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.
The Amazons obviously worked hard on their new album, 21st Century Fiction.
The fourth LP from the UK rockers is giant-sounding and mines hip-hop, electronic dance music, country and hard-rock for a wide range of high-impact sounds, which are slickly mixed into brooding alternative rock across the album’s 13 tracks.1 There’s a smoldering intensity throughout that gives 21st Century Fiction a harder edge than past releases from the Amazons, and the darker sounds are a good match for the album’s gloomy hang-ups. These include general desultory feelings, global chaos and disillusionment with modernity.2
That synchronization between form and lyrical motif is a nice touch and speaks to an admirable level of thought and intentionality that went into the making of 21st Century Fiction. It’s an album that’s both professionally made and conceptually cogent.
If that sounds like faint praise, it sure is. That’s more or less what 21st Century Fiction deserves. It’s not the worst thing ever. It takes aim at a specific sound, which took some degree of ambition, but it’s tough to hype up an LP that sounds like Imagine Dragons covering the perfectly cromulent blues-rock supergroup the Dead Weather.3
That’s not a completely charmless amalgam. Extended Bukowski allusion, “Love Is a Dog from Hell,” pushes the tempo with some rockabilly strumming and functionally rips until it’s stopped in its tracks by a radio-tuning coda. Its dopey lyrics, complete with extended metaphor and an undergarment-based pun, are also fun.4 But the band doesn’t often nail the right ratio of dumb to fun. “My Blood” and “Wake Me Up” sound like songs from a fictional arena act who would be objects of worship for a teenage protagonist in a Disney Channel original flick. “Pitch Black” has a radio-ready country stomp in the most irritating possible way. The lyrics do not get any better to compensate.
It’s nice that the Amazons tried something with 21st Century Fiction, but the brooding-but-enormous sound simply misses more often than it hits. There’s always next century.
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
“My Blood” and “Wake Me Up” sound like songs from a fictional arena act who would be objects of worship for a teenage protagonist in a Disney Channel original flick.
Oh, damn, the “smoldering intensity” from the first paragraph meets the outright fire of the burn. Great final line to the review too.
Ben has a real knack for spending the right amount of attention on details and this review is no exception.
I hope you’re including the puns in his titles.
Thanks!
I firmly believe there’s already more than enough snark in online music writing, but I couldn’t resist!
If it’s true it’s true! That line said everything I needed to know, “Fever Dog but for Hannah Montana” is something I could do without.
What did we watch?
The Kids In The Hall, Season Three, Episode Four
– “Oh, I’m just not good at small talk, ya prick.”
– “I think we overdid it a little bit last night.”
– I always like it when characters cameo in other sketches. I feel like comedy sketch shows should do tht as a matter of craft. In this case, Dar-ill is in a small role in this sketch.
– “Waiting, like matter, can neither be created nor destroyed.”
– “And without me and the French, [Canadians] are just Americans.”
– It’s funny to me how pretty much any show shot in front of a live audience ends up pushing the boundaries of what you can do with filming in front of a live audience; this has the flying pig, an obvious green screen effect, where the live audience would be watching it on TV anyway. Live audiences obviously give performers energy to play off, but even all the way back in the Fifties, it seems just as much of an albatross around a show’s neck.
– “I’ve got a spike in my head! Read it. It says “Pennsylvania Steel”.”
– “Everybody but the Hamlet guy!”
– “God, I gotta put my ear to the street a little bit better.”
– The punchline to the flying pig sketches was funny.
– You know, at this rate I’ll finish the show about halfway through 2026.
Final Destination Five
A return to form, though it does put into perspective how low the standards of the series are; it at least looks and acts like a real movie, with actors who clearly had time to work out their characters and filmmaking that’s fun. This actually felt like it taunted me at points, with the gymnast’s death especially being rather clever. A lot of the deaths in this film are pointless bait-and-switch jokes, like dropping a bunch of different clues only to have, say, a character killed by a loose rock from a lawnmower that goes straight through the eye. The gymnast death drops a few things that made me wince – like a screw on the horse – and then had them go off, but in a completely different way than expected.
The gymnast death was definitely one of my highlights for the series, so nasty! The ending is such a ridiculous, fun twist too. I ended up with 2 and 5 as my favourites although I think 1 and 3 are the ones I’ve seen multiple times for whatever reason.
1 and 2 make a good pairing, 3 is a mixed bag, and really the only thing wrong with 5 is that it’s repeating the greatest hits of the series – to great and deliberate effect in both the ending as you say, but also the opening with the nod to the log truck.
Sounds like I need to look for the gymnast death scene on YouTube. I’ve seen things go wrong for real so curious to see how creative they get!
(I’m thinking of the Sydney 2000 Olympics when they set the women’s vault something like 5-10cm off where it should have been, and a lot of athletes stacked it before one of them finally insisted the height didn’t look right and they measured and found the error.
Oh, and also that amazing video of the Russian gymnast landing and presenting after killing her routine, ignoring the uneven bars apparatus collapsing to the floor behind her.)
The Righteous Gemstones, “I Speak in the Tongues of Men and Angels” and “After I Leave, Savage Wolves Will Come”
Very strong S2 opener, with a lot of obviously compelling plot hooks: Eli’s dark and violent past coming back to haunt him in the form of Eric Roberts (fuck yeah, and my wife practically screamed with joy when he turned up as the older Junior); Jesse and Amber partnering up with a Texas televangelist power couple to start an all-inclusive Christian resort, challenging and alienating Eli in the process; and smarmy reporter Jason Schwartzman sniffing around (and snorting coke off the line of his Adirondack chair, which is a whole vibe).
The show is never afraid to burn through plot at rates that put most contemporary TV to shame, so as of “After I Leave, Savage Wolves Will Come,” the third plot I mentioned has already majorly escalated in an unexpected direction. The sense of the world and morality remains precise, too, with Lyle and Lindy Lissons as kind of mirrorverse Gemstones, offering even more superficial charm, glitz, and gaud, but even less, you know, God–it’s notable that the service of theirs that we see doesn’t have anything like the substance of one of Eli’s sermons, and their private conversations certainly don’t indicate anything like the Gemstones’ fundamental (if often vulgar, prickly, and treacherous) regard for family.
Random highlights: Amber giving a reluctant thumbs-up to Jesse’s Adderall since he wrote a “great email.” Judy and BJ’s Disney wedding, officiated by Prince Eric, and them being heckled about not even having a “legacy character” marry them. Gideon being genuinely, offhandedly good at directing the televised sermons.
“BJ’s dream was to get married at Disney Land!”
And BJ deserved to live his dream! The poor guy goes through a lot.
Love these observations, in particular about the Lissons.
Live Music – brought a ridiculous run of gigs to a close by attempting two in the same night. I already had a ticket to see Austria’s Laundromat Chicks at one venue and then Australia’s Hachiku announced a show at another venue less than five minutes away so I optimistically grabbed tickets for both and… just about pulled it off! I reckon I saw about 75% of the Hachiku set before dashing back and only missing Laundromat Chicks’ opener. Hachiku makes really sweet dream-pop and Laundromat Chicks are kind of jangly post-punk I guess? Both very good! Now, a few days off.
Wooo, the live music version of having two dates at the same time!
Wooooo live music!!
Wooooo live music!!
Twoooooo live music!
Golden Girls is pretty, pretttayyyyy, pretty good! Big boosts here: (1) everyone in the cast is a great actor and they treat the emotional moments with real sweetness and gravitas, especially McClanahan and Arthur, (2) everyone’s funny, and (3) as I get older in a city, which slowly weeds out the people who’ve moved to the burbs or started families, it feels increasingly relevant to watch a show about middle-aged women who are settled but still with active sex and dating lives.
Showed a friend Glengarry Glen Ross despite watching it a week before, that’s how good it is, and also in tribute to James Foley (RIP). He makes all the right choices here, especially with the camera moving in whiplash with the dialogue, the strong noir lighting in the first half, and his focus on people’s faces exactly when he has to (Levene’s face in the final minutes, the close-up on Roma’s about to be unleashed rage when Lingk walks out in a panic). Arkin is also so goddamn funny in this – he turns Mamet’s repetition into blinkered comedy until, as my friend observed, he stops just repeating whatever Williamson says at a crucial time.
last of us most recent. How are the wolves and the scars supporting populations that size, with, apparently, a pretty high soldier-food gatherer ratio? How—let alone why—are two factions fighting over non-arable land that’s full of underground pockets of infected? How can they spare that many fighters, let alone that many dead? How do they have tobacco??? They have greenhouse agriculture and they’re growing tobacco in Seattle?? If anyone had any damn sense the scars would go to olympia or bainbridge and the wolves to bellingham or centralia. You can’t ask me to think semi-realistically about logistics in Jackson and then have two magic self-sustaining armies in Seattle, apparently living off eating rotten concrete.
Otherwise good episode. Dina is a nice foil for Ellie—Ellie masks her homicidal rage with aloofness. Dina maintains a transparently plucky attitudes through trauma. Kinda lurking in the background here is that all the characters have similar levels of past trauma; Joel and Ellie are not unique. Every unnamed extra has lost just as many people. Dina is transparent about it; Ellie buries it till it comes out.
In the little making of snippet Druckman compares the choice the Wolf commander made at the start of the episode to Joel’s choice at the end of season 1. I think it’s a problem for the show that they’ve built it around this central “dilemma” and no one working in it has read any philosophy ever. Either get smarter or just accept who you are and let me enjoy a revenge fantasy with mushroom zombies.
doctor who, most recent. Solid episode. The doctor visits a barber shop in Lagos and bikinis ensue. There’s some neat ideas here and I think they could have done more with it. The central idea here is that we need stories about about the storytelling gods (anansi, etc.) but it’s not totally clear why or what mythic gods are in the world of doctor who.
Cars. Halfway into this the three year old shouts “cars don’t talk!” I cannot get over having this objection to Cars—half of what she watches is things talking that don’t talk—and it only being an issue halfway in is even funnier. (The 6 year old did the same thing, and I probably made this observation at the Solute 3 years ago). I tried explaining in an Owen Wilson voice that “Everyone knows that Cars don’t talk. What this film presupposes is, maybe they do?” and the reference was totally lost on her.
somehow autocorrect replaced hijinks with bikinis. There are no bikinis in this episode of doctor who.
I am now 1000% less interested than before.
I was very confused about how I missed them. Thank you for explaining
That’s hilarious – it must be a 3YO thing, my son said the same thing around that age (re: toys) during Toy Story 4. Maybe we’ve found the exact age where the brain starts to categorize sentient and non-sentient items.
Last night was for catching up on Sunday night viewing – The Rehearsal and The Great North specifically. More to come Sunday! Short version, The Rehearsal returns back to Earth this episode, and The Great North is, well, the same show as always.
What did we listen to?
1001 Albums, etc.
Neil Young – Tonight’s The Night: Very enjoyable but again not hitting the heights of those earlier albums that really knocked me out.
Bob Dylan – Blood on the Tracks: Excellent stuff, up there with Blonde on Blonde as his best work for me.
Patti Smith – Horses: Yep, lives up to the hype. Still sounds fresh and exciting – early punk energy but tied to more ambitious song structures and obviously the lyrics are great.
Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here: Had a vague memory that I much preferred this to Dark Side… and yep, I definitely do. The synths on this sound GORGEOUS and may have encouraged me into an ill-advised impulse buy.
Queen – A Night at the Opera: One of the albums on the list I’m most familiar with, possibly not my favourite Queen album but a solid pick for their best work. Amazing use of the studio too, not just Bohemian Rhapsody – there’s a glorious level of production madness here that pays off consistently.
Willie Nelson – Red Headed Stranger: Never really listened to Willie before. Probably never will again.
Earth, Wind and Fire – That’s the Way of the World: Surprisingly ahead of its time in terms of production, although it lacks the big tunes that I’m familiar with from this group. Admired it but nothing that really stuck in my head.
Screen Drafts, Nicolas Cage – grabbed this early, very long episode last week to soundtrack a couple of big drives. Not sure I’ve gone back this far before, this is a pre-COVID episode so it was recorded in person with players handing in physical cards for their picks etc. This also means that they were mostly drafting from his earlier career since he was only just getting out of tax-repayment hell at this point. Some pretty wild choices! A fun actor to discuss, as usual. Think I’d seen everything they chose apart from Zandalee which I should probably check out at some point.
Of all of Dylan’s albums, Blood On The Tracks is one of the two I keep coming back to to listen to the whole thing. One of those unified albums, not just in theme but in tone.
Good choice on the better Floyd album. The Shine On arpeggio alone makes it better, imho. It’s a door opening you want to walk straight away into.
I’m a complete sucker for slightly wobbly 70s synths where they still had to tune them between every take. This album is definitely a winner for that kinda thing, and it’s nicely poignant too.
Strong recommend for the movie That’s The Way Of The World, a lost if not suppressed bit of 70s oddness. It features the (fictionalized) band and their music but focuses on the sappy pop group that record execs prefer instead, the plot is unfortunately cutting against the ostensible idea of giving these guys their own movie. But it’s a great, bitter time capsule with prime Harvey Keitel Roller Disco Content.
And if nothing else it’s better than Blood On The Tracks, a mid album with an outright terrible song (Simple Twist Of Fate) to boot.
Shots fired!
I’d like to see that, yeah – big fan of weirdo musician movies. If I hadn’t been stuck at work late yesterday I was going to try to fit in a screening of Slade In Flame before the double-gigs…
Valerie June, Owls, Omens, and Oracles
Delights, If Heaven Looks a Little Like This
Two previous Sounding Board candidates! I have nothing too specific to say about the Delights’ album–Ben is right about the “ebullient ear candy,” so this made for pleasant listening even if no particular songs jumped out at me. Felt very summery.
Owls, Omens, and Oracles, on the other hand, was stupendous, and I counted up several favorite tracks: opening stunner “Joy, Joy!”, “Endless Tree” (the lyrics meant I could have found this one either too twee or too mystical, but June’s warmth and sincerity, and the sheer beauty of her voice, made it work), “All I Really Wanna Do” (great chorus), the gospel-feeling “Changed,” and the croony “Sweet Things Just for You. I will definitely have to seek out more June.
The White Stripes, The White Stripes
And Ben’s 1999 YOTM piece led me to this. Unsurprisingly strong debut album with great blues rock, and I think my favorite was actually the cover of “St. James Infirmary Blues.” It’s impossible to listen to this and not wish I’d somehow been able to see The White Stripes live before they made it big.
of Montreal, The Sunlandic Twins
Nath recommended this as a possible follow-up to The Soft Bulletin, and it rules: sunny, funky indie pop with just the right amount of weirdness. Highlights: “Requiem for O.M.M.2,” “Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games” (possibly my favorite, and with the relatable earworm chorus bit of “Let’s pretend we don’t exist / Let’s pretend we’re in Antarctica”), “Forecast Fascist Future,” “The Party’s Crashing Us,” and “The Repudiated Immortals.” Already kind of in the mood to listen to this all over again, so maybe it’ll be my soundtrack for work today. And I’ll have to check out more.
Queens of the Stone Age, Songs for the Deaf
And the first album off Nath’s retrospective of his favorite 110 albums of the ’00s. I’m not much of a metal person, but 1) “No One Knows” and “First It Giveth” are both terrific, and 2) the radio station structuring here made me happy and, since I don’t listen to the radio much anymore, also provided a nice nostalgia hit. The muffled, barely-there noise of the pregap–“The Real Song for the Deaf”–is more of an eye-roller than it’s probably supposed to be, but mostly now I’m just curious if the album title came about because someone hurled it at them as a criticism of their songs being loud. Wikipedia is not helping me on this front. Again, pretty good overall, even to someone without much of an ear for the genre, and with two songs I especially liked.
Since I’ve been in an unprecedentedly musical mood lately, I’m also throwing out a request for recommendations and playlists. I’m going to keep working my way through a fair number of Ben and Nath’s write-ups, but I’ll also take any suggestions anyone else might have. Foist your favorite things upon me. Assume I have barely any knowledge of anything music-related, because that will sadly often be true.
Legitimately curious what you’d make of Dark Side Of The Moon.
I already foisted a little Baths upon you last week, but I’d love to hear your take on the full Romaplasm album, which is one of my very favourite things.
This QOTSA album is pretty good but it was kinda where I drifted away from them, for whatever reason. There’s a mischievous / chaotic edge to the previous album that I missed on this one. Although I saw them do a very good show on the UK tour for this album, with Mark Lanegan included.
I’ll endorse Kate Bush here as always.
Looking forward to Kate showing up on the 1001 list. love a lot of the singles but haven’t really dug into the albums.
Hell, I’ve only dug completely into Hounds of Love and her debut, so should I.
00s list crossover! The Futureheads cover of “Hounds of Love” is one of my favorite cover versions ever:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awjE92YZeEQ
Beulah might be a good rec based on the of Montreal love. Like oM, they were connected to the Elephant Six Collective.
Their first album, Handsome Western States, is decidedly mid-fi at best, but catchy. Their middle two albums, When Your Heartstrings Break and the Coast is Never Clear, are both kind of like if Weezer albums used the baroque pop instrumentation of psychedelic period Beatles. Very sunny melodies, very sour lyrics.
I think I lean When Your Heartstrings Break, but Coast is Never Clear is bigger and more immediate.
Also “If we can land a man on the moon, surely I can win your heart” is one of the greatest song titles of all time.
I’ve also long been fascinated by California bands use of Southern Gothic imagery, and Beulah have a lot of songs with Spanish moss, or that are set in Augusta or that riff on Flannery O’Connor.
It’s subtle compared to the Gun Club or CCR who went full Foghorn Leghorn with their presentation, but it’s an odd thing that keeps happening.
Also a song that lives up to the quality of its title!
Possibly annoying but Camper Van Beethoven is great weird college rock with Balkan vibes and slacker wryness concealing some heart but not sap. Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart is probably the best intro.
And on the White Stripes-esque front, Boston’s own Mr. Airplane Man owns – two women, guitar and drums, fantastic rock.
In a different vein, the horrible to search for Come is furious and weary dark blues, the opposite of CVB. Eleven: Eleven is a great debut, if you like it there is a lot more from vocalist/guitarist Thalia Zedek to pursue.
Hooray!
Those are largely my favorites from The Sunlandic Twins too, although “So Begins Our Alabee” is also near the top and I’d put “I Was Never Young” on there as well. (Maybe “ever since I was a kid I’ve been a brooding basket case” doesn’t apply as well to everyone else.)
If you’re already going through the 00s albums, I’m not sure what else I have to recommend at the moment. Although I would’ve recommended starting with the better ones, instead of the bottom, but, yeah, “No One Knows” was a big hit for a good reason. I like “First It Giveth” too, although my top-3 (along with “No One Knows”) probably includes “You Think I Ain’t Worth a Dollar, But I Feel Like a Millionaire,” and “Hanging Tree” (with Mark Lanegan– if you’re not familiar with Screaming Trees, Dust would be a great album to check out).
Of my favorites and the artists who show up on that 00s list, I wonder if you’d like Ted Leo and the Pharmacists. They’re upbeat and punk-adjacent without quite being punk, and you’re, um, literate, so I think you’d appreciate some of the stories, references, and worlds in the songs. I’d probably just listen to the big three albums in chronological order– The Tyranny of Distance (#15), Hearts of Oak (#5), Shake the Sheets (#65).
If you’re looking for something in a particular style or from a particular era, let me know– I can throw favorite albums at you all day (not physically, unless that’s how you want to receive them).
Re: the ’00s albums, going in actual countdown order was too tempting; apparently I have a built-in respect for the integrity of the list formatting. (Although of course listening to The Sunlandic Twins now inadvertently meant skipping to the end at least a little.)
Don’t know Screaming Trees, so I’ll definitely check out Dust. Ditto Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, and thanks for the order: that does sound very much like my kind of thing.
I’ll let you know if I wind up in a particular mood as I go through these: right now I feel like I’m still learning what my own tastes are called, if that makes sense. But I always love “if you liked that, you’ll probably like this”-style recs, which has obviously already led to a winner with The Sunlandic Twins. (Gotta listen to Satanic Panic in the Attic now too.)
If you’re the kind of person who can appreciate an “Oed’ und leer das meer” in a song– the first one you will hear if you go in the recommended order, even– then you’ll like Ted Leo and the Pharmacists.
And, otherwise, per your request… as far as stylistic recommendations based on current listening…
If you like Of Montreal and the power-pop from the recent article, in the 00s article I’d listen to the three New Pornographers albums and the Shins album. (Some people like the first Shins album better. I happen to believe those people are incorrect.)
From an earlier era, there’s Big Star’s #1 Record and Radio City, which are foundational and not optional, the blueprint to power-pop. The Soft Boys’ Underwater Moonlight is an underrated classic of the genre. Squeeze’s Singles 45s and Under is a great collection of songs– in other classic best-of compilations, The Very Best of Badfinger and the Raspberries’ Capitol Collectors Series fit the bill nicely.
I don’t really have anything for Songs of the Deaf because that QOTSA album is kind of an outlier for me in terms of the type of music I typically like. And with The White Stripes, the best recommendation is probably, um, more White Stripes.
This morning got some Kate Bush going! The guitar whirring and mowing on “The Big Sky” is still amazing, isn’t that Robert Fripp?
Sinners soundtrack. Only criticism is that the sound track versions of songs should be edited a little to be more listenable while you’re not watching the movie.
Ludwig Goranson is probably the best composer that is also a music supervisor. He’s T Bone Pickett and Hans Zimmer in one.
Speaking of T Bone, O Brother Where Art Thou takes place the same decade and state. If Coogler, MBJ, Goranson, Caton, Coen, Coen, Clooney, Goodman, T Bone, and Krauss wanted to sell out a little they could make a billion dollars
on sinners 2 as a crossover.
Sinners 2: Hydroelectric Boogaloo
Sinners 2: revenge of the dammed
Sinners 2: The Secret Of The Blues
I can imagine Clooney and at least one of the MBJs bonding over pomade preferences.
among other things.
clooney, excitedly bobbing his head: “like an ice cream cone? Wow. I’ll have to give that a try.”
Hahaha – also the juke joint siege would definitely elicit a “Damn, we’re in a tight spot!”
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 15th: John Bruni: L’Eclisse/Il Sorpasso
May 16th: Gillian Rose Nelson: Big Red
May 19th: Bridgett Taylor: D’Aulaire’s Book of Greek Myths
May 23rd: Gillian Rose Nelson: Almost Angels
May 30th: Gillian Rose Nelson: In Search of the Castaways
And coming in June, we’ll be moving on to 1983, including all these movies, albums, books, et al!
Jun. 9th: Sam Scott: El Sur
Jun. 23rd: Sam Scott: Codex Seraphianus
Jun. 24th: John Bruni: Legendary Hearts
Jun. 30th: Tristan Nankervis: The Big Chill