp altar-call is freaking phenomenal. The fans of psychedelic folk may look elsewhere; the mind-altering nature of God always makes the strictly secular cultural guardians uncomfortable.

As we surmise, an instant classic takes us by surprise. The 21^st century update to “Freebird” is another “Sunday Bloody Sunday,” another arm-waving set from a quartet qualified to sing about Jesus and release cover songs by American 60s greats without them winking or us cringing.

Ghosts and hope, lovers and light, feet and knees, haste and wander: the poetry drips like a waterfall,  melts ice after a deep freeze, flips a switch to the turn the lights back on inside a cynical self, rips like a roatrip waiting for a thousand sunrises. Don’t confuse their earnest yearning with clobbering certainty, though, for these are songs for serving and learning, not turning or burning.

Lest people perceive this soaring universalism and spiritual populism as some kind of creepy uptight piety, it seems the band members themselves are hardly as serious as the songs. From a distance, it even looks like they are robust partiers sipping the strong stuff, even though this listener-fan-reviewer loves the fact that even the debut Sigh No More came out after I got sober. Never having heard the Mumfords while drunk serves me forever strong and singing along, a tall glass of cold water or mug of hot coffee for the sunniest of sainted and dry intoxications.

The rock n roll inside this folk revival insists to roll us and persists to save us. No sea of quiet or army of acoustic can hide the arena-worthy aspects, and frankly, the kids fighting to find tickets will find some peace when these gents offer shows in giant venues. Don’t believe any of the negative hype and remain a believer.

This album gives and gives and forgives, nothing shy of the soundtrack to your savory living, a constant reminder of hope’s fire and your heart’s desire. Nothing about Babel can be construed as a step backward, and even for those who claim they’re just treading water, they are treading water in a soul-thrilling river Jordan for the Facebook generation, where our ears get perpetually baptized and our fears have forever capsized. –Andrew William Smith, Editor

http://www.mumfordandsons.com/

 

 

Two Gallants Bloom

 Two Gallants released their 4^th studio album The Bloom and the Blight on September 4^th of this year^. This is the first we’ve heard from them after a 5-year hiatus during which the drumming half of the pair, Tyson Vogel made his solo debut with his project Devotionals back in 2010. It is a mostly instrumental meditative album and it was released around the same time as his band mate, Adam Stephens’ solo record We Live on Cliffs the same year.

After all this time, it isn’t surprising that their style has evolved in some ways. With The Bloom and the Blight listeners find an unexpected shift in their whole sound. This album, released on ATO, seems to be much more heavily produced than their previous work on Alive and Saddle Creek records. Their folk-punk vibe hasn’t left them completely; however, this is a much more polished album than anything else they have put out before. Stephens’ trade mark finger picking is not present in this record anywhere and is probably one of the things that stood out about them when they first emerged as a band. Their rough and ragged sound was a huge part of their appeal initially; however, this album offers something in a totally different direction, one with smoother edges and corners unbent—with the same amount of passion as always—it is merely in a different form than their audience is used to hearing from them. “Ride away” is the only song on this album that embodies their earlier style, and the throw back is appreciated. Differently, their new tunes present a delicate contrast between fragile, soft melodies and heavy, howling climaxes previously unexplored in their music.

The lyrical style has also taken a surprising turn for catchy and less raw. All said, this album’s sound, though drastically different from the other albums’ is not necessarily a negative change. “My Love Won’t Wait”— about a blatant eerie fixation— and “Broken Eyes”— a relatable ballad about the lingering of one despite all— are haunting, moody songs that impose the same convictions that are present in their other albums, only this time more cautiously assembled.

The Bloom and the Blight still conjures the same feelings and invokes the same demons as their previous three records. They are now finishing their U.S. tour and will be heading to Europe for the rest of 2012.  Even after a 5-year break, the two of them still perform with the same spirit and fury that is to be expected of them by fans—the truest of which are not disappointed in their recent efforts. – Sarah Naomi Townsend

http://www.twogallants.com/

 

Tallest Man on Earth Stands Tall with New Album

The third full length recording by 29-year-old singer-songwriter Kristian Mattson—performing under the name The Tallest Man on Earth—There’s No Leaving Now can be defined by the growth it represents. While many artists with his mastery of a particular style might find themselves complacent, Mattson turns his comfort into confidence. In the process, he crafts an album that manages to push forward while holding tightly on to its roots without sounding strained or losing itself anywhere in the process.

Fans of Mattson’s previous efforts will notice the difference only seconds into There’s No Leaving Now. The first song, “To Just Grow Away” starts with the same minimalistic fingerpicking typical of his style but quickly blooms into a landscape of reverb-drenched strumming with stray guitar tracks floating above, marking Mattson’s first serious venture into multitracking. The following songs continue to play with layered sounds adding slide guitar, woodwind, and even subtle percussion in various combinations.

This all leads up to the title track wherein Mattson returns to a more minimal style closer to previous albums and, though select songs do feature multiple tracks, never fully returns to the heavily-layered sound of the first few songs. This is one area where the album excels—despite reducing the complexity of later songs, the transition is by no means jarring. The fullness is maintained by way of reverb ensuring that no sonic space is left empty, and even the most basic tracks feel warmer than anything seen on 2008’s The Shallow Grave or 2010’s The Wild Hunt. 

The growth seen here is just that—an expansion of an existing sound, rather than a shift or refocusing. Although very distinct from previous albums, none of the staples of Mattson’s success are abandoned, creating an experience that is unlikely to alienate fans.  His mastery of fingerpicking is only highlighted by the new additions and his voice is in top form. The bond between vocals and guitar, so strong that Mattson usually records the two together, remains unbroken. Lyrically, There’s No Leaving Now continues his tradition of celebrating nature and, as Mattson’s lyrics are packed with such imagery, the music even comes closer to a matching organic sound than the older, more bare-bones albums.

This album highlights an artist capable of growing without losing himself. While Mattson sings that “whatever happened to the boy is now a tale for the seas,” the boy that wrote and recorded two of the most essential works of the late-2000s indie folk explosion is still very present. None of the songs here, different from one another as they may be, feel like experiments. Every piece of this album is pushed forward and held together by Mattson’s skill and, just as importantly, confidence. From the lyrically blunt and uncharacteristically personal “Little Brother” to the metaphor-cloaked narrative “Wind and Walls,” from “Revelation Blues,” in which the many instrumental layers blend into one wave of sound, to “On Every Page,” where the spotlight is on a smooth classical guitar line, this album thrives from its willingness to explore.

There’s No Leaving Now succeeds on many levels.  As an album, it is worth the time. As individual songs, each is strong enough to stand out. Outside the context of The Tallest Man on Earth’s discography, the album has a wide appeal. Compared to previous works, it fits in just fine. And looking forward, one sees an artist ready and able to do even greater things. There’s No Leaving Now ensure that, for its young composer, there’s no leaving now. —Austin Phy, Contributing Editor 

For more info, check out http://www.myspace.com/thetallestmanonearth

 

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