Jim James and the sound of God. Plus Eels and Nick Cave.

3 records play in my head.
3 short "first impression" reviews magically appear below.
1 winner. You.

1 ounce of reverb: Not worth your time. Not even if its free streaming.
2 ounces of reverb: Ok, but still a little disappointing.
3 ounces of reverb: Good stuff. You might even want to buy the download.
4 ounces of reverb: People will buzz. You might even star listening to CDs again!
5 ounces of reverb: A modern day classic! 180 gram vinyl is not even good enough!

Jim's James "Regions of Light and Sound of God" 2.5 ounces of reverb.  Good but not going to become great.
 First off I'm not a huge My Morning Jacket fan.  I get them to a point.  Jim James is the lead singer and driving force behind MMJ and I've always felt their music was missing something.  It can be grandiose.  Sometimes rocking.  Jim's voice is strong.  I've always felt the songs just didn't grab me enough.  I can't remember a time I heard an MMJ song and felt like, "I need that song on repeat all day today!"  With that as a long and probably useless intro I have to say that JJ's first solo record is interesting.  The first song in the free stream I listened to (there is another song showing before it on the iTunes album.  I'm not sure why it is not in the streaming version.) "Know Till Now" had me thinking that Mr. James thinks that the sound of God is similar to a Flaming Lips record.  But for some reason "Dear One" hooked me.  I don't know if I like the record but it sure seems worth a listen or two.  Highlights: "Dear One" and "A New Life".

Eels "Wonderful, Glorious" 2 ounces of reverb. Where are the hits?
Spinner compares Eels to Beck and Sparklehorse and that is not a bad comparison.  So considering I like both Beck and Sparklehorse that means that I like Eels.  What Mark Oliver Everett cops from Beck and Sparklehorse is more sound then substance.  He is not as talented as Beck and is missing the deep sadness and beauty that Mark Linkous captured in Sparklehorse's music.  "Wonderful, Glorious" is just more of the same from Eels.  Nice production, some nice beats, and some cool sounds...just missing the songs.  Highlights: "New Alphabet" and "Wonderful, Glorious".

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds "Push The Sky Away" 4 ounces of reverb.  Cough up the dough Cheapskates!
I'm a late in finding Nick Cave.  I've only been aware of his music for the last couple of years.  Better late than... (CLICHE ALERT!)  I like what I'm hearing on this new record.  It's dark but not heavy.  Lyrically Nick Cave is the man.  It seems that he is telling stories but there's not really much more than images, details, and the truth.  Highlights: "Wide Lovely Eyes" and "Water's Edge".



Comments

Post a Comment

You are loved. Probably.

Popular posts from this blog

Big Haunts Sleep Past the Few

Image
Welcome!  Bienvenidos a mi blog!  How do you say blog in Spanish?  I'm going to have to check Google translator.  Be right back!  Cool.  In Spanish it is blog!  Like you didn't know that was coming.  Today on Fiercely Me (the blog sent from Heaven): I review 3 new records and then tell you why they suck.  No that's too negative.  I might have good things to say too.  Nope.  I don't. Don't forget that I listen one time through the whole record, I give the record an unfair rating from a random and arbitrary rating scale, and then I try to express my feelings about the record with written words. Okay this has gone on way too long!  On to the random and arbitrary rating scale! 1 hour nap.  Not even worth the time it took to try to fall asleep. 2 hour nap.  Not bad but really it could be better. 3 hour nap.  Good.  This should be the standard that others are measured by. 4 hour nap.  Now this is getting ridiculous!  This is so good that you might as well just
Read more

Cheap Sidekicks and Cursive Girls

Image
Shaky from the coffee...wired from the sound...ready to take on the World...only because I won't be sleeping for hours if this feeling doesn't go away. Record reviews (I hope): Random scale of randomness... 1 wide awake hour of creativity.  This is probably not worth the time. 2 wide awake hours of creativity.  Ehhh...I'm just not convinced this is the real thing. 3 wide awake hours of creativity.  This is the norm.  Something worth the effort. 4 wide awake hours of creativity.  This is better than the rest, but something else is probably the best. 5 wide awake hours of creativity.  Great, greater, the bestest! Cursive "I Am Gemini" 2 wide awake hours of creativity.  Indie Dream Theater for sure. I admit it.  Years ago I had a musical affair with Cursive.  I came across 2003's "The Ugly Organ" and loved it, loved it, and loved it again!  But as it sometimes happens Cursive and I fell out of love.  Ok so it was me.  Still...we could have
Read more

Will Facebook and Twitter Miss Me When I'm Gone?

This one might be better for a philosopher or a psychiatrist to try and tackle. However this topic has me so curious that I thought, “Why not just put something out there in a blog and see if anyone has any insight out there?” I was on Facebook a while back and I noticed that a FB friend of mine had posted something about a friend of hers who had died unexpectedly. I looked him up by the name that she posted and I took a look at his wall. Not really out of morbid curiosity to see what happened, but mostly to see who he was. What kind of guy was he? Married? Single? Did he have kids? While checking out his wall I noticed that he had tons of postings from FB friends. He seemed to be a very popular guy. He had hundreds of FB friends and most of them were posting on his wall. I noticed that there were a few different kinds of postings. A few of the postings were just mentioning that they just saw him the other day and then would ask if anyone knew what had happened to him. The other ki
Read more