Snap Judgements

Time to do some quick record reviewing. I'll use this as an opportunity to say how much I love MySpace Music. Their collection is amazing, and being able to stream entire albums before they come out makes me feel much more law-abiding. It's a wonder the music industry didn't start this years ago. Like, when Napster came out.

Anyhoo, let's get down to it:

Kanye West - 808s and Heartbreak

Yeezy gets down to his emotional side. After a year in which his mother died and he split with his fiance, he was feeling some pain, and this is the result. Whatever one thinks of Kanye West, he's anything but conventional.

The album's an intriguing mess. In the event you live in a box and don't know, there's no rapping here, no samples, and barely more than a few instruments per song. The result is a cold, methodical, haunting sound that doesn't change enough to be truly great. A few of the tracks, including the initial singles "Love Lockdown" and "Heartless," really swell up and attach themselves to you, whether you like it or not. But on a whole, the album's a bit one-note, repetitive and uncompromising in its bleak outlook. It's nothing great, but it's still something special.

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The Killers - Day And Age

The Killers are a band made for the modern era but desperate to have been from the '70s. That is to say, they make great singles, but ultimately would rather make great albums. The problem is, they're painfully unaware that they're incapable of this.

Hot Fuss featured classic songs "Mr. Brightside," "All These Things That I've Done," and "Smile Like You Mean It." The album sucked. Sam's Town featured classic songs "When You Were Young," "Read My Mind," and "This River Is Wild." The album sucked.

This one features a few solid tracks, particularly "Losing Touch," the album opener and high point. It's a soaring rock track that belongs right up there with the aforementioned songs, but the rest of the album can't live up. Maybe one of these days they'll get that cohesively great album that lives up to the potential of their singles, but I can't help feeling they won't achieve that until they stop trying to.

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Guns N' Roses - Chinese Democracy

If Kanye's new album was a rushed, small, introspective album, this is the opposite. It took nearly two decades, and it's bombastic as hell. But it's just as much if not more of a mess.

Then again, I'm not the world's biggest GNR fan, so the most I can say is that there's nothing here I see myself listening to in a year or two, no classic songs on the level of "Sweet Child O' Mine," but it's not particularly bad. It just doesn't stand out at all. For any other album, that'd be just fine. For this one, I'm left thinking "we waited fifteen years for this?" Sorry, Chuck Klosterman, I just don't get it.

Live Review: The Police

A week ago, I had the honor of seeing an atmospheric, no-frills show by the Police, and they knocked my socks off.

As we walked up to the behemoth that is the Staples Center, it was clear this wasn’t going to be any ordinary show. We found ourselves amongst hordes of twentysomething hipsters, mid-forties soccer moms who wanted to get in Sting’s pants, and dudes in their late fifties who still think they’re in their mid twenties. Eclectic doesn’t say enough.

Sting’s a nice guy, so he let his son’s band, Fiction Plane, open. Personally, I think this is a bit harsh. They got to play to a 20,000+ seat arena that had maybe 1,000 people in it. I could have had a conversation from the upper tier with them, if they’d wanted. Staring them in the face was 19,000 empty seats, screaming: “we don’t care, give us The Police!”

And just before 9:00, we got ‘em. Sting, Stewart Copeland (aka Badass), and Andy Summers appeared, three individuals together. Sting wore his classic sleeveless muscle shirt, Copeland was looking geeky cool in a t-shirt and headband (and awesome grey hair), and Summers tried to hide his age with a slick suit. After a moment acknowledging the crowd, Copeland smashing his giant gong, they burst into Message In A Bottle, and that crowd acknowledged them back.

You couldn’t help but smile. This was a no-frills rock show, just three guys playing all the songs that made them one of the biggest bands in the world. No backing musicians, no piped in music, no stage extending into the audience (it was a simple oval), no lazer light show, no bullshit. Just rock. And damn good rock.

For the most part, the songs were only slightly changed, and generally for the better (at least in terms of the live experience). I’d list the highlights, but there were too many. “Wrapped Around Your Finger” saw Copeland retreat to a wall of chimes and control the arena. Summers let loose on a variety of guitar solos, including “Roxanne,” and Sting’s voice pounded through hits like “So Lonely.”

It wasn’t perfect, in the technical sense, anyway. But the imperfections made it better. Sure, Sting’s voice cracked a bit on “Every Little Thing,” but they had the crowd so enthralled (wrapped around their finger?) that we picked up the slack for him, and he regrouped by the end of the song.

In fact, there was a ton of audience interplay. Whether offering call-and-receives (on at least three songs) or illuminating the arena with spotlights (which they did constantly), they were very aware of their adoring fans and made sure we knew it. The back of the ovular stage was raised, allowing Sting and Summers to walk back and play to the crowd with the shitty rear-view seats; every time Copeland moved, he’d speak to or motion to the audience. This is a band that respected its fans, and it made the show feel like a communal ceremony.

Now, a disclaimer: I was once a Police hater. That is, I didn’t like Sting’s voice, at all. Then, this January, I decided to give them another chance. I got Synchronicity, and I listened to it on repeat for months. I got Ghost in the Machine. I got it. Stewart Copeland’s pounding, fresh beats; Summers’ jumping guitar; Sting’s powerful, emotive voice. I got it.

But even if I didn’t get it before this show, I would have after. When you see people in the upper deck at the opposite end of a huge arena like the Staples center dancing their asses off at the end of a two hour show, it tells you something. This is a band that connected last Wednesday, and did so on their own, their way, without any of the gimmicks that plague modern arena shows. It was a refreshing reminder of what rock can be.

Advance Review - Hanson's "The Walk"

I love me my Hanson. I'll never lie about that, I'll never add a "but" or qualify that statement in any way. I fell in love with their most recent release, Underneath, a collection of incredibly fun pop/rock songs; I went back and realized the joys of This Time Around, a bluesy romp of a follow-up to their debut. And I appreciate Middle of Nowhere, which established Hanson as the only boy band, a collection of barely-teens playing their own instruments and writing their own songs, one of which was arguably the biggest pop hit of the 1990's.

So naturally, when I hear they've got a new album, coming out, it's exciting, and nerve-wracking. What if I don't like it? What if it bores me? What'll I do? What can I expect?

Well, The Walk feels like a departure, and kind of threw me off at first. The first true song, "Great Divide," is one of my favorite songs they've ever written. But it feels at first less like Hanson and more like a really good Matchbox 20 or Maroon 5 song.

This album is darker, more mature, more adult. The kids are growing up more and more with each album, and their talents are developing in kind. "Great Divide" highlights Isaac's now excellent guitar skills, confident and powerful, "The Walk" is a vritually a solo piano song for Taylor, and Zac's drums come in in surprisingly subtle ways throughout the album.

But they've reduced the impact of their harmonies, one of the elements that made Hanson the unique band it was. This is good and bad. On Underneath, I'll admit, the melodies could get lost, but you didn't notice, because it was all so singable. Here, everything's more complex - so while the melodies are highlighted, they seem harder to sing along to on first listen, and they don't stick in your head quite as forcefully.

I love the album, but it did feel like a departure. Listening to it all day, I've come to this view: Underneath is a party album, the kind you stick in the car and sing with your friends, and dance to at parties. The Walk is more personal, something ultimately more rewarding for when it's just you in the car.

Download: Hanson - Great Divide

Advance Review - Ryan Adams' "Easy Tiger"

I got a really good heart / I just can't catch a break / If I could I would treat you like you want me to / I promise

I'm sitting on the couch at 2am waiting for the new Hanson album to continue downloading, and so it's time to talk about my new candy that I got today: Ryan Adams's new album.

After releasing 3 albums in 2005 and 11 albums worth of mostly-joke material on his website last year, this was an unexpected project, and from the ears of a Ryan Adams fan, a much-appreciated one.

Easy Tiger has Adams continuing to work within the alt-country mode he has so eloquently dominated with Gold (one of my all time favorite albums), Heartbreaker, Demolition, and more. And like many a Ryan Adams album, it truly gets better with each listen.

It starts out pretty damn strong, though. "Goodnight Rose" rollicks into "Two," the masterpiece of the album. It's a slow, sweet song, one I always struggle to get past, but by the time I reach the rock of "Halloweenhead," I'm glad I did.

The lyrics are focused and simple. The music isn't breaking new ground, but continues to subtly twist the country genre to fit Adams's alternative leanings. It's not the freshest album of the year, but it's one of the best. If you're already a fan, you're probably picking it up regardless of how I feel. If you're not, you need to listen to Gold, get over your pretensions, listen to it again, and then give this a chance. You won't regret it.

Download: Ryan Adams - Two