Album Reviews

HYPNOS 69
The Intrigue of Perception
(Elektrohasch)
Hypnos 69 hails from Belgium, of all places, and maybe coming from a country better known for its frigid, experimental electronica is what keeps the quartet from sounding like a typical psychedelic rock band. That's not to say the band doesn't work with the usual building blocks—there's plenty of acid rock riffs, psych pop hooks and space rock textures to be found here. But somehow the band resists sounding just like anybody else—maybe it's the jazzy runs from saxophonist Steven Marx. Regardless, with the crunchy rockers "The Endless Void" and "Twisting the Knife," pastoral shimmers "Third Nature" and "Absent Friends" or the bluesy swinger "Good Sinner - Bad Saint," Hypnos 69 stakes out its own turf on the sunshine-bright mushroom mountain. Michael Toland [buy it]

IDLEWILD
Warnings/Promises
(Capitol)
Scots band Idlewild took the alt.rock world by storm in 2000 with its second album, the alternatively tough and tender 100 Broken Windows. It's been a few years since, though the band released the strangely ignored The Remote Part in that interim. Warnings/Promises, the band's fourth album, seems poised to capture the bigger audience its cheerleaders have always claimed it deserves. Well, maybe. The group (recently expanded to a quintet with an extra guitarist) certainly actively works its musical ambitions, giving songs like "Love Steals Us From Loneliness" an effusively widescreen treatment that makes the most of the melodies and Roddy Woombe's evocative vocals. Unfortunately, that approach sometimes works against the band's intentions, burying its emotional fervor in a mushy haze. When it strips down, as on the noisy rockers "I Want a Warning" and "The Space Between All Things" or the ballad "Not Just Sometimes But Always," Idlewild is far more effective. Warnings/Promises is by no means bad, but it's still not fulfilling Idlewild's oft-touted potential. Michael Toland [buy it]

THE KINGS OF FROG ISLAND
The Kings of Frog Island
(Elektrohasch)
Apparently leading one power trio isn't enough for Josiah point man Mat Bethancourt—the British singer/guitarist also fronts the Kings of Frog Island. But while Josiah simply kicks out the power rock jams, the Kings focus on Bethancourt's more acid-fried brain leakage on their self-titled debut. "The Longest Hour," "Amphibia" and the appropriately-titled "Psychomania" prove Bethancourt as adept at loud psychedelic anthems as at more straightforward ones, while "Slate Blue Sky," "The River" and "Save Me" find the band exploring more varied, even acoustic textures. Bethancourt's dramatic, soulful baritone finds a comfortable home amongst the fuzzy riffs and roiling rhythms, and his way with a melody comes even further to the fore here than it does with Josiah. The Kings of Frog Island isn't re-writing the rules as set down by Blue Cheer and Love, but it certainly puts a fresh narrative on the same book. Michael Toland [buy it]

THE MAIN INGREDIENT
Everybody Plays the Fool: The Best of the Main Ingredient
(RCA/Legacy)
In a lot of ways, the Main Ingredient is a fairly typical example of 70s soul. Everybody Plays the Fool covers pleading romance ("You've Been My Inspiration," "Let Me Prove My Love to You") as well as Afrocentric social commentary ("Black Seeds Keep on Growing"), moving through rubbery pre-disco funk ("Happiness is Just Around the Bend"), lush balladry ("I Am Yours") and R&B-flavored pop like the title track. There's also a smattering of covers, from the predictable (the Impressions' "I'm So Proud," Stevie Wonder's "Superwoman") to the surprising (Bread's "Make It With You," Seals & Crofts' "Euphrates"). This doesn't have the power of the O'Jays or the instant appeal of the Spinners, but the songs are strong, the arrangements are accessible and lead singer Cuba Gooding has an easy grace that really sells the tunes. If you're a fan of 70s R&B, this disk will make a fine addition to your library. Michael Toland [buy it]

THE JAN MARTENS FRUSTRATION
The Jan Martens Frustration
(Brass Button/Hidden Agenda)
A decade from now or so, people are going to cite Sweden's one-album wonder the Nymphet Noodlers as a seminal band in the Nordic rock revival. (Maybe they already do.) Singer Mattias Hellberg has begun what looks to be a remarkable solo career and guitarist Mattias Barjed and keyboardist Martin Hederos joined The Soundtrack of Our Lives. Now bassist Jan Martens and drummer Jesper Karlsson step into the spotlight as the Jan Martens Frustration. The JMF has a deep love of 60s garage rock and psychedelia in common with its Scandinavian brethren, and the band also isn't above an arena rock flourish or two. Led by Martens' charismatic vocals, tunes like "Get Along, Get Together," "Speak to Me" and "Good Day Today" nicely balance melody and muscle, while "A Few Too Many" and "Reaching Over" set the controls for the heart of the sun with solid song structure and a sense of whimsy. The American version combines the group's debut EP and album with a bonus cut ("Catch as Catch Can"), but it's a completely unified, sweetly satsifying listening experience. Sweden: the mecca of melodic rock & roll. Michael Toland [buy it]

THE DEL MCCOURY BAND
The Company We Keep
(McCoury Music/Sugar Hill)
Another Del McCoury Band album, another sterling collection of top-flight contemporary bluegrass tunes. Few acts in any musical genre are as stunningly consistent as the McCoury bunch—if they've ever made a bad record, it's buried in an unmarked grave on some Carolina hill somewhere. Sure, you could argue that there's a bit of same ol', same ol' here—there's nothing in "Fathers and Sons," "Untamed" and "She Can't Burn Me Now" that you haven't heard on the Band's records before. There is one twist; in the surprisingly carnal opener "Nothin' Special," the usually deeply romantic and spiritual McCoury asserts that sex with his baby is the greatest physical pleasure he's experienced. And who can argue with a voice that high and lonesome? There's no one who plays and sings bluegrass as well as the McCoury Band, and you'd be hard-pressed to find a better bluegrass record on the new release shelf than The Company We Keep. Michael Toland [buy it]

MINOR MAJORITY
Up For You & I
(Big Dipper)
Variety, experimentation and eclecticism is always cool around these parts; at the same time, it's always nice to hear some straightforward, no-muss-no-fuss songcraft. Like Belle & Sebastian playing Neil Young's songbook, Norway's Minor Majority plays quiet, melancholy folk rock. Up For You & I, the quintet's third album, makes the most of its easygoing melodies, sparse arrangements and frontguy Pål Angelskår's plainspoken, soulful croon. It's so easy to let down your guard around this record's sonorous beauty you'll find yourself singing along to sad, yearning laments like "I Thought I Knew You," "Wonder If She Knows" and "A Song For Nicole." Up For You & I is a gorgeous, heart-on-sleeve masterpiece. Michael Toland [buy it]

MIRA
there I go daydreamer
(Projekt)
Following up on the teasing Pieces EP, Tallahassee's lovely Mira graces us mere mortals with there I go daydreamer, a beautifully wrought soundscape of glimmering textures and delicate emotions. Regina Sosinski's heavy thoughts and feelings contrast nicely with the light atmosphere of tunes like "Passerby," "Window Seat" and "Highs in the Lows," as the guitars swirl around her siren song and the rhythm section prods everybody forward. "Hinterlands" ends the record in a cloud of distortion and fog, as Sosinski coolly asks "What do you have to say?" Gorgeous, melancholy stuff. Michael Toland [buy it]

NICKEL CREEK
Why Should the Fire Die?
(Sugar Hill)
Mentor Alison Krauss' slick production crushed the life out of Nickel Creek's last two records. But the band enjoys a warm, intimate sound, courtesy of pop/rock producers Tony Berg and Eric Valentine, on its third album Why Should the Fire Die? The organic aura is perfect for the album's program of originals, hardly any of which could be called bluegrass. Similar to recent solo albums by mandolinist Chris Thile and guitarist Sean Watkins, tunes like "Helena," "Somebody More Like You," "Best of Luck" and "Jealous of the Moon" (co-written with the Jayhawks' Gary Louris) would fit on the shelf with compositions by Elliott Smith, or even Joni Mitchell. Sung by fiddler Sara Watkins, the lovely cover of Bob Dylan's "Tomorrow Never Knows" sheds the most light on the trio's current direction. Even the smattering of instrumentals have only tenuous connections to bluegrass. Nickel Creek has always been a pop band that happens to use bluegrass instrumentation; it's good to hear the band fully embracing its own destiny on Why Should the Fire Die? Michael Toland [buy it]

NOVADRIVER
Deeper High
(Small Stone)
Novadriver has been through the kind of shit most bands would rather avoid. Between 2001's Void and the current opus, singer/keyboardist Mark Miers left (and came back). Worse, bassist/songwriter James B. Anders passed away following the completion of Deeper High. So while it may just be me putting my own assumptions on it, this record definitely sounds like a triumph over adversity. The Detroit combo slams propulsive riff-rockers like "Machine," "Bury Me Alive" and "Turn to Stone" (cue cowbell) into the nosebleed seats and out of the park, as if it couldn't wait to start swinging. Slower cuts like "Dark Aftermath" and the sample-laced "Stars After Stars…" luxuriate in an expansive spaciness that's relaxing even as it blows your speakers out. The album concludes with the pounding, swirling, shimmering one-two instro punch of "Blackout" and "Whiteout," sending Deeper High off into the stars. This is psychedelic hard rock as emotional liberation. Michael Toland [buy it]