Category Archives: CD

Klark Kent • Klark Kent [CD, LP]

KLARK KENT has come out of seclusion! With a new kollection of the Policeman’s solo recordings from back in the day, there is now ample evidence to support the opinion that Stewart Copeland was, indeed, the one with all the talent. Available as a 2LP vinyl or 2CD kompact disc release (downloads are also available), Klark Kent is the kleverly-titled kompilation that brings together all of the one man (band)’s recordings, including never-before-released demos (on the CD version).

Kent’s discography starts back in 1978 when his first two singles were released. An 8-song vinyl EP, Klark Kent, followed in 1980. The secret about Kent’s identity wasn’t exactly safe, as the press release included in the US promo, for instance, made barely-veiled konnections to Copeland. Intrepid Police fans knew. I knew (having that US promo version, with press release inside, helped). What is so kool about Kent’s tunes is that they’re snappy and fun. If you’re unfamiliar with Klark Kent (either the original 8-song or this new 18-song version), think of the songs attributed to Copeland on the first two Police albums (“Contact,” “On Any Other Day”). I played the hell out of this on my college radio show back in the early ’80s, especially “Don’t Care” and the teenage freedom epic, “Away from Home.” It may be due to the sheer exuberance of Kent’s tunes that I lost interest in The Police as they got bigger; the quirky fun evaporated as Sting took kontrol of the band (assuming he didn’t already have it). A couple of years after the EP’s release, nascent music video channel MTV aired the IRS Records-subsidised The Cutting Edge, which featured IRS and other record labels’ new wave artists and used “Theme for Kinetic Ritual” as its theme.

Klark Kent released numerous singles in the UK, nearly all of which included tracks not on the original 10″. (“Don’t Care” made the Top 50 in England and included 2 non-EP tracks, for instance.) This new Klark Kent (kinda konfusing; kouldn’t they kome up with something more katchy?) has all of the early B-sides and tracks released on the 1995 Kollected Works CD, and you get the never before released, bombastic “It’s Gonna Rain,” the similarly over the top “Someone Else,” and Kent’s lone Khristmas tune, “Yo Ho Ho,” which had originally appeared on IRS Records’ Just in Time for Christmas (among other compilations). In all there are 18 tracks on the 2LP and first disc of the CD set and they’re all alotta fun. Disc 2 of the CD set features a dozen of Klark’s demo versions and they’re all pretty interesting, too, some being quite different from their final, official versions. The vinyl release, though, is a beautiful pressing on thick wax and has a great gatefold cover, too. You’ll probably need your readers to check the kredits, though, so be ready for that. (You youngsters, just skip past that last comment. Oh wait – you’re already past it now. My bad.) Since Kent played all the instruments, though, you may not need the kredits to enhance your enjoyment when listening to his amazingly cheerful discography.

So there you have it. Klark Kent is back and the best thing to do about it is to welcome him into your home. Krank him up! – Marsh Gooch

4/5 (BMG 538907281, 2023)

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The Beatles • “Now and Then” [7″, CD single]

It’s new, it’s now!, it’s… odd. THE BEATLES have returned to the charts with what is being touted as their last single and the press is all over it. The YouTube video brigade has weighed in heavily, too, but there’s not much opinion about the music – it’s all “the cover is horrible,” “this one’s on clear-with-blue-streaks vinyl,” “the packaging on the CD single’s cheap and thin,” etc. “Now and Then” is certainly a pretty good song but as can be the case so often these days, the marketing of the single and the timing of its release has taken the spotlight. (I’ve already mentioned some of it here before talking about the song itself!) Well, Fab Four Fans, I’ll give you my opinion and it’s worth every cent you paid for it.

“Now and Then” is a sweet, melancholy song. It started out as a late ’70s cassette recording of just John Lennon singing at the piano. Yoko sat on it (literally, I don’t know) for decades and in the mid ’90s Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr attempted to do something with it the way they had with similar Lennon home recordings (“Real Love” and “Free As a Bird,” which were tarted up by the remaining Beatles and released as singles and on the first two Anthology collections). They shelved it at the time and 25 years later took another crack at it (without George, since he died in 2002). AND WHAT WE HAVE NOW, THEN, is a nice tune augmented by every trick in the Beatles’ book. Paul and Ringo (okay, it’s mostly Paul) have heaped so much on top of John’s humble recording that it practically buckles under the weight. (Hey Paul, you mean you didn’t add any theremin? What’s wrong with you?!) Seriously. Somewhere under multiple guitars, orchestra and more is a nice little song trying to get some air. I also find that what has been added sounds off-time from John – like everything else is just… off… center. (Houston, we have a latency problem.) And finally, Paul and Ringo’s backing vocals add a very weird flavor: you’ve got these two old men, over 80 years old, singing along with 37 year old Lennon and it’s kind of eerie. When Paul, George and Ringo added vocals to those mid ’90s Anthology centerpieces, their voices hadn’t changed so notably so it sounded like everything could have been recorded around the same time. Now there’s a noticeable difference. (Your mileage may vary…)

“Now and Then” is still a beautiful song, and it has brought a wee lil’ tear to each of my eyes nearly every time I’ve played it (I bought the clear vinyl, for those of you keeping score at home). Who knows where it will land in The Beatles canon? It could end up sitting right next to their greatest, or it could end up at the kids’ table. But it’s The Beatles! Yeah. Yeah? Yeah! – Marsh Gooch

3/5 (Apple/Parlophone Records 0602448145864/45-R 4814586, 2023)

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Marshall Crenshaw • Field Day [CD, LP]

Yours truly’s a bit late on getting this review completed. Reissued this summer, MARSHALL CRENSHAW’s Field Day has come out in a new edition with interesting bonus tracks and an explosive sound that’s nowhere near as bombastic as some said it was back in the day.

I don’t remember the furor being as big as is stated in the notes to this new 40th anniversary CD (also out on vinyl), but apparently it left enough of a mark that Marshall says in this edition’s booklet, “I think that all the criticism it got back then was completely lame.” Before we dig in to that, let’s just say now that Field Day is packed with some of Crenshaw’s best songs and sounds real good this far out from 1983. Producer Steve Lillywhite was a young, hot shot British producer then who was known – like fellow compatriot producer Hugh Padgham – as one who liked to use a ton of gated snare drum in his mixes. (You know the sound I’m talking about?! It was on a crazy number of hit records in the ’80s…) The critics thought that would ruin Crenshaw’s momentum, or uniqueness, or something. I was so hot for MC’s first record that I could barely wait for the followup, and when I heard that he was recording it with Lillywhite, I thought it was a great idea. Field Day arrived and I loved it right outta the… ummm… gate. After Richard Gottehrer’s bright, snappy production on Marshall Crenshaw, I figured this guy was gonna give us a sort of modern take on the Phil Spector wall-of-sound. The moment lead-off track and single “Whenever You’re on My Mind” broke into full instrumentation, I thought I was right. Mostly, I am.

Field Day’s not only filled to its jingle-jangle gills with power pop hooks galore, like on “Try” and “One Day with You,” it’s got a brilliant take of a somewhat obscure early ’60s tune called “What Time Is It” that was seemingly purpose-built for Crenshaw’s merry band of popsters AND the production style Lillywhite would bring to the mixing board. Yes, that big gated snare really stands out on the LP’s final cut, “Hold It,” though it’s used more as a sound effect than for its humongous song-propulsion capabilities. Now, when you get to the bonus tracks, the instrumental “TV track” of “Our Town” definitely suffers from mega-gate, but this was meant to be a backing track for the band to sing and mime to on television (Lillywhite insisted they mix these; not sure why there’s not one for “Whenever You’re on My Mind,” which was the only single released from the album). Anyway, the inclusion of this and “Monday Morning Rock (TV Track)” don’t really support Crenshaw’s “lame” comment, since these two tracks weren’t publicly available back in ’83. I suppose hindsight – and 40 years of rock ’n’ roll – softens the, ummm, blow of Gategate.

Speaking of bonus tracks, I really enjoy the covers of “Jungle Rock” and the live version of “Little Sister.” Not sure I like the new album cover artwork, but that shouldn’t prevent me or you from digging this disc. Altogether, this release of Field Day shows us how the talented Mr. Crenshaw was both ahead of his time and woefully behind it at the same time… in a good way. – Marsh Gooch

3/5 (Yep Roc YEP-3058X, 2023)

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A Produce • Land of a Thousand Trances [2CD]

Ambient music is something I’ve never written about. I have been listening to it – or actively not listening to it – for a few decades now, ever since I was first turned on to one of Eno’s ambient releases (knowing me, I probably started with Ambient 1!) Trying to describe it really puts my writing and communication skills to the test, so when I saw that Independent Project was putting out a reissue of an ambient release by A PRODUCE called Land of a Thousand Trances, I decided to give it a listen. If I liked it enough I’d give it a go. And so here we are.

One thing you can say about ambient music is that it has the power to transport you to any number of places. Indeed, the more influences that seep into the music, the more likely you are to be taken out of your somewhat dark apartment with light blue carpet (hey, I’m renting this place!) and gently placed in a lightly breezy desert landscape, on top of an iceberg floating in the Antarctic, or among a large group of people beating out drums and other percussive objects to a heavy groove. Some ambient music I’ve heard is literally ambient: you almost wouldn’t know it was there if you didn’t see the record spinning or see the CD player’s digital counter showing the track and time info. But A Produce – the name Barry Craig used for his ambient projects – created music that could transport you somewhere exotic or put you in a trance right there in your living room.

Craig passed away in 2011 but this 1994 release (reissued and expanded in 2007) has continued to intrigue those who have come into its midst. Land of a Thousand Trances has now been re-reissued as a deluxe 2CD set with the full Independent Project treatment, including letterpress cover and a nice booklet giving you a little more information about A Produce and Craig’s philosophy about his music. What comes through listening to this release, including its bonus tracks like “The Dreaming Room” (both studio and live versions) is that there’s just as much room for Gilmour-ian electric guitar as there is for long, contemplative keyboard pads and textures or African drums and Aztec flutes. As attributed to Craig in this package, in relation to producing such music in the cacophonous atmosphere of L.A., “I like being near so many environments: the oceans, the desert, the mountains. These things influence me as much as the urban side of Los Angeles.” That all comes through on Land of a Thousand Trances. It’s highly worth your attention if ambient music floats your boat… or wisps you away on a desert breeze. – Marsh Gooch

3.5/5 (Independent Project IP090SECD, 2023)

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The Minus 5 • Calling Cortez (Neil Vol. 3) [CD]

“Don’t be denied” – it’s a line from the song of the same name, which also closes THE MINUS 5’s new album, Calling Cortez (Neil Vol. 3). (We’ll get to why it’s dubbed “Vol. 3” further on down the road…) Well, apparently my old friend Scott McCaughey won’t let himself be denied of releasing, what?, an album every other month just like his idol Neil Young! Granted, Scott puts his out under completely different names that keep you guessing a bit – Scott The Hoople, The Minus 5, The No Ones, The Baseball Project, Young Fresh Fellows, phew! – but still. The thing is (and I hate to say it), McCaughey’s stuff is sounding better than ever while Young’s releases aren’t as consistent. At least as far as I can tell, since I have not heard every single release Neil’s put out in the last decade (8 in 2022 alone, 3 so far this year). I haven’t been let down yet by The No Ones (see my reviews here), The Baseball Project (here) or Young Fresh Fellows (here). So I guess I’m not being denied, either. But I digress.

Calling Cortez is, apparently, an homage to Neil that started with Scott The Hoople’s Neil Vol. 1, which he self-released in 2020. (Neil Vol. 2 is MIA but slated for release sometime in the future, according to the Bandcamp page.) Only a handful of the tunes here are actually Neil Young songs, but they’re all quite good. I first found “Pocahontas” to be lacking the pathos of NY’s version, with its peppier, happier vibe. But it’s grown on me. And I really like the closer, “Don’t Be Denied,” a helluva lot. It appears to have been recorded live (you can hear some hoots and hollers near the beginning and end) and is solidly in the NY/Crazy Horse camp (though it appeared on Neil’s Horse-less 1973 album Time Fades Away). “Hitchhiker” has some nice, chiming piano chords and an excellent memoir-ish story (it’s from 2010’s LeNoise), and the others are pretty good, too.

Scott’s own tunes on Calling Cortez definitely fit in with the NY stuff, and sometimes are better than the man of the hour’s. Where Roky Erickson constantly heard white noise and alien planets in his head, McCaughey must channel rock ’n’ roll 24 hours a day. He’s certainly a big enough Neil Young fan that he probably has to be cognizant of his tunes coming out too “Neily,” and that may be why he created a “concept album” that could handle it. I really dig “Bad Fax” (with its punky Crazy Horse vibe and the chorus of “Everyone’s a work in progress”), “Empty Quiver” and “One Last Tank,” which laments those who have tried, flailed, floundered and failed while using up “one last tank of the American Dream.”

This time the Minus 5 isn’t noted explicitly but McCaughey and Peter Buck (who’s also a sometime member of The No Ones and The Baseball Project) are listed first, and then come guest appearances from everybody from Mike McCready (Pearl Jam) to Debbi Peterson (Bangles). (Oh yeah, for those keeping score, yes, Kurt “I’m Gonna Be Ubiquitous If It Kills Me” Bloch is here.) Calling Cortez is a real fun album and worth repeated listenings. Problem is, getting to know any one of McCaughey’s releases is difficult unless you just keep a stack of his various projects next to your stereo and shuffle through them and only them. But it can be done and this is one I’d definitely keep toward the top of the pile. – Marsh Gooch

4/5 (YepRoc YEP 3082, 2023)

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The 3 Clubmen • The 3 Clubmen [CD EP]

XTC’s Andy Partridge always seems to have a new project cooking. This one, THE 3 CLUBMEN, is a trio performing what I would call posh pop. The four songs on their EP, The 3 Clubmen, are smooth and kinda quirky. Think of the early, experimental XTC of Go 2 merged with the end-of-life XTC of Apple Venus and you’re getting close. Andy’s mates on this one are multi-instrumentalist Stu Rowe of The Lighterthief and singer/guitarist Jen Olive, who does the bulk of the singing. (Andy supplies supporting and backing vocals, among the various instruments he plays.)

Right from the start there’s a dreamy vibe to The 3 Clubmen, as evidenced on opening track “Aviatrix” (is that like a dominatrix-slash-flight attendant?), with its sing-songy verses and chorus of “Straight into the sun you shoot me like a gun/I’m flyyyyying, flyyyying, I’m coming undone.” Track 2, “Racecar,” has a definite Go 2 thing going on – I can hear hints of “Battery Brides” and its off-kilter, kooky time signature throughout. (Traces of the guitar slashes of latter day XTC “Wake Up” are also detected.) Following track “Green Green Grasshopper” sounds like it could almost be a Dukes of Stratosphear outtake, as if the Dukes were trying to tame their psychedelic tendencies and make them safe for the world of 2023. “Look at Those Stars” is a showcase for Olive’s mod, affected vocals, which border on being twee but with a decidedly more adult sound. The song’s message is a good one (things aren’t so good in my life “but, hey, would you look at those stars?”).

Don’t know if we’ll ever get another XTC album but at least Andy’s keeping busy with his “solo” releases. Something from him is better than nothing, and anything is at least something. Something/anything? Yes, The 3 Clubmen is really something. – Marsh Gooch

3/5 (Lighterthief TAB001, 2023; available via Burning Shed)

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The Teardrop Explodes • Culture Bunker 1978-82 [CD, LP]

You’d have to be completely off your rocker to add THE TEARDROP EXPLODES’ Culture Bunker 1978-82 to your music library. A 6CD set (also available in truncated vinyl form), this compilation includes a truckload of the obscure UK band’s even more obscure recordings – along with their semi-known “hit” singles – in a handy set that will sit alongside your other box sets crying out for your attention for years to come. I’m not saying you won’t occasionally pull it down from the shelf, look over its contents, and wonder if there’s time to dig in… because you will. But it could very well be that you’ll only play Discs 1 and 2: the ones with the familiar album and singles tracks that are really, truly, what keep you interested in The Teardrop Explodes in the first place.

As I sit in my chair (it’s not a rocker, incidentally) writing these words I’m actually listening to The Teardrop Explodes’ Wilder album, their second LP (from 1981). It’s easier to write about Julian Cope’s band by listening to the more tuneful stuff. What’s on Culture Bunker that is worth checking out is, I’m afraid, going to be appealing only to the most hardcore Teardrop fan, and quite possibly only once or twice in this lifetime. For instance, the live tracks on Disc 3 (entitled From Drug Puritan to Acid King; very apropos) are from the band’s very first gigs and have an annoyingly monotonous vibe – you know, the kind of gig you go to where you can tell the band is still trying to find its sound. The Teardrop Explodes were capable of coming up with some awfully great tunes, actually, like most of Wilder, so Culture Bunker serves what may be its ostensible purpose of showing how Cope & Co. got from point A (forming in Liverpool in 1978) to point B (breaking up in 1982), with a couple of handfuls of both highlights and turmoil in between to keep the thing afloat.

“What highlights are to be found in the Culture Bunker?” you ask. Well, there are multiple versions of Teardrop classics like “Sleeping Gas,” “Treason” and “Read It in Books” (original single and live versions), demos of later Julian Cope tunes “Screaming Secrets,” “World Shut Your Mouth” and “Pussyface,” and a rare cover demo of The Zombies’ “Butcher’s Tale.”  Naturally, there’s the stone cold killer “Passionate Friend,” and further good ones “Like Leila Khaled Said,” “Bouncing Babies” and “Reward.” In all there are 95 tracks on the CD version (and 81 on the vinyl) and nearly half of them are unreleased.

Do you need Culture Bunker? No. You need food, air and water. And friends. If you’re already a Teardrop Explodes aficionado, though, you may want to snap this box set up before they’re gone. Rumor has it that it is extremely limited, which isn’t surprising when you consider the cost of keeping something like this in print. The label could make a lot more money off of some Elton John/Rolling Stones/Beatles/insert-some-other-classic-rock-band box set; Culture Bunker is the kind of thing that gets released because some A&R person in charge of “catalog” has a hard-on for putting out something like this. I guess we should thank goodness for hard-ons, then. – Marsh Gooch

3.5/5 (Universal Music Recordings 3585940, 2023)

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The Baseball Project • Grand Salami Time! [CD, LP]

“Hey! Dying quails and frozen ropes or a can of corn…” What? It’s Grand Salami Time!, that’s what. When listening to THE BASEBALL PROJECT you’re gonna encounter a whole lot of catch phrases and slang terms, but don’t let that deter you from this (home) plate of rock ’n’ roll that just happens to be all about America’s National Pastime (baseball, that is). Actually more of a platter than a plate, there are fifteen – 15! – songs about baseball here, and this is the band’s FOURTH release! Jesus, is there really that much to say about a sport that seems to be in such decline these days? Apparently there is.

The Baseball Project, if you don’t already know, is made up of Scott McCaughey (The Minus 5/Young Fresh Fellows), Peter Buck and Mike Mills (R.E.M.), Steve Wynn (The Dream Syndicate) and Linda Pitmon (Filthy Friends, Alejandro Escovedo) – a “supergroup” if you like that kind of term. And as you might expect from their pedigree, the band puts a decidedly alternative rawk spin on these songs about baseball, using all the “stuff” they can get away with to get you to take a swing… even if you’re not a fan of the game you’re likely to go into extra innings listening to Grand Salami Time! What’s really cool about this one is the songs aren’t all happy-go-lucky, ah shucks cornpone about the game. Because, as any true baseball fan will tell you, it ain’t all grand slams, triple plays and successful suicide squeezes. There’s a lot of melancholy, sadness and heartbreak (boo hoo!) in the game – just ask any Mariners fan – and The Baseball Project projects that, too. “The Yips,” “Screwball,” “Fantasy Baseball Widow” and the epically sad “Journeyman” are just a few that’ll bring tears to yer eyes. It’s definitely nice to get not only the lyrics but McCaughey’s play-by-play commentary about the songs in the liner notes, which helps explain what is or isn’t going on in the songs, especially if you’re not as hardcore about the game as these folks are. The album definitely knocks it outta the park/clears the fence/insert-your-own-favorite-baseball-cliché-for-a-good-thing here.

There may be other bands in the world dedicating themselves to one sport or another (have you heard The Duckworth Lewis Method, cricket fans?), but none are as engaging or prolific as The Baseball Project. If you’re a fan of hard hitting power pop ’n’ roll (or any of the bands these musicians are typically associated with) you’ll surely want to get out the rye bread and mustard, gramma… ’cause it’s Grand Salami Time! – Marsh Gooch

4/5 (Omnivore OVCD-517, 2023)

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The Three O’Clock • Baroque Hoedown [CD, LP]

Set your wayback machine to Los Angeles, 1982. THE THREE O’CLOCK crowd into a small recording studio and lay down their first recordings, to be released as a humble 5-song EP called Baroque Hoedown on local Frontier Records. The foursome go on to spearhead what was coined as the “Paisley Underground,” a loose group of new indie groups that included The Bangles, The Dream Syndicate and Rain Parade. A movement in which young folks of the ’80s paid tribute to young musicians from the ’60s, it didn’t so much “take off” as it did permeate the growing college rock/MTV Cutting Edge world. (A couple of those bands found fame beyond that original clique.) Make your way back to now, 40 something years later, and that lil’ ol’ extended play has continued to inspire, enough so that YepRoc Records has reissued it with four more tracks and made a proper, exciting LP out of it. Okay, “LP” may be a bit of a stretch… Baroque Hoedown, even with bonus tracks, clocks in at under 30 minutes. Still.

The Three O’Clock lead off their debut release with the curiously titled “With a Cantaloupe Girlfriend,” which certainly caught my eye as a freshman English major-slash-college radio DJ. I dropped the needle on it and it caught my ear, too, with its insistent intro drum beat and guitar/keyboard swirl-o-rama. Bassist/lead singer Michael Quercio’s nasal, boyish, English-affected voice exudes wonder and respect for the sounds that his group pay tribute to, whether he and Gregg Gutierrez, Mickey Mariano and Danny Benair are doing their own accomplished tunes (“Cantaloupe Girlfriend,” “I Go Wild,” the excellent “Marjorie Tells Me,” “As Real As Real”) or their killer cover of The Easybeats’ “Sorry.” The band created a vibe that brought mid ’60s L.A. to early ’80s L.A. without sounding dated or cloying. And at the original five songs, it definitely left me and many like-minded kids wanting more. Of the bonus tracks here – all recorded around the same time – we get original “In Love In Too” and two more covers, “Feel a Whole Lot Better” (The Byrds) and “Lucifer Sam” (Pink Floyd), that are real zingers. (These originally came out on a 1983 French release that added them to the original five.)

Well, my friends, The Three O’Clock’s Baroque Hoedown is again available for your insatiable desire to dig what was put down before… I hope you’re ready for the big smile that’s gonna appear between your lucky ears. – Marsh Gooch

4/5 (YepRoc YEP-2730, 1982/2023)

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The Damned • Darkadelic [CD, LP]

THE DAMNED are still with us. That’s basically a good thing, for it’s hard for me to imagine my life without these clowns in it. I started listening to them in my early 20s and have never stopped. The problem is, they’re just not what they used to be – which is to be expected, but still…

This week saw the release of Darkadelic, The Damned’s fourth album of new-material in the 21st century, and it’s quite similar to their last one, Evil Spirits. I declined to review that one at the time because I felt it was nowhere near as good as 2001’s Grave Disorder, a genuinely great album, so I just couldn’t do it. Still, this new one, though flawed, has some great moments. I’ll go with “Beware of the Clown” and “The Invisible Man” as the two tracks that positively stand out, but the bulk of the rest of the album feels a bit like “generic Damned” to me. And I hate to say this! I love these guys! But there’s just something missing. There’s a vague “phoning it in” feel, for one thing, and then there’s the production. Right from the start Darkadelic feels like it’s missing some top end, sounding a bit muffled until Dave Vanian’s voice comes in and tells you that the mix itself is a bit off. With Evil Spirits, with production by the great Tony Visconti, it was more an issue of the songs themselves. This time the songs are better but the production isn’t. At least they still rock.

Oh, what is a Damned fan to do? Well, in my case, I am always interested in what they’re up to so I stay tuned in. You may likely find you like Darkadelic, if only because  – despite their name – The Damned are still with us. Hallelujah. – Marsh Gooch

3/5 (earMusic 0217847EMU, 2023)

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