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. We’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.
What a wild week for new releases.
Viagra Boys returned as fun and chaotic as ever. Samia set a new high point for her still-young discography. Beach Bunny popped in for a quick burst of exceptionally anxious pop-punk. Self-Esteem crashed the party with transgressive, baroque pop. Tennis called it a career. Sumac & Moor Mother keyed in on a new kind of heaviness by combining soul-scarred poetry with paint-peeling noise rock. Among all those big swings and much-feted releases, Sunflower Bean put out an unassuming but incredibly solid new LP.
Mortal Primetime, the trio’s fourth album, is nothing more or less than 10 well-crafted conventional indie rock songs featuring exceptional instrumentation and striking vocals.1 It’s likeable front-to-back and worth working into even a recently crowded listening rotation. That’s an impressive bit of alchemy because the types of adult-oriented rock that provide the most obvious points of reference for Mortal Primetime don’t necessarily scream, “must listen.”
Depending on the song, listeners can expect to encounter ultra-slick hair metal guitar, somber string accents that used to class up songs like “Iris” by the Goo Goo Dolls, the Paisley Underground’s psychedelia-lite, or what sounds like a mid-’80s Stevie Nicks song. There’s also a full-fledged shoegaze track that brings the album to a somnolent close, but its glorious anxiety-obliviating buzz is a one-off.
Generally, Mortal Primetime silos its disparate sounds. Aside from a sense of theatricality and bassist-singer Julia Cumming’s voice, there’s not a lot that ties the sleek rock of “Champagne Taste” to the shimmering strumming of “Take Out Your Insides,” which uses body horror imagery to describe emotional intimacy.2 But there are some moments of genre cross-pollination, and when they crop up it’s a good time.
“Shooting Star” is mostly a straight-down-the-middle ballad, but it works in some touches of static and twinges of guitar twang that streak by like the song’s title. “Waiting for the Rain” is the most successful of those sorts of mild experiments. The song, which features guitarist Nick Kivlen on lead vocals for most of its runtime, begins in a gentle, woozy place complete with chords that evoke “Dear Prudence” and eventually cede airspace to a heavier hum. About two-thirds of the way through the song, that hum is punctuated by an extended guitar solo. It’s almost 30 glorious, gratuitous seconds of quivering notes and includes a brief bit of finger tapping. It’s a downright Randy Rhoadsian moment of cutting loose on an album that doesn’t feature many other indulgences. Both the song and the album are richer for it.
While Mortal Primetime‘s other tracks don’t aspire to the same level of flash, there are plenty of other enjoyable songs and moments. The fade-in on “Take Out Your Insides” is attention-grabbing, and not since “Conversation 16” has a song this soft featured a central metaphor so grotesque. Cumming cooing “I want you to take out your insides in front of me,” is, if nothing else, super memorable. The ’80s radio rock pastiche, “Nothing Romantic,” nails its tone with eerie accuracy. It finds the exact midpoint between ’80s Pat Benatar and ’80s Nicks to fun results.3 “I Knew Love” is a soft-rock sunbeam of a song.
These aren’t show-stopping moments cementing a series of future classics, but they are interesting features on solid songs. It’s decidedly worth setting aside the time to notice and enjoy them.
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
Ha, somehow missed that the new Samia album was out, even though I’m seeing her live tomorrow and on closer inspection it’s an album launch show. The clues were all there!
What Did We Watch?
One to One: John and Yoko – had a couple of options with my regular Monday Night Cheap Cinema group, most people were going to a screening of They Live but one person decided to pivot to this, and since I’ve already been lucky enough to see They Live on the big screen I decided to switch as well. It was a good choice! I’ve been in a bit of a terrible mood recently and I’m not sure the cynicism of They Live would have helped (much as I love it) but this doc is oddly hopeful and optimistic despite being set in the middle of Major Turmoil and it really worked for me.
It’s a doc without interviews / talking-heads, all archive footage apart from some linking shots in a recreation of the Lennon / Ono New York apartment. It does a fantastic job setting the time and place via news footage and other early-70s TV (appropriate given the couple’s obsession with television during the era) and uses these montages between performances from the One to One concert which was Lennon’s only full-scale post-Beatles live performance apparently.
I’ve never been a huge Lennon fan but like all the Beatles he’s very funny, and his relationship with Yoko is very sweet – and it was also just generally great to properly hear from Yoko after a bunch of Beatles content that sidelines her. She’s fucking cool, man. The couple were heavily involved in activism at this point and it’s kinda sweet hearing their naive plans to change the world, stuff that I wish more mega-celebrities were trying today even if things didn’t always work out. The concert itself raised a ton of money for disabled children which is at least one unqualified win. Anyway I loved this, it made me appreciate John & Yoko more as people even if it showed some glaring flaws in Lennon’s songwriting at times. Also the archive phone calls are reliably funny, especially one running theme about flies.
I am a pretty big Lennon skeptic (he was obviously talented but also annoying within and without that talent), but this sounds really good. Any footage-only doc is already in the plus column for me.
Would be curious to see some American opinions on it as I suspect my ignorance of US (recent) history helped my enjoyment – there was a ton of stuff here I just did not know about at all or did not know was all happening at the same time that might not be as revelatory to other viewers. But yeah it’s a definite recommendation and SOME of the music is great
The Kids In The Hall, Season Three, Episode Two
– I enjoy the theme song of this show.
– “Yeah. And I’m asleep too, and I’m ready to do a little sleepfighting.”
– The location title coming up in response to a character asking “Where am I?” is a great dumb gag.
– I enjoy that the character consistently play mothers as naively helpful. They remind me of at least two of my aunts, if you count the aunt who is actually just my Mum’s friend.
– “What do you mean, I haven’t been at work for a week?”
– “Would you like the smoking section, the non-smoking section, or the section where people talk about their relationships?”
– The “I broke up with you” sketch was very funny. (“I knew we shouldn’t have sat so close to him!”)
– “Let’s hope they keep their clothes on, because I’m completely out of pink.”
– I enjoy the element of tragedy with Daryll, where he’s aware nobody likes him and is working insanely hard to ignore that.
– The girl drink drunk sketch was already great, but I loved the turn that he became an alcoholic through it.
– “I can’t help feeling responsible for your condition. But I can’t help not caring.”
“You got one hour, then out!”
Great episode. “Girl Drink Drunk” is an all-timer, but “Tiggy” is great too.
Kojak, “The Pride and the Princess” – When is a nun not a nun? When she’s really a Balkan princess trying to find the family jewels, stolen from her when she was in hiding in Sicily during WWII. And did I mention that the jewels appear to have been stolen by a mobster? A twisty and surprisingly emotional episode, with Maria Schell as the princess, alternately flirting with and angering Kojak, and Herb Edelman playing very much again type as her ex-soldier bodyguard and maybe-lover. But the episode is stolen by Vivian Nathan as the mother of the mobster, whose life experience is heartbreaking and chilling. On my short list for best episodes. Plus a scene is filmed in Washington Square Park, which never changes.
Frasier, “Mixed Doubles” – Daphne’s boyfriend dumps her, and Niles decides to confess his love, only Frasier gets him to delay. Naturally, Daphne meets someone else who of course off-brand Niles. But hey, Niles met someone too, right? Only off-brand Niles hooks up with the other woman. Leading to the payoff: Daphne and Niles commiserating and Daphne both admitting she could have been interested in Niles if things were different and asserting she could never go out with a separated man. That one last heartfelt scene makes all the contortions that came before worthwhile, though Niles coping with his copy is very funny, plus Niles calls the guy a “ludicrous popingjay.” I want to have an excuse to call someone a ludicrous popinjay.
When I was heavily crushing on a mutual friend who had no interest in me, this episode had a bit of real pathos. Pierce is heartbreaking at the end. “…I love you too, Daphne.”
The Grand Budapest Hotel – Wonderful film that fully expresses the potential in the Anderson style for humor and melancholy. The Anderson company of players know their role, to be inserted in the tableau, and how to maximize their presence within those limitation. They’re led now by new Anderson player Ralph Fiennes who shares Anderson’s gift for tight control of his areas of the frame which make his outbursts all the more surprising and colorful. The disc came with a great visual essay by David Bordwell, one of the greats at breaking down the visual language of a film in quick and easy-to-understand terms. Looking forward to watching this film again already.
When Gene Hackman died I saw a take that Anderson didn’t have another lead performance on that destabilizing (to the aesthetic) level until Fiennes, which I think tracks. And Gustave’s mannerisms and mood are much closer to Anderson’s preoccupations than Royal’s boisterousness, but he shares an incredible vitality as opposed to Anderson’s generally depressed adults, he’s a bit Max Fischerian in that regard. So that makes it all that much more devastating, of course. Magnificent performance in maybe Anderson’s best.
last of us, most recent episode.
What’s the WLF’s plan? What are they eating? Do they have an oil refinery? The only person talking any damn sense this show is the guy talking about corn at the town council meeting.
The apparent lack of trade and relations between settlements is also problematic, and leads to the council being stuck with a dilemma after last week. (when
happened due to ex-fireflies currently living in Seattle). Does Jackson need to establish deterrence? Is Seattle a threat? No way of knowing. You just have to send someone out for a trip thats well over a month round trip to do anything. If you had trade routes and ambassadors or spies you would already know which settlements were large enough and ambitious enough to potentially be an issue. Joel and Tommy in season 1 were implied to have a long history as smugglers, but now Jackson knows basically nothing about the west, so those smuggling networks have also broken down.
It’s a little silly anyway; the purpose of the mission is revenge, like in the life aquatic, and high-minded concerns about the security of Jackson are beside the point. And that’s fine. I like revenge. But sometimes the gamer logic comes in and tries to deliver tough dilemmas when there’s actually only one rational/moral answer and/or one answer consistent with characterization. (see also the false trolley problem at the end of season 1, where Joel’s character alligned with the only rational or moral option but it’s presented as a tough dilemma).
Also, according to tv logic, Dina is definitely pregnant but is also going to hook up with Ellie.
righteous gemstones They’ve pretty much tied up this season’s plot now. There’s only one episode left.
I keep calling mcbride the redneck garcia marquez and that’s not just because I read hundred years of solitude this winter and I have it on my mind. I’m not calling McBride redneck Wagner even though I also have the Ring cycle on my mind. (This would be a fruitful source of inspiration for him though). But I genuinely think the gator farm plot is something that could have happened to an Aureliano.
You have this family always under the twin pressures of true faith and running cons. A love triangle with an alligator farmer is only going to end one way. This is the most basic law of dramaturgy. You can’t introduce a gator farm and not have anyone get eaten. The gator comes in as a bolt of divine judgment and approbation.
Also Goggins is stealing every scene between the dance-off and “Jesus, Bless this cocaine” he’s on fire. I would like to see mcbride work with john c reilly, only because I want to hear reilly ask “dear lord sweet baby jesus. bless this cocaine.”
It’s like they heard us all and literally had Goggins dress as Jesus.
Instead of a traditional finale they should do a feature length release of Teenjus, starring Baby Billy.
I know Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, showrunner of Riverdale, is kicking himself that he did not come up with this idea first.
Whoa, we can do spoilers here? How’d you do that?
so I said [ spoiler] without spaces. But I don’t know how to put the text of the spoiler in it. I was just saying spoiler in lieu of stating the actual event.
Let’s test it.
If it worked by fake spoiler will not be visible to people who aren’t me unless you click on it. I did [ spoiler ] text [ / spoiler ] without spaces.
Looks like it did! Sick! Fantastic!
I was gonna say, I was not aware we could do that.
I wasn’t either!
It does create a giant target if you’re someone who is weak willed when it comes to resisting spoilers.
Glengarry Glen Ross – Must hand it to Spacey, unfortunately, but I’ll also credit Mamet (agh) and Foley (whew) – SPOILER Williamson at the climax is humiliated and avoiding eye contact as Levene smugly dresses him down, and his recognition and cold, hard stare is still incredible. “How did you know I made it up?” So too is Levene’s face at the end, all too recognizable as a Man trying to gather his emotions in front of other men before he will implode. SPOILER
Also watched half of Face/Off, this is some peak Cage, especially Archer REMEMBERING that he is posing as Castor Troy and consciously going Full Cage in the beatdown scene in the…underwater magnet boot prison. What an insane movie. We used to make shit in this country, build shit. Travolta’s way less convincing as nice guy dad, much more as an evil terrorist pretending to be a (cool) nice guy dad. (Archer kinda sucks as a boss and parent, hilariously, Troy is evil and leering at his faux-daughter but is also actually aware of her life and what she might need.)
Only 2 more days to watch THE PLOT AGAINST HARRY on Criterion– I’m profoundly glad I re-warched this comedy about a New York city based Jewish bookie reconnecting to a family and community that he’d walked away from for a quarter century, partially against his own volition. This is a great document (from 1969) of the changing neighborhood demographics in New York jostling against continuity of traditions, and the interweaving of criminal enterprise within both. One also senses a Coen-esque sense of divine forces acting against the lead characters’ instinct and actions in order to uncover his better self through abasement and cruelty. This needs to be mandatory viewing.
What Did We Listen To?
Ecstasy, Lou Reed
Beautiful. Polished production, simple songs, a sense of peace.
Flowers In The Dirt, Paul McCartney
It’s amazing how McCartney’s wonderful songwriting comes through no matter how trashy the production. It’s also interesting how rarely his music resembles his Beatles work despite clearly being the product of Paul McCartney; how much of this is the lack of Lennon and how much is from the lack of the rest of the Beatles is an open question.
The Lennon doc above made me think about the Beatles individual contributions a lot. I’m guessing with John’s songs there must have been a lot of “not bad John, but have you tried looking past the first word in the rhyming dictionary?” comments that his solo work could have really benefited from.
The oversimplified take is that McCartney would have forced Lennon to put more effort into developing his songs (half the time, I feel like Lennon’s solo work is him getting half an idea and just not developing it, lyrically or musically) while Lennon would have fed McCartney more ambitious and conceptually interesting ideas. Of course, as Alan W Pollack pointed out, half of it would just be the general process of them trying to one-up each other. Apparently Lennon was coming out of retirement specifically because McCartney’s solo work was improving.
Yeah, Lou Reed could still bring it on a song like “Turning Time Around”:
My time is your time when you’re in love
And time is what you never have enough of
You can’t see or hold it, it’s exactly like love
That’s lovely. I also love “Hang Onto Your Emotions.”
McCartney’s solo stuff also tends towards the DIY and homespun which has made his music age very well in the context of lo-fi and bedroom pop. Even his poppier songs like “Coming Up” absolutely slap.
1001 Albums, etc. – big week:
Gene Clark – No Other: Pretty decent. A few songs felt a bit “but we have Neil Young at home” but it gets more ambitious in places in ways that mostly worked for me.
Steely Dan – Pretzel Logic: Love it when they bust out the huge stacked harmonies but otherwise I’m just kind of “meh” on the Dan.
Randy Newman – Good Old Boys: Helped me understand the Randy Newman appeal better than his previous album on the list but still not really my thing.
Bob Marley & The Wailers – Natty Dread: Solidly enjoyable, I’m not the biggest reggae fan but the Marley style is pretty undeniable. The version of No Woman, No Cry on this album is great, I think I’m more familiar with a later version that is a bit more polished, to its detriment.
Robert Wyatt – Rock Bottom: Pretty fantastic – I’d heard and liked some Wyatt stuff in the past so was disappointed that I didn’t get much out of Soft Machine, but in solo form he’s odd and playful and full of ideas.
Gram Parsons – Grievous Angel: Some great songs on here but I enjoy them more when other people cover them – production is a bit too much trad-country perhaps? The Evan Dando / Lemonheads versions of $1000 Wedding and Brass Buttons are gorgeous.
Brian Eno – Another Green World: Great stuff, heard this before and already knew that it was excellent but a pleasure to hear it again. “I’ll Come Running” is a perfect song.
The Dictators – Go Girl Crazy!: Wasn’t really familiar with these aside from one or two tracks but it’s thrilling to hear punk kicking in this early. Great stuff.
NEU! – NEU! ’75: Another one I’d heard before, I am fully onboard with Krautrock and it doesn’t get much better than this.
Led Zeppelin – Physical Graffiti: Double album tested my patience for Led Zep but there’s some killer stuff here, Kashmir obviously but it’s nice and varied which helped.
Keith Jarrett – The Koln Concert: An hour of improvised piano jazz sounds like it should be my nightmare but I actually really enjoyed this, and the story behind it is fascinating. I see there’s a new film about it starring John Magaro!?
Aerosmith – Toys in the Attic: I’m only really familiar with later-era Aerosmith although I knew the title track mainly from the REM cover (!). A real mixed bag, some enduring hard-rock hits but also some of the worst songs I’ve ever heard (“Big Ten Inch Record”, jesus christ)
David Bowie – Young Americans: Absolutely not my favourite style of Bowie. Couple of great songs but not one I’ll return to. The Beatles cover is just awful.
Burning Spear – Marcus Garvey: Not as enjoyable as the Wailers for me, but more solid reggae that sounded good on a hot day.
Bruce Springsteen – Born to Run: Never really dug into Bruce for some reason, this was pretty great and also it’s funny how much the Meat Loaf sound (my favourite artist aged approx. 12-13) stole from his sound, just with a bit more OTT drama.
Emmylou Harris – Pieces of the Sky: Pretty, sad country music is another thing I can appreciate but not really fall for. Her Beatles cover kicks the shit out of the Bowie one though.
Blank Check, Fast Times at Ridgemont High – new series! I have a lot of Heckerling blind spots and have only seen this one once, really enjoyed the discussion and I should probably rewatch at some point. I remembered the cast being ridiculous but they mentioned a ton of people I don’t remember even being present.
Heckerling might be the least Blank Check-y director they’ve ever done. I get that if you want cover more women, you have to bend the rules, but is anything she did really a blank check? Looking forward to Johnny Dangerously, but mainly because it is one of the worst movies I have ever seen (don’t tell my wife i said that) and I wonder how they deal with it.
Yeah lacking in “crazy passion projects” I guess. An interesting collection of hits and misses though. I haven’t seen Johnny Dangerously but it seems to have some big defenders as well as haters so I’m curious, if I can actually find it anywhere I might watch this week.
To be fair, it has a killer cast and some funny bits. But when my wife showed it to me, I was just shocked how dumb it is. I can see some people finding the gags funny enough to deal with the rest of it, but I thought my wife was nuts.
It’s got its funny moments, but it’s kinda front-loaded and loses steam the more the plot kicks in (and as a great supporting cast starts falling by the wayside).
Steely Dan don’t really hit the groove until the next album, Katy Lied. Then they get harder and funkier on The Royal Scam. After that, they perfect the smooth pop surfaces that hide really nasty, really funny lyrics on Aja and Gaucho.
This list has their first three albums and then jumps to Aja, and I’m sticking with it for now so I’ll have to take your word for the albums in between! I don’t think they’re really for me, but I can understand why they hit for a lot of people (now as much as then, seemingly).
Old Aerosmith rocks pretty hard! They got so schlocky in the 80s.
Meat Loaf/Jim Steinman could not write Jungleland, but Springsteen could not write Tonight Is What It Means To Be Young, so the Boss loses this fight.
A bunch of Irish folk on this playlist has got me wearing a balaclava and muttering “Fuck the English,” though some of the latent misogyny of otherwise banger tracks like “Whiskey in the Jar” and “Seven Drunken Nights” sours this mood a bit. There’s also a gospel list I found and every Mahlalia Jackson song is this huge burst of power and vitality, she BELIEVES!
I listened to most of the Velveteers album in preparation for possibly going to their show Friday night, but the weather was miserable and so was I, so I stayed in instead. It’s pretty great, though. The big single “On and On” makes me think a lot of Kim Deal’s “Crystal Breath” from last year.
Will check this out, I keep missing out on their albums/forgetting to check them out.
Year of the Month update!
May’s year will be 1962, so you can write about any of these movies, albums, books, et al!
May 2nd: Gillian Rose Nelson: Moon Pilot
May 9th: Gillian Rose Nelson: Bon Voyage!
May 15th: John Bruni: L’Eclisse/Il Sorpasso
May 16th: Gillian Rose Nelson: Big Red
May 23rd: Gillian Rose Nelson: Almost Angels
May 30th: Gillian Rose Nelson: In Search of the Castaways
And there’s still time to sign up for any of these movies, albums, books, et al from 1999!
Apr. 29th: Dave Shutton: American Pie/Class of 1999