LEONA NAESS
I Tried To Rock You But You Only Roll
MCA
I need an emotionally wounded female singer/songwriter to fall in love with on a pretty regular basis, so skipping across the worn cobblestones of Fiona, Shea Seger, Sarah Harmer, among others, I see Leona Naess approaching in the distance.
She's been around here before, with her debut Comatised, an album that contained only a twinkle of what was to come. Songs like "Lazy Days," detailing the bursting passivity with which Naess asked a lover to chill in her apartment and order Chinese, and "Charm Attack," a pop song of steel whose hooky gaze gave us a not-so-outsider look into the world of beautifully unattainable guys. The momentum of the album slowed down soon after those highlights, though, and, like the latest Travis album, waded far too deep into the sludge of over-confessional songwriting accompanied by sparse and unaffecting musical accompaniment.
With her latest, however, I'm the one that's gonna need something to cataract her charm attack, as the heightened clarity and vitality of I Tried To Rock You But You Only Roll is enough to drown anyone in its confidence. Naess had a cute checklist on her last album where certain emotions (like a broken heart) could be checked off as inspiration for the individual songs. The new album could have a similar checklist with all exclamation points, since whether she's yearning, empowering, or apologizing, it's all done with an assuredness and conciseness that we all secretly want from our pop songs, no matter how many pieces the author is in.
The album title is cringeworthy at first, but it only takes one listen to roll right along with the sense of humor that livens both the songwriting and the music, the latter often augmented this time around with bubbly electronics. "When you fall, I'll be around/ I'll be the mayor of your town," Naess throws back at a love that missed his chance. Other times she's less cryptic. "Come with me to Mexico/ Stop listening to that damn radio," she demands. How anyone in her presence could be anything but transfixed is unknown, but I think you oughta take her up on this ride. (Michael Delano)
MAPPARI
High Enough to Notice
Wheelkick Records
The up-and-coming band Mappari has been receiving a lot of buzz. They supposedly rock in concert and have opened up at sold-out venues for G. Love and the Special Sauce and the Rustic Overtones. They've also recently released this debut album, which was produced/mixed by Rob Stevens (who has worked with everyone from John Lennon to the Red Hot Chili Peppers). With this in mind, let me just say one thing. They suck! A lot.
Listening to this album is like getting punched in the ass. And not in the good way. The band doesn't have an original bone in its eleven-song "album." But how can I describe their sound? How about this: suppose the Gin Blossoms came back but left their songwriting talent back in the 90s. And suppose their comeback album had a green cover and sounded nothing like their good old stuff and made you embarrassed that you ever liked them in the first place. Hmm, maybe that's a bad example...alright, suppose Toad the Wet Sprocket came back...
The fact that this band was signed to a label and given a record deal single handedly disproves the existence of God. After listening to this album twice (the second time, I muted my stereo and the band's strength was revealed to me), I now truly believe in evolution. Charles Darwin would have loved Mappari but he's dead so let me tell you why they suck. First of all, on the cover of the album, there is a picture of a boy holding a piece of broccoli. No one likes broccoli! Why are you doing this to us, Mappari? What have we done to deserve this?
The best song on this album is a track called "Light," only because it kind of sounds like a second-rate Guster song and makes mention of Allen Ginsberg and Van Morrison (does the band even know who these people are?). The track also manages to have a good closing that speeds up the beat of the song, kind of like the Beatles' "A Day in the Life" except nowhere near as good.
With lyrics like "all I want is to be a fish," it's amazing that this band got where they are. On one track, leader Will Bailey sings "sex hurts the first time, but then you find your role" and it really makes you wonder what Bailey is doing wrong and what compelled him to write a song about this. The track "Idiot," which was probably written about the guy that signed Mappari has lines like "he wears your skin like a dress, to hide his manliness." First of all, that makes no freaking sense! And secondly, I hate broccoli!
This album punched me in the ass and left a mark. Don't let it happen to you ... wait for Mappari's second album featuring a girl holding a piece of cauliflower. I'm sure people will eat it up. Mappari, you are the reason I stopped believing. Thanks for showing me the dark. (Serge Pinsky)
LITTLE A
Scene
Say aaahh!! Records
You know the TV commercial with the little blue aliens using a Pentium to alter a tourist's photo of the Eiffel Tower, making the woman in the photo more aesthetically pleasing to them? Well, the cover photo for Little A's new album Scene looks as if it went through that same process. It's that kind of cheapness that permeates this wan, lusterless album.
With lead singer Bruce Grover's whiny, nasal voice, and the band's desire to probe new places with their instruments, Little A sounds kind of like Our Lady Peace, the difference being that OLP actually bring passion to their noodlings. Whenever Grover isn't growling or bleating to sound like he has vibrato (it doesn't work), he's moaning as if he had taken Thorazine. At a little over 45 minutes, this hazy mope rock gets downright dreary. Each song (excepting two) run past four or five minutes, even after the song should've ended. The band endlessly repeats lyrics and beats, with either Grover's drowsy keening or his strangulated attempts at nu-metal anger.
I wished the band would break out at least once, and my hopes got high halfway through, during the beginning of "Down." But the song quickly died, and the remainder of Scene was a flat-liner.
The members of Little A - Grover, guitarist David Kirkdorffer, and drummer Danny Lee - also have the problem of wanting to be other musicians. At times, Grover comes off like a nu-metal Dave Matthews, complete with the singer's sometimes-incoherent verbal gymnastics. This is most obvious on the worst track, "Pendulum," a long, slow, nearly six-minute downer bracketed by 40 seconds of ... people eating. "Silences" sounds like it could've come off the Verve Pipe's self-titled, somewhat misguided, sophomore disc.
Little A may think they're bringing melody and inventiveness to the world of hard rock. But their arty touches are ill advised, and the music is unlistenable. Despite their optimistic name, Little A gets a big, fat F. (Johnny Donaldson)
MIKE WALKER
Mike Walker
Dreamworks
Mike Walker is the reason most people today hate country music. Every bad cliché that is associated to the long lost, once respected music style can be found on Walker's latest and hopefully last album. From the incestual "Who's Your Daddy?" (seriously, that's a song), to the heartfelt closing track "Memphis Women and Chicken," Mike Walker destroys everything that greats like Johnny Cash and Hank Williams created. He also doesn't play a single instrument and didn't even write one song by himself. He co-wrote three tracks on this album, and you guessed it, they're terrible.
The only thing that Mike Walker has going for him are sideburns. He has killer sideburns. If they could somehow just get their own album, I think it might be better than Walkers'. You heard it here first, people - Mike Walker's sideburns are going places! He, however, is not. I think that Mike Walker's career will be over before you can say Tom Cochrane. Except that "Life is a Highway" was a kick-ass song and that guy ruled.
Listening to this album, I get the impression that Mike Walker isn't even trying. The songs that he sings are pathetic, and his personality is nonexistent. He doesn't want to be Garth Brooks, he wants to be Chris Gaines, the ill-fated Garth alter ego. Hell, if Garth Brooks' alter ego were Mike Walker, he would never get a show at Staten Island, let alone a sold-out Central Park.
Walker also does a terrible cover of a great Roy Orbison song on the track "What Kind of Love." If the Orb wasn't dead, he would have totally grabbed Walker by his sideburns and shown him what good music is all about. If Chris Isaak ever hears this track (and I have a feeling he will, since bad music tends to become popular, and since country stations have already put songs off this album in rotation), he'll show Mike Walker how imitating Roy Orbison is really done. Until then, Walker is safe in his crappy downward spiraling country music scene world. But time is running out until it starts getting good again and he will be seen for what he really is: a hack. And those sideburns are growing... (Serge Pinsky)
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