Bonny Wolf, NPR commentator and author of the book "Talking With My Mouth Full"
@ National Harbor
Q:What's your favorite food TV show or host?
A:"I like 'Top Chef.' They're serious about food, and have personality."
WHEAT RELEASED ITS first album 11 years ago — and this is most likely the first time you've heard of the band, which plays vintage Flaming Lips-like indie rock, swinging from epic layered freak-outs to sparse experimental pop.
But that relative anonymity doesn't bother the group's mainstays — guitarist-singer Scott Levesque and drummer Brendan Harney — in the least.
"Not at all frustrating," said Harney. "[Rather it's] both something that is liberating and something we're basically indifferent about. See, we've kinda found that people really dig one record of ours ... and then kinda want that version of Wheat to be the one that they always get — and that seems to leave a trail of disappointment. ... We are a tough band to follow because of the constant changing."
But Wheat's latest album, "White Ink, Black Ink" (The Rebel Group), is its most straightforward, least obtuse CD yet, featuring 11 songs that are as catchy as they are consistent. Levesque's voice recalls the tremulous croon of Tim Kinsella, but his lyrics address more relatable things than the Joan of Arc frontman's cryptic observations. "Living to Die" and "I Want Less," for instance, address a Zen-like approach to life, which was inspired in part by the February 2008 death of Levesque's father.
Even with the CD's instant likability, Wheat's music still retains the mystery that made its previous releases — four LPs, one mini album, plus expanded reissues — such great headphone gems.
"My love of musical acceptance is always overshadowed by my love of artistic exploration," Levesque said. "But not just being as far out for far out's sake, but all the spaces in between the extremes, like, say, atonal screechy gray noise pressed up against the most pristine and pointed woodwind."
"It's not being willfully obscure; it's more about being very easily bored," Harney said, "and never wanting to even come close to repeating ourselves. We really do love pop, but we really also do love strange and difficult beauty."
Express conducted an epic e-mail interview with Wheat and had Harney and Levesque give a track-by-track tour of "White Ink, Black Ink."
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THE THEORY OF eternal return posits the universe has no starting or ending but the matter within it is finite and ever-changing.
Darkest Hour's own take on "The Eternal Return" (Victory Records), the D.C. metal band's sixth album, deals with that philosophical concept by trying to bash it into submission. The breathless CD was recorded in Baltimore's Salad Days Studio with producer Brian McTernan but without guitarist Kris Norris, who left the group last year.
"The press is an interesting place to tell the dirty insides of the way a band operates," said guitarist Mike Schleibaum, 32, who co-founded Darkest Hour in 1995 with singer John Henry. "So, in fairness to Kris and our friendship ... sometimes real-life problems start to creep in, and it just got to the point where there were problems that were creeping into the band."
Mike "Lonestar" Carrigan replaced Norris, and he and Schleibaum handle all the ax duties on "The Eternal Return." While Darkest Hour still mixes melodic Swedish death metal and D.C.-inspired hardcore, the album is the group's most furious since 2001's "So Sedated, So Secure." That return to Darkest Hour's early brutality was due in part to the influence of McTernan, who produced the group's 2000 debut, "The Mark of the Judas."
"We wanted to find out what is Darkest Hour," Schleibaum said. "It just felt like we needed to go back to somebody who knew where we came from to figure out the actual essence of what we're trying to do. ... This is a band that grew up in front of everybody ... and every record got a little better. This record is, like, adults who beat the [stuff] out of each other to make some [angry stuff]."
While "The Eternal Return" sounds tumultuous, it also captures the essence of what makes Darkest Hour so amazing and its concerts so inspiring.
"We still love metal," Schleibaum said. ""Musically [the CD is] very angry, but you definitely see five guys who want to be there, who like it enough to have dedicated our lives to it."
Schleibaum gave Express a track-by-track tour of "The Eternal Return" while standing outside the Sonar club in Baltimore where Darkest Hour was performing on the "Summer Slaughter" tour. Click hear to listen alone to the whole album while reading Schleibaum's funny, energetic, swear-word-loaded commentary.
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SOMETIMES CLOTHES MAKE the band. The five members of Los Angeles' Miss Derringer dress up in costumes that mix western and military gear with gangland and juvenile delinquent accents, and singer Liz McGrath sports a wardrobe that resembles a goth-Weimar baton twirler/torch singer. In a city whose music scene favors milquetoast montage rock, Miss Derringer's a group that certainly stands out.
"Most of my friends are fashion designers," says McGrath, who's also a well-known artist and sculptor, "so I've been lucky enough to be surrounded by creative people who have great ideas for Miss Derringer. Of course we have an idea of how our 'look' should be, but talented people like our friends Adele Mildred, Winter Rosebudd, Aileen Duke, and Jared Gold have really helped us get things to the level we want them to be in that regard."
The band formed when McGrath met guitarist Morgan Slade at a going-away party. They started dating, and after he played her a song he had written, they made plans for a musical projects about a woman named Miss Derringer, who, Slade says, "was always in trouble with the law and on the wrong side of love."
The project soon blossomed into a full band renowned for its colorful and energetic live act, adding bass player Sylvain de Muizon (a lifelong friend of Slade's), drummer Cody James and guitarist Ben Shields.
"Visually, we try to have an evocative look," says Slade. "We want the live show and the images of us that are out there to all create a feeling or image that plays up to the themes we are dealing with and makes them bigger than they would be if we were all just up there in faded jeans."
Ultimately, Miss Derringer's unique fashion sense is just an extension of the music, which mixes and matches genres ingeniously. Their songs bristle with punk energy and old-school country sentiments, but the musicians add surf guitar licks, new wave melodies, girl-group vocals and Brill Building pop flourishes.
Their third album, "Winter Hill," is loosely conceived as music that might have been playing on the radio during the infamous Winter Hill Gang mob wars in Boston during the 1960s. So we asked the band members to give us a track-by-track tour of their most fully realized and accomplished record to date.
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WHILE GROWING UP in Versailles — a wealthy suburb of Paris — the members of indie-pop rockers Phoenix had a very simple attitude.
"When you grow up in a city that's like a museum you have to mess with things," singer Thomas Mars said. "I remember just the fact that you'd be in a band and make noise in this giant museum would be a problem for people living there."
The title of Phoenix's fourth album follows that line of cheeky thinking by co-opting the name of one of history's greatest composers: "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix" (V2 Records).
"I think it's like the mustache on Mona Lisa — it's really childish," Mars said. "Without knowing it, I'm discovering why we chose the title [and] why it's appealing. ... It's messing up with something iconic."
The album also messes with Phoenix's sound. Nearly every song has a hint of electronica and the driving singles "Lisztomania" and "1901" show the quartet brimming with confidence.
Express asked Mars to take us on a track-by-track tour through "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix." Stream the whole album here and follow along.
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WARBRINGER SHOULD CONSIDER getting a timeshare in Northern Virginia. The Ventura, Calif.-based thrash metal band has played Jaxx at least a half dozen times in the past year.
At least they think that's the case.
"I don't remember most of when our shows are," said vocalist John Kevill, 22.
Actually, Warbringer could have timeshares from coast to coast. The band seems to be on a never-ending tour.
"Any given night, Warbringer is playing somewhere. They seem to be on every single tour," laughed Adam Haritan, drummer from fellow road warriors and neo-thrashers Mantic Ritual.
"We average 8 or 9 hours a day driving," Kevill said. "Sometimes its really short — like 2 or 3 hours — but then we have to go from Portland to San Francisco in a day, and that's 12-plus hours."
So, how do five fellas in their early 20s deal with being on the road pretty much year-round?
Continue Reading "Liner Notes: Warbringer, 'Waking Into Nightmares'" »
IN THE LATE 1960s and into the early 1970s, the "Nashville Sound" defined country music. Like Phil Spector's "Wall of Sound" style, Nashville favored lush, expansive production over simple, stripped-down songs. Bold backing vocals and heavy-handed strings dominated the recordings, leaving often all-star backing bands lost in the shuffle, or even contradicting a song's meaning.
"Let It Be ... Naked" stripped Phil Spector's post-production strings from the original Beatles LP; similarly, Mickey Rapahel untangled some of Willie Nelson's earliest work from the Nashville Sound. The result is "Naked Willie" (Columbia Legacy).
Rapahel is Nelson's longtime harmonica player, and for his self-described "unproducing" process he went though about 50 of Nelson's RCA recordings from 1966 to 1970 — which meant sessions produced by Chet Atkins, Felton Jarvis and Danny Davis — and removed the extra instrumentation, settling on 17 tracks to strip to their cores.
"Willie at the time had no say on the production, he was glad to be working with these guys, but he had no input," Raphael said. "I think the songs were great, the performances were great, but what would they be like if we cut them last week? That's the idea of unproducing, where a producer puts things together; my project was to strip things away. Basically it was the strings and the background vocals. It was great for that time, really locked into the sounds of the '60s, but it had no success with these recordings — it wasn't Willie, that's the deal."
It took Raphael three weeks to complete the task, and while Nelson himself ironically had no real input, Raphael did have his blessing on the final product.
"He loved it," Raphael said. "He said, 'This is the way it might have sounded had I produced it.' He took ownership, he said, 'Yeah, this is what I had in mind when I originally wrote these songs.'"
Express asked Raphael to give us a song-by-song tour of "Naked Willie."
Continue Reading "Liner Notes: Mickey Rapahel on Willie Nelson's 'Naked Willie'" »
FOR THE THIRD volume of his "Throw Down Your Heart" series, Bela Fleck wanted to bring the banjo back to its homeland: Africa. The Flecktones virtuoso took a trip to Africa a few years back to play with as many African musicians as he could.
Accompanied by a film and sound crew, Fleck gathered more than enough material for an album and a feature-length documentary (directed by his brother, Sascha Paladino). In the process, Fleck had to figure out how to fit his instrument back into the culture that birthed it.
"That's the part that I can't really explain: why it works or why it did," Fleck said. "But everything I actually played, I can't describe or explain why I made the particular choices that I made, or why it fit so well, but I feel like it sounds like it belongs in this music, and that's what I was going for more than anything. But it was an unconscious thing: how can I make it sound like it fits? I was just trying to play in an honest way, be myself, and also respect their music."
"Throw Down Your Heart: Tales From the Acoustic Planet, Vol. 3 - Africa Sessions" is out now, with a DVD release of the award-winning film coming soon. We asked Fleck to take Express track-by-track through his trip to Africa.
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MICHAEL FRANTI'S STYLE has morphed from rap to hip hop to reggae since he appeared on the music scene as part of the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy in 1992. But the substance of his music hasn't varied all that much: he's always sought to bring a politically-charged message to the masses.
His dedication to social causes is evidenced by his film about Middle East politics, "I Know I'm Not Alone," and anti-poverty protests. He was recognized in 2002 by the human rights organization Global Exchange, which gave him the Humanitarian of the Year Award
Major radio play might have eluded him, but that's starting to change with the release of his new album "All Rebel Rockers." Its lead single, "Say Hey (I Love You)," has been all over college radio thanks to an infectious chorus and knowing lyric that references classic oldies like Harry Belafonte's "Jamaica Farewell" and the Dixie Cups' "Iko Iko."
On his previous release "Yell Fire!" from 2006, the reggae rhythms of his band Spearhead became more pronounced. But on "All Rebel Rockers," Franti and company make the transition to reggae complete. The album was recorded in Jamaica with the legendary reggae rhythm section of drummer Sly Dunbar and bassist Robbie Shakespeare producing and playing.
"Sly and Robbie are incredible," Franti says. "The two of them together have this experience of working with hundreds of artists and making thousands of songs, and they're so willing to impart it onto whoever they're working with. They'll tell you exactly why something might work or why in their experience it hasn't worked for them. If you just listen you just learn so much."
Franti talked to Express about the ideas behind the tracks on his newest work.
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MURRY HAMMOND'S SOLO DEBUT isn't a concept album.
It's a metaphor record about trains as spiritual vehicles, traveling a dangerous route to a heavenly destination.
The collection reflects his lifelong fascination with not only with Texas railroads but with old-time music in general. Fittingly, "I Don't Know Where I'm Going but I'm on My Way" sounds worlds removed form the music Hammond makes with his day-job band, the Old 97's. Instead of power pop with a country edge, he puts the "western" back in country & western, creating sepia-toned songs about trains, travels and tribulations. Hammond yodels, croons, yearns and prays throughout his own originals as well as Carter Family covers and compositions by Mormon poet Eliza R. Snow.
It's an album as a long journey, relating disappointment and grief but ultimately arriving at a hard-won redemption.
Hammond retraced his footprints for Express track by track, and you can follow along by listening to the album at Last.fm. (And if that doesn't work, several songs can be heard at his MySpace page or at CD Baby.)
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THE MUSIC OF Australian singer/songwriter Xavier Rudd has always been a battle between light and dark.
Just listen to "G.B.A." from 2004's "Solace." Rudd sings over a slightly distorted lap-slide guitar and a barrage of didgeridoo: "I know, I see, I feel and yes, I fear it everyday / These egos, their minds and games / With all their power could end our days / Still the sun it shines and the moon it sinks with grace."
While Rudd's message is generally one of peace, there's always been a deep-seeded anger in his words, his fears for what the Earth he loves so much could become.
And the new "Dark Shades of Blue" (Anti-) is Rudd's most harrowing album yet, with crunchier guitars and a much fuller sound.
"This time we were able to achieve a darker tone which I've been trying to do for a long time," Rudd said. "I'm really happy with the sound on this album; I think we captured the thickness. The music comes from the last couple of years of traveling, which has been amazing: a lot of high highs and low lows. So, I think there's all sorts of emotion on this album, high and low."
For many years, Rudd championed a one-man-band approach playing live; then Dave Tolley joined Rudd on tour as a part-time drummer, though he only sits in to add percussion when needed.
For concerts, the 30-year-old Rudd sits in the middle of the stage flanked by an army of different guitars (Weissenborn slide guitars, resonator slide guitars, acoustic guitars, slide banjo, basses, electric guitar and more), percussion instruments (including a stomp box at his feet) and a barrage of didgeridoos to his front.
Actually, Rudd prefers to call the didgeridoo by its Aboriginal name, yidaki. The instrument produces deep, almost moaning tones that, when done correctly, can be manipulated to yelp and produce other strange sounds.
Rudd, already a household name in his native land, guided us through his "Dark Shades of Blue" album track by track. [You can preview parts of each track on Amazon.]
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Addison Road