Jack Johnson
Jack Johnson may be a former pro surfer, but he ain’t no Beach Boy. Where the songs of Brian Wilson (who never actually surfed, remember) celebrate the rush and exuberant triumph of catching a wave, Johnson draws on the sport’s solitary, Zen-like side — the gentle, rolling rhythms of his music match his simple, nature-inspired language. Over the course of three platinum albums, plus the bulk of the chart-topping 2006 soundtrack to Curious George, this laid-back worldview has been enough to make the affable Johnson an unlikely pop sensation.His new disc, Sleep Through the Static, was supposed to be the project on which Johnson shook up his formula. The album reunites him with Ben Harper’s producer, JP Plunier, who helmed Johnson’s 2001 debut, Brushfire Fairytales. Touring keyboard player Zach Gill has been added to Johnson’s usual guitar-bass-drums studio trio, allowing for a slightly wider range of sounds and textures.
But while Johnson has spoken about the darker themes informing the songs on Sleep, and even referenced his punk-rock past, the album isn’t exactly a radical departure. Certainly, some of the lyrics here represent a more mature sensibility than the Johnson of goofball favorites such as “Bubble Toes” and “Banana Pancakes.” (The Curious George assignment was an inspired idea, since the singer often comes across like a cool, lovable camp counselor.)
Johnson is now a thirty-two-year-old father of two, and his new songs express the contemporary fears and realities that hit home even in his idyllic Hawaiian paradise. The opening “All at Once” sets the tone when he sings that “as the darkness gets deeper/We’re sinking, so we reach for love.” The title track is a jumbled meditation on the Iraq War. It’s a bit too cheeky for its own good (“shock and awful thing” is dated and obvious), but somehow still effective, if only because of its surprising source.
Some of the more ambitious writing, though, just falls flat. “Archaism is a dusty road leading us back to nowhere,” from “They Do, They Don’t,” has to be one of the clunkier lines in recent memory, and building the lite-reggae number “Monsoon” around the phrase “mon-sooner or later” is unfortunate. Johnson also still has a weakness for Deep Stoner Thoughts such as “All of life is in one drop of the ocean.”
If the words sometimes suffer from trying too hard, the music on Sleep Through the Static would benefit from being a little braver. Drummer Adam Topol is kept on what must be the tightest leash in rock, and though Gill’s keyboards add a few nice, soulful splashes, you can almost feel Johnson and Plunier holding back. In song after song, solos and instrumental breaks arrive only after the singing is all done, extending the tranquility of the grooves rather than disrupting the motion of the ocean. Incorporating some of these unexpected elements — the weird little “woo-woo-woos” at the end of “If I Had Eyes,” the guitar buzz that concludes “What You Thought You Needed” — into the bodies of the songs would have gone a long way toward adding the variety and contrast that’s generally been lacking in Johnson’s work.
Or maybe, in the end, Johnson is best when he’s stripped down. The finest moments on Sleep Through the Static are the simplest, like the aching love song “Angel” or “Go On,” a sweetly swaying meditation on his growing children. These songs are barely more than sketches, but they’re completely realized, with a focus to the sound and a specificity to the lyrics that thelarger-themed numbers never quite attain.
Though Johnson has been keeping up with the headlines, it’s clear that his heart is still in the things closest to home: his family and his environment. Sleep Through the Static marks a tentative step forward for this improbable superstar. We’ll see if the album’s well-intentioned worldliness turns out to be an experiment or if he pushes himself further the next time. Either way, like any surfer will tell you, if you want to ride the big ones, you can’t be afraid of wiping out.
Review By The RollingStonaeReview
Artist: Jack. Johnson
Album: Sleeping Through The Static [2008]
Genre: Alternative / Soft Rock / Pop
MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/jackjohnsonmusic
-Track List-
01 All At Once
02 Sleep Through The Static
03 Hope
04 Angel
05 Enemy
06 If I Had Eyes
07 Same Girl
08 What You Thought You Need
09 Adrift
10 Go On
11 They Do, They Don’t
12 While We Wait
13 Monsoon
14 Losing Keys
ALSO:
01 Hope (Nightmares On Wax Remix)
02 Losing Keys (Katalyst Remix)
03 Monsoon (Money Mark Remix)
04 Angel (Kid Koala Remix)
05 They Do, They Don’t (DJ Tropikal Remix)
06 Hope (Mario C. Remix)
Read MoreTry Album [Mediafire] | Jack Johnson – Sleeping Through The Static
Paramore
The Final Riot! is Paramore’s first DVD release, showing a full concert performance as well as footage of the band’s daily life. The show’s highlight is, of course, Hayley Williams. She’s always had a strong voice, but on The Final Riot! her performance is somehow even better than what she did on Riot!. Paramore’s songs are more demanding vocally than some would like to admit, and it’s amazing to see her keep her voice all the way through the concert. “Let The Flames Begin” is her finest moment yet, with its dark, epic chorus replicated with flawless emotion by the fiery teen. Paramore wrote a coda to the song to perform live, and on this DVD it will absolutely blow listeners away. On her knees, Williams give a career-making performance as she belts out “I am here now; I want to dance in the mighty palm of your hand.” Slower tracks like “When It Rains” and “We Are Broken” show a different side of her stage presence; the former, one of Riot!’s weaker tracks, is given new life by Williams’ singing, and the latter, which was slightly cheesy on the record, is stunningly poignant, Williams’ surprisingly adept piano playing making it all the more enjoyable, although it does sound as if she’s leading a praise chorus at the end. (“Sing this with me…with all your heart.”)
Perhaps playing second fiddle to their lead singer in the press has inspired the other members of Paramore to step up their game. Once again, “Let The Flames Begin” is the highlight; while the added intro and outro are a bit simple, it’s impressive to see a mainstream band like Paramore making their songs more interesting live as opposed to merely replicating what they did on the album. Many of the other songs feature new sections as well, including rousing intros to both opener “Born For This” and All We Know Is Falling single “Emergency.” Disappointingly, one of the band’s best songs, “Pressure,” is consistently weak live; Farro’s chorus lead is given too much volume, making it overbearing and grating, and his slowness in switching tones makes parts of “Decoy” not as powerful as they could have been. However, gripes with the band members are few and far between, and the things that the band amalgamates into their show are often very enjoyable. Notably, they perform the first verse of Leonard Cohen’s classic “Hallelujah” before exploding into their own song of the same name, and while purists may cry heresy, Williams’ voice works amazingly well with the song, and hearing a crowd of thousands sing along shows just how far-reaching the song has become over the years. Thankfully, they don’t perform the bridge of At The Drive-In’s “One Armed Scissor” at the end of “Here We Go Again” like they usually do. Williams has an amazing voice, but only Cedric Bixler-Zavala should perform Cedric Bixler-Zavala material.
The Final Riot!’s flaws come not from the band themselves, but with the overall presentation of the DVD. The documentary-style interludes that are shown after every few songs interrupt the flow of the concert, and while there is an option to watch them separately, there is no option to watch the full uninterrupted concert. Furthermore, the interludes are rather uninteresting and predictable anyway; if you’ve seen one DVD showing the band “having fun on tour,” you’ve seen them all. It also seems like Paramore should have waited to release a DVD until at least one more album is out. The concert features every song from Riot! bar “Miracle,” and they even perform the b-side “Decoy.” While they do their best to make things interesting, listening to the CD version of The Final Riot! is basically like listening to a normal Paramore album. Additionally, some of Williams’ attempts at aggression make her sound like an immature tween, but that can be chalked up to her having fun playing the music she loves.
While The Final Riot! wasn’t a necessary release for Paramore, it shows that they’re capable of more than hardcore music fans give them credit for. You can watch them play their best songs, watch them become familiar with and work the crowd (who sing along to basically every single word), and best of all, you can finally watch Hayley Williams shake her hips in hi-definition. She’s become an accomplished performer, nuanced and powerful, yet not without a certain amount of sweetness underneath it all. After her mindblowing performance in “Let The Flames Begin,” she lets out a little giggle.
Review By SputnikMusic
Artist: Paramore
Album: The Final Riot!
Genre: Alternative / Pop
MySpace: http://myspace.com/paramore
-Track List-
1. “Born for This” – 5:46
2. “That’s What You Get” – 3:34
3. “Here We Go Again” – 4:10
4. “Fences” – 3:31
5. “Crushcrushcrush” – 3:15
6. “Let the Flames Begin” – 5:38
7. “When It Rains” – 4:04
8. “My Heart” – 5:31
9. “Decoy” – 3:14
10. “Pressure” – 3:02
11. “For a Pessimist, I’m Pretty Optimistic” – 4:27
12. “We Are Broken” – 5:25
13. “Emergency” – 5:22
14. “Hallelujah” – 4:57
15. “Misery Business” – 4:40
Read MoreDOWNLOAD EP: PARAMORE – SUMMER TIC (EP)
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – ALL WE KNOW IS FALLING
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – RIOT!
BONUS TRACKS: PARAMORE – RIOT!
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – LIVE IN THE UK
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – THE FINAL RIOT
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – LIVE IN ANAHEIM
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – LIVE + ACOUSTICS
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – LIVE AT THE SOCIAL
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – LIVE IN SPOKANE
DOWNLOAD ALBUM: PARAMORE – LIVE AT CBGBs
Cage The Elephant
When I was in high school, I went on a trip with some of my classmates to Kentucky. It was quite the experience. Although we were there to see the famous caves and learn about geography, we also learned that you may not be able to drink until 21 but you can buy a gun as young as 14 and that our Canadian accents were just as funny to the kids behind the counter at Taco Bell as was their thick southern accents to us.
Nearly twenty years later, I revisit memories of Kentucky while thoroughly enjoying Cage the Elephant’s debut self titled release and neither have anything to do with the other aside from the geographical location. I would never have envisioned an alternative rock outfit hailing from the same Bowling Green, KY I had visited so long ago. My impression had always been southern sticks and country fare. Cage the Elephant certainly wipe that notion clear away.
This album actually debuted nearly a year ago, reaching a favourable #38 on the U.K. Charts but was officially released here in Canada just this week (what the fuck took so long?!), hence the tardy review.
Comprised of vocalist Matt Shultz, guitarist Brad Shultz, drummer Jared Champion, bassist Daniel Tichenor and lead guitarist Lincoln Parish, Cage the Elephant first received attention after their 2007 appearance at SXSW. They ended up signing a deal with EMI and moved to London where their music seems like it rightfully belongs.
With quirky attitude and pointed, sometimes appropriately vulgar lyrics, this debut is refreshing and fun. With vocals that are easy to understand (one of my favourite lines include “Kill our leaders, Persecute our teachers, Criticize our culture, Crucify free thinkers”) you can easily get engaged in their music.
Aside from their excellent singles (”Ain’t No Rest for the Wicked” and “Free Love“), songs like “In One Ear” and “Tiny Little Robots” are so great you’re compelled to give them a second play. Make no mistake though, this entire album is fantastic and worthy of much more attention.
Review By OffTheDial
Artist: Cage The Elephant
Album: Cage The Elephant
Genre: Alternative Rock / Punk
MySpace: http://myspace.com/cagetheelephant
-Track List-
- “In One Ear” – 4:01
- “James Brown” – 3:21
- “Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked” – 2:55
- “Tiny Little Robots” – 4:11
- “Lotus” – 3:17
- “Back Against the Wall” – 3:48
- “Drones in the Valley” – 2:28
- “Judas” – 3:27
- “Back Stabbin’ Betty” – 3:39
- “Soil to the Sun” – 3:18
- “Free Love” – 3:28
Read More