Guerrilla Music Review

The Saddest Christmas Songs I Know, by Nick Kieper

2009-12-25T09:02:00.000-08:00

In a retail situation, you hear every secular Christmas song covered five times in the space of a five-hour shift. If you’re working the full eight hours, may Santa have mercy on what is left of your soul.
I’ve found that, if I can analyze my worst fears, I can begin to cope with them. Psychologists describe it as engaging the cognitive mind instead of the animalistic instincts. I describe it as pissing all over your Christmas cheer. These are the elven eleven worst offenders.

Deck the Halls
My primary problem with Yuletidery is its cruelty: who can be that happy all the time? How is it possible to have that much cheer? Is that much sheer joy and happiness even possible?
Each time I hear the twinkling chirps of 50s-era choirs who remind us to be happy at all costs, I wonder who they’re trying to convince. Don’t worry, overpaid celebrity on a filmset, I’m pretty sure you’ll have a fine lot of presents awaiting you in your trailer. Unless you have some hidden demons you’re trying to wash away with egg nog and whatever is in that flask of yours… But then, why would we need to overcompensate? We’re all happy, happy people!
Fa la la la la. La la. La. La.

Frosty the Snowman
Behind that saccharine pop melody and holly-jolly cheer lurks a sinister perspective on sentience. Without so much as a “My will be done!” an old top hat is tossed onto a column of snow, which then breathes its first waking moments. Upon being rudely and accidentally birthed into the world, he is expected to entertain a hapless gaggle of hyperactive apelings. He dutifully exerts himself day in and day out until the whole plan unravels—apparently, winter doesn’t last forever! Oh sure, a tepid puddle of water will rise again, someday, to judge the naughty and nice once and for all. I wasn’t aware nihilism was the reason for the season.

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of The Year
God, I hope not. Between seasonal affective disorder and standard loneliness amplified by cultural pressure to be surrounded by a crowd, suicide rates skyrocket around the holidays. Anytime I hear Christmas songs like this, I always suspect they are trying to hide some pretty intense self-pity. I remember Herff Jones tried to tell me similar nonsense about high school in order to sell me a class ring—“These are the best years of your life!” I mentioned it to my mom, who assured me with these words: Don’t worry, they’re just lying.

White Christmas
Though not particularly sad, I’m not sure how comfortable I feel conflating feelings of nostalgia—things used to be so much better!—with postwar imagery of whiteness and purity. “May all your Christmases be white,” indeed!

Santa Claus is Coming to Town
While I recognize the line “You’d better not shout! You’d better not cry! You’d better not pout!” is aimed primarily at small children who do any and all of these at a moment’s notice, I do wonder what adult feels this is a necessary and proper for mass consumption. While the song teaches us that crying and pouting are wrong, it says nothing to the fact that people left and right are shouting, crying, pouting, protesting, yelling, dying for no damned reason! But no, don’t you dare be unhappy, or else Santa might leave some unclean coal in the Wal-Mart stocking dangling above your big-screen television (both of which were probably made by the same underpaid small child in a tinseled sweatshop; does he know it’s Christmastime?).

Blue Christmas
I do like this one, but like any other pop song it reinforces feelings of loneliness and heartache. Think of how you feel on Valentine’s Day if you’re single. You don’t get to feel that bad on that specific day without somebody reminding you to. But real holidays are different; their one redeeming quality is that they stress that feeling of community, the bonds that keep us whole. Being reminded of vital absences—especially by such smooth and casual crooning as The King’s—is the last thing any truly lonely person needs to hear. Here’s my ultimatum, Elvis: either sing another happy jingle or just make it an all-blue single; this wishy-washy nonsense isn’t becoming of you.
Well, I guess it’s too late to issue any real threats to you. Thanks for bringing the mood down. Again.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
So yeah, Rudolph saved the day and made Christmas possible for one more year. He’ll be a local celebrity, maybe wield some clout around the ol’ salt lick for once. How long do you think the other eight will put up with this? Popularity used to resound over the course of a month, but the way social circles revolve these days, he won’t last a week. Then he’ll just be the lonely old has-been who peaked too soon: a four-legged Chris Farley, reliving the same moment of pride, sapping it of any positive emotion, until the moment of his untimely, drug-addled demise. Following a hushed investigation, Santa will invest in some damned headlights. (I can’t decide whether red or blue lights would add more insult to the injury of Rudolph’s very existence.)

Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
…Too easy. Who can’t get teary-eyed watching this? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5g4lY8Y3eoo

Mele Kalikimaka
“Mele kalikimaka” is certainly the thing to say when you are living up your upper-middle-class vacation on the beach of a violently annexed island. And as you sip your fifth peppermint margarita, make sure you don’t think of the family your waiter can’t afford to feed; it might just ruin your Christmas.

Silver Bells
For the longest time, I loved this tune. It was my last holdout of corporate-sponsored cheer. After I lost my faith in Rudolph, in Frosty, and even in the smooth crooning of White Christmas [not for the reasons mentioned] I still held on to this one. It was special. It played with the modern decorations—Santa, shopping, urban sprawl—but only as being secondary to the genuinely quaint imagery of snowball fights, of frosty breath, of the world being in absolute harmony.
But that is because I was being selective in my listening. I now must ask, why are these city sidewalks so busy? What is this “holiday style”? Why are people suddenly passing each other? Is this representative of how we relate to each other, merely noting faint memories of old neighbors as we rush home to stuff our swollen attics with plastic gadgetry?
And remember the lights? “Even stoplights blink a bright red and green” is such a Romantic approach; rather than lighting the way, they simply reflect the sympathies that resound in the chest of every full-blooded patriot. And yet… these patriots are just shopping. This isn’t about community. This isn’t about cheer. This is about the paper bills in your wallet and how they translate into a cheap mockery of what we used to believe in, if we can believe we used to believe.

I’ll Be Home for Christmas
This is generally regarded as sappy, but not normally sad. In the song, a father promises his family that, for one fleeting moment, he will be there—if only in his dreams. The tale is genuinely heartrending, drawing upon feelings of abandonment and solitude, as well as the complementary yearning for affection and attention. At the same time, look at what the father wants more than anything else: “snow and mistletoe and presents on the tree.” I can imagine two ways to read that line:
1. He is so indoctrinated into the consumerist narratives of constructed meaning and attachment that, while he enjoys his family, he can’t imagine a Christmas without the red-and-green accoutrements. Even if Daddy were there, he’d be somehow miles away.
2. He feels so much affection for his estranged family, and so much shame and regret at his chronic absence, that he can manage only to mutter nonsensical ramblings about Christmas trees. He’s so depressed, he can’t even muster a simple “I love you.”
I’m not sure which is worse.

Black Death All Stars's "Black Death All Stars" by Nick Kieper

2009-11-07T15:13:00.000-08:00

I think you need to see Black Death All Stars to really get what makes them work. Maybe not. The sound is singular enough: too rough to be old-fashioned folk, too sour to be Arrah and The Ferns, too well produced to be Reverend Peyton or his Big Damn Band. Shit, son, just listen to them

I found them when my ex-band opened for them in some guy’s basement. They had stopped in Bloomington in days-old rags and a worn van ,with their instruments and a briefcase of merchandise. I dropped a ten in their jar, grabbed the LP, and danced into a bluegrass mosh pit.

These neo-Appalachian noisemakers self-released their self-titled album sometime this year in a cardboard sleeve with a handwritten sheet of lyrics. At the time of recording, they had lost their bassist somehow. So what did they do? They recorded the thing as a trio. As a bassist myself, even I am not saddened [though their pierced Alaskan replacement is well appreciated].

Though I must classify this as neo-folk, the band is truly rooted in tradition. From the first track onward, flies an intense barrage of visceral guitar, banjo, fiddle, and yelling, all infatuated with traditional folk themes: leaving town; going to jail; anarchy; and most importantly, liquor. They even manage to improve Hank Williams’ “Rambling Man,” already one of his best. They get it, man. They get it.

They get what it means to be desperate, to be down on your luck, to be penniless and have nothing to survive on but “sawdust and blood.” The vitality here is different from most bands, as it stems not from anger or rage, but from a combination of fear, joy, regret, necessity and want—real human emotions.

“The lights in the city, they don’t shine for me.”
In “Winchester County,” the first downtempo tune, the guitarist laments, “Brown liquor, brown liquor, look what you’ve done.”
Halfway through the album, they warn the listeners, “Anything you do, they’ll put you in jail.”

But this is not some collection of sad folk archetypes set to strummed acoustic guitar. There are solos—solos on a folk album! The acoustic breakdown for “Wayfaring Stranger” sounds like a damned jazz piece. These breakdowns are perfectly placed and collectively agreed. When they all quiet down for eight bars, the plucked melodies get to whisper raspy nothings into your ear. These ditties are simple harmonically, but well constructed and well worn.

They even have a couple of instrumental tracks, “Blackberry Blossom” and “Arkansas Traveler.” The latter really sounds like a journey, wheat fields and all, and the former sounds like pure beauty.

As far as song quality, I’d say it’s 180 proof. I’m a little irritated by the hokey quality of “Trainhop Story Rag,” but the rest of it is all Grade-A Appalachian gold. Even the memory of “Trainhop” is soon wiped clean by “Wreck of the Old 97.” The rest is all solid, gristled, and rough.

If the review is a little scattered, it’s only because the album is similarly unstructured. The overall flow feels organic, uncalculated; in a word, honest—even the invented tales and exaggerated drawls breathe of honest humanity. Old characters come back to life in a wild flurry of noise and celebration, scratchy fiddle and good mourning. The songs are generally weighted in theme toward old archetypes, but in doing so construct a rough skeleton of the uncounted American masses and what it means to be a misunderstood drunk, a trapped rambling man, a folk socialist with a half-flask of wine and a banjo.

I recommend this album for: leaving town on foot; drinking a handle of Wild Turkey; smuggling your iPod into jail for pissing on a cop—likely all in the same night.

Sam Vicari's "Keep Careful" by Jenna Slesinski

2009-11-02T23:00:00.000-08:00

I can pick up on lyrics pretty quickly. Usually after two or three listens I’ll know most, if not all of a song. Sometimes by the end of one listen I can get a chorus down, if I focus. Sam Vicari’s lyrics on his hidden gem of an album “Keep Careful” will follow me throughout my day with different lines or phrases floating in and out of my head. This album has an obvious cohesion within its songs. As an avid listener of bands such as the New Pornographers and Fleet Foxes, bands that carry an obvious and identifiable style from song to song, these variations of a basic pattern sometimes shows more craftsmanship than an overly technical piece.

It’s often said that it’s hard to make a song seem simple and almost effortless, but it is the simple songs with natural refrains that often seep into your head with their comfort and familiarity. The songs on “Keep Careful” are not forced or overcomplicated and overworked; instead, they are honest, and easy, with a refreshing dose of sincerity and kindness. Vicari’s songs, although simple are not doused with irony, like the Magnetic Fields (which I love don’t get me wrong, but they have their own time and place); conversely the vocals are earnest without seeming hungry or trite. He knows how to write a perfect song. Also, the fact that the flow of the album as a whole is wonderfully done adds to the overall quality of the album as a cohesive piece of music. If I had to place this album into a category, I would call it “Rock for Nice Guys”.

Vicari’s music is the kind of music you wish you had found while still in high school. It’s the types of songs that you feel speak for you at such a formidable time of your life, that even after those four years have passed they still ring true with their catchy lyrics and easy melodies. The worlds created in these songs are so relatable that it seems almost impossible for a listener not to insert themselves and their lives.

Now all this honesty felt within the songs does not mean that they don’t still rock. The music itself combines pop-punk sensibilities with sixties influences. Bringing to mind comparisons to Elvis Costello, Green Day, and Big Star and the vocal qualities of a full voiced Elliott Smith, Vicari’s music has a comforting familiarity. With songs like “Driveway” that sound like they could come from a Green Day album, and “Like an Island” displaying his Bacharach-pop sensibilities. Vicari’s songs may not flip the definition of rock music on its head, but it is familiar and hopeful without being boring, or preachy.

It is the refrains of “Sleep When You Want, Wake When You Please” and “Driveway” that will most often float through my conscious so much so that sometimes I’ll have to stop myself from dancing in my seat or at least bobbing my head in time to the music in my mind. These songs are two of my favorites on the album. There is something indescribable about these songs that causes them to stick with you and also causes you to return to them time and again.

I think that the emotions expressed within this album can stir the feelings that make us feel simultaneously vulnerable and confident and therefore profoundly human. Even some of the songs’ titles say emit these feelings before they’re even heard like “Where Do We Go From Here” and “Please Come Around”. These universal questions posed in refrains and melodies that may seem simple, in my opinion make them not only more relatable but also more direct.

“Keep Careful” is a wonderfully strong album that won’t beat you over the head with any one component of the music. Sam Vicari has found a conscience sonic balance and keeps an even hand within his wonderfully crafted album. This album is like the sibling of a close friend, its features and qualities are familiar, and yet the sibling has its own unique attributes and the ability to be there for you in different capacities than your original friend. You wouldn’t get rid of your original friend, or ditch other bands for Vicari, but both can be a welcomed, gratifying addition to your life.

St. Vincent's "Actor" by Matt Hogg

2009-10-24T21:36:00.000-07:00

Now I figure I'd better do something more contemporary. With Camera Obscura, Feist, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Metric, She & Him and even Scarlett Johansson already on the indie scene, there's a lot of competition for the top woman on the indie scene but I'd like to introduce you to a definite contender, St. Vincent and her magnificent album Actor.

Actor is the breakthrough second album from St. Vincent AKA Annie Clark, former member of the Polyphonic Spree. However you don't get any of the Spree's trademark heaven-looking lyrics or singing. This album is down in the muck and rolling around laughing. Vincent's guitar work is Actor's most immediately noticeable trait. It gets wildly distorted on The Neighbors and single Actor Out of Work, and it picks and twangs in Laughing With a Mouth of Blood. Her voice is also instantly recognizable, think Feist taken down an octave and then given a morbid streak.

St. Vincent sounds desperate on quite a few of the songs. On Save Me from What I Want, seventeen cold showers couldn't wash away whatever it is she is trying to get away from. She berates the man she thinks she loves calling him a boxer in the ring with brass knuckles underneath, a liar, a supplement, and a host of other less than stellar things. In Marrow she needs H-E-L-P. Despite all this she sounds very confident, even when asking for help she projects the air of not needing it. This is what I found most intriguing about this album.

The Strangers digs a hole deeper and deeper, or as she puts it "paints the black hole blacker." The Bed almost plays like Peter and the Wolf, with its holdup and accompanying violin. The Party is a more straight forward piano ballad, complete with oowoos for a chorus. The Neighbors plays with the same themes as XTC's excellent Respectable Street. Except that it's more of a celebration of what you do that the neighbors don't know about then mocking the ones that are judging you.

Each of the songs works on it's own but as a collection they have an eerie, almost ghostly quality to them. The album artwork has St. Vincent looking off to her right and you get the sense you're not getting the full story when she's singing to you. She has a mysterious, exotic quality to her singing and songwriting that leaves you wanting more yet still satisfied with what you get. It's a terrific album from start to finish and its one my favorites of this year.

Joanna Newsom's "Milk-Eyed Mender" by Jenna Slesinski

2009-10-12T20:56:00.000-07:00

Last week as I was driving my mother to a doctor’s appointment, Neutral Milk Hotel’s “Two Headed Boy” came up on a mix, and as the song played, my mom made commented: “He really sounded like he was struggling on that note. Why didn’t they fix that in recording?” I tried to explain how good artists don’t have to have ‘good singing’ voices. My mother, who is part of the Motown generation, (and was never one who ‘got’ Dylan in the 60’s, or ever) couldn’t understand how sometimes getting past a singer’s voice is needed to enjoy the song. This ability to get past a singer’s voice is why I think more people don’t understand how wonderful Joanna Newsom’s music can be.

If I ever played anything from Newsom’s album Milk-Eyed Mender, especially “Peach, Plum, Pear” my mom would absolutely hate it, and sadly she’s in the majority. “Peach, Plum, Pear” was the first Joanna Newsom song I had ever heard and when it came on I was shocked and I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was also repelled. I asked my friend who had put the song on what was this noise and he told me it takes at least three full listens to get Joanna Newsom. When I would listen to Newsom in college, my roommate would walk in my room and ask, “Is this the girl whose voice I hate,” I would say yes and she’d promptly turn and leave the room. I can’t remember how long it took for me to really begin to enjoy Milk-Eyed Mender, but it has become my favorite Newsom album (more than Ys which wonderful, but also not as tonally abrasive).

Where Ys sounds rich and complex, Milk-Eyed Mender sounds deceivingly simple. This deceptive simplicity is what I find so attractive in this album. Although most of the melodic accompaniment to Newsom’s intriguing lyrics is sparse and not deeply layered, it proves that a song does not need to depend on a multitude of instrumentation to be complex. The silences in the song create an air that is able to move within the songs which generates a more timeless folk or ballad feel.

I also think that the empty space within the songs allows them to generate multiple connotations. “Sprout and the Bean” is used in a horror movie and to the watcher becomes not just eerie but very creepy, and yet until a friend made me watch the in a lingerie commercial which used the songs intro). Now I understand that the context of the film in which the song is placed makes it seem scary, but I think if the song were more than her voice and a harp there would be less room for interpretation and more concrete. I think it is the fact that her songs can take on a more fluid feeling makes them unique in the time of effects pedals and Autotone. The fact that there is unashamed space within the songs allows Newsom’s lyrics to really shine.

As a music listener, as well as a lifelong book worm, I have found that I am more musically drawn to interesting or smart lyrics than a unique guitar riff. Not that I don’t appreciate complicated rhythms and a charging bass line, but if the lyrics don’t strike me as captivating then I’m most likely going to dismiss it. Joanna Newsom’s lyrics are thankfully impossible to dismiss.

Even though Newsom’s story telling abilities may not be as linear and direct in this album, her use of language and word placement is so rich and unique that it creates incomparable sonic qualities and rhythms within the music. The fact that the Decemberists, who with the help of Colin Meloy, are known for their lyrical execution covered Newsom’s “Bridges and Balloons” for an EP speaks volumes of her mastery of the English language. Listening to Joanna Newsom may require some to use their dictionaries. These dictionary-grabbing words aren’t placed on some high pedestal either, which I love. They seem natural and even at times disposable. Just one stanza in “Bridges and Balloons” includes two complex references to Mediterranean sailing (“our caravel… and lateen sails”) as well as a reference to C. S. Lewis’s Narnia (Cair Paravel). These words and phrases are not given any more focus or weight than any other. Her mentions of thimbles and throwing around words like taciturn may make you think that you’re talking to someone grandma, but it is exhuming of dead phrases and words that generates such a love for Newsom’s songs.

These songs seem to live in both the past and the present. It’s almost as if Newsom came from a world of traditional folk ballads and was able to update the songs without losing their authentic soul. Maybe her songs seem too new to some or too foreign to others; however, to me it sounds odd enough to keep your attention but recognizable to feel familiar (once you give her the three listen rule to get over the shock of her voice).

Steely Dan's “Two Against Nature” by Nick Kieper

2009-10-11T16:34:00.000-07:00

“Look in my eyes: Can’t you see the core is frozen? You can’t ask me to access the dreams I don’t have now.” —Steely Dan, “West of Hollywood”

My whiteness has never been a matter of doubt, but few would have expected me to reach this extreme. My whitest characteristics always have been rooted firmly in some subversion: I am Scotch-Irish/German, but I look Jewish; I am of middle class origins, but I am not rich and have power over nobody; I neither own an SUV nor ride my bike everywhere. With this sense of balance in place, nobody ever could have expected me to handpick a Steely Dan album as my absolute favorite.

Let me preface by saying I never bought Two Against Nature. My dad had it in his CD collection, and I discovered it back in high school. I had been aware of its existence, largely through the many punchlines of its incestuous “Cousin Dupree,” but was otherwise indifferent. At the time I finally played Nature, I was listening to Top 40 radio, plenty of Barenaked Ladies, some Billy Joel, and a lot of The Beatles. I suppose, in retrospect, Steely Dan was an easy extension of those flavors: from white to whiter to whitest.

The title track grabbed me first; it is track three, but “Gaslighting Abbie” and “What a Shame About Me” didn’t mean much to me at the time. It comes up soft but quick. Some bongos, some tings on the ride, some light electric piano, all lead up to the short, percussive bursts of saxophone that sound like dry heaving and sneezing, if they were fun. These all distract you from the groove you cannot even perceive until the bass outlines the 6-8 skeleton these disparate rhythms pulsate around. A short distorted guitar solo introduces the lyrics:
Bad news breaking in 18A
Missy’s kitty turned inside out, she say
Spider king demon and that whole crew
‘Cross the lobby the wicker wing chair flew.

The rest of the song continues much in the same vein, popping English like a foreign language, paying tribute to urban vignettes and tales of bizarre mundanity. The brass, piano and guitar all interlock beautifully, always hesitant to repeat themselves. The song says so much—in its words, in its music—that its listeners can learn something new five years later.

I don’t mean to discount the rest of the album, for it is all deadly powerful. I didn’t realize that at the time, though I liked the whole thing and enjoyed listening to it. However, I never really understood it as a full concept until I started to pay attention to the second track, “What a Shame About Me.”

The main character is “stacking cutouts at The Strand” when old flame Franny walks in the door, on break from her fame and success. They catch up, comparing stories and lives, reminiscing about old friends and recounting their successes, generally making small talk. Over the course of the conversation, he sketches out the consequences of undergraduate tenure:
I’m still working on that novel, but I’m just about to quit
‘Cause I’m worrying about the future now, or maybe this is it
It’s not all that I thought it would be… What a shame about me.

In the face of all this success, all he has to offer are his meager attempts at merely getting along. He knows where he stands when stacked against his peers, but neither of them can say anything about it. Finally, Franny suggests they “grab a cab to my hotel and make believe we’re back at our old school.”
I said, ‘Babe, you look delicious, and you’re standing very close
‘But, like, this is lower Broadway, and you’re talking to a ghost.
‘Take a good look, it’s easy to see. What a shame about me.’

“What a Shame” is a fable about middle-aged depression, emasculation, and the unbearable weightlessness of a lifetime of failure. It’s about a life that never quite went anywhere, despite a world of promise and potential. It’s a tangible passion play, a terrible view of many lives of people we know and love.

The rest of the album continues the theme. The love songs (“Almost Gothic,” “Negative Girl”) are about bad ideas and temptation. “Jack of Speed” lists the interventionist necessities of a friend’s coked-up burnout boyfriend who is “gone—he walks through the old routines, but he’s gone—guaranteed.” The title character in “Janie Runaway” is one of the beautiful people who never does much except be beautiful and have a wonderful time—but more to the point, it is about what she is running from. The incestuous instincts of “Cousin Dupree” all proceed from the main character having “come back home to plan my next move” at his aunt’s place. These terrible tales about unemployment and disillusionment are wonderfully bleak, drearily colorful, and ultimately depressing, if you listen to what Donald Fagen and Walter Becker say about their wacky, post-Kerouackian comrades.

Before the words, though, the music grabs you. This is the most complex and engaging smooth jazz I’ve ever heard, between the rough funk of the bass, the deft pacing of the percussion, the sharp guitar jabs and vivid brass sections. This isn’t the sound of rebellion and passion. It is intentionally dispassionate, a mild yelp from the bland nightmare of aging. It is beautifully orchestrated and goes nowhere; it is extravagantly written about nothing; it is a calm, sober rendering of pre-death afterlives that makes no pretenses about fame, fortune, or success: exactly the warning we twenty-somethings need before we find ourselves there.

I recommend this album for: Staring dramatically into an overcast horizon; reading the New York Times while smoking some expensive weed; crying.

The Mountain Goat's "All Hail West Texas" by Matthew Hogg

2009-10-10T17:00:00.000-07:00

Jenna suggested we started with an album that influenced us if we couldn't think of anything to review. All Hail West Texas was not the first, or even the second, Mountain Goats album that I heard but it changed the way I listened to them, and albums in general. Normally I would cherry pick the songs I liked best and make mixes so I could listen to them over and over again. AHWT starts off with 5 great songs, and I would find myself just listening to it in its entirety. Doing this really grounds you in the album and allows you to hear new things whenever you listen to it. You also definitely get a sense of place, as you would expect with an album with such a title. Most of the songs mention towns and landmarks in Texas but even in the ones that don't you get the same sense from the open arrangements and Darnielle's spartan storytelling.

This is the last of the tape-hiss Mountain Goats albums; for most of the album it's just John Darnielle, his guitar and his endless array of interesting characters. This lends itself to the immediacy of each of these stories. Every person is at a crossroads at some point in this album and most make decisions. You start with The Best Ever Death Metal Band In Denton with Cyrus and Jeff. I'll let Darnielle tell you their story:

jeff and cyrus believed in their hearts they were headed
for stage lights and leer jets, and fortune and fame.
so in script that made prominent use of a pentagram,
they stenciled their drumheads and guitars with their names.

this was how cyrus got sent to the school
where they told him he'd never be famous.
and this was why jeff,
in the letters he'd write to his friend,
helped develop a plan to get even.

He really gets you on their side so that by the end when we're chanting "Hail Satan!" it's almost like a prayer to God instead.

A star running back till he injured himself and started dealing acid; people from all over the world find solace in a small town bar outside of Dallas; a young man finds freedom on the back of his girlfriend's motorcycle; a new father struggles to deal with his newborn child. These are five of the stories Darnielle tells and as diverse as they are, they fit together like elements of a painting. From Jenny's big orange sun to the tall glasses of sweet iced tea underneath sweet gum trees of Balance, you can see, feel, and taste his vision of west Texas.

You also get the Mountain Goats signature sense of humor. Some of their best songs (No Children, Cubs in Five, and Golden Boy to name a few) are very funny. Fault Lines is another song in that line, where a relationship is disintegrating but the upbeat sound and Darnielle's inflection makes you laugh. Selling acid was a bad idea/selling it to a cop was a worse one. The Mountain Goats are the only band I know where I can get rousing anthems, somber ballads, jokes, philosophical tangents and a lot of heart all in one place and All Hail West Texas is a microcosm of all that.

-Matthew Hogg

Welcome to the Blog

2009-10-07T22:17:00.000-07:00

Welcome to a collective music review blog aimed at expanding the ideas of what a review blog can and should be. This blog will aim to embrace the clashing of opinions created by good music. I wanted to celebrate musical opinions and tastes beyond my own, and so I present the Guerrilla Music Review.

Jenna