The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
Every Tuesday, the Sounding Board is a space for a short-ish review of a recent-ish release and conversations about new-to-you music. I’ll get things started with a write-up about a newer, likely under-heard album, and invite you to share your music musings in the comments.
Cory Hanson loves all sorts of people, and if his discography were more widely known, they’d probably love Hanson back.
Over the past decade, Hanson has released four good-to-great albums with the well-respected but under-listened-to band, Wand, and put out four solo LPs, all of which are at least solid and whose ranks include the wonderful but unfortunately named Western Cum. 1
I Love People, a pitch-perfect recreation of the exquisitely detailed, unnecessarily ornate and often twangy singer-songwriter fare that populated ’70s radio, probably has long odds of introducing a wider audience to Hanson. There’s definitely a market for Harry Nilsson-meets-Jason Isbell, but it’s not a particularly big one. However, Hanson’s fourth solo album easily extends his streak of quality releases. The LP is heavy-lidded and a smidge maudlin, but it’s undeniably pretty and consistently lyrically interesting.2
“Lou Reed,” an elegiac song dedicated to the deceased icon whose name provides the song’s title, is not I Love People’s best track. However, it is the most demonstrative of the album’s defining characteristics. The song is slow-building and begins as a simple duet between Hanson’s soft voice and a piano. Strings come in to add further complexity, and toward the back third of the song, creamy saxophone arrives to both nod to one of Reed’s best-known songs and turn a bite-sized morsel into something decadent. All the while, Hanson sings about Reed and his legend. Musically, the song could pass for a lush Elton John number, but it’s tough to imagine Bernie Taupin penning “the unlikely but accurate couplet, “You were a prince and a fighter/ And you were a Tai Chi Master/ Yeah, you were a Tai Chi master.” 3
While I Love People lacks any outright rave-ups, it does have a few songs that move at a brisker pace than “Lou Reed.” “Bad Miracles” covers similar piano ballad territory with a major difference in the form of a 30-second guitar solo in the last third of the song. Hanson’s slightly grungy guitar playing sticks around post-solo to provide some extra punch to the song’s melody in its closing moments. It doesn’t push the tempo, but it’s a nice change of pace. A couple of songs, including the album’s title track, do speed things up. “I Love People” is buoyant thanks to a lively brass pulse that pushes the song forward as Hanson runs through the sorts of people he loves. It’s a rather long list that avoids overstaying its welcome thanks to propulsive trombone gorgeous “ba-da-da-da” vocalizations.4 Album-closer, “On the Rocks” is an odd-but-successful proposition. It’s a jaunty country tune complete with steel, but it’s also a brisk track that seems to pay homage to another rock legend who was friends with Reed. There’s a recurring, ascending riff throughout “On the Rocks” that sounds unmistakably like the chords that back the chorus of “The Man Who Sold the World” by David Bowie. It’s a bit distracting, but after the novelty of hearing that riff inserted into a gentle heartland rocker wears off, it’s a choice that works and carries the song up, over and far past its bucolic beginning. It also helps to give its conclusion some gravitas.
The commercial prospects of a song that grafts Bowie onto an upbeat ’70s country ditty lyrics touched by terror, paranoia and nudity seem dim. In fact, there’s absolutely nothing about I Love People that suggests it will be a unit shifter. However, the people who do find it are in for a strange, incredibly smooth trip, they just might enjoy.
About the writer
Ben Hohenstatt
Ben Hohenstatt is an Alaska-based dog owner who moonlights as a music writer and photographer.
For more information, consult your local library or with parental permission visit his website.
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The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
The Sounding Board
A weekly column where New Music Tuesdays live on. Conversation is encouraged in the comments.
Department of
Conversation
What did we watch?
The Kids In The Hall, Season Three, Episode Fifteen
“There. I now have the cleanest kitchen counter in the world.”
“I’m thinking about those cable cords that go out of the wall and into the back of the unit.”
“Come on, man, you gotta let it go! That stuff will eat you up!”
“This is a gay home alone outfit.”
HOMO ALONE
“Great! Tom here just told me he was a virgin until he was twenty-six!”
Larry not responding at all to Larry was the funniest sketch I’ve seen on this in a while. The inane grin on his face was so funny.
“Strange guy, but I like him.”
Alfred Hitchcock Presents, “Into Thin Air” – In short, good presentation and acting trump story. More on Thursday.
Sherlock and Daughter, “The Last Dance” – Well, the end is not perfect but it’s good enough for me to say it sticks the landing. Amelia is really Sherlock’s daughter, which makes sense in the context of the show though I will never entirely buy the man whose idea of an ideal relationship was a one time battle of wits with Irene Adler as being very sexual. And the bad guys were foiled, though the resolution to things was (intentionally, I think) messy. The most interesting part? It seems like everyone involved in the conspiracy had a different reason for their actions, and also though he or she was the true power. Fairly smart and clever writing here. I hope this is not the end for the show, but even though it did well both over the air and streaming, there’s no predicting the actions of the people who own the CW aside from “make it cheaper.”
Chicken Town – a ramshackle British comedy that feels a little too scrappily made to really deserve the fairly substantial release that it seems to be getting. I’d tolerate the slack editing and uneven writing at a festival screening but as a standard Monday night outing it left me a little frustrated, even if there were enough funny lines among the flat ones to charm me at least a little. I was kinda surprised when I looked it up on Letterboxd and found that the director had made other films though, everything about this one screams “nobody here had made a film before”.
It’s a low-stakes tale of a teenager who gets out of ten months in a young offenders institution for a crime he didn’t commit. In theory he’s looking for the person who set him up but the film doesn’t really commit to this storyline and gets sidetracked by a drug-dealing plot involving an older neighbour, played by British cult hero Graham Fellows (known for his musical alter-ego John Shuttleworth). The young cast are likeable if not always convincing, but that general sense of flawed charm only carries the film so far, I’m kinda glad I saw it but wouldn’t really recommend it to anyone.
I have strep so my attention span is hilariously low. Watched a King of the Hill and the Curb Your Enthusiasm with Bryan Cranston as Larry’s therapist. It tracks that Larry can’t really do doctor-patient relationship boundaries.
Heretic
First time. Philosophically thin, but it’s a satisfying thriller anyway. Great production design, moving casually between a casually-beautiful mountainside small town, to a cozy but foreboding living room, to a mock-church library, and a scary basement. Still, this is an acting showcase, with Hugh Grant weaponizing his usual persona into the atheist-debater-from-hell, the striking Sophie Thatcher as a skeptical Mormon rising to his rhetoric as a survival tactic, and Chloe East having the more subdued role, until the third act forces her into a more proactive role. The horror elements at the end raise questions that the movie doesn’t need to deal with, and that’s fine, since the backbone of the movie is in suspense rather than mystery, and that holds up just fine.
This is really well-put. I wind up fighting with the last two acts of this because the first part works so well for me that I want it to all be squarely in my wheelhouse, but it really does have its (considerable) charms.
Didn’t take the time to report it yesterday, but I also rewatched Oldboy and ended up kind of gushing about it during film club. Still surprised by my reaction since on paper this is 100% the kind of movie that I’m usually in the skeptical minority for. But Park is so endlessly inventive visually and so clever in his plotting that I’m delighted to discover each new moment. A good film has a moment where I think “how has this never been done before,” Park’s film have me wondering how he has several moments like that in every single movie.
What did we listen to?
1001 Albums, etc.
Fleetwood Mac – Rumours: there are a few Fleetwood Mac songs that I really love, and the making-of story of this album is incredible, but it’s not a personal favourite if I’m honest.
David Bowie – “Heroes”: I definitely prefer Low but this is still top-tier Bowie.
Dennis Wilson – Pacific Ocean Blue: I remember a friend lending me this years ago and not particularly getting into it, but I enjoyed it a lot more this time around. The grit in his voice works well for the songs, some of it is a bit too generically blues-rocky for me but other songs are fantastic.
Suicide – Suicide: A band whose influence I enjoy more than their actual music, maybe? But the actual music is pretty great too. I like the oddly pretty ones between the bleak repetitive ones.
Iggy Pop – The Idiot: can definitely hear that Bowie and Iggy were spending a lot of time together at this point! Pretty great.
Blank Check – first couple of Coens episodes have been great, the Raising Arizona one in particular was so much fun. I loved John Hodgman’s running joke. Just started the Miller’s Crossing episode, I’m not really a fan of Ari Aster’s films but he seems like a decent guest so far.
Did not expect Ari Aster of all people to like Miller’s Crossing so much.
Feels like he’d be more of a Serious Man kinda guy.
Playful Anti-Semitism or stereotyping based on his movies? You decide!
Shocked by how much I enjoyed Hodgman’s running joke.
Been getting into this SF Ultra podcast, where a very smart Irishman delves into science fiction, a genre he apparently never liked much until now. (1) He has a marvelous voice and (2) some of the episodes are several hours long and actually earn that running time, he has good insights about the likes of Alasdair Grey and his current focus, William Burroughs.
Music-wise: Was looking for dread-inducing music while I write and the Weird Studies discord introduced me to Univers Zero’s 1970’s album Heresie, a European band that reminds me of Scott Walker and Swans, a lot of scary vocals and freaky strings.
Zombie by Fela Kuti fucking rocks, so THIS is what Talking Heads was ripping off and that explains a lot. A band absolutely going off a groove but they also feel very tight and there’s more warmth to the music even if there’s clearly some darkness at the edges.
Alice Coltrane’s Journey in Satchidananda is excellent free jazz, probably the most I’ve responded to the genre outside Miles Davis, and i’m gonna try Universal Consciousness next.
Most notably, saw Of Montreal live on Saturday night on The Sunlandic Twins 20th anniversary tour. That was great and really what I hoped it would be. Might even have motivated me to finish out my article on the album.
Heard a surprising amount of new music I hadn’t heard before on the radio yesterday, although I still haven’t made any hard decisions on which of the songs I really like. The new Cass McCombs single is pretty good, though, and I’m intrigued by Loaded Honey, a project from a couple members of Jungle.
Don’t have time for any particularly substantial write-ups today, but:
Ghosts of the Great Highway, Sun Kil Moon
Gorgeous, melodic, melancholy set of story songs with incredible lyrics.
Panic Shack, Panic Shack
Sounding Board gets results! An energetic, boppy, pop-punk delight that instantly made me a fan. Favorites are “Lazy” (“I wake up just to go back to sleep!”), “Tit School,” and “Thelma & Louise.”
Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, Outkast
I’m with Nath’s write-up on this one: The Love Below is great, and it has plenty of highlights–“Hey Ya,” obviously, but also the sexy “Spread” and the intimate little play “Where Are My Panties”–but Speakerboxxx is the half I really got into, especially songs like “Unhappy” (“Might as well have fun, ’cause your happiness is done / And your goose is cooked”), “Bowtie,” and “Church.”
Fire, Electric Six
Another album where I was having such a good time that I just wrote down song titles. Cool, fun, and just an all-around good time; I’m smiling as I’m thinking about it. Favorites: “Naked Pictures (Of Your Mother),” “Danger! High Voltage!”, “I Invented the Night,” “Improper Dancing,” “Vengeance & Fashion,” “Synthesizer,” and the almost country-esque “I’m the Bomb.”
Madvillainy, Madvillain
Intricate and impressive. I especially loved the vintage sampling.
DJ-Kicks, Annie
Very fun, upbeat mix album.
Just realized that I put this in the wrong place. /facepalm
Interesting. I loved “Western Cum” (although agreed on the title, ugh) but that was my first real exposure to Cory Hanson so I was kinda expecting this to be in the same vein. Will give it a listen and see if I find him as appealing working in a different mode, with a less off-putting album title.
Harry Nilsson meets Jason Isobell does sound like an album that was made for 70’s singer-songwriter geeks like me.
Year of the Month update!
This August, we’ll be covering 1959. Check out all these movies, albums, books, et al
And in September, we’re covering these movies, albums, books, from 1938!