There are times — not many, but a few — when I sit down to write about an album and know I’m not going to need to pull out my gonzo rock n’ roll thesaurus in order to spin my praise. This is one of those times. As one friend recently stated, “Mark Lanegan has no peers,” and, really, what more needs to be said? The musician’s work with The Screaming Trees, Gutter Twins, Isobel Campbell, Soulsavers, and others is well documented, but the landscape he’s laid out with his solo work is incredibly gorgeous and virtually untouchable. The majority of his recorded solo material is deep, dark, and gracefully tortured, but where the albums he’s released as just Mark Lanegan present it in a softer form, the Mark Lanegan Band turns it up and wraps it in a whole bunch of grit, fuzz, and noise. It’s been eight years since their only other album, 2004′s Bubblegum, but Blues Funeral picks right up where that one left off, turning drum machine chaos, savory sequencing, bluesy rhythms, and a malady of melody into something emotionally gripping and powerfully rock n’ roll. Of course, as with anything Lanegan does, it’s his voice that is the star, and Blues Funeral is no exception. His voice could sell me my own death and I’d buy it. And at least I’d be at peace knowing I’ve got an amazing soundtrack for the long, slow walk down. No one does it better.
Check out the video for “The Gravedigger’s Song” from Blues Funeral!
Infernal Overdrive Last Rays of the Dying Sun
Small Stone
Discovering that Boston hero* Marc Schleicher has surfaced as the front man for New Jersey rock n’ road warriors Infernal Overdrive is one hell of an early Christmas present, my friends. Hell, I’m not sure I’d be here today if it wasn’t for Schleicher’s brawlin’ brand of East Coast riff n’ roll, so to hear him once again stranglin’ the six-string like a twenty dollar hooker is something special; a sure sign that the wheel of the American rawk machine is back in the grip of one of its most prolific drivers. Last Rays of the Dying Sun, the band’s full-length debut, is, quite simply, arena rock for dive bars, like KISS or Cheap Trick on a chain link tour through Southern wilds, and the way they saturate it with razor-backed hooks, sky high solos, nasty drum fills, and blacktop lingo (“I-95,” “Electric Street Cred,” “Rip It Out,” “Motor”) will lead a man to submit himself to a life of drinkin’, cheatin’, lyin’, and dyin’. Or, if you prefer, a life of glory. You know, I don’t think this one actually comes out until 2012, but either way, Small Stone has finished this year off — or started the next — on a definite high note.
*I’m not from Boston, but I have spent many years there vicariously through people much cooler than me, and I would be utterly shocked to find out that anyone who played in Cracktorch, Antler, and Quintain Americana isn’t a hero in that town.
Listen to “Rip It Out” from Last Rays of the Dying Sun!
Hailing from what seems to be the most magical of all rock n’ roll boroughs right now, Brooklyn, Hull represent that geographical body’s brute Hulk force, and one run through their sophomore album, Beyond the Lightless Sky, will leave you wondering how there are any buildings left standing at all in Kings County. Indeed, Hull’s dense, triple-guitar punishment can reduce anything to rubble, but it is amidst the dust and debris that Hull emerges to capture our collective astonishment by drawing us into their more kindly tempered, idyllic post-rock bosom. Of course, we soon realize it’s all a fantastic ruse, the promise of proximate peace nothing more than a lie designed to get us close enough to crush, and sludgy blows rain down upon us once more. Apparently Beyond the Lightless Sky is some sort of concept album about Mayan brothers, so I’ll just go ahead and assume that’s what all the dudes in the band are screaming about, but what does it for me is the way Hull mixes the massiveness of Omega Massif with the lumbering pace of Harvey Milk and then tosses in some mystical solos for good measure. Beyond heavy, man.
Mark Lanegan Band
Infernal Overdrive
Hull