Album Review: The Wood Brothers- The Muse

The year-end top-ten-album list I just submitted to the official gatekeepers is dominated by hip-hop and jazz entries.  I'm pleased with my choices, but obviously a brief list won't fully represent my listening habits.  For instance, I listen to a lot of folk and folk-rock ranging from favorite albums by the late Bill Morrissey to current folk scare acts like the Head and the Heart that are inflicted on me by members of my compound.  Because its relaxed tone is reminiscent of creaky old albums by The Band, I'm particularly partial to The Muse, the latest effort by The Wood Brothers.  I'm not about to forsake my beloved jazz, hip-hop and metal for The Muse, but it's pretty solid.  Here's the video for the album's title track.


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I reviewed Harry Connick's concert at the Midland theater on Sunday.

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Kansas City rapper Ace Duce has died.

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Dalima, a Kansas City rapper associated with Tech N9ne, was involved in a shooting in Salina several months ago.  (Tip via Tony's Kansas City.)

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Composer John Tavener has died.  I reviewed a performance of one of his works in 2011.

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The video for Josh Berwanger's "Time Traveler" is RIYL: Warriors (the movie), 1989, Cheap Trick. 

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Marcus Yates, the artist known as Obergeek just a few months ago, has released Dark Taupe Schemata . RIYL: XV, Tech N9ne, Kid Cudi.

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Danny Brown's cameo is my favorite part of the new interactive Bob Dylan video that's threatening to explode the internet today.

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Esperanza Spalding campaigns for the closure of Guantanamo in "We Are America".

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Death's edition of "What's In My Bag" is pretty great.

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El Pelon del Mikrophone's "No voy a llorar" is my idea of a good time.

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Here's a track from Neneh Cherry's forthcoming solo album, her first in 16 years.  RIYL: M.I.A., The Slits, Roni Size.

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I mentioned Marco Polo's PA2's The Director's Cut in the previous post.  I finally got around to listening to the supremely entertaining 80-minute project that serves as a tribute to old-school hip-hop.  RIYL: Pharoahe Monch, Large Professor, King Tee.

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Oh, Kanye West,, how I love you!

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By request- here's the soundtrack of my childhood: "Hee hee he haw haw haw".

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Kansas City Click: My official picks are published here.

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)

Album Review: Rodan- Fifteen Quiet Years

Mods and rockers.  East coast or west coast hip hop.  Acoustic Miles and Dylan versus the plugged-in versions of the icons.  The seemingly mandatory obligation to pick a side confounds me.  I never understood why punk/indie-rock and metal had to be mutually exclusive genres.  I love Husker Dü and Judas Priest, Fugazi and Van Halen. 

That's why bands like Rodan appeal to me.  Rodan's three-year existence ended in 1994, before subgenres like metalcore and mathrock became codified.  It's easy to suggest that the members of Rodan were simply in thrall of Sonic Youth and fellow Louisville band Slint, but I hear Rodan's music as a bracing hybrid of metal and punk that contains traces of both the Minutemen and Megadeth.

A press release for Fifteen Quiet Years notes that "the "collection includes the 1994 BBC Peel session, together with all of Rodan's long-out-of-print 7"s and compilation tracks."  It will be released on June 11.  A new interview with the surviving members of Rodan in The Village Voice provides additional context on the project.

Fifteen Quiet Years is highly recommended to listeners nostalgic for the era in which left-of-the-dial college radio served as a vital lifeline and for a slightly younger audience eager to explore the sounds that inspired bands like the Appleseed Cast and Cursive.


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Marva Whitney's God, the Devil & James Brown: Memoirs of a Funky Diva was published last month.

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"No Touching" is putting OoberGeek on the map. (Via the Mills Record Company Blog.)

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The video for Hospital Ships' "Servants" is messed up (in a good way).

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The Grisly Hand is giving away a live version of "Chucky".

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I misjudged Rittz.  The Strange Music signee sounds pretty good with Mike Posner on "Switch Lanes".

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Myron & E's "If I Gave You My Love" is RIYL Northern Soul, 1968, Jerry Butler.

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Howard Reich wrote a profile of Bob Koester.

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"… but the little girls understand."  I Heart Local Music documents Thursday's sold-out show headlined by Marina and the Diamonds.

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Scout Niblett's "Gun" is remarkable.  RIYL: Heartless Bastards, Liz Phair, Lenny Kaye.

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Wut.

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Chuck D is angry.  (And I like it.)

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Kansas City Click: My official picks are published here.

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)