Album of the Month

Whatever Brain's Soft Dick City cassette

(self-released)

25 FEB 2009 • by Bryan Reed

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This month's Album of the Month is presented as one track, due to the cassette nature of its release. The track order is: 1. Dead Flowers (The Urinals) 2: Nesting 3: Mount Whatever 4: Eli C/O 2k5 5: Swhatever 6: What Happened to All the Destructionaires? 7: BOHD 8: Pyramids 9: Summer Jammin' 10: What Happened to All the Destructionaires?

Also reviewed:
Whatever Brains's Mt. Whatever 7"
(Bull City Records)

In the half-hour it takes to hear Whatever Brains' Soft Dick City—a spray-painted, cassette-only release bookended by a screeching Urinals cover and a Johnny Cash sound-collage sabotage—there's little question what this Raleigh quartet is about: This is a band that can't sit still. From The Urinals homage and the Johnny Cash sacrilege to the hooky-and-hissy space between, raw enthusiasm comes tied together with jagged and noisy interludes.

Within that jittery impatience and irreverent ruckus, witness a consistency of style that's not just uncommon but mostly unknown for such a new band. And Whatever Brains has done it twice now. Just as Soft Dick City feels spontaneous in its noise and spittle-lipped in its urgency, the subsequent Mt. Whatever 7" feels self-assured and somehow meticulous in its relative professionalism.

The three tracks that comprise Mt. Whatever—two of which, the title track and "Summer Jammin," are reprised from Soft Dick City—come out cleaner, which is to say less shrouded in feedback, but no less excitable. On the 7" version of "Mount Whatever," cooed vocal harmonies turn to roars behind Rich Ivey's snotty snarl (Ivey is a contributor to the Independent Weekly). Jagged guitars spike harder, but with less static. It sounds no less primal than on the tape, where a droning rumble cloaks the song, making it rough and rowdy. The no-fi charm and noise-fueled unification of Soft Dick City is exhilarating, but the same holds—just in different ways—for Mt. Whatever's half-polished fits. The tape trades undulating feedback and squelching electronics for the single's basic guitars-bass-drums setup. Neither suffers the exchange.

Taken together, these two releases—both issued on formats you may consider obsolete—are defiantly good but defiantly inaccessible for mass markets. Just 500 copies of a 7" and a handful of cassette tapes remain as the lone artifacts of the band's existence to date. This is the sort of sticky stuff that could be huge, though (we've called these Brains "Raleigh's best new band," and we'll echo that here). Collectors and early listeners are rewarded, then, with two very different but complementary releases, each of which keeps its best track—Soft Dick City's "Swhatever" and Mt. Whatever's b-side, "Crass Ringtones"—proprietary and isolated. This is the stuff from which anthems, legends and eBay auctions come.

What functions as a two-part debut shows Whatever Brains to be a band born fully formed, a more prickly and brash cousin to Ivey's defunct Crossed Eyes, but with a similar foundation on pop-structured punk. Indeed, it's Whatever Brains' greatest virtue that, behind the din of scorched amps, shattered chords and snot-rocket singing, there's a gooey bubblegum center charged with immediacy and drunken abandon.

Mt. Whatever has just been picked up by Matador's distribution wing, so get your hands on the vinyl now.

Hearing Aid

YES, PLEASE

02.28 WAUMISS @ NIGHTLIGHT

The willfully scattershot sonics of Waumiss made the duo's self-titled LP a playful and engaging platter. Bits of dub and electronica pulse through psychedelic gauze and indie rock propulsion. Half-formed song structures keep things accessible, while allowing Clarque and Caroline Blomquist, Waumiss's core, to vary their textures—and the songs' direction—at a whim. In doing so, the pair creates an enticing, evolving sonic landscape that manages to be both fun and interesting. With Evil Wiener frontman Billy Sugarfix at 10 p.m. —Bryan Reed

Des Ark Photo by Jeremy M. Lange

03.01 DES ARK, YARDWORK @ NIGHTLIGHT

Now boasting a sturdy three-piece lineup, Des Ark is at its most muscular yet. It's a hellride of unpredictability that purrs and sputters and roars in new and exciting directions, driven, as ever, by Aimee Argote and her twin selves: the heartbreaking songwriter and the caterwauling frontwoman—either of which could send most bands whimpering. Good thing, then, that the more-than-competent Yardwork—Charlotte's next-big-thing for a hot minute now—will take on support duties. The band's room-filling clatter recalls Akron/Family and an Afrobeat arkestra as fronted by ex-hardcore kids. Register opens at 10 p.m. —Bryan Reed

Sound Board

Bleeding Through w/ Acacia Strain, As Blood Runs Black, Impending Doom

Sun., March 1.

Bleeding Through is yet another in a long line of metalcore bands worshipping at the altar of At The Gates, the Swedish band that literally created the template for bands melding death metal’s brutality with hardcore pacing and moody melodies. So why should we care about Bleeding Through? Short answer: they’re coming to town, and if the metalcore sound appeals to you, you might enjoy this. Consider the bulk of the genre to have the explosive power of Mentos and Diet Coke, which is to say it’s as momentarily impressive and ultimately innocuous as a geyser of Nutrasweetened cola. At its best, Bleeding Through bursts like a hand grenade, a tightly wound balance of keyboard gauze behind bludgeoning blast beats, squealing false harmonics and gruff hardcore vocals. At its worst, Bleeding Through is still as good as any other metalcore band. —Bryan Reed
$16, $13 (adv.), www.bleedingthrough.com.

Music Farm
32 Ann St., (Downtown)
(843) 853-3276
http://www.musicfarm.com

Charleston City Paper, 2/25/09

Hearing Aid

YES, PLEASE

02.22 ICY DEMONS, WHATEVER BRAINS @ LOCAL 506

Chicago's Icy Demons bring its swinging pop—keyboards buoying bass grooves and electronic accents like a head-fucked bossa nova—to the marquee. But the real draw ought to be Raleigh natives Whatever Brains, whose frantic fuzz-punk lives and dies by in-the-red guitars, snotty vocals and undeniable pop hooks. The band kicked off the new year with the three-song Mt. Whatever 7-inch, the first release on the brand-spankin'-new Bull City Records label. Watch out for these Whatever Brains, literally and figuratively. $8/ 9:30 p.m. —Bryan Reed

Independent Weekly, 2/18/09

8 Days A Week

Sunday 2.22

Chapel Hill
Dexter Romweber & The New Romans
The Cave—Drummer Dave Schmitt founded The New Romans as a vehicle for putting duo-veteran Dexter Romweber in front of a nonet. The band invoked Romweber's underlying love for surf-rock, '60s crooners and lounge music. Hazy keys and blankets of guitar reverb wash behind his growl. Saxophones bleat and moan. The music swings, slinks and seems to exist outside of time. Night Tide, released late last year, serves to document the band's rich retro-chic: rock 'n' roll with a balance of grooving instrumentals and charged shoulda-been-standards, meant for dancing in tight, dark bars. Pay $5 at 9 p.m. —Bryan Reed

Independent Weekly, 2/18/09

VISITING ACT | Michael Franti & Spearhead

FEBRUARY 18, 2009

VISITING ACT | Michael Franti

Spearheading pop music globalization: Michael Franti & Spearhead's worldly reggae rocks

BY BRYAN REED

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The idealistic Michael Franti and his band return with a pile of grooves

For all its questionable authority, Wikipedia has a means of prioritizing facts such that the first sentence of any entry is often alarmingly telling. It's little wonder then that Michael Franti's entry begins thusly: "Michael Franti (born April 21, 1966, in Oakland) is an American poet, musician, and composer of African, American Indian, Irish, French, and German descent." This is telling in that the author of Franti's micro-biography deemed Franti's diverse ethnicity second in importance only to the most basic details of his career. He's a musician who is multiracial.

And indeed, Franti's multiculturalism has been his biggest selling point since the earliest days of his band Spearhead. The same image of worldliness and multicultural awareness remains the primary focus on Spearhead's latest, All Rebel Rockers. Recorded in Kingston, Jamaica, with famed reggae producers Sly & Robbie, All Rebel Rockers adopts reggae's deep bass grooves, syncopated staccato guitars, and lyrics that mesh spirituality with politics — owing to the Marley school of songwriting. And at times it comes off a bit forced. The pairing of "Rude Boys Back in Town" and "A Little Bit of Riddim" are so tied to reggae-specific imagery that it borders on stereotype — think Combat Rock, not Natty Dread. Still, Franti's lyrics place his beliefs and motivations into simple terms: "A little bit of riddim make the world go 'round," he chants through the chorus of "Rock with Me," "I'm a human being, y'all."

Franti's messages of global understanding and unity are stated in no uncertain terms. This is where Franti & Spearhead are at their most consistent: making easily digestible statements into idealistic manifestos. But deeper into the LP, the sloganeering and typecasting of earlier cuts gives way to a proper mélange of worldly sounds, and Franti gives the politics some breathing room. On the record, he sings a lot about the transformative powers of music. But it's when he doesn't have to sing about them that his message seems most believable.

Michael Franti & Spearhead share the bill with Cherine Anderson and Courtney John at the Music Farm (32 Ann St., 843-853-3276) on Sat, Feb. 21. 8 p.m. Admission is $25. Visit www.musicfarm.com and www.spearheadvibrations.com for more.

Charleston City Paper, 2/18/09

Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele

02/18/2009

Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele

The Good Feeling Music of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele

(Paw Tracks)

www.paw-tracks.com

Good feeling my ass. Sure, Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele deliver the charming, jangly crooner-pop replete with sunkissed steel guitar, easy shuffle sin the drumbeats and that ukulele, which, while perhaps something short of "magnificent" is at the very least pretty gosh-darn nice-sounding. And yeah, May himself delivers a warm kind of croon, something like a cheered-up Morrissey-even when he's a heartbroken troubadour as on the schmaltzy waltz "Girls On The Square," where he sings "The girls on the square make me blue/I always compare them with you." Indeed, May's lyrics are not so very good feeling at all. At one moment he's smiling to cover a wince, drinking to numb the pain on "I'm An Alcoholic," the next he's filled with schadenfreude, singing, "How does it feel to be nothing?/I wouldn't know" on "College Town Boy."

The Dent May proffering his so-called Good Feeling Music is a bit of a downer, a maudlin popsmith masquerading behind upbeat tunes evoking shallow, sentimentalist cheer like a sad clown intent on drawing laughter from his own undue misfortune. Maybe it's a coping mechanism or maybe it's a gimmick. It doesn't really matter. The Good Feeling Music of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele does the job; it softens the blows we're dealt by attracting us, first with a chipper melody and then with the ability to point at the characters in the songs and remark, "Well, at least I'm not that guy." Sometimes that's the best medicine.

Standout Tracks: "College Town Boy," "Girls On The Square," BRYAN REED

Blurt, 2/18/09

P.O.S. - Never Better

P.O.S.
Never Better

[Rhymesayers; 2009]

Styles: indie hip-hop
Others: Atmosphere, Cage
Links: P.O.S. - Rhymesayers

P.O.S. is a victim of misplaced marketing. Three records into his career, the Minnesotan MC still can’t shake the “grown-up punk” angle. Yeah, he also plays in a punk band. How revolutionary and interesting. And to think he can rap, too. Let’s never stop talking about how radical it is that one person might be into more than one style of music. And then, with the release of Never Better the angle is the packaging: an admittedly cool clear-plastic digipak with mix-and-match cover art. Nifty, but ultimately inconsequential. This halo of trivia that adorns his head only obscures what really matters: P.O.S. is good. Real good. His elastic flow slings alliterative rhymes and super-specific pop culture references (“Dufrane, party of four”), while he balances the swing and bludgeon of his beats with charisma and conviction.

Too often we’re tempted to erect a wall between hip-hop and rock, acting shocked when the two bump shoulders — as they do so effortlessly on Never Better — and pretending like Rick Rubin never had anything to do with Def Jam. No, this isn’t a rock record; it’s hip-hop to its very core. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t rock, either. It doesn’t mean P.O.S. can’t turn head-nods into headbangs or a sample into a riff. And still, whether or not P.O.S. grew up on Fugazi and Nas — both of whom he nods to on the record — is trivia. What matters is how the MC carries himself, which is chest-puffed, fists-clenched and tongue venomous. Images collide with narrative, filling songs with vibrancy. “Been Afraid” turns a broken home story into steely drama. “Purexed” drops its cleverest line — “hands steadily Purexed, but never quite clean” — like a manifesto, tying the song’s patchwork of visceral imagery into a bumper-sticker-sized slogan. Then comes the hook, like cavalry. We know P.O.S. isn’t happy with the world, but he’s gonna keep trying. Hope’s alive on Never Better, and it’s the glue that holds us together as the world beats down on us.

P.O.S. is still standing, though. Gruff voice buttressed by his own outsized conviction, these songs quiver with anger and fear and dynamism. We feel the rattles in the headphones; we hear the words in our heads and hearts and bodies. And when it’s over, what’s left? A long-player wrapped up in an admittedly cool clear-plastic digipak with mix-and-match cover art? Or a musical testament of life in 2009? Too often, we put the artist in the background. And that’s a damn shame. Don’t let it happen here.

1. Let It Rattle
2. Drumroll (We’re All Thirsty)
3. Savion Glover
4. Purexed
5. Graves (We Wrote The Book)
6. Goodbye
7. Get Smokes
8. Been Afraid
9. Low Light Low Life
10. The Basics (Alright)
11. Out of Category
12. Optimist (We Are Not For Them)
13. Terrorish
14. Never Better
15. The Brave And The Snake

by Bryan Reed

Tiny Mix Tapes, 2/17/09

Fol Chen - Part I: John Shade, Your Fortune's Made

02/16/2009

Fol Chen

Part I: John Shade, Your Fortune’s Made

(Asthmatic Kitty)
www.asthmatickitty.com

Ambivalence is rarely a virtue in rock criticism. It hints at indifference more than bona fide confliction of ideas, two poles that in the case of Fol Chen might not be so very far apart. With Part I: John Shade, Your Fortune's Made, the debut release from the deliberately (and somewhat obnoxiously) enigmatic group, empty sonic mosaics offer mostly distraction with occasional memorable moments like the somewhat funky "No Wedding Cake" to bring in that element of critical confliction that leaves me enticed by the particular arrangement of sonic doo-dads-here, drum loops and synth blurps meet a squirmy guitar and layers of blank vocals--even if diving into it would be about as successful as doing likewise in a kiddie pool.

I'm not one to savor a concussion, though, so I'll be content to merely let the record pass on by, casually enjoying its colorful façade but ultimately unmoved. Pleasant and briefly interesting cuts like "Cable TV" save the record from utter mediocrity, and do indeed offer all the mindless "fun" of your standard bubblegum ditty-albeit with an ear more inclined toward Hot Chip and TV On The Radio than Britney and Timbaland. The listening experience is not wasted, but neither is it significantly rewarding, it just kind of is. I don't think I like this, but I don't hate it. I guess you could say I'm ambivalent. So sue me.

Standout Tracks: "No Wedding Cake," "Cable TV," BRYAN REED

Blurt Magazine, 2/16/09

Wino - Punctuated Equilibrium

Wino
Punctuated Equilibrium

[Southern Lord; 2009]

Styles: blues-based hard rock
Others: Saint Vitus, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple
Links: Wino - Southern Lord

Branded as stoner metal’s guitar hero, Scott "Wino" Weinrich has a lot to live up to on the first album to bear his — and only his — name. Teamed up with producer J. Robbins, Clutch drummer Jean Paul Gaster, and Rezin’s Jon Blank on bass, those expectations only get bigger.

And largely, the former Obsessed and Saint Vitus centerpiece doesn’t disappoint; Punctuated Equilibrium is a riff-heavy and easy-to-listen-to platter of bluesy proto-metal. Wino’s guitar playing is so fluid, his riffs so naturally momentous that the technical heroics seem an afterthought or accident. We hear the effects of his fingers running hurdles on the fretboard, but it rarely comes off as flashy or ostentatious. It gives the record a feeling of classicism — as though you could (or should) hear Wino playing next to Deep Purple on an FM "classic rock" station. Here, though, decades of blues-based hard rock coalesce into a full-bodied force of hard rock purity that ought to run devoid of hyphenated modifiers (says the guy who in the same paragraph refers to this as "proto-metal"). Generally, the record is a consistent and concise platter of mid-tempo riffs and throaty vocals.

Only "Gods, Frauds, Neo-Cons and Demagogues" hinders that consistency, and in doing so becomes a disfiguring blemish on an otherwise good LP. Its political-commentary-via-soundbite approach doesn’t mesh all that well with the attempted atmospherics in Wino’s guitar backing. Ultimately, it comes off as dated and unnecessary, especially next to nine cuts each with its own singular identity within the album’s uniformly well-defined sonic template. Wino is best when he’s playing heavy, not heavy-handed. Save for the one glaring misstep, Punctuated Equilibrium doesn’t disappoint.

1. Release Me
2. Punctuated Equilibrium
3. The Woman in the Orange Pants
4. Smilin’ Road
5. Eyes of the Flesh
6. Wild Blue Yonder
7. Secret Realm Devotion
8. Water Crane
9. Gods, Frauds, Neo-Cons and Demagogues
10. Silver Lining

by Bryan Reed

Tiny Mix Tapes, 2/13/09