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Mark Lanegan

Once the sound had fled my head and I'd located it as coming from somewhere inside the bottom portion of that middle escalator, the ghost didn't stay around very long...a few days perhaps. And so I'm not surprised then to find it almost a year later lingering like cigarette smoke in the first moments of "One Way Street," the leading song off of Lanegan's fifth solo release, Field Songs. When the sun dries up each night, Lanegan's adopted home of Los Angeles has always been a harbor for dark shadows, and Lanegan himself has always known how to take those inner turmoils and, with them, create hauntingly beautiful pieces that linger on long after the sound has passed.

Joined, as always, on guitar by his brother-in-arms Mike Johnson, with additional drum and bass duties courtesy Barrett Martin (who played with Lanegan in the Screaming Trees--R.I.P.) and Ben Shepherd, respectively, Field Songs is Lanegan's most fully realized release to date. Taking the transcendental shudder of Whiskey for the Holy Ghost with tracks like "One Way Street," the quiet serenade of Scraps at Midnight ("Pin Hill Serenade"), and the folk-tinged influences of I'll Take Care of You ("Don't Forget Me"), Field Songs creates a bittersweet elixir of naked honesty. Here we find the gentle roll of "Kimiko's Dream House," co-written by close friend Jeffrey Lee Pierce (Gun Club) who died in 1996 from persistent health problems before the two had the chance to record; the achingly sad "She Done Too Much" ("Got so sad today, she done too much / Although I had the same, she done too much / And it's a bad, bad feeling that you get when you get so alone"); and the album's closer, "Fix," a slow burning blues raga that, behind Lanegan's gruff vocals, finds the distorted howl of the same ghost that began Field Songs.

Lanegan, now looking like a fit, much younger Tom Waits, has always given us salvation through his suffering. Here at last with Field Songs, it looks as if he's mastered his own demons and found his own redemption by turning the specters of his poisons into sacred wine. "Oh, the glorious sound of the one way street / and you can't get it down without crying."

-Craig Young
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Unsane, Insane and Mentally Deranged won't set the world afire, but it may spontaneously combust just for the hell of it. The pounding, punishing drums of Peter Stjarnvind propel Murder Squad, but Matti Karki's twisted, gurgled vocals give it direction. Murder Squad is fairly inventive lyrically, which is odd, but you might find out that their demented tales have quite a bit of sick truth to them. Songs like "Twisted High," "The Return of the Rotten," "Spraying Lead" and "Sent Home In a Box" are juicy slabs of prime death metal. Ufo Cederlund's guitar work on "Impaled" is awesome. I must confess I didn't think I'd care much for Murder Squad, but after a few listens, I find myself quite impressed with Unsane, Insane and Mentally Deranged.

-Sabrina Haines
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Nebula

On To the Center, Nebula pursued a dichotomy of trance-inducing space jaunts and greasy, low-slung punk metal. Only on "So Low" were the two melded into something similar to what takes shape on Charged. The warm rolling tones of "Travelin' Man's Blues" and "This One" pervade even the harder tracks, as Glass' syrupy riffs and Romano's adventurous stick work coat any sign of the sloppy abrasiveness that invaded parts of To the Center. Glass has made huge leaps in his ability to carry out a groove. He still plays with the freewheeling abandon and blues-stung attack of Nebula's previous efforts, but on Charged he lays down a much steadier foundation of song-driving rhythms that draws more out of his slippery-fingered leads than ever before. It seems as though Glass will always be playing catch-up with his vocals while his guitar repeatedly steals the show, but there are signs of change in songs like "Beyond" and "This One," as he eases into a deeper, fuller tone, picking different spots in which to sing rather than simply following the lead guitar line with his voice. His burnt-out delivery finds a home beside the organic strumming of "Goodbye Yesterday," a song that features deft use of a repeating one note keyboard line that enunciates the electric push that emerges after the chillin'-in-the-flatbed feel of the intro. Charged is a perfect companion for when you're rollin' down the highway, the blazing summer sun drawing the wavy haze off the blacktop.

-Dan Cullity
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ohGr

-Jeff Ashley
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Pigface

-Jeff Ashley
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Luckily for those of us hankering for a true Painters fix, Sub Pop pulled Old Ramon from mothballs and resurrected it without edits. The intervening three years have not affected the songs on Old Ramon. Like the rest the Painters' oeuvre, the music is timeless, but this album undoubtedly verges on a more mature style--sadly losing some of the bittersweet poetry and desperate fragility in the process.

In spite of its maturity--or perhaps as a result of it--Old Ramon is an extended confessional of sorts, falling somewhere between the nostalgia of the first self-titled album (from 1993, known as the "rollercoaster" record by its cover) and the solid, intelligent music of Ocean Beach (1995). In fact, it seems more anachronistic than its delayed arrival would indicate. Old Ramon is not the logical follow-up to 1996's Songs for a Blue Guitar, an album which suggested the band was moving into a more commercial world.

Circumstances might have a lot to do with it. The songs were written while the band was in flux. Kozelek was living in Oaxaca, Mexico, far away from his San Francisco home; Mercury, their label at the time, was fast approaching its demise. The homesickness and estrangement led to songs like "Wop-a-Din-Din," the wistful tribute to Kozelek's cat which opens the album, and the driving riffs of "Between Days." "Cruiser," a lullaby of dreamlike reminiscence, was penned on a flight from Los Angeles to San Francisco.

The Painters have kept to their traditional format: structuring their music around one acoustic guitar. But the gritty groove of "Byrd Joel" and the crackling electric guitar of the eleven-minute "River" show that the band was beginning to explore--and re-explore--different musical niches within their tranquil, reflective world. Their reunion with Billy Anderson, the engineer from their earliest albums, during the Old Ramon sessions highlights the delicate blend of roots and growth on this LP.

Some of the tracks on Old Ramon--"Kavita," "Golden," and "Michigan"--had already found their way into the Painters' setlist on their penultimate tour. (Live versions have appeared intermittently on Napster in the past year or so, but it's a relief to finally have them in their proper form.) Although it is apparent with "Golden," one could argue that remaining two were also Kozelek's quiet elegies to John Denver, whose unexpected death came just after Kozelek had produced the tribute album Take Me Home in 1997. Their simple, enveloping melodies are the best homage to a folk singer who composed so many of the same.

The press release notes that a twenty-minute version of "Michigan" "sadly...fell to the cutting room floor" during the decision-making meetings. A shame, really. But, thinking optimistically, that just leaves more material for the next Red House Painters release. Old Ramon, however, should satiate demand--for a little while at least.

-Eric J. Iannelli
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Seafood

The album is indie-pop mopey bliss, for both good and bad. "Easy Path" kicks things off with up-tempo pep before giving way to the heady brashness of "Belt." "Dear Leap the Ride" has a Nick Drake country-inflected warmness to it, while "This Is Not an Exit"--a UK Top 100 charter--should do as well over here. "Led by Bison" is the shoegazer number on the album; good for grabbing your sweetie and holding her tight, or for those long drives in the rain when you've got no one but yourself. The rest of the bunch consists of guitar-driven numbers yearning for FM alterna-radio acceptance, or down-tempo affairs struggling for poignancy without becoming too self-indulgent.

Even though the hidden track at the end of the album deserves a bullet through the brain, with Surviving the Quiet Seafood have crafted an album that has the ability to do well on the radio while being able to survive the sharks of indie credibility. That's not a feat so easily accomplished. Hell, maybe they'll even tour the West Coast, because songs like "Easy Path," "Guntrip" and "Folksong Crisis" just yearn for that live punch.

-Craig Young
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Maybe I'm trying too hard. Voices drift out of the ether of the eight mostly instrumental tracks and the lyrics of "K2" essentially sum up Alloy: "Drifting, breathing, slowly falling, silence, shifting, stalling..." Alloy is an album that is difficult to actively participate in, but, as background drift, it breathes of the moments between thought and activity where the motion of your lungs and heart may be activity enough.

-Mark Teppo
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S.I.N.A.

The first rhythmic noise act to add female vocals to the mix, S.I.N.A. certainly harkens back to the sound of a neglected industrial guitar act of the late '90s for which I have a certain soft spot: Coptic Rain. Which, I have to admit, I have a certain soft spot for. "How Long" powers along with all the characteristics that made Coptic Rain enjoyable: heavy distorted percussion, squealing lurching guitar melodies (though in S.I.N.A.'s case, the melodies are more electronic-based), and the heavily augmented voice of the singer. Sina has more than one setting on her microphone, moving from the bruised sex kitten growl of "How Long" to the static-spitting snarl of "Scream" and the bored radio announcer of "Axiom."

Rhythmic noise is a genre that has a narrow range of appeal--the artist must walk a fine line between generating just noise and actual music (another relative term). Winterkälte set the standard a while ago and Hands clearly recognizes that as a label, in order to grow, they just can't sign the twentieth million Winterkälte clone. They need diversity; they need to make the genre grow. S.I.N.A.'s Snapshot is a much more friendly approach to the rhythmic noise sound, one that will undoubtedly be pummeling you from the hidden speakers in your favorite S & M dungeon in no time.

-Mark Teppo
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Sister Machine Gun

These fifteen tracks are polished stones, turned their time in the tumbler until the extraneous elements are gone and all that remains is voice, guitar, and rhythm. Has he been consciously working towards this point--this flirtation with the pop song? What else do you call songs that have such hook, such insistent ability to slide under your skin and get down into the very marrow of your bones? After the opening double-fisted fury of "Automaton" and "Loser," Randall sets the dial at "Lounge Funk" and, with the delightful addition of harmony vocals (which we've all been supplying all along anyway, right?), begins to meld the distinct poles of his dual visage into one powerful voice. There isn't an easy niche for Sister Machine Gun and, really, you have to ask yourself why bother finding one? Maybe so that I can tell you more easily how enjoyable it is to have the SMG funk spilling out of my speakers. Too caustic for candy pop, too incredibly groovy to be tossed into the electro-guitar industrial arena, too refined to be lumped in with the rest of the lo-fi independents, Chris Randall continues to cut his own path. And, we realize that two faces are but a mask and he is actually the Pied Piper. We are the rats and there is no shame in gleefully following his sound.

-Mark Teppo
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