New Music: Barry – Yawnin’ in the Dawnin’

Posted on November 23, 2011 by bgibs122

Hey all, and welcome back to another New Music segment!

Today, we have Yawnin’ in the Dawnin’, the debut EP of the band Barry. Barry’s sound is pure folk rock at its most freewheeling, but doesn’t sound dated or antiquated. Part of that is the fun the brothers have together; the opening title track is a somewhat silly a capella of getting 10 hours of sleep and wishing for ten more, but doesn’t take itself seriously (and boasts some fantastic harmonies).

The easiest, most contemporary comparison to Barry is Mumford and Sons. Second song “For Your Own Good” has the same front-and-center acoustic guitar assault and hoedown oomph as Mumford, but where that band sounded stodgy and stiff, “For Your Own Good” is kinetic and loose. The song has a natural rise and fall, no doubt aided by the frantic drumming of Bradford Barry.

Barry’s songs manage to be fully loaded while not losing any deft; when “Carnival(e)” explodes, it genuinely catches you off-guard, but still sounds logical. “Carnival(e)” also pushes frontman Patrick Barry a bit more than “For Your Own Good”; a large part of the reason that “Carnival(e)” works is that he manages to keep the tension going in the verses while letting lose at the end of the song. But “Carnival(e)” isn’t the only song that uses tension to great effect; penultimate tune “Love Something Too Much” brings in subtle keyboards and “Oh-whoa” vocals to build a melancholy atmosphere. The bridge going into the final chorus only adds to this, and the resulting end of the song begs you to sing along.

Similarly inviting is drink-in-the-air-style anthem “Drink One More”. The song’s storyteller lyrics and folk-song melody honestly reminds me a little of Flogging Molly’s quieter songs ,both in sound and in “Ah, fuck it, times are hard, but let’s have another and be happy” comfort. While it’s nothing particularly new in subject matter, Barry’s ability to build a solid song instrumentally, and their well thought out lyrics help them succeed.

Meanwhile, “Three Years in Carolina” could sneak right into any Class Rock FM station in a great way. With strong vocal harmonies, Southern Church organ, and a laid back jam feel, “Three Years in Carolina” shows Barry slipping right into southern rock without a hitch of trouble. Even though they’re folk to the bone, something about Barry as a band harkens back to the heyday of classic rock. Their music is free of any pretension, image-consciousness, or pandering; it’s just three brothers pumping out music.

And doing it well. In today’s music scene filled with acts trying too hard to act one way or another (looking at you, Mumford and Sons), Barry’s sincerity and earnest attitude is a breath of fresh air. Yawnin’ in the Dawnin’ is a tight EP and a promising debut; perhaps slightly too-midtempo for a full album, but “For Your Own Good” proves that Barry isn’t afraid to get raucous, either. Definitely someone to keep an eye on, 4/5 stars.

And you can do just that! Like the band on Facebook, or check out their website here. Yawnin’ in the Dawin’ is up for streaming via Spotify or their Facebook page.

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Radio Rant: Bruno Mars – It Will Rain

Posted on November 20, 2011 by bgibs122

Ok, Radio Rant time.

I feel like someone needs to tell Bruno Mars he’s running low on good karma. And, if the growing height of the pompadour is anything to go off of, hairgel as well. I still don’t quite get it; dude had a great 2010, but his 2011 has just not been good. “Grenade” was an awkward, needy single; “The Lazy Song” was a lazy, autopilot attempt at a summer hit; his chorus on “Lighters” only added to that song’s fractured mood; and not even a Glee cover could turn “Marry You” into a success. The guy obviously has talent, but he needs to harness it better.

Ok, so today we’re looking at single number five, “It Will Rain”, which I assume is the global warming version of “Let It Snow”. The song opens with a squall of noise before going into some piano and percussion per Mars’ usual sound. But “It Will Rain” sounds a little more produced than his previous songs, and has a bigger scope. Essentially, it’s a much less hammy, and therefore more successful version of “Lighters”. For one thing, “It Will Rain” has a seldom used but great post-chorus “Ooooh” hook.

As for the chorus itself, it’s built around a vaguely Michael Jackson drumbeat and subtle strings. While The Smeezingtons aren’t exactly minimalist producers, they do a good job of getting mileage out of “less is more” production, and it works on “It Will Rain”. It’s fun to sing along to, and sticks with you, but like a lot of other Bruno Mars songs, feels a little too labored to be catchy or comfortable.

Speaking of Bruno, I’m still not sure how I feel about him on “It Will Rain”. The song sounds like it’s just a little high for him, and so we have to listen to his higher, more strained voice the whole song. Used in spurts (ala the last chorus in “Grenade”), it’s effective, but after awhile it just gets grating. When this song first came out, my girlfriend described the song with, “I like it. I think I’d like it more if someone else sang it”, and I agree. Musically, “It Will Rain” is pretty and has a certain smoothness to it. Bruno does a good job on the final, more a capella chorus, but in other spots, he sounds kind of whiny, which curdles the song just a bit.

The lyrics to “It Will Rain” don’t detract from the whiny factor. Opening lyrics? “If you ever leave me baby/Leave some morphine at my door/’cuz it would a whole lot of medication/To realize what we used to have/We don’t have it anymore” Bruno, you know that morphine is a hardcore opiate, right? Narcotic, renders your ass catatonic, I wanna be sedated, that stuff. If you go on a morphine bender, the only realization you’ll come to is how much you’ve drooled on your shirt.

“So keep in mind all the sacrifices I’m making/To keep you by my side/And keep you from walking out the door” Sacrifices, right. Like jumping in front of a train?

“I’ll pick up these broken pieces ’til I’m bleeding/If that’ll make it right”. That’s not romantic, that’s Saw VII.

“There will be no sunlight/If I lose you, baby/There’ll be no clear skies/If I lose you, baby/Just like the clouds/My eyes will do the same/If you walk away/Everyday it will rain” I know I’m ragging on the song for being needy, but if you’re going to do needy, make it damn sad. This works, all I can say. Where does “It Will Rain” fall on the Scale of Neediness, anyway?

Most of the problems with “It Will Rain” are negligible since this is actually an enjoyable song. After a few listens, Bruno’s voice finally seems to fit the song, and even though the lyrics are so-so at best, the chorus and production pick up the slack. I just wonder why this song got released, it wasn’t on Bruno’s album or anything. Was this a bonus song, or a movie single, or what?

With lead single, "It Will Rain"

But…why? The other Twilight movie singles were moody, rocking songs about how awesome love was. And for a movie that I’m given to believe centers around wedding porn, a “Don’t leave me” song seems kind of counter-intuitive. Anyway, I still can’t figure out why Bruno Mars of all people was chosen for this. Hm, hang on. What happens if you combine this:

 with this: .

Would you get something like this…?

Huh. Well, that explains that. See ya!

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Album Reivew: Angels & Airwaves – Love (part 2)

Posted on November 17, 2011 by bgibs122

Goddammit, Tom.

I’ve always thought Angels & Airwaves could be a really cool band. Spacey, U2 style rock but with more energy and hooks than most put into it? Sounds like an absolute blast. And, to be fair, that’s what AvA’s better songs sound like. The band arrived more or less fully formed on the 2006 debut We Don’t Need to Whisper, and hasn’t really done much past their initial sound. Love: Part 1 was released last year, and pushed some boundaries, tried some new things, and was ultimately good enough that I even think it’s the band’s best album. Truth be told, I forgot that LOVE was a double album in two parts until a few weeks ago when I heard that the new single “Surrender” was out, but hey, here we are.

Love: Part 2 falls flat right away. Leading tracks “Saturday Love” and “Surrender” are probably the most boldfaced “The Adventure” retreads that Angels & Airwaves have ever done. The guitars ring out in all the predictable places, the synths creep in right when you expect them to, and the band slogs through the mid-tempo beat with workman-like monotony. It’s not that they’re terrible songs, but they’re weaker versions of what the band’s done in the past, and immediately strip away any of the progress made in Love: Part 1.

Thankfully, though, things improve slightly with third song “Anxiety”. The usual AvA single formula is there, but redeemed somewhat by a chorus with a grinding guitar riff. We’re four albums in, and I don’t know why DeLonge and company change so gradually. They’re comfortable in “The Adventure” rewrites, but at the same time, those are the songs that feel the stiffest. This is a band that improves marginally with a boot to the ass; previous songs “It Hurts”, “Flight of Apollo”, and now “Dry Your Eyes” and “Inertia” are good because they stay in the same basic Angels & Airwaves perimeter, but are kinetic at the same time.

After weathering a poor-to-decent first half, Love: Part 2‘s back six is pretty decent. “Dry Your Eyes” gives the album a nice shot of adrenaline, and “One Last Thing” might be the band’s shortest song at 2:53, and the brevity helps. “Inertia” takes awhile to get off the ground, but makes up for it with some true tension, not to mention a solid guitar riff. “Behold a Pale Horse” (no, I don’t get it, either) changes little to the usual AvA sound of echoy guitars, spacey synths, and DeLonge’s stars-in-the-eyes vocals, but the band sound vital. Closer “All That We Are” might be the most singular song in the band’s canon: the first half is a mostly electronic ballad, but then morphs into a band jam/extended guitar solo.

The back half is successful, but there are still some lingering problems. As always, the lyrics are trying too hard; “My Heroine (It’s Not Over)” sounds like a sophomore in high school writing to his girlfriend, just for one example. The extended outros from the last record are back and as meh as they were then, but I suspect the record would run short without them. I know that it’s customary to beat-up on Tom DeLonge for his nasally, pinched singing, and while there’s still plenty of that, he also turns in decent, lower vocals on “Moon As My Witness” and other songs.

Overall, Love: Part 2 is a frustratingly normal AvA album. As always, the band shows signs of change and development, but doesn’t embrace them, or any of the changes that were present on Love: Part 1. Fans and listeners that stick around past, say, “My Heroine” will be surprised, but the first couple of songs drag down an otherwise great album. Three stars out of five.

tl;dr: Love: Part 2 pushes AvA’s sound (if only slightly) for a transitional result. 3/5

End note: Considering the LOVE project as a double album compliments both records. The first disc is still somewhat better, and I really wish that the first half of Part 1 (call it the beginning to “Epic Holiday”) was combined with the second half of Part 2 for a single album. Such a result would unquestionably hands down be Angels & Airwaves’ best album. At the same time, it would be fairly redundant, and the little variety on both sides goes a long way, 4/5 for LOVE as a double album.

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Radio Rant: 5 O’Clock ft. Lily Allen, Wiz Khalifa

Posted on November 9, 2011 by bgibs122

Hello, and welcome to Radio Rants. Who are we looking at today?

Yeah, this one caught my eye only because the collaboration went so high on the WTF Meter. I could see Wiz Khalifa and T-Pain on a song because neither of them is an artist I trust to carry a song alone, but Lily Allen’s inclusion was baffling, especially considering that she’s on a musical hiatus. The other two don’t exactly scream star power either; anytime I see T-Pain’s name on a track, I know it’ll a tolerable club jam, and Khalifa’s been surviving on random hip-hop R&B appearances since “Black and Yellow” left the charts. That doesn’t explain Lily Allen, though.

It turns out that she’s here because “5 O’Clock” owes its entire existence to a sample of  “Who’d Have Known”. To be fair to T-Pain, this was actually a pretty smart sample. It’s catchy, pretty much unheard of, and instead of just letting it sit there, T-Pain takes it somewhere else and even turns it into a duet. The chorus is probably best the first time when it opens the song with a sedated piano part and Allen’s sweet, untouched vocal. But, then the slowdown/fade out technique (that’s becoming overplayed) kicks in, and I remember that I’m listening to T-Pain featuring Lily Allen, and not just Lily Allen.

Like I mentioned before, T-Pain works better on support staff than he does front and center. There’s two reasons for that. His Auto-Tune usually isn’t that bad, but it goes from tolerable to “Why is that chipmunk trying to shatter glass?” annoying when he goes for a high note (see: the second verse). Secondly, he’s fairly uneven as a songwriter (ok, ok, besides “Believe me when I say I fucked a mermaid”) . He can do the club/cruising for chicks style song, but when it comes to being sensitive, he just can’t quite…well, you’ll see.

“It’s 5 o’clock in the morning, and I want ya” Shit, dude. The only thing I’ve ever wanted at 5 A.M. is a bed, no matter what I’ve been doing beforehand. Lily’s chorus even implies that 5 in the goddamn morning means bedtime, and not in the sexy way. Heck, he’d probably fall asleep on top of her by this point. GAH, like I even wanted that image!

“Cause you’ve been waiting on me since/I said I was hitting the club” Wait a minute, you already have a woman at home waiting for you, yet you’re still going to the club? Why? I’ve never been to a club myself, but according to Enrique Iglesias, it’s basically a place to go stare/hook up with women, which is useless because someone’s already waiting for you at your house.

“Something coming up on me/And I know you be getting so horny” This is what I meant when I called T-Pain an uneven songwriter. “5 O’Clock” is, for the most part, a sweet sounding crush song, then we have lines like this and “And she’ll be waiting on me naked/With one of my chains on” that run adversely to the rest of the song. Again, T-Pain: She’s waiting for you. In your bedroom. Naked. Why is the club even an option?

Let’s recap T-Pain’s verses: He’s out at the club while the woman he has at home is calling/texting/waiting for him to get back so they can have sexytime. That means that at some point, they had to have this conversation.

“Woman: So, I was thinking…perhaps we should stay in tonight, just you and me, and not leave the bedroom until tomorrow morning.

T-Pain: Oh, I thought about spending time with you, but I want to go to the club first.

Woman: The club? Sure, go ahead. I’ll stay here and meet you later!

T-Pain: Cool, peace!”

I found the above conversation next to a chapter called “How Nickelback Became the Best Band of the Decade” in the Big Book of Shit That Will Never Happen. If I ever told my girlfriend, “Yeah, we could spend time together, but I’m going clubbing instead”, I’d be going to the club that night and every night from then on single.

Oh, right, Wiz Khaleafa is on this song. What’s he got to add?

“You ain’t got nothing on
But the t-shirt that I left over your house
The last time I came and put it on ya”

Wiz, you broke your own meter THREE lines into your verse.

“And you yawning, but I’ve been drinking all night and I feel like performing” Oh Wiz, that’s just not…nice. Also, there are some unfortunate implications in that line.

“The sun ain’t the only thing that’s coming up” And he closes his verse with a dick joke, truly a cavalier!

This song doesn’t really do it for me. Lily Allen’s chorus is pretty good, and there’s a charm to how T-Pain duets with it, as well as the production in general. Even Wiz doesn’t do too terrible outside the lines I mentioned. But none of the elements really come together, and bum lines take down what could have been a workable song. Ah well.

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