On the beat

The year in review: Local

by Bob Gulla

Because I started this local beat somewhat late in the year, I didn't get a panoramic purview of this year's local releases. But that still didn't make choosing the year's finest area albums a difficult task. Seems that even though most of this year's local projects didn't get much fanfare nationally, it didn't prevent them from accomplishing impressive things creatively. Competition for adequate distribution channels and limited shelf space make putting out records for most bands a labor of love. Perhaps now, given the many impossibilities of making it in music, we'll get more uncompromising artistic statements from talented folks who'd have been otherwise tempted by commercial success. The following records all rank highly in that category already and should, based solely on artistic merit, rate national recognition.

1) Purple Ivy Shadows: White Electric

Purple Ivy Shadows' rickety layers of homespun acoustic guitars provide a delicate emotional subtext to their ever-so-fragile indie rock. And it's that delicacy, that charming imperfection that makes "White Electric" so wonderful and so easy on the ears. That, and Erik Carlson's subtle fascination with the Beatles, makes this recording one of the top local records of the year, and an accomplished album by any standard.

2) Velvet Crush: Free Expression

Free Expression represents some of the best, most casually wonderful pop you're likely to hear this year. Produced by the band and colleague Matthew Sweet and featuring steel guitarist nonpareil Greg Leisz, the album remains true to the band's pure pop roots but sounds entirely original. The listening experience involves intimacy on songs like "Things Get Better," '60s time travel on "Gentle Breeze" and giddy drones on "Worst Enemy." Velvet Crush may not be a viable working band, with members having fled the metropolis for various locales. But this post-break-up recording goes a long way in filling the void they've left.

3) Kristin Hersh: Sky Motel

Kristin Hersh's first outing as a solo artist and not a principal in Throwing Muses is chilling in scope and pulsating with accomplishment. Never before has Hersh written with such emotional authenticity and stylistic diversity, with songs like "White Trash Moon" and "Costa Rica" bridging the chasm between her customary paranoid poignancy and the Muses' chunky, chord-changing beauty. "After finishing the record, I started feeling like the future wasn't just randomly happening to me, and I began feeling lucky and happy -- obnoxiously so, at times." We're happy, and happy for her, too.

4) The Complaints: Fear

In a way, Dean Petrella's new disc is a throwback to the rock-based singer/songwriter acts of the early '80s, when guys like Tom Petty and Graham Parker, along with bands like the Del Fuegos, True West, and the Replacements were working out meaningful songs with ragged rock fringes. Fear, the Complaints' debut disc finds Petrella and his trio -- which also includes bassist Chris Cruz and drummer Anthony Marotti -- searching for and finding a clear and crackling sound, heartfelt enough to appeal to straight-on rockers and tough enough to grab the attention of harder-edged guitar fans.

5) Medicine Ball

Stymied frequently by the suffocating myopia of the music industry, Medicine Ball has hung in there by staying true to its music. Their new album wends its way through psychedelic, progressive, rock and weird pop passages the way Willy Wonka sashayed his way through the Chocolate Factory. Some surprises are hidden, some are exciting, some are visceral and nearly all are worthwhile. This is invigorating soulful rock music for its own sake; music that doesn't answer to anyone but those who create it.

6) The Masons: Change Me Back

Change Me Back possesses the understated melodies, crisp simplicity, and droll humor a good record needs to be successful. Written and recorded over a two-year period, Change Me Back surges and recedes with good-pacing, a hip-but-not-holy attitude, and warm-hearted performances. The acoustic "Ghost In the Attic" feels like Buffalo Springfield-era Neil Young; the Ween-style "Whiz Kid" could be the only -- and wry-est -- song you'll hear about giving a urine sample at a doctor's office, and "I Stole This From You" features some "Pet Sounds"-ish background "aaaahhs" over a subtle but pulsing Zeppelin guitar riff. Good influences, good results.

7) The Eyesores: May You Dine On the Reeds Made Bitter By The Piss of Drunkards

Up from the noisy detritus of demi-legends the Amoebic Ensemble rises the more traditionally titled Eyesores, led by former Amoeba Alec Redfearn. Originally consisting of two basses and a percussionist, the sestet has now evolved into a more conventionally rock-based din, with two guitars, a string bass, percussion, lap steel and Redfearn's cheesy accordion, though that major structural alteration hasn't restricted the band to playing conventional material. The Eyesores bounce from country and gypsy to punk and Zappa-rock; May You Dine shatters into a million stylistic shards, never remaining in one place for too long, never letting on where any one song will take you next.

8) Foxtrot Zulu: Frozen in Time

Foxtrot Zulu, the only great band currently residing in Ashaway, Rhode Island, has a terrific record on its hands with Frozen In Time. It revs and glides, cruises and explodes, pokes its head around shadowy corners and brightens up a room with horn-happy funk. The new record strips away the sloppy, seven-piece blur of the band's past efforts and carves each instrumental track into clear, exhilarating sections. OK, so it qualifies as a "jam band." But it's a good jam band, with concise musicianship and focused, impressive improv journeys.

9) JP Jones: Ashes

Tonally and stylistically, Jones follows kindred blues folk lights like T-Bone Burnett, Richard Thompson, and Greg Brown with some diligence. His voice, close to Dire Straits' Mark Knopfler, breaks up in so many off-key ways that it's endearing, while his music rumbles along with soulful intensity. On Ashes, Jones genre-surfs with terse, tight effectiveness and good taste, guaranteeing that every element of his arrangements has a place and a reason. And, oh yeah, he's a smart, powerful lyricist, too.

10) Code Mesa: Hollywood

Local art-pop diva Jennifer Smith and Larry Heinemann, frequently of the Blue Man Group, combine on Code Mesa's excellent new recording. A feathery bed of synthesized atmospherics provides a nice cushion for Smith's double and triple-tracked vocal chants, which manage to sound both ethereal and powerful. Cuts like "Thief in the House" have gorgeous percussion tracks to complement.

11) The Pines of Rome: On All Fours (Plays-Rite Records)

Matt Derby and the Pines of Rome have the sort of de-energized, low-rock feel that makes homespun deconstructivist bands like Palace and Vic Chesnutt so important. Their subtle, primitive melodies and ramshackle performances sound stitched together but have the emotional potency of grooves that go much deeper.

12) Fat Buddah: Ohm

Joe Bartone's skewed creative presence looms largely over Ohm, Fat Buddah's debut album. Assisted by bassist Ryan Clausious, guitarist Tom Tsouris, and drummer Brendan Ormsby, Fat Buddah cycles through an interpretive soundscape of experimental pop, driven by keyboards, bolstered by samples, and fueled by Bartone's cynical rants. The band's tactile performance art arrives mercifully free of trends, and full of colorful, futurist focus.

13) Escher: What Makes Demons Cry (Moksha Records)

Part black metal, part prog, part screaming rock, the audacious noise enthusiasts in Escher have come a long way in a short time with the material on this surprisingly good, 23-minute EP. "Ambition to Be" and "Remnants of Eden" are amazing excursions into stylized metal. A little more time together might see Josh Lawton and company making some waves in the loud rock community. You heard it here first, or maybe second.

Here are some records I missed, courtesy of Beat Writer extraordinaire Mike Caito.

Zorgina: Polyphonics (Ohmnibus)
Various Artists: You're Soaking In It . . . The Sounds and Smells of Load Records (Load)
The Mockingbirds (5-song indie CD)
Duke Robillard: New Blues for Modern Man (Shanachie)
Willie Myette Trio: . . . this is jazz (JazzKids)
Ed Spargo: Invisible Man (City Boy)
The Fly Seville: Carousel (Sealed Fate)

Bob Gulla can be reached at b_gulla@yahoo.com.