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ЦД-коментара

Дио: Доннингтон уживо 1983-1987

Име прилично много говори све. Ово су неки пријатељи корисника Дио постављене на одговарајућим Доннингтон фестивала година. Први диск је од деби соло бенда његовог Ронние Јамес Дио је, са веома млада Вивијан Кембел (сада у Деф Леппард преко Вхитеснаке), а друга садржи "основана" Дио тријумфални повратак. Иако је неколико могла Жаљење постоји доста репликације на ова два ЦД-а, већина навијача неће бити брига. 25 песама са много пропуштених Дио није нешто што се ругали. Ливе свирке су првобитно снимио ББЦ у току дана. Упркос њиховим годинама не постоји ниједна од нормалне проблеме можете имати са неким ББЦ-ствари, квалитет звука је прилично респектабилан.

Како очекивати од вокалних легенда да је Дио, чија каријера графикони неке врло велике висине, чак још 80-их, то је нека добре ствари. Добијате да чују његов верзије Дио-ере Блацк Саббатх и дуге. Не постоји ништа као прилично пуно о верзији "Небо и пакао" да се сокови тече. би бити теско као ни метални вентилатор или следбеник Дио да се не ужива све што је у понуди овде. То само може да вас наведе да потражи верзије ЦД-а од свих Дио старе албуме. Почетком Дио јавност заиста издржати тест времена у прилично импресиван начин.

Свако има своје омиљене нумере Дио и између два ЦД-а шансе су један од ових ЦД-ова ће имати ту песму. Иако можда не живе најбоље икада ЦД-ови свакако су респектабилне ЦД од великог бенда. Онда опет са легендарним предње човек Дио на челу како тачно можете да крене наопако?

Атлантиде кодекс: Златни Боугх

Лабаво заснован на списима једног Џејмс Џорџ Фрејзер и његова теорија да су све религије је дошао из исте основне корена. Његова тврдоглав ствари за ЦД-а пауер метал то је сигурно. Ствар у вези ЦД-а што је прилично чудно албума је да има много воде звучи на њему. Они који су били у великој мери пију можда желе да иду у тоалет прве. То је прилично паметан стварању и многи од песама стану на своје. Имајући у виду предмет не би шок нико да чује да је нумера "Пророк у шуми", да сатови у на 15 минута.

Ово није ЦД за слабе стрпљења. Његов епско путовање са свим врстама фасцинантних преокрета. Нема ништа лоше са овим ЦД-а по себи, али је само потребно доста стрпљења да се кроз превише често. Ово је дубоко промишљен издање. Постоји чак и стаза одакле бенда траје то име. Ако волите своје металне дубоко и добро промишљена онда да овај доста пробати. Нема песница дизање у ваздух, али путовање ума.

Астросоник: Квадрант

Упркос име то није нека тренду плесна група која пише нумеру за е-кокичара Ибица Раве скуп. Иако је бивши члан бенда Урбан Данце Скуад. Они су, у ствари, прилично добар бренд од психоделичних простора тешка стена. Сада то није џем каменован прилично чудно албумнесс од Хавквинд, постоји далеко више од тога структура. Међутим, они покушавају врсту судопере музике која никада не преокрену у преко врха Боллоцкс области жанра. Његова сасвим лепо заједно.

Ова врста простора стене с времена на време се осећа помало Стонер рок у комбинацији са неким паметним тастатуре чаробњаштво. "Намамио" је велика нумера која цури из звучника и ванвременски. То је тип нумера која ће добро радити у неким сци-фи епски у било којој деценији је направљен. На стази "нула", они детаља напада на Перл Харбур, уз помоћ из бенда Зевса.

Није тешко видети зашто је требало три године да би ово. Његова јасно пројекат са много посвећености и професионализма. Ако сте у неке Спејси тешка стена која само вриска да се филм звук колосека онда проверите ово гомила.

На Венс: Декаде

Као што можете замислити из наслова овог ЦД-а, то је Врап-уп у последњих десет година историје овог бенда. Не само највеће хитове ти смета, са потпуно другом ЦД покривају песама у распону од класичне до АББА. Кладим се да никад не мисли "Победник узима све" може да буде претворен у нумеру пауер метал? Заправо они покривају још две песме Абба превише "Монеи Монеи" и "СОС", као. Да ли постоји ништа не можете да урадите са Абба песму? Такође укључена је прилично добар поклопац орлова "Десперадо".

Класичне нумере често подсећају на бендова попут Емерсона језеро & Палмер и може бити неки претенциозни. Онда опет су неокласичне метал бенд, тако да је врста поклопца се очекује.

Све у свему ово је вредност за новац наплате од популарних европских пауер метал бенд. Тридесет и седам нумера је прилично импресивна за било ослобађање и има довољно разних овде да би интерес. Иако можда није најбоље увод у бенд своје свакако добра колекција за оне који воле бенд. А ко може одолети верзија пауер метал на "Схоут"?

Укључујући и нумере са сваког од њихових издања је леп додир. Ако волите мало хумора са својим пауер метал Ово би могла бити издање за вас.

Револуција ренесансе: Тројство

Албум је назив одражава чињеницу да је ово трећи албум три албума циклус од Тимо Толкки и чланова посаде. Баш као и када је био део Страдивари, он је геније за РР. Посвећеност и Ситнице опседнута Мусо даје неке фине снаге техничке метала. Ово није за слабим срцем или оних који су пронашли нешто паметно претенциозно.

Десет минута насловна нумера је нешто и ево је велика стаза. То је песма која никада не успева да пронађе себе доле заглавила и креће у веома импресиван ред. То је рекао уопште не постоји Турске на њу. То је неке од најимпресивнијих пауер метал ћете чути било где. "Прелазећи Рубикон" је епска нумера која само лепи у главу.

Фрозен Зима срце "је велика сила баладу да се заврши цео албум искључен са својим срцем осећао-вокал и акустична Интро. То је прилично шаблон за Како да произведе добру техничку Албум власти метала који остаје на десној страни превише паметан за половину. Ипак, поново је поставио Тимо знак за квалитет у овом жанру. Љубав или невољан да, тешко је цепидлачење да је ништа друго него велики албум.

Симпхорце: Неограничен

С обзиром на неке од коментара сам прочитао претходних албума овог бенда, ово стварно пуно треба да урадите нешто пристојно да заустави своје доле слајд. Као и са сваком новом издања слушао сам ово са отвореног ума. Једна ствар која ме је ударио била је чињеница што су урадили песму о 9 / 11 у комплету са аудио-снимке тог ужасног дана. Да ли је то заиста потребно? Сигурно тог дана је урађено до смрти. Тхе Цхееси хорор музику увод песме која се зове "Миндлесс" само не ради уопште.

Осим горе укуса нумеру, остатак овог издања је веома Бог стандардних металних моћи. Ништа ту посебну или оригинална, али ништа то страшно било. Можете имати неки забава са прилично чудно албума изговор на енглеском из певач, ако ти тако се померају.

Његова само БОГ-стандардне европске пауер метал албум бенда који имају талента, али су мало слаби на песми писања испред. Само ме оставља са осећањем Мех. То није страшно, али није ни велика. Постоје много бољи издања тамо заслужује ваше уши.

Па то је ваша моћ металне пуно за ову недељу. Будите безбедни и љуља као дана расту краће.

Погледај оригинални чланак о блогцритицс.орг

Поп

Кингс оф Леон
Хајде Око Сундовн
(РЦА **)

Арена рока и амбивалентност: није савршена заједно. Краљева четврти албум Леон, 2008 је само ноћ, изграђен Јужни Алт-рок састав се састоји од четири Фолловиллс - браћа Калеб, Натан и Џаред, са својим рођаком Метју - масовна публика на снази конвулзивног хитова " Сек Он Фире "и" Усе Сомебоди ", друго изненађење победника као Записник године на 2010 Греми награде.

Али сада када краљеви су прилично чудно Албум мушкараца у у мејнстрим пејзажа доминира поп-Р & Б диве, краљице тинејџер земље и рок-звезде репере, они звуче дубоко непријатно да тамо Сундовн. Цоме Ароунд није смелости да одбије ивица попут Гуитар одјек у циљу јефтини седишта и друге претерано велики рок манире. Али, бивши "Јужни строкес" претворила глобалне фестивала крова и тврдоглаво одбијају да служе уз грабби кукице које проширују своју базу фанова.

Певач Калеб Фолловилл још увек поседује богату, грлен урлик и он изгледа да призна проблем бенда да изгуби додир са својим језгром идентитет, који се обратио у оба "Бацк Довн Југ" и, нажалост, он је такође звучи немоћна да "Радиоактивно". ништа о томе.

- Ден ДеЛуца

Бриан Ферри
Олимпија
(Астралверкс ***)

Ово није први пут да је већина Лизарди Поп'с Лоунге од гуштера, Брајан Фери, користи његов бивши члановима бенда у легендарном авангарде Глам Ансамбла Идоли.

Олимпија је, међутим, први пут цроонер ставила гитариста Фил Манзанера, саксофониста Енди Мекеј, а Сониц ландсцапер Брајан Ино кроз неке од аморпхоусли прилично чудно Албум корака Рокси једном трод. (Олимпија носи још један Идоли-као што је потпис у да је свој први соло албум на функцију прилично гоил (Кате Мосс), на поклопац.

Фери је уобичајено љубазан, акустичан сјај се може чути на цвркут фанк на "Хеартацхе од бројева" (написао заједно са Сциссор Систерс) и нежно свервинг "можете играти." Ипак, делиријуму постоје Идоли-као експериментални аранжмана, беепинг синтисајзери , и разбацани удара кроз које врлетан Фери тестове низ вокалне трикова за максималну драму. Ту је Сатија базирани баладе "тендер ноћи," у којој је Фери куаверинг и нервили жив. Што је најважније, Фери срећно показује сензуалност година (он 65) над узбуђење потере кроз текстове "Алфавил".

- АД Амороси

Префаб Спроут
Хајде да променимо свет музике
(Томпкинс Скуаре ** 1 / 2)

Стеве МцКуеен, Префаб Спроут други албум, класика 80-тих-Брит Поп. Објављен у континенталном делу Америке, као два точка Добар, 1985 запис упарен деликатан, лопинг мелодије са емотивно сложеним текстовима. Хелмед Падди МцАлоон, Префаб Спроут отишао на снимање албума гушће оркестриран, више отворено комерцијалних и амбициознији, коначна у 2001. Ништа није старо као грациозно као Стеве МцКуеен, међутим.

То је камен спотицања са Хајде да променимо свет музике, који МцАлоон намењен праћењу 1990-Јордана: Тхе Цомебацк. То је концептуални албум о духовном, овлашћења трансцендентално музике, пун буквално оријентисаних песама о музици као спас. Ово су његове високо полирани демонстрације из 1993. И они то звук, са од синтисајзера и ритам, игнорисана рогове, и своонинг хармоније. Иако је велики комад за изгубљено време изданка навијача, Хајде да променимо свет је толико отворено у опису трансценденције да је ретко постиже.

- Стив Клинге

Вака Флоцка пламена
Флоцкавели
(Ворнер Брос./Асилум/1017 Екипа градња ** 1 / 2)

Све што треба да знате о Гуцци Мане Аффилиате Вака Флоцка пламен се може научити из његових хитова "О, да урадимо" и "хард у Да Боја", где Вака успева да протежу своје хор-као-стих црквене песме преко смешно Слинки позадине. То је ВАКА, који су наизменично издвојеним кул малолетничког и маничне беса Давид Баннер, на његов опојан најбоље. Очигледно, то је у свом Вака највише, превише. Флоцкавели, који укључује изнад синглова, добија доста километража од неколико трикова. Оволико је јасна: Вака не даје много размишљања да се лирицс; Вака воли да каже његово име много; Вака има одличан укус у откуцаја. Прави звезда деби Вака је, у ствари, је лек лугер (произвођач, а не рвач), који снабдева више од половине насилно гласно албума Филмска - то је готово немогуће да се мирно играју ову музику. Ако је само било неке дубине да попуне звука.

- Мајкл Полок

Земља / Корени

Разни извођачи
Крвави рат: Песме 1924-1939
(Томпкинс Скуаре *** 1 / 2)

Од 15 снимака на овом чудесном скуп су између два светска рата, али је опсег предмета назад до грађанског рата и шпанско-америчког рата, као и "рат који ће окончати све ратове."

Музичке представе - од турнеје Френк Хутцхисон'с де форце гитаре-и-хармоника инструментални се на "Дуг пут до Типперари" да Хот ниску-бенд распада "Џони, Гет Иоур Гун Ерл Џонсон и његова Цлодхопперс - су широко почевши као тема и расположења. Наравно, постоје дирљив баладе туге и губитка, као што су Буелл Казее је "Постепено појављивање Цоат оф Блуе", а Диксон браће "Стари Упражњено председник," и позив на патриотизам Вилијам и Версеи Смитх брацингли блуеси "Сви Помоћ Боис Дођи кући. "

Али исто тако постоји изненађујућа количина хумора, такође, из наслова песме Јимми Јејтс 'Бол Веевилс да Тома Дарби и Јиммие Тарлтон је "капетан Вон'т Иоу Лет Ме Го кући." У међувремену, Црвена Патерсон Пијемонт Приступи Ваљци "читања" на бојни Мејн "нуди неке Сли антиратног коментар. Чињеница да је нови Лост Цити Рамблерс касније адаптиран у износу до Вијетнамског рата, као брод белешке показују, помаже да се укаже на непрекидној виталности ове музике.

- Ник Кристијано

Џез

Дејв Лиебман Биг Банд: под руководством Гунар Моссблад
Ливе / као и увек
(Мама Рецордс ***)

Саксофониста и флаутиста Дејв Лиебман ради свој удео вијоре и вристе на високе тонове као и увек, али овај скуп живе од шест Лиебман оригинала увек долази на земљу.

Пет различитих људи, укључујући Гунар Моссблад, Запад Честер заснован трска човека и композитора, организовати мелодије, живахног резултате који улазе и излазе из слободне зоне џез остављајући много знаменитости. Моссблад је распоред "Филип Под Зелени мост" гради се посебно затегнутом врхунац, док је "Турн Ит Око" је милостиво блуеси.

Бруклин-рођен Лиебман, који је свирао са Милес Давис у раним 1970-их година, добија овде узбуђен. "Светли комад" је вероватно најупечатљивијих мелодија, али је насловна нумера је пун пријатних тарифе, и пијаниста Џим Ридл сија на "Нев Бреед".

- Карл Штарк

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Даве Лиебман Биг Бенд ће одржати странка ЦД издање суботу у Јазз Цафе Крис ', 1421 Сансом Ст, улазнице: 8 увече Схов 22 $, 10 ам Прикажи 20 $. Информације: 215 563-3131 или ввв.цхрисјаззцафе.цом .

Попут многих других запослених на Арс, ја сам прошао кроз неколико итерација Иос, и посматрао је зрео у више функционалне, више употребљив производ. У последњих неколико месеци, и ја сам добио прилику да игра са оним што су у суштини 1,0 верзије оперативних система смарт телефона, Уиндоус 7 и телефон најновији БлацкБерри ОС, оба од којих су требало да буду спремни и екран осетљив на додир-радикалних одступања од њихове претходника. Пошто оба узорка, мислим да је фер рећи да је Мицрософт урадио фантастичан посао у односу на РИМ-а, али још увек има свој рад исећи за то, и можда ће морати да преиспита неке од својих интерфејса избора.

Као Петар указао у нашој епској преглед , постоји много допада код ВП7. Оперативни систем је брз и течности, померање дуге листе је велико искуство. Анимације су, у највећем делу, брза и информативна, и, за разлику од РИМ-најновији, тоуцх-базирани интерфејс не осећају неспретно закључа на врху Мицрософт претходних телефона оперативни систем. Компанија је обећао потпуну прерада, а испоручена. Чињеница да је доступан на толико телефона је такође леп, јер би требало да буде могуће да се пронађе скуп функција које је ближе прилагођена мојим потребама.

То је рекао, ово је 1,0 верзију производа, и показује на неки начин. Још увек постоје неколико грубих ивица-анимације које нису информативни или узети предугачак и неке велике функције као што су копирање и лепљење недостаје. Знамо да Мицрософт ради на некој од ове, тако да не трошите време да расправља, и уместо тога усредсредити на неке од интерфејса дизајна изборе које је компанија постигла.

Као и већина других телефона, ствари ће почети са приказом инсталираних апликација. За ВП7, у ствари постоје два приказа: почетни приказ на екрану, са најчешће коришћеним апликацијама, као и списак свих инсталираних апликација. Општи Идеја о почетном екрану, у којој се најчешће коришћеним апликацијама представљају као велики, лако погодио тастера је добар. Нажалост, све то није на екрану треба да се приступи преко листе, што може бити проблем ако Мицрософт-ов Апп Сторе скида и већина корисника има доста апликација. Неки степен организације додатних овде боље појавити у исправку.

Додавање, уклањање и преуређивање иконица на почетном екрану је практично идентичан ИОС искуство. Мицрософт је отишао корак даље иконографије Аппле је анимирам неке од икона, и омогућавајући другима да покаже садржај одређене информације. На пример, Зуне музике апликација ће приказати илустрације за последњи албум који су слушали (сличне ствари се односе на контакте и слике). Ово изгледа сјајно, али има ефекат израде иконе изгледају другачије сваки пут када одете у потрази за њега. Имајући могућност да затвори ово искључите ће бити добродошли.

Понашање статусне траке, који садржи ствари као што су јачина сигнала и нивоа напуњености батерије потпуно мистифиинг. По подразумеваној вредности, то је невидљива, потребно је да тапнете на врху екрана да бисте добили да се појави. Када се то деси, по подразумеваној вредности, поново нестаје после кратког временског периода. Ово може ослободити мала мало простора на екрану за апликације, али за некога ко воли да обрате пажњу на ове ствари, нашао сам понашање изнервирало. Ако постоји могућност да подесите како то ради, не могу изгледа да га пронађу.

Навигација ВП7

Мицрософт се на кретање у оквиру апликације је интригантно. Различитим екранима садржаја се приступити лево или десно свипес, и примена треба да обезбеди визуелних сигнала да указују на то да додатног садржаја на располагању. У неким случајевима, то ради одлично, а активна екрану појави по имену у горњем левом делу уређаја, као и све додатне опције исцурити на десно, често раде ван екрана. То даје јасну визуелну индикацију да друге опције су само далеко пребацивали, иако је фонт који се користи за текст који је мало превише танке да се лако чита.

Када не постоји текст да га организује, међутим, систем је мало глуп. Додатни садржај је означен стрелицом на десном делу екрана, или чак делић садржаја следећег екрана у вире са десне стране. У овим случајевима, тамо завршава се мање простора за приказивањем садржаја ви заправо усмерена на, који једноставно изгледа као лоша идеја.

Друга опција је за навигацију на дугме Назад, лево-већина реда који садржи три куће и дугмад за претрагу. Ово је прилично убедљив функцију, јер се враћа на претходни екран, чак и ако је екран био у потпуно другачији Апп. Перформансе су прилично добро, посебно јер ОС наводно не дозвољава процесе у позадини.

Једна прилично чудно албуму ствар је да је хардверски тастер, а навику очекујући за контролу где се стриктно преко екрана осетљивог на додир је тешко навику да паузе, наставио сам у потрази за "Откажи" дугме у различитим дијалозима. Ипак, дугме корисности чини заиста висок, тако да бих свакако покушати да уче нове навике су ми да један од ових телефона.

Унос текста је такође веома добра. Тастатура је прилично стандард за екран осетљив на додир телефона, али је предлог бара, што је веома клизав. Док куцате, она приказује списак потенцијалних завршетак до слова које су доле. Када се прави појави, можете једноставно да га чесме, и то ће бити постављене у поље за текст и курсор ће бити напредна. То није много за помоћ лако Упишите речи (у ствари, користећи га ремети ток куцање), али за дуже или више речи изазов, то је прави уштеду времена.

Сисање у облаку

Гоогле и Аппле оба имају цлоуд сервисе који су желели да помере ка својим корисницима телефона који има ограничавајући ефекат наспрам лакоће са којом се интегришу своје мобилне телефоне са производима конкуренције. Мицрософт је у истом чамцу, с обзиром на Виндовс Ливе услуге; вас буде затражено да пружи Виндовс Ливе ИД-у току процеса инсталације, али телефон ће радити добро и без њега. Ипак, компанија је прилично агностик када је реч о изворима података. Контакти могу да долазе из места као што су Гоогле и Фацебоок, као и разне услуге е-поште се лако подешава, мада слика може да се дели са сопственим сервис Мицрософт-а.

За услуге које сам тестирао је синхронизација радио добро, баш као и подешавање е-маил налога. Мицрософт је изабрао да сваки налог своју икону, и он покреће на е-маил апликацију појединачно. Имајући само стечен јединствене инбок на ИОС ми недостаје овде лоше. Мицрософт-ов корисник тестирања очигледно је рекао да су одвојени рачуни бољи, ипак. Претраживач, што је за око бизарна копиле дете две различите верзије ИЕ Десктоп, обавља много боље него што сам очекивао.

Нисам био заинтересован за постављање рачуна са музичку услугу Мицрософт, али сам видео демо изгледа прилично импресивно, с обзиром да можете да приступите било каква претплата песму са било ког места. Апп Сторе почиње да испуни мало, као добро. Дакле, све у свему, изгледа да Мицрософт може да буде добро на свом путу да осигура људи могу да попуне своје мобилне телефоне са неким привлачног садржаја.

Општи утисци

Најупадљивија ствар у вези са коришћењем ВП7 је познато како је све изгледало. Изгледа да су метафоре и УИ за тоуцхбасед гест рачунарство већ срасле у скуп стандардних приступа, и Мицрософт је урадио добар посао од њих спроводи. У неколико области у којима је то урадио нешто ново, резултати су често велики-предлог траку за унос текста је заиста одличан. Апликација скакања "Назад" могућност је још један добар један.

Ипак, нису сви идеја рада све то добро. Одсецање искључивање део већ уске екрану само да укаже додатних садржаја је лоша идеја. Пошто иконе које мењају свој изглед тако често није стварно добар кориснички интерфејс. Статусна трака је само досадно. Ако ништа друго, ови аспекти ВП7 су превише попут јабука производ: жртвују функционалност да би се корисницима нешто уметнички тражите.

Дакле, како то додати до? То је фантастичан 1,0 издање које ће се суочити са два веома зрела оперативне системе са веома великим следеће, тако да је у за грубу вожњу. Кључ за своју будућност није присутан на разматрање хардвера себе. Да бисте разумели ВП7 будућност, ми ћемо морати да видим колико брзо Мицрософт добија се ажурира на тржишту, и да ли је вољан да направи значајне промене да се ствари у праву.

"То је разумљиво, али ... ја никада нисам ћутао чињеницу да пишем песме о људима. То је као, то је број три албума. Ти момци су имали фер Упозорење [! "- Тејлор Свифт на бивши љубавници су узнемирени због њихове изложености у њен албум МТВ ]

"Када почнем везу, постоји тај притисак да се највише, да буду удобне и отворенији од било кога другог. Када коначно схватите да сте управо може бити ваш сопствени страх, сјебан-до себе, и да и даље можете бити секси без покушаја да се, то је тако велико олакшање. Када унцонденсед сте довољно је. '"Она се зауставља и смех. 'Хеј, то је прилично добар. Ако делује не ради, могао сам будућност у оглашавање - '. "Ен Хатавеј, звезда новог филма Љубав и други лекови [ Мода ]

"Као, ја сам отишао у стриптиз клуба са директором и костимограф и то се прилично чудно албума група људи иде у стриптиз клуба у сред поподнева, био сам, као, равно-а понудио посао. - Кристен Стјуарт на радости истраживања њеног дела за Добродошли на Рилеис [ МТВ ]

"Ово је ПСА: Нико треба да једу 7 / 11 НАЦХОС У 3ам И идите десно на спавање или ћеш ОСЕТИТЕ Ратх на углу ПРОДАВНИЦА БОГОВА н јутро!" - Т-Паин [ Т-Паин/Твиттер ]

"То је само требало да буде смешно, заиста. Али, има толико тога у музици да је моја деца чују на дневној бази - усуђујем се да их неко има проблема са ову песму! "- Цее-Ло с одговор на родитеље забринути за своју децу слушајући његову песму" Фуцк Иоу "[ поп & Хис / лат ]

"То је као нашао сам се поново. се под утицајем Иоу све што чујете на радију, или можда оно што ви сматрате да очекивања других људи су. Али, онда одједном схватите да све што је потребно да пишем о је оно што је унутра од вас - да не изгледају споља, али унутра [. "- Шакира на њеном новом албуму, Продаја Ел Сол, углавном пева на шпанском Нев Иорк Тимес ]

Шта Боб Дилан и Лил'Ваине имају заједничко? прилично ништа, иако су ова два уметника су врху ове седмице 5 Феатуред албума. Наравно, победник је Дилан колач, са годинама шкрипав цроонинг и тванги гитару мелодије под појасом, ипак успео да угоди критичара и страхопоштовање навијача 30-неке прилично чудно Албум година низ пут. Погледајте ове друге уметнике који су објавили нове музике, као и видети шта су критичари говоре о новој музици ове недеље:

Лош

Фантом бенд, жели

Ствар о Фантом Бенд је да неки људи попут њих, док други проналазе своју музику комплетну буку. Тхе Гласгов заснован секстет су прошли кроз доста жанр и промене име бенда да се коначно реши сатисфиингли, али је превише мешати стварно добра ствар? Ево шта су неки критичари говоре о својим последњим албумом, жеље, због од 25. октобра:

• Тхе Гуардиан : "Већи део жели осећа чудно клизав, као да је стално на прагу промена лепљивости ... он бенда одлучили су да не укроти своју склоност ка цхеррипицк из практично сваког жанра који су им доступни" - Мајкл Црагг
• Линија Бест Фит : "Неки елементи жели, чак, могла да буде копирали и налепили од две играчице, а ревербератед гитаре, светло, Бонго погон удараљке, Рик Ентони је китњаст, сваггеринг вокални наступ и сексуално ипак злокобне задужен за песме попут "О". And again, you can draw parallels between the two bands through the fact that both are expected of bigger and better things, despite current achievements” — Jamie Milton

The Wants is available on Amazon for $11.98

Lil' Wayne, I Am Not A Human Being

Dwayne Carter, or Lil' Wayne to most, is still serving out his prison sentence but already thinking of his music career's future. With the critically panned Rebirth album released earlier this year, Weezy learned a few things about the world of experimental hip hop/rock (better to not go there…), and with the release of his eighth studio album last week, we see that he still has a long way to the top:

• Absolute Punk : “The album closes with “Bill Gates,” an entirely forgettable track that doesn't even entertain with typical Weezy antics. It's slow, repetitive, and overall the worst track on the album. While very few of his songs carry any sort of meaning or coherent thought, “Bill Gates” goes way beyond that…Because Human Being does very little to impress, it was a huge mistake to make “Bill Gates” the last song and therefore the freshest in someone's mind when they think back on the album as a whole” — Ian Walker
• Spin : “So when Wayne uses his eighth release, I Am Not a Human Being , to spout off over the sawing techno synths of “What's Wrong with Them,” or “Popular,” it's like finding a nine-month-old cheesecake in the back of the fridge. These songs, gleaned from pre-jail studio sessions, adhere to the since-dispelled notion that commercial rap should be threaded with Lady Gaga's DNA” — Ben Detrick

I Am Not A Human Being is available on Amazon for $13.85

Добри

Kisses, The Heart of the Nightlife

Пољупци, у Лос Анђелесу на основу Дуо који се налази негде између КСКС и Иеасаиер, потпуно очаравајуће са својим једноставним и мелодијски дан-Гло поп нумера. Дана 16. новембра њихов последњи албум, срце на ноцни зивот капи у САД већ узбуђен фан базу. За оне који су љубитељи припит Синтх-рок звук, сте сигурни да вас пронађу нови омиљени овде:

• НМЕ : "За снимак различитих нити за дан-Гло Поп то тако радост блогосфери у овом тренутку, не гледа даље од ЛА Пољупци ово. Срж ноцни зивот светлуца на врху Иеасаиер Тецхницолор и мрачније Хипнагогиц и цхиллваве склоности, али усред глиттер-тачкаст ФУГ дуо често посрну у потрази за сопственим гласом "- Сајмон Џеј мачкица
• Префикс Маг : "То је изненађујуће да постоји привидна несташица Лос Анђелесу бендова који пројекат врсту свиленкасте вечери слике које смо навикли да очекују од сјај престоници Америке. ЛА Дуо Пољупци изгледа као да је са циљем да попуни ту празнину са деби издање, срце ноћни живот. Сингловима "Бермуда" и "Људи могу учинити највише невероватне ствари" имају лак, приморски Вибе онима који обећава много више Цхилл ноцна музика из првог излет овог дуа "- Матеј Ричардсон

Срце је ноцни зивот је доступан на Амазон за $ 23,49

Симиан Мобиле Дисцо, је фиксна

Симиан Мобиле Дисцо, Велика Британија Дуо / мешање тима познати по својој аналогне продукције и ДЈ мешање, су прилично на врху целог ДЈ и мешање сцени широм рибњак и око САД као добро. Њен само нешто не можете помоћи, али расте на љубав, и са издањем фиксиран 15. октобра, клуб љубитеља техно сцене и широм света могу да коначно окреће неки професионални откуцаја:

• РА Фотографије : "Фиксна ради је највише неприметни ствар Симиан су ставили своје име на. На папиру, ово Трацклист хитови неке од истих нота као и тканина микс-Цлассиц Чикагу Ацид Хоусе ... Али Фиксни унфурлс у правој линији, начин на који Тецхно Мик треба да, и док звук представља релативно уски-а посебно у односу на све-преко-место осећај тканина микс-то је такође вијугав и добро темпом, са сопственим дуа "нерава Салата" истичу, наизменично ошамућен и клипно-као што је "- Микеландјело Матовиц
• ЛимеВире Мусиц блог : "Странке су садржану ко је ко од техно, електроника и инди електро - од ЛЦД Соундсистем, да Клаконс за Литтле Боотс да МАНДИ на Боока Схаде правди. Тхе Симианс да различите листе гостију странке похвалити разноврстан, бешавне два диска Сет "- Дејв Клин

Је фиксиран је доступан на Амазон за $ 15,49

Велики

Боб Дилан, Тхе Мик Серија: Витмарк Презентације: 1962-1964

Боб Дилан је добитник албума ове недеље је у недељи, и треба ми објаснити зашто? Човек је револуцију у музичкој сцени још од 60-тих, његова музика боравак у домаћинствима генерацијама, а он и даље на то тако. Тхе Витмарк Презентације су песме које је записао Дилан назад у дан, и поново пуштен, као компилацију аудио-микс да прате хода низ Лане меморије. Није ни чудо критичари се слажу да је Дилан генија неупоредиви:

• Тхе Гуардиан : "Ипак, овај свеобухватни, хронолошки скуп демонстрације из формативног периода Дилан, 1962 до 1964, је узбудљиво - и за оне који су нови на Ремик серија, вероватно од суштинског значаја. За све своје крчање грубости, неколико демо не само да устане са другим снимцима, али их превазилазе, нарочито сирове преузме ћу држати са минским постављен на храпавост клавир. Тхе реткости имају своје предности: блиставе блуз гитару Балада о пријатељу, запаљиве сарказам у давно, далеко "- Меди Коста
• The Independent : “And if what we look for here (apart from songs which never previously reached the world) is telling variations on what we already know, that's not to say that the genius of Dylan isn't everywhere to be heard, stark, relaxed, withering, totally unburdened in its self-conviction. Quietly gripping” — Nick Coleman

The Witmark Demos are available on Amazon for $13.99

As easy as it may be to take Sufjan Stevens for granted now, his 2005 breakthrough album “Illinois” remains a sprawling masterwork that more often than not achieves its ambitious aims. It's no wonder, then, that the guy never hinted at what direction he might go in next. It took Stevens a little longer to adjust to his newfound fame and its attendant expectations than it took his rapidly multiplying fans to adjust to the intimate, accessible, intricately orchestrated world he created.

Stevens' just-released “The Age of Adz,” however, may be another matter entirely. Rife with digital noise, dense arrangements and few concessions to the pretty chamber folk that Stevens is best known for, it's a brave, bewildering and utterly uncompromising work. It's also ultimately a folly, and an pretty odd album foundation for a tour.

In fact, Stevens took several minutes midway through his sold out set at the Chicago Theatre Friday night to dutifully explain the album's (and evening's) inspiration — the works of schizophrenic outsider artist Royal Robertson — but the explanation didn't make the strange, discordant, deconstructed sci-fi R&B of Stevens and his 10-member band any easier to grasp. Blurting synths and booming drums abutted loose brass on “Too Much.” Cascading vocal harmonies vied with herky-jerk beats on “Get Real Get Right.” The epic “Impossible Soul” even dared break out Auto-tune effects in the midst of its prog indulgence, yet Stevens, to his credit, never gave in to irony, even as he matched the casual pop-and-lock moves of his dancers.

Yes, he had dancers, who, along with the modest multi-media presentation, often made the night seem less like a concert and more like a work of performance art or avant-garde opera. More power to him for trying something different, but one wonders what ticket sales might have been like had fans known exactly what they were in for.

Then again, “Illinois” clearly remains beloved enough that those same fans are willing to give Stevens a lot of leeway. Indeed, all it took was the anthemic crowd-pleaser “Chicago” and the encore ringers “ Casimir Pulaski Day ” and “ John Wayne Gacy Jr.” to make it seem like the previous 90-minutes of madness hadn't even happened.

ctc-live@tribune.com

A Conversation with Shawn Mullins

Mike Ragogna : Hi Shawn.

Shawn Mullins : Hello Mike, how are you?

MR : I'm pretty good, how are you doing, sir?

SM : I'm doing just great, man, I'm doing just great.

MR : I have to say, I was a fan of your music before The Thorns.

SM : That's great. Well, I'm just grateful that you even know about The Thorns.

MR : (laughs) The Thorns absolutely was on my radar when it was first issued. Now, you've been the songwriter's songwriter for a long time, care to go into some of the Shawn Mullins story?

SM : Well, I started off in around '89, trying to write my own songs–I mean, I've been doing it since I was in high school, but I started getting a little bit better at it by then. I put my first record out in '90, and then I kept making records almost every year. There were eight releases, and then Soul's Core happened in '98. There were already six studio albums and two live albums before that, and a few of those records are really good too. I'm sure I probably started recording before I should have, but I was just dying to get in the studio and record, you know? I was always wanting to write songs, but I was also interested in recording them and then singing them live for people, so I kind of did all of that. My first real success was in '98 with “Lullaby,” which started as an alternative hit and crossed into the pop charts. I never had an idea that would happen, but that was cool and it went to #1 on the charts for five weeks. I did another record on Columbia, and then The Thorns happened. Matthew Sweet has always been one of my favorites, and I loved Pete's work as well. So, when we got together–I think it was around the end of '02 because I think the record came out in '03–we wrote all the songs together out on this ranch in Santa Ynez, California, and that was the most fun we had–writing the songs.

MR : Pete Droge and Matthew Sweet, of course, are incredible artists, so it must have been terrific when you got together with them.

SM : Yeah, no doubt. We did that for close to three years–the writing, making the record, and then touring the world a couple of times. We opened a ton of shows for The Dixie Chicks in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, we did a proper tour of the US with The Jayhawks, which was really a great tour, and then it was time for us all to get back to our individual stuff. I started writing in Nashville shortly thereafter, as well as continuing my own recording career, and I wrote a little bit with Zac Brown on the tune called “Toes.” A couple of years later, he got a deal, and it just went to #1 on the country charts last year. It's just kind of been fun to have this other thing going, with the professional songwriting in addition to doing my own records and touring. I love both of them a lot.

MR : You also had one of my favorite songs by you, “All In My Head,” featured on Scrubs.

SM : Yeah, I actually wrote it for Scrubs . They were looking for a theme song in their first season, and Jerry and I wrote that song and sent it in. They didn't use it for their theme song, obviously, but they ended up using it in an episode, and then I ended up putting it on a record several years later. Funny how songs can kind of come back to life.

MR : I know. And they used the demo version, right?

SM : They did, they used our original demo version, which is kind of funny because we just slapped it together really fast to see if they'd like the song. They did like it, and in fact, that used it on TV. We were kind of hoping that we would get to go back and record it properly, but I was still pretty psyched that they used it. It's always funny when you slip someone a demo because they may like that, but you weren't giving it to them the best way that you could, you were just doing it fast. (laughs)

MR : You also had a song on Dawson's Creek .

SM : You know, Dawson's Creek , Party Of Five , and a bunch of those shows in the late '90s used a ton of songs. I think Dawson's Creek used four songs off of Soul's Core . They used “Shimmer,” and I know they used “And On A Rainy Night” and “Lullaby,” so they used at least three. That was kind of fun, and that really helped, actually. It helped get more and more people to know about my music. What's weird is that I seemingly disappeared after that, but at the same time I'm doing two-hundred shows a year, and kicking as much butt as I could kick without having a major label or a huge hit. So, it was a weird predicament because I never stopped doing anything, but I've had so many people come up to me recently and say, “I'm so glad you're back.” Mostly, I just think it's funny, but it's a strange feeling because you're like, “Wow, I never really went anywhere. In fact, I've been trying to hard to stay on your radar.” It's hard without some kind of major success, and it's also hard to top or to keep going after having a hit that was that big. I kind of look at it similar to Aimee Mann's career with 'Til Tuesday, where she had this huge pop hit in the early '80s and then she seemed to go away until the early '90s, when Whatever came out, which is this unbelievable record that her and Jon Brion did. But I'm sure she was doing shows, writing songs, and performing and stuff. I'm thankful that anyone still knows who I am. It's always a funny thing to go through that, you know?

MR : I guess it depends on how you measure success and what kind of success you are looking for, huh?

SM : Well, the way I measure success, and probably you as well, is probably really different from the masses out there, you know? They're watching American Idol every week, and that is kind of the pinnacle of success–to be the winner of American Idol . Hey, big things grow and change, and also they're cyclical. It's a very similar thing to Star Search back in the '80s, it's just bigger. I've never looked at my success in terms of how many people know about it. It's more of how good I'm getting or not getting, and my trying to become a better songwriter, singer, and a better entertainer live. I look at the masters–people that are just great at being onstage acoustic, like John Hiatt or Lyle Lovett, and Shawn Colvin is another one. There are people out there who are just master singer-songwriter-entertainers, and these are people that I've always looked up to and studied. And the more shows I do, hopefully, I'll get better at it. I think that's how I measure success, you know?

MR : Nice. You and those names you mention are all in a higher caliber of “artist” that I really wish the masses could hear more of.

SM: Thanks for saying that. Those people are like serious masters, and they've been doing it long enough that they just keep getting better and better. John Hiatt is the perfect example of these people who just kind of do what they do, and that grow and change, and their audience grows and changes with them. Yeah, it's not American Idol , but I think that's just another thing, you know? It's TV, it's hype, and sometimes on American Idol , it's a great artist that slips through and wins.

MR : Yeah, like Daughtry and Josiah Leming, I said sarcastically.

SM : Yeah, I mean there are some great singers that end up doing that, but typically, they're not also writers or whatever. Working in Nashville as much as I have in the last couple of years, I've seen a lot of really great singers that no one may ever hear about and musicians as well. There's something to be said for those people who kind of transcend all that, stick with it, and don't try to change what they're doing according to whatever fad is happening at the time. I think that's why John Hiatt, Lyle Lovett, Emmylou Harris…well, Emmylou doesn't write a lot, but what an interpreter of song, you know? She's one of the best. Her doing a Townes Van Zandt song is one of my favorite things to hear. But yeah, I think they are classic performers, writers, and singers. It's just that the audience is not the every day masses, and I think that most great art is like that–the masses don't get it until years later, and maybe they don't ever get it, you know?

MR : Yeah, a very good point. When you have a choice between commerce and art, in a lot of cases you have to make your choice.

SM : Absolutely. It's funny, I'm constantly being asked for my music to be licensed in commercials or things that like, and you know, times are hard. I would prefer to have more of the Bill Hicks mentality, which is that no artist should ever support a corporation with their art. But since we've had a kid, all that's changed for me. Of course, I have to be picky about what I support and endorse; but at the same time, we've got to make a living as artists, and, obviously, it's harder and harder to do that with record sales. So, if you're a songwriter, any way your song can be worked as a copyright is a good thing.

MR : You downplay your level of writing with regards to being in a class with John Hiatt, Nancy Griffith, and the rest. But anybody who can turn a traffic jam in California into a wonderful love song is amazing. You, sir, did just that with “California.”

SM : Listen, I appreciate that, and I do work hard at it. Also, I have to give Chuck Cannon some credit on that because Chuck and I wrote some of these songs on this record, and “California,” in particular, is one that we wrote together and we really both brought it. Often times when you're co-writing a song, one person is kind of the leader on it, and the other person is filling in the gaps. “California” and “Light You Up,” both of the songs that Chuck Cannon and I wrote, were truly equal, collaborative efforts. I'm glad you like it, it was fun. We were talking about Prince's “Little Red Corvette” and how we loved that double meaning of a woman and a car, and the whole rock 'n' roll imagery, and then I had mentioned that we had done a video of mine, years ago, in an old El Camino, where I was getting to race it down the desert highways. The next thing we knew, we had the El Camino, and then we had a red Trans Am instead of a Corvette, which you obviously wouldn't want to do.

MR : I especially love the lyrics, “Her stereo was blaring Dylan, The Bootleg Sessions , and oh 'The Times They Are A Changin” made a pretty good impression. She looked over and caught him smiling. Under the California setting sun they fell in love on the 101.” Sweet!

SM : The verse before that basically uses two cars to kind of describe the characters. You're not ever sure which one is driving which, but you can kind of take a good guess at it.

MR : Right. Let's get into “Light You Up,” the title track of this album. Shawn, you know that if you build a man a fire he's warm for a day, but if you set a man on fire he's warm for the rest of his life, right?

SM : (laughs) Exactly. I like that, that's the old “teaching a man to fish” thing taken a little bit further.

MR : But the title track is another great song, can you go into it a little bit?

SM : Yeah, that's another one that Chuck Cannon and I wrote together. It started off in weird sort of way that has only happened to me two other times out of all the songs I've written, which is about eight-hundred songs at this point. It's only happened a couple of other times where I dream the song or I wake up with part of a song kind of playing as a soundtrack to a dream, and that's what happened with “Light You Up.” I woke up one morning and I had all that “I just want to write you a…” It had been kind of playing over and over as the background of whatever dream I had, which I soon forgot about, but luckily the song kind of hung out. I sang it for my friend Chuck, and he said, “Man, are you asking me in on that?” Which is kind of a songwriter's way of saying, “Are you opening that song up to me? Because that's great, and I want to be a part of it.” And I was like, “Yeah, man, let's write it together.” So, we stayed up all night in Nashville–typically that's how Chuck and I write. We don't do a three or four hour songwriting session, we kind of do it in a day or two, and it's a very long, drawn out, concentrated deal. I've seen so many other writers try to write with the two of us, and it's a matter of concentration. You have to take breaks, but you have to stick with it, and you're not satisfied if the song's just okay, you just keep working on it. You don't want to take it too far, where you've worked it to death because that's part of the art too, knowing when to quit. I love that song, and Chuck and I write the lyrics to the verses together just staying up, having a little scotch, and just kind of trying to think of the most random things that we could think of that everybody wants, putting it together in a song, and making it rhyme.

MR : So, no surprise, I'ma big fan of yours. I'm also a big fan of Matthew Sweet's as well as Pete Droge's. Now, when the three of you got together, that was a celebration for me, when you guys formed The Thorns on Aware Records. You said that was what, '03?

SM : Yeah, I think that's when the record came out. We got together a little bit before that.

MR : What's the story behind that? How did that all come about?

SM : Well, it originally was a writing exercise. Originally, it was myself, Pete Droge, Marshall Altman–who is a songwriter, producer, and has been in A&R for Columbia too–and Glen Phillips from Toad (The Wet Sprocket). It was the four of us originally writing together, and we wrote “No Blue Sky” together, and a couple others. Then, when we sent those demos in, Aware and Columbia all kind of flipped out over the sound. They were like, “Hey, would you guys be into doing kind of a vocal, acoustic band?” You know, we all had to kind of think about it, and Glen Phillips in particular was like, “Man, I just got out of a band, and I'm trying to solo stuff.” So, he punched out of it, and Marshall ended up having another obligation, but Pete and I were into the idea. So, my manager, Russell Carter, asked Matthew Sweet to join in and see what would happen if the three of us wrote together. So, that's really how it started, and when we wrote together, it was even more magical than before. It was just like the right combination. I have to give Russell Carter credit because he was a big part of it–he and Greg Latterman who really kind of thought this whole thing up. So, that's kind of how it started. We wrote a bunch of songs together–we wrote twenty songs in ten days, and eleven of them ended up on The Thorns record, I think. Then, we toured really hard for about two years. That was the hard part, I think, for The Thorns. It was just hard because you've got three guys that are used to being their own boss, and now no one is really in charge, but we're all kind of used to having things the way we want it on the road. So, that was the harder part, I think–the traveling.

MR : Yeah, you were three grownups as opposed to three brothers. When bands start out together really young, it's a different vibe.

SM : Yeah, that's totally true. We're three guys with three different types of successes, but we all produced our own records. We all were songwriters and leaders of our own bands, so it was interesting. Matthew really likes to be ahead of the beat, and Pete actually is the other way, where he likes to be on the very back end of the beat–for all you musicians out there, you know what I'm talking about. So, I was in the middle of them on stage, so there was always this like three beat thing happening. It was the funniest thing in the world, and both of them would be yelling at the drummer–not yelling, but going, “Come on, man, speed up!” And the other guy would be like, “Come on, man, slow down!” (laughs)

MR : (laughs) Nice.

SM : Yeah, it was a blast. I love the songs we wrote, and “No Blue Sky” I always felt like didn't get it's proper tracking. I felt like it was done too fast on The Thorns record because they wanted it to be a single and they didn't want it to be too slow. I think we kind of didn't do it right because we recorded it too fast, and the production was just too big and slick. So, that's why I put that song on my new record–to kind of do it like I always heard it, which was really stripped down. You know, my drummer is playing with his hands on the kit, and it's just a very acoustic-based song that way.

MR : Now, you have a song on Light You Up that you're not the author of called “The Ghost Of Johnny Cash.” Can you talk about what inspired you to cover that song, and also about the song itself?

SM : Well, first of all, I've never been afraid to put a cover song on a record. You have to be careful about what kind of cover song you put on a record if you're a singer-songwriter. But James Taylor's biggest songs ever were not his songs, and he's obviously a great songwriter, so I've never had a real problem with it. The trick is to pick one that's right, and I had first heard Chuck Cannon do this song, he was one of the writers on it, and it just blew me away. I just felt like this was the song that we all needed to hear, that mentions Johnny Cash. This is the one that really describes, from what I know–and I'm pretty good friends with Kris Kristofferson, and he's told me a lot about Johnny–it just nails the whole deal, you know? So, typically, if I'm going to cover a song on a record, it's one that I wished I had written. That's part of it, and the other thing is that it needs to fit. We kind of had a place on the record for something like this, so I felt like it was the perfect song to do, and it hasn't been recorded other than on Chuck's album. So, I thought, “Hey, here's an opportunity to get the song out there, hopefully with a lot more listeners too.” I really wish I had written that one, and I love interpreting it.

MR : It's a great song, and you give it such a personal spin, it's as if you had written it. Now, “Tinseltown” is sort of a reflection on the LA scene and all that. That had something to do with the thought behind this album as a whole, right?

SM : Well, here's what happened. As the songs were coming together and being written, they just started being written about Southern California, specifically, Los Angeles and Hollywood. It just kind of happened. I didn't set out to write a record–I never do that. It would probably be an interesting way to write a record, to go, “Okay, this record is going to be about the Midwest.” I just typically start to have themes that roll in, and I start to notice it. This one was definitely LA and Hollywood heavy, and I kept asking myself why. I was like, “Gosh, you've never lived out there, and you've always had kind of a love-hate relationship.” Maybe that's it, that I am fascinated by it, and I also kind of don't want to be there for very long before I'm ready to get back home. “Tinseltown” I wrote with Max Gomez, who is a great young singer-songwriter. He's twenty-three, and he's out of Taos, New Mexico. We wrote a few of the songs that are on this record, actually. He just has this fresh perspective that's very hip, and also very old school–his favorite artist is John Prine. He's a twenty-three-year-old songwriter, and you just don't have that a lot, you know? So, Max and I wrote that, and you know who I was thinking about? The character in the song who I was thinking about when singing it was Matthew Sweet because he's kind of a homebody. He lives up in the canyons, he doesn't really like getting out that much unless it's something really special, and I was kind of embodying him a little bit when we were writing that song. I was thinking, “Gosh, if somebody wanted to go downtown, down to Hollywood or whatever, what would Matthew say?” He would be like, “Man, I don't want to go downtown tonight.” So, that was a little bit of an influence on that song–just knowing Matthew as well as I had in the past.

MR : Nice, I got to work with Matthew on a project called To Understand , which was a collection of all his material up to the A&M stuff, and it included the demos for “Divine Intervention” and “Girlfriend,” which, at that time, I think was called “Good Friend.”

SM : Yeah, and it's really slow, right?

MR : Yeah, it's a different vibe, but I know what you're talking about with the home body thing because I was at his house a couple of times when we worked on his collection together. By the way, one of the many enviable things he has is that old Fender Rhodes.

SM : Oh yeah, he's got so many things and so many instruments. There are two sitars, a real Fender Rhodes, and a couple of different organs. Was he a collector of the “Big-Eyed Children” paintings when you visited him last?

MR : Yes, I think he was. The animation on his early videos were perfect for him too. He really injects himself into his art personally, and I love that.

SM : It is really cool. He's definitely kind of multi-canvased that way. There's a lot going on. He's an interesting guy to work with, and he's very fast at songwriting too. I remember him coming up with certain lines with The Thorns where I was like, “How did you come up with that just like that?” I typically have to work kind of hard at the lyric before it's like I like it, so I was always fascinated by that. Melodies tend to come a lot easier for me, naturally. But yeah, I really like that song “Tinseltown,” and Max Gomez is somebody you guys should check out because something's going to happen for Max. It's just a matter of time because he's so talented and such a good guy.

MR : You've got it. Send him our way.

SM : Yeah, I will. Also, he's from Taos, which I believe may be one of the only other solar-powered radio stations in the whole country. I know there's you guys, and the one in Taos is a really interesting place too. I don't know if you guys know each other.

MR : Yeah, we know of them, it's terrific. Let's talk about that for a second. I don't know how into it or not you are, but for me, it's just a bizarre thing that every business and home isn't using solar power and getting off the grid, especially in the Southwest. The sun is shining virtually every day of the year.

SM : You're talking about an energy source that, well, we will probably go before it will. I've wanted to do a solar tour, and I'm looking for sponsorship this next year to try and do that. Basically, you put on all the concerts with solar power, you've got the panels on top of the bus, you're going down the highway collecting energy, and then the shows can be powered with it. We have done a few shows solar-powered with a company in Atlanta that is a solar-powered recording studio called Tree Sound. Those guys are really, really hip, and they're into wind power as well. So, that's something that I'm kind of looking into doing, and I agree with you. I guess it's because it's still kind of expensive. The initial buy I think scares people off.

MR : But in the old days people used to invest in things for their home that were as expensive, it's just that the concept of solar power is a little more complicated than turning on the TV. There is an expense, of course, but if you have to replace your septic system, well, that's going to be an expense. You have your daily spending rituals and you have your expenses for your home, and my feeling is that this should just be one of them, you know?

SM : Yeah, and in a lot of states, you can get a break by doing that anyway. Obviously, you're going to save money, but you can also get a rebate to help pay for that initial cost. It's an interesting thing, I think it will happen, and I think it's starting to get more and more into the population. I'm hearing more and more people talk about it, and I feel like the more people like me that can tour around the country talk a little bit about it, and maybe even put it into action, hopefully, the better.

MR : It feels like a steadily building thing. Sometimes “green” issues end up being a ten minute concept. But solar power is always discussed, I guess because of the energy crisis that we always seem to be in–aka manipulated prices at the pump–and the real cost spikes of oil.

СМ: Апсолутно. I think it's totally building. I don't think it's going to go away. It's been around. When I was a little kid, my brother was really into the idea of solar power when he was twelve or thirteen and had built this little model home that was solar-powered. It was a really cool thing and that was the late '70s or whatever. So, it's been around, obviously, a long time. It's just going to take a little while, but it's also going to take the corporations. GE is one of the biggest solar power companies in America. They have a huge solar power sector, but they need to start talking about that, and commercials need to start happening related to that because, let's face it, everyone is sitting in front of their flat screen TV at this point. I've got to be the only person in the city of Atlanta who doesn't have a flat screen TV–we just try not to watch it a lot. I like them and whenever I see them, I go, “Wow, that's so cool. Look how big.” But we just had our son a year ago, and I got to thinking that I'm not sure if I really want him growing up, sitting in front of this massive screen.

MR : Very smart. When you do that solar-powered tour, you come back and let's talk again, okay?

SM : That would be great. I'm going to keep working on it. I'm going to keep working on GE–they've got a pretty big base here in Atlanta, and I'm going to keep working on them, to try to help sponsor this whole thing.

MR : It's important, it just seems like we had a lot of energy to do something once, and now we're petering out. Like we said before, I think solar power is building, but I just wish there was a little bit more of a national initiative. So, I have a traditional question which is what is your advice for new artists coming up now?

SM : I always love the story I hear that Tom Waits told some kid. Some guy spotted Tom Waits a few years ago, went up to him, told him he was a fan, and said, “Listen, what is your advice for young, upcoming artists?” Tom was like, “Forget about it kid. Go home. Be a doctor. Be a lawyer.” I don't know if I would say that though. What's kept me going this long–being in and out of popularity and having my own definition of success–is kind of always trying to remain true to what I'm doing, and not to change with the times. You're going to find something that you think is really cool, that you can utilize in the studio–an instrument, a sound, or a recording technique. But for the most part, you just need to do what you do and keep doing it. Those are the people that grow and change over the years, but they're not doing it to follow trends, you know? So, I think the big thing is to do what you do and do it well. For songwriters, you need to be reading because you've got to have words pouring in for words to pour out, and I think people don't even think about that sometimes. Stephen King talked about that in his book on writing. You've got to read, you know?

MR : I love how you phrased that, “You have to have words pouring in before you can have words pouring out.”

SM : Yeah, and old school songwriters that I've met within Nashville say the exact same thing. You know, the Harlan Howards and the Hank Cochrans. Those guys were old school and they were great songwriters, and they read a ton, you know?

MR : It does seem like a lot of people are reading still–that's not going away. It just also seems like there is a lot of video game time and having to go through the complete season of whatever television show you're watching on DVD to compete.

SM : I played video games growing up, and I went to the arcade whenever I could to play Pac-Man and Battlezone, or whatever. But I also loved to read, always, and my dad really encouraged that. I think, just as a songwriter, you need to be able to take in words to pour them back out. It just taps into another part of the brain that sitting in front of a screen and taking in the images does not.

MR : Very wise advice. Sir, You're smart as a whip, as they say.

SM : Man, thanks so much for having me on. I can't wait to come and visit you guys (KRUU) again. Maybe when I do this solar tour we can meet up.

MR : Absolutely. Let's end with a discussion of one of your favorite songs from your new album. What should that be?

SM : I really like “Can't Remember Summer,” the Michigan auto worker song.

MR : Nice. What's the story on that?

SM : Well, basically, when I was watching TV at some point, I was flipping on CNN and I saw a helicopter view of a soup line going into a church in Michigan. It was like scenes from the depression, and I was like, “Oh my God, this is really…”–I kind of tapped-in for a second and got that this is a huge thing. This industry that we once had in our country that was driving the whole thing, to a degree, is for the most part gone, and all those jobs are gone. A lot of these people were counting on a few more years, then retiring. So, this song's about one of those characters. It's a song sung from that person's point of view, and it has a chill about it, and you can kind of feel Michigan in the Winter somehow.

Tracks :
1. Калифорнија
2. Light You Up
3. Murphy's Song
4. No Blue Sky
5. The Ghost Of Johnny Cash
6. Tinseltown
7. I Knew A Girl
8. Catoosa County
9. You Make It Better
10. Can't Remember Summer
11. Love Will Find A Way

(transcribed by Ryan Gaffney)

A Conversation with Chely Wright

Mike Ragogna : First of all, let me pose a question in a rather pointed way. This is 2010, right?

Chely Wright : Yeah, last time I looked at the calendar it was.

MR : Okay. Why is someone's personal life anybody's business?

CW : Well that's a very multi-layered question.

MR : I'm talking about why this would be some sort of a concern anymore, like ever? It's unbelievable to that your private life is up for discussion.

CW : Well I'm with you, but I can tell you why. I can tell you exactly why–religious beliefs and what people are being told to echo. They're hearing it in their churches, and they're being told to tell young people, “Try not to be that. You're best to not be that.” We tell our kids, “Do your best to not become a drug addict, do your best to not become a thief, and do your best to not become a homosexual.” And we should not be saying all of those three, we should not be telling our young people to not be who they are as God made them to be.

MR : There's such a disconnect there. I guess there would be a disconnect with people who are blindly following a faith, incorporating whatever prejudices they want to incorporate into their belief systems. I was brought up Catholic, and I know a lot of Christians whose wiring doesn't go there. Yet prejudice seems to be the political football that's used by those that want to control others through fear. It just seems like in 2010, why is homosexuality even worthy of a debate?

CW : And those are political waters that are easy. When you get down and dirty, and you just want to get primal and divide people, that's the easiest way to do it. For politicians that want to divide people in the name of God, this is fpretty odd albumer for them, this is so easy it's like painting by numbers. When you want to go out and sling daggers of hate and division, this is the easiest one.

MR : And, like you said, It's been used and it's still used as a divisive play in order to get people to the polls if they want to defeat something else, some other issue.

CW : It's a trick. It's a manipulative trick, and unfortunately, most of the constituents that find themselves manipulated by it, they know not what they do. Most people who find themselves manipulated by this don't have the time to dissect it. They're busy working, feeding their kids, figuring out how to pay for three-and-a-half dollar per gallon gas.

MR : There you go. I interviewed Steve Forbert months ago, and we were talking about the oil spill. We were talking about things like how California killed the electric car because of interests that were more greed-oriented than humanity-oriented. It's almost like no matter where you turn, you're being manipulated, and you can always follow the buck. Even with what we were talking about earlier, that ignorance always seems to be a financial payoff in the end for somebody.

CW : In that documentary, Who Killed the Electric Car? , the same principles apply to this. I don't hold parents that responsible for echoing what churches tell them because when you have a baby, you take it to the church and say, “Help me raise this human being. Help me do the right thing.” I feel like we have to stand up as a largely Christian society, that's why I joined the Faith in America board because of the damage that's being done to young people since parents are echoing what the churches are saying–”Try not to be gay.” Well, there's no need to try not to be gay. You really should try not to become a junky, you should try not to shoplift–these are breaches in judgment, and we shouldn't judge people for these breaches in judgment because we're all human and sinners, and we all make mistakes. But I don't have a choice to love a man or a woman, I can't love a man. I've devastated men trying to love them the way they loved me, and I've devastated myself trying to love them the way they loved me. It's not a breach in judgment for me to be gay.

MR : It seems to be an older generation thing, most young people I know don't even care. This ridiculous type of prejudice seems to be going away culturally.

CW : Well, you're right. There is a new generation of understanding and young people who really have absorbed the notions of equality and liberty. Now, it's not as far reaching as you and I would like to believe, I have to say. It hasn't reached the far corners of small town America like you and I would like to believe. You are an educated man who's writing for a living, and you're finely evolved. I'm fortunate enough to make my living in the arts, and I've been lucky to travel around the world and hang out with smart and forward thinking people. But my tour bus also makes stops at every small town in America, and I see that we have a long, long way to go. I just got off the phone earlier with the Matthew Shepard Foundation, and I also work with GLSEN (Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network), and today, the statistics are such that young kids who are in transgender identification situations are called, “faggot” or “dike” in nine out of ten school days. Nine out of ten days that they go to school someone calls them that, and that's nine days too many. I know we have come so far, but we have so far to go, and to go back to your question, “It's 2010, why are we still talking about this?” You've got me. It blows my mind. I thought ten years ago, “I'm never coming out in country music, surely someone else will do it.” It's staggering to me that no one did it–no one in commercial country music. I just thought someone would come out or be outed before me.

MR : I lived in Nashville for a while, and there were known homosexuals who were stars–you just didn't utter their names, and, of course, they didn't come out. It was sort of this “happy ignorance,” and it's really unfortunate that I would say something to you like, “Gee, it's really great that you did that.” It should just be understood, period. It's just mind-boggling.

CW : But you know what? I was one of those who was whispered about; but no one knows for sure until you say it, and whispers don't make it to the airwaves in Albuquerque. Quite frankly, what if an eleven-year-old kid is being driven to school by his mom, and my record comes on the air and she says, “Oh I love that Chely Wright.” What if that kid is about to go to school and get picked on? What if that is my chance for that mom to turn that radio station up and hear the disc jockey say, “Chely Wright came out as a lesbian today”? I took that chance, I cashed in my public equity, and that did happen on that Albuquerque radio station–that announcement happened. And that mom that says, “Chely Wright is my favorite. What a great American. What a nice lady.” That did happen. And that eleven-year-old kid in the backseat who's getting picked on? He feels one less person alone. There's a difference in being a whisper–and you're right, we get protected in Nashville, although I was more in the closet than anybody I know of in Nashville. I'm not okay to be a whisper, I'm too proud of the steward I've been in my life, and at some point, it's a narrative of who I am as a human being. Am I really going to allow another fourteen-year-old kid to sit in his bedroom and feel like an alien?

MR : I read the Entertainment Weekly piece in which we learn some new facts about you. For instance, you gave Rascal Flatts their start. Let me ask you about that. How did you discover them?

CW : Well, I hired them both. Jay was my piano player, I hired him from a Contemporary Christian background in Nashville. I hired Joe Don sight-unseen out of a club in Oklahoma, and he drove through an ice storm and slept on my drummer's couch for an audition in Nashville. He kept following me around for an entire day in Nashville saying, “Do you want to hear me play now?” I said, “Just bring your guitar and follow me.” We were just boppin' around the studio and I finally said, “You know you have the gigs, Joe Don, it's okay. You don't have to get out your guitar and play for me, I've heard your CD.”

So, then we went to dinner and I knew how much he loved Vince Gill–he just kept talking about Vince Gill and how amazing he was. And I said, “Well, of course, everybody loves Vince Gill. You're a guitar player who sings high, of course you love him.” So, I happened to get a phone call from Vince that said, “Hey Chely, let's go listen to the Bluebloods.” They're great session players that were playing out at a club that night, and I said, “Okay, cool. I'll see you out there later.” So, I didn't tell Joe Don that we were going to go hang out with Vince later and I said, “Come with me.” I invited him and my drummer, Chris. So, we walked into this club, and Joe Don is saying, “Oh my God, that looks like Vince Gill in the back.” Then, we're walking toward Vince's table and he's saying, “That is Vince Gill!” Lo and behold, we sat down at Vince's table. Joe Don and Vince got to have a conversation all night about guitars, and then we ended up touring with Vince.

Now, Joe Don tells everybody, “My first night in town, I got to meet Tony Brown, I got to be at the studio. Chely Wright took me to dinner, I got the job, and I got to meet Vince Gill.” So, we worked together on the road for a couple of years, and I knew that they were working on a side thing–I think they were just trying to make some side-money. Jay said, “Chely, we recorded ourselves, would you mind listening to our CD?” And I said, “I'll listen to it,” but I was thinking, “Oh no. Another couple of my band guys trying to get together a band, this is going to be awful,” because it had happened before, and it's usually bad when that happens. So, I was driving to my house, I put their CD in my player, I heard two songs, and I hit stop, picked up the phone and called Jay and said, “Jay, there's something here.” I said, “This is really, really good.” Shortly after that, they were signed to Lyric Street, played their last few months with me, and the rest is country music history.

MR : (laughs) That is so cool. Now, fact number two from that same Entertainment Weekly piece: Patty Griffin saved your life.

CW : What did I say?

MR : You said, “I became aware of her during my breakdown in '05, which eventually led to her coming out. I was looking for anything divine. When I heard 'Living With Ghosts,' I felt like God was whispering in my ear.”

CW : Yeah, I said it right. That's the truth. As a musician, I don't think that I am different than a non-musician. When something amazing happens in my life, I go to music, and when something devastating happens in my life, I go to music. During my breakdown, I sought out–or perhaps music found me in a way that I didn't even know. I became aware of Patty Griffin during that time, and that album, Impossible Dream , really kind of held me. There were days that I laid on the floor of my bedroom in Nashville. I mean there were entire days, and I don't want to say they were wasted because I was absorbing that music, but there were days that that's all I did–lay on the floor and hit repeat on Patty Griffin records. She changed the way I wrote songs, and she freed me from the constraints of commercial songwriting. You understand what I'm talking about. As a music writer, you understand the commercialism of Nashville songwriting.

MR : I'm so over the whole Nashville cheesy pop thing. Where's Merle when you need him?

CW : Again, there's a certain craft to it, and I don't want to begrudge the people who have figured that out. To a large degree, I made my living making commercial country music, and I love that part of my history. But I'm not nineteen anymore, I'm thirty-nine.

MR : Well, I also noticed, by the way, when I put your CD in my iTunes, the “genre” that comes up reads “folk,” not “country.”

CW : Oh, does it really?

MR : Yeah, so, some entity has designated you as folk now. That's interesting because when I listened to your album–which we should probably get to–one of the things I noticed is that it maintains your country style, but it does feel like it's embracing more of a Jakob Dylan meets Court Yard Hounds-ish kind of sound.

CW : Wow, cool.

MR : Maybe it has to do with how you approached this, as the person you are now, embracing other things besides needing to have a country hit.

CW : Oh, wow. Хвала. You've just given me some very high compliments. I want to stew in those–I want to wallow around in how that felt.

MR : (laughs)

CW : In listening to the music that I did during my breakdown, quite frankly, I had kind of dipped my toe in it on my last record, The Metropolitan Hotel , which really was a low selling record for me, but my most critically acclaimed. To that point, really what I found success in, personally and creatively, was writing what I know and doing my best to suspend my intellect. I made kind of a half-assed attempt to do that on my last record, and on this record, I couldn't have employed my brain if I had tried. I didn't even know where it was. I really kind of lost my mind, and that was such a good thing for me, creatively. You read about the great poets, painters, and creative people of legend, and they all were crazy. For once, I finally lost my mind. It was so good for me.

MR : You know, that line, “I lost my mind”? When you think about that, it just means you let your mind get out of the way and let the creative process happen.

CW : Right, and I think I always probably got in my own way. Art meets commerce is always a bad intersection. When you're trying to make anything for the masses, something has got to give. When you're trying to make food for the masses, you get fast food, and when you're trying to make art for the masses, you get fast art. You get what you get.

MR : That's a really brilliant point. It's like you've got to be in the moment when you're doing your craft or even every day at work. I mean, the people that are multi-tasking–what are they really getting done, you know?

CW : Right, there's a point of diminishing return. What I learned through the process of rolling around on my floor, listening to Bob Dylan, which I admit this with a lot of guilt and shame, I'd never really listened to too much. Срамота на мене. I'd really never explored Tom Petty the way that a singer-songwriter should, but I've corrected that.

MR : Let me ask you where you would rate Blood On The Tracks ?

CW : Oh, a thirteen.

MR : (laughs) What would you rate as his “one”?

CW : What would I rate as his best one?

MR : Yeah, we're looking at it differently. In the pecking order of Bob Dylan albums, where would you place Blood On The Tracks ?

CW : Oh, gosh. Well, I don't want to fall in line just because I'm on the phone with you, but it's really hard to beat that one.

MR : That's kind of why I threw that one out there. Though Blonde On Blonde and his earlier albums were brilliant, for me, there was something about–wait, I may be wasting our time…

CW : God, no. This could never be a waste of time.

MR : Blood On The Tracks , for me, was like a turning point, where I felt like I could relate totally to everything he was saying on that record, even on lighter tracks like “Lily, Rosemary And The Jack Of Hearts.” Even in the wackier, more fun moments, there was still a groundedness…what a brilliant album. It's probably in my top five albums with Joni Mitchell's Court And Spark , Paul Simon's There Goes Rhymin' Simon , and albums like that.

CW : There's a reason that so many people who write songs, like you and me, site that as one of their top five records of all time. If anybody has ever squeezed themselves out on tape, it's that one.

MR : (laughs) That's a good way to put it. And I'll never understand why “Tangled Up In Blue” wasn'ta huge hit. I think it's an American classic.

CW : Well, look at the records that came out during that time. It's all relative, and it's so funny to look at the landscape of what came out at that time. You wonder what gets lost in the shuffle, you go back and look at records like this Conway Twitty album that just blows my mind, though the title has escaped me. It didn't even have one hit on it, but I think it was his best record. But it was the year that the new generation of hit makers came out, and he just got kind of retired. He became the old guy. Now, you mentioned Joni Mitchell. Let me tell you how obsessed with Joni Mitchell I became during this process. I didn't know much about her either, but I was–do you know who Steve Buckingham is?

MR : Yes.

CW : Steve is a very good friend of mine, and a guy that I confided in early on about not only my breakdown, but the reason for my breakdown. He'd say, “Let me come over and hear your songs and talk to you.” When he got there and listened, he said, “What are you doing on that guitar?” He's an old session player who has played on a lot of hit records, and he said, “That's fascinating, what you're doing with your tunings.” I couldn't get my fingers to do what I was hearing, so I just started turning my knobs. I'ma piano player, so I just decided on this record that I was going to start turning knobs until I could get the voicings I want. So, I made up these crazy tunings, and he said, “Where'd you get that tuning?” I said, “I made it up,” and he said, “So, you didn't go to some Joni Mitchell website?” I was like, “No. Did she do alternate tunings?” He said, “Well, she was famous for it. You've got to come over and watch this documentary about her crazy tunings.”

So , I watched this documentary about her whacked-out tunings, and I realized that none of my tunings are actually the ones she used, which I was glad about. That way I couldn't be accused of ripping off Joni Mitchell, but then I started discovering her body of work, which is mind-boggling. So, I really kind of feel brand new about music. I feel like I have this old country past, but when I hear Bob Dylan's Live At Carnegie Hall album, which is, I think, the best live recording in all of music, it still gives me chill bumps. Then, I hear Joni Mitchell and that crazy tuning stuff she was doing, and it makes me want to just jump off of a building. I feel like two different artists. I feel like before breakdown, BBD, and after breakdown, ABD.

MR : (laughs) I was lucky enough to work with Joni on a compilation of her Geffen and Warner recordings and a box set, and I learned so much about her. When people bring up negative things she says, I remind them it's because Joni doesn't have a filter, and most great artists were lacking them as well. To me, it seems like since she's a fountainhead of creativity, that stops her from having a filter because if she had a filter, then it would afflict her creativity. You know what I mean?

CW : Thank God. I can't believe you know her. I can't believe you got to be near her.

MR : It was brilliant, a beautiful period. It was always fun to be eating dinner together somewhere and have folks like Warren Beatty stop by and pay tribute to her. Okay, that was kind of a wild sidebar, let's get back to the third point from the Entertainment Weekly piece. That is: “She and God have an understanding,” and your quote is, “I felt like there were two Gods, the one they told me about in church that I should fear, and the one that knew my s**t. The one I believe in told me not to lie. When I was on my knees and said, 'Tell me what to do,' God said, 'Tell the truth.'”

CW : That's true, she quoted me correctly.

MR : You know, you would think that anyone with a functional mind would understand the concept that God doesn't hate anybody. Isn't Christianity supposed to be based in love?

CW : Yeah, it just doesn't make sense to me. God also blessed me with discernment. Even before I knew to pray for discernment, I was given it. I have a spiritual compass that God gave me, but I was being told about this God at church that was going to burn me in the fires of Hell, once I died. That was really scary. Then, when I got home, there was this other God that was on the piano bench with me that was giving me songs to write. And when I'd climb a tree, there was God up there. I never felt alone. I felt the presence of this being or this “something.” So, I thought, “I'm supposed to keep this secret from this being that's with me?”

MR : That being is supposed to know everything, right?

CW : Yeah, this dude, not a bearded guy in a robe, but this God–this present power that's with me–I'm supposed to keep a secret from that being? Or am I supposed to run around with this abiding fear of this poster on the wall in Sunday school of this guy who's going to burn me up and throw me to another guy in a red suit with a pitchfork. I don't get that, and it didn't make sense to me. So, the God of love and light won out, and it changed everything for me. It changed the course of everything. I knew I was okay, I just knew it.

MR : My friend's son once had a nightmare about burning in Hell. Now, he didn't hurt him, but he pinched the little guy just a tiny bit. The child said, “Ow! Why'd you do that?” My friend asked his son, “You felt that, right?” The boy said, “Yeah, so?” and his father told him, “Well, that's because you have a nervous system. Now, when you die, do you have a body?” The child answered, “No,” and the father continued, “Okay. Well, your body has these nerves, and that's why you feel everything. So, if you die and you don't have a body anymore, are you going to feel like you're burning up? You don't have a nervous system!” It sounded like a brutal lesson to me when I heard it, but I realized that it probably saved his son a lifetime of fear.

CW : Well, way to go. Nice job. (laughs)

MR : (laughs) It's sort of like, if somebody thinks that through for just–how long did it take for me to tell you that story, fifteen seconds? If somebody just takes fifteen seconds to think that through, it sounds as crazy as it is, you know?

CW : Right. We're supposed to be taught that God's love is unfathomable. Now, Jeffrey Dahmer's parents knew that he ate people, and they still went to see him in prison and said, “Son, I love you.” He ate people. And I'm supposed to believe that if I fall in love with a woman, then my God will condemn me to a fiery Hell? He ate people! And his parents went to see him and said, “Son, I love you.” God's love is supposed to be that kind of love times infinity. This is not adding up, people. Come on, it's crazy.

MR : Alright, though I'm thoroughly enjoying our tangential conversation, let's discuss your latest album. Lifted Off The Ground . I wanted to start by talking about the song “Heavenly Days” on which you teamed up with Rodney Crowell. I especially admire the lyric, “Dare to be different, dare to be true.” How did you get hooked-up with Rodney Crowell?

CW : Well, it happened in the most pretty odd album way. One would think that I decided to come out, wrote a bunch of songs about freedom, and went and asked Rodney to make my coming out record. You have perhaps read the book, and if you haven't, I hope you do because the timeline is much more different, pretty odd album, and perfect.

MR : Yes, I read it. Very personal.

CW : When I was writing these songs, I had no idea I was actually writing my next record. I was halfway through making this record with Rodney before I decided to come out. Rodney did not, of course, know that I was gay until halfway through the making of this record. I did not approach Rodney about making this record, Rodney approached me. I had sought him out in my pajamas a couple of months into my breakdown, and all I wanted to ask him was, “Am I dying? I need to know if I'm dying.” He wrote on the back of my guitar, that day I showed up at his house in my pajamas, “Dear Chely, I love your broken heart, and someday you will too.” About a week after I went to see him, he said, “Do you have those songs you played for me on tape?” I said, “Well, I have my work tapes that I do each time I write a song. They're just little home studio recordings.” He said, “Bring them over, and come have a meal.” I said, “No, thanks.” At that point, I was embarrassed that I'd even sought him out just to ask him if I was dying of a broken heart, and I said, “I don't want to come over and eat.” Then he said, “Well, drop the songs in the mailbox.” So, I did, and every couple of weeks, he'd just email me, “Songs?” and I'd make a pilgrimage to his mailbox and leave songs.

This went on for about nine months. No phone calls, no dinners, no “friend” nothing–we weren't hanging out. Then, he called me and said, “You have the option to go to dinner with me on Friday night or Saturday night.” I went to dinner with him, we sat down, and he said, “I'm not going to beat around the bush. You need to make a record, and you need to let me help you make it.” I said, “What, a record?” He said, “You do want to make a record, don't you?” I said, “Well, I hadn't thought of it. Why would you, Rodney Crowell, want to help me make a record?” He said, “Well, seldom does a producer get to see someone really going through a change and is giving into it. You're really giving into it. I'm emotionally invested in these songs, and I want to make a record with you.” I said, “Do you need money to…,” and he said, “I don't need your money. Do you have a label at this time?” I didn't, so he said, “Fine, when you're ready to make your record, then we'll make it.” I said, “I'm not ready now. These songs are still coming to me.” He said, “Great, when you're ready, we will.” We didn't start that record for another nine months. So, the next summer, we started the record–that was the summer of '07, I think May is when we started it.

We were six songs in, and I was realizing, “Holy crap. I've written all these songs by myself,” because he and I didn't write “Heavenly Days” until the record was completely finished, in the can, and then in '09, we wrote “Heavenly Days” kind of as an addendum and put it on the record. But I realized that I had all these songs, written by myself, and I had to go out there and promote this record, where people are going to ask me, “Who are these songs about?” I talk to journalists when I make a record, people like you, and they were going to say, “Who's this relationship…” or “Who is this break up about?” As it stood, nobody knew about a relationship I was having. What was I going to do, make up a fake boyfriend from Buenos Aires? I realized my truth was, again, hunting me down. I could see myself back in that dark, dark place. You know, our truth is stitched to our feet, and no matter how hard you try to outrun it, you can't. I was feeling that layering of my truth, and I felt God continuing to whisper in my ear, “Stand up, stand up, stand up, this is all I expect of you.”

Rodney came to my house one day, flew in from LAX, and said, “I need to land in Nashville, and I need to come talk to you.” He came over, sat on my porch, and he said, “I gossiped about you, and I want to apologize. People have asked me as long as we've been making this record. They've said, 'I hear you're working with Chely. She's great, what a great gal?'” And he said, “Then they'd always whisper, 'But isn't she gay?'” He said, “I always say, 'I don't know, we've never talked about it,' but I flew out to LA four days ago and I participated in a four hour conversation about your sexuality. I'm here to tell you I did that and that I apologize.” I think that Rodney thought that I would melt into some kind of admission, “Oh, Rodney, I am gay.” But I didn't. I just thanked him for telling me something I surely would never have found out.

That night, he left, and I thought about it and prayed about it. Then, I called him the next morning and said, “Can you come back over?” He came over, and we sat on that same porch, and I said, “Rodney, I am gay, and I am going to come out.” I said, “There's one song I held back from you the entire time. Out of all the songs I've written in the past couple of years, it's the musical heart of all the things I've written, and I've held it back from you because it clearly depicts my being in a relationship with a woman.” He said, “Play it for me,” and I said, “No, I'll email it to you. Just go home now.” So, I went to my computer, emailed him the song “Like Me,” opened up a word document, wrote the cover page for my book, Like Me , and I started my book on that day.

MR : Beautiful. What was the process like when you were writing it?

CW : It's the hardest thing I've ever done, and the most profound experience of my life. I'm really thankful that I have had fourteen years of therapy under my belt. I know myself better than most people I know, but I needed every tool that I possess of self-introspection and self-awareness to write this book. All of the work I've done on myself, especially in the past few years, seemed to coalesce during the writing of this book. I wrote it myself, I didn't have a ghostwriter, which most celebrities who write books have. It was an amazing, profound experience, and hard. It was the hardest thing I've ever done.

MR : Another of my favorite songs on this record is “Broken,” although it's a toss up between that and “Notes To The Coroner”–I love your sense of humor in that one. In “Broken” you have my favorite line: “Why can't you just believe in me? Not everyone is an enemy.” To me, that says, “I'm doing the best I can, what do you want from me?” I totally relate to it, it's so reasonable.

CW : That's the best thing, as a writer, if you can get the listener to take it on as their own. and to see themselves in it. That's great and that's a compliment. Really, I'm not a cynical person, but we all find that the older we get, we bring that baggage with us. That song really–I know the title is “Broken”–but it's really a song about hopefulness. It's about, “I'ma little beat up, you've been a little beat up, but let's join hands and jump. Let's give it a shot, love might be waiting for us. I know we're both broken, but broken can be pretty.”

MR : Nice. What advice do you have for young people?

CW : My best advice for young people, even if you're going to school and trying to get your masters, or if you're trying to be a music star, follow that compass within. If it feels too good to be true and it feels like somebody is offering you something that you shouldn't be getting, you probably shouldn't. There aren'ta lot of short cuts in life. You know, in school, when you earned your “A” and you know in school when you haven't earned your “A” because you happened to look at your neighbor's paper? Your internal compass and your spiritual compass tells you. I guess my spiritual compass told me to do some things that I should have done a long time ago, and I'm finally honoring that compass. I'm so glad I named my album Lifted Off The Ground because it's how I feel. I guess that's my advice. Honor that compass within.

Tracks :
1. Broken
2. Heavenly Days
3. Hang Out In Your Heart
4. Notes To The Coroner
5. Snow Globe
6. Like Me
7. That Train
8. Damn Liar
9. Wish Me Away
10. Object Of Your Rejection
11. Shadows Of Doubt

(transcribed by Ryan Gaffney)

Follow Mike Ragogna on Twitter:

www.twitter.com/ragz2008

It's turning out to be an autumn full of Weezer albums with crazy covers and fan favorite songs. The band has already dropped 'Hurley' and announced the 'Blinkerton' tour in celebration of its first two albums, and now Rivers Cuomo and company have revealed plans for a rarities record, 'Death to False Metal,' which will drop on Nov. 1 and sports some pretty bizarre artwork.

In addition to a cover of Toni Braxton 's R&B staple 'Un-Break My Heart,' the Weezer camp is cleaning out its closet with titles like 'Turn Up the Radio,' 'Blowin' My Stack,' 'I'ma Robot' and 'pretty odd album Couple' slated for the project.

The 10-track disc, which was initially titled 'pretty odd albums and Ends' when Cuomo first spoke of it during a 2008 visit to LA's KROQ, features material dating back to the early '90s. Cuomo spoke collectively of these unreleased tracks as “great songs” and “great recordings” that never made the final track sequences of Weezer discs.

As previously announced, the band's deluxe reissue of 1996′s 'Pinkerton' comes in tandem with its 'Blinkerton' dates when it hits shelves on Nov. 22. As for rarities, many Weezer fans already know that Cuomo still has an arsenal of material that remains available. Between January of 1999 and June of 2002, he wrote a staggering 384 songs, including a number of tracks such as 'Mad Kow,' 'Mansion of Cardboard' and 'Buttafuoco,' which were recorded during US tour stops in 2002.

The track list to 'Death to False Metal' is:

1. 'Turning Up the Radio'
2. 'I Don't Want Your Loving'
3. 'Blowin' My Stack'
4. 'Losing My Mind'
5. 'Everyone'
6. 'I'ma Robot'
7. 'Trampoline'
8. 'pretty odd album Couple'
9. 'Autopilot'
10. 'Un-Break My Heart'

It's hard to fathom exactly what the state of mind of Weezer currently is considering the rollercoaster ride of releases over the past few years. Sixteen years on from the release of Weezer's critically acclaimed Blue Album , the power pop quartet has returned with their eighth album album Hurley .

At first glance, Hurley looks like one of the biggest musical disasters since well….Weezer's last album Raditude . That record was critically panned, which cames as no great surprise to fans considering the pretty odd album appearance of Lil Wayne .

However, despite the cover artwork, Hurley is actually a pretty damn good album and the record represents a return to form for the band.

It's clear that Weezer have moved on from the days of the classic Pinkerton and Blue Album records. Over time the band's sound has shifted from the harsher alternative end of the spectrum to a more professional, laid back pop styling.

The opening track and first single Memories , defines this laid back pop style. Rivers Cuomo’s strongly major vocal melodies, Beverly Hills Cop era synths, glockenspiel counter-melodies and a driving rock beat all fuse to form a lighthearted track that sounds like it should have been in an 80s John Hughes movie.

However, Memories also suffers from intolerably bad lyrics penned by Cuomo that are riddled throughout the album. A fan would hope that over twenty years, a songwriter would drastically improve their writing. However with shallow lyrics like “Now I got so many people that I got to look out for, Never know when I'll become awake and buy some food at the store”, one has to question what has happened to the Rivers outstanding writing of the early 90s.

However whilst some of the aforementioned lyrics are just dull, some are just purely insane. When Cuomo belts out “Mom made my sex, she knitted it with her hands. Sex-making is, a family tradition”, one has to wonder what the hell his childhood was actually like.

Despite the mediocre lyrics feature throughout the album, the consistent element that works in Cuomo's favour is his vocal melodies. In a true pop style his vocal hooks are catchy, melodious and serve as a great improvement of those on Raditude . They're the one element that manages to save a track like Where's My Sex from being a total write off. Most notably the pop hooks on Unspoken , Ruling Me and Hang On manage to lift Hurley to a point where it can actually be enjoyed, rather than shunned in the same fashion as many Weezer records of late.

As with previous Weezer's albums, the instrumentation of Hurley is exceptional, with Brian Bell , Scott Shriner and Pat Wilson providing a strong foundation for the tracks penned by Cuomo. However in a real pop style, solos have been killed off in favour of repetition of choruses, which is a real disappointment the great instrumental performance that Weezer has previously demonstrated with tracks like Say it Ain't So .

Overall, whilst Hurley may not be the next Blue Album , it certainly meets the high standards set by some of Weezer's more modern releases. Hurley has managed to prove that Weezer isn't giving up on living the rock star dream, or at least not without making another 20 million dollars.

When their singer Charlie Haddon died on August 20th this year, the issue of the release of the debut album by Ou Est Le Swimming Pool paled almost entirely into insignificance. The story of the end of Charlie's life is an awful one, and there is nothing I can add to it that you haven't read already. While it would be completely crass for me to talk about The Golden Year without acknowledging the tragedy which preceded it, it would be equally wrong to discuss the album exclusively in the context of Charlie's death. Chances are that if you're reading this, then you know the background, and you're probably here to get an idea of what the record sounds like.

For the most part, The Golden Year sees Ou Est Le Swimming Pool building on the reputation which their previous singles built for them as doyens of punchy synth pop. The album houses a good five or six instances where the band completely and utterly hit their mark from a pop point of view, snaring you with a catchy chorus or insistent synth line and refusing to let go. 'Dance the Way I Feel' and 'Jackson's Last Stand', in particular, provide the sort of devastatingly effective thrill out of seemingly simplistic ingredients which so many bands strive for, but which few achieve as completely as this.

When you've hit on a successful formula for pop perfection, there's always a danger of overdoing it, and laying it on too thick with the hooks, which has the inevitable impact of diluting their effectiveness. This is a pitfall which Ou Est Le Swimming Pool sidestep here, because The Golden Year isn't played out entirely at full speed, with the pop stompers broken up with the pretty odd album slowie. While the more downbeat moments like 'Our Lives' don't necessarily show the band playing their strongest hand, they are useful in saving The Golden Year from overwhelming you with boisterousness (aka The Passion Pit effect).

In spite of anyone's best efforts to separate The Golden Year from its background, it was always likely that there would be one or two moments where its context would result in moments more poignant than the band probably intended them to be. 'Better's occasional dark sentiments, although masked by an upbeat melody, make for pretty difficult listening: “The quiet walls are more help than a friend could be” . A similar effect is created by the waves of delicate hope which open up the album on 'You Started', particularly its “You have started the beginning of my life” refrain.

Whether or not The Golden Year will prove to be the only album Ou Est Le Swimming Pool ever release is, at the time of writing, unclear, and is something which is a private decision for the band's remaining members to make in their own good time. Clearly, if they do continue it will be with an entirely different dynamic to that which produced this record, a dynamic which at once shows the finely honed instincts the band possessed even at this early stage, as well as highlighting the potential they had for the future. Hopefully the strength of the album means that this music is what Charlie Haddon will be remembered for, rather than the manner of his death.