Mit Shepherd In a Sheepskin Vest veröffentlicht der Vorreiter des Lo-Fi sein erstes Album seit 6 Jahren. Anders als die in musikalischer Hinsicht einfach gehaltenen Vorgänger, erscheint Callahans neues Werk komplett und rund. Er geht in den 20 Songs tiefer als je zuvor. Auch weil sein Songwriting aus einer veränderten Perspektive heraus, andere Aspekte als in früheren Arbeiten fokussiert.

Der bis Mitte der 2000er Jahre als Smog auftretende Singersongwriter ist heute Ehemann und Vater. Er reflektiert die bisherige Existenz; die Songs oszillieren zwischen Ausdrucksformen neu erlebter Freude.

Die Arbeit an Shepherd In a Sheepskin Vest gestaltete sich für den Künstler systematisch zielorientiert: Sobald er seine Gitarrenparts und den Gesang komponiert bzw. geschrieben hatte, kamen die anderen Teile hinzu. Sein Zusammenspiel mit Gitarrist Matt Kinsey ist eine wesentliche Beziehung innerhalb der Musik. Brian Beatties akustischer Bass fügt ein weiteres Element diesem facettenreichen Potpourri hinzu. Shepherd In a Sheepskin Vest ist ein akustisches Arrangement, welches Klänge und Geschichten zu einer großen musikalischen Proklamation verbindet.

Bill Callahan packed a lot of living into the years between Dream River and Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest: He married in 2014, welcomed a son in 2015, and lost his mother in 2018. These experiences couldn't help but inform his music, and on his fifth solo album, he sounds like he's rediscovered the wonders of life (and death) and is primed to share them in a way that feels new to his lengthy career. Though Shepherd is over an hour long, its songs are on a smaller, and more personal, scale than any of Callahan's previous work -- instead of panoramas, they're family snapshots. These shorter tracks may or may not reflect how he balances being a husband, father, and artist (though "Writing" and "Morning Is My Godmother" sing the praises of sacred creative times), but they bring a riveting directness to his music.

Reflecting the growing wisdom of his songwriting, Callahan begins the album by casting off the people and ideas that no longer belong in his life. On the smoky, three-minute long "Angela," he says a final goodbye to the kind of star-crossed relationship that, earlier in his career, might have inspired an entire album. On "The Ballad of the Hulk," he bids farewell to the suppressed anger and toxic masculinity of his "Bill Bixby days." From there, he marvels at the simplicity and complexity of life and death with a refreshing and thought-provoking lightness. These songs float with a free-flowing ease, turning what could be midlife crises into opportunities to grow and reflect. Callahan's gentle musings on the nature of true love on "What Comes After Certainty" find him at his most literal and most spiritual (and, on asides like "I got the woman of my dreams/And an imitation Eames," at his wittiest). Meanwhile, his reflections on his mother's death on "Circles" and loss in general on "When We Let Go" reveal how the philosophical nature of his music has ripened over the years in aching yet graceful ways. On each of Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest's songs, Callahan does a masterful and moving job of marrying real-life glimpses with storytelling on a grander level that brings out the essential truths of both. He grounds the album's music in allusions to Lead Belly ("Shepherd's Welcome") and the Carter Family ("Lonesome Valley"), includes Icarus and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in its cast of characters along with his wife and son, and envisions the cosmos among his wedding guests on "Watch Me Get Married." Most of all, the album's songs are connected by joy, whether it's the bustling domesticity of "Son of the Sea," the existential gratitude of "Call Me Anything" or the chance to tell his son when to wander and when to put down roots on the charming "Tugboats and Tumbleweeds." Unassuming yet frequently profound, Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest is a gorgeous and much-needed return from an artist whose powers have only grown during the time he spent living his life.

(by Heather Phares, All Music Guide)

Endlich wieder vereint

Kaum zu glauben: 14 Jahre nach ihrem ersten Kollaborationsalbum »In The Reins« haben sich Calexico und Iron And Wine 2019 erneut zusammengefunden und einen Mini-Longplayer aufgenommen.

»Years To Burn« heißt die neue Platte der US-Alternative-Rocker um Joey Burns und John Convertino und der amerikanischen Singer-Songwriter-Ikone, die mit bürgerlichem Namen Sam Beam heißt.

Calexico hatten erst im letzten Jahr ihr sehr erfolgreiches »The Thread That Keeps Us« veröffentlicht. Iron And Wines »Beast Epic« erschien bereits vor zwei Jahren.

Für »Years To Burn« haben sie nun acht neue Kollabo-Songs eingespielt, und zwar im Sound Emporium in Nashville zusammen mit Produzent Matt Ross-Spang.

Das Ergebnis ist ein spannender Mix aus Americana und Folk, wie bereits die erste Single »Father Mountain« eindrucksvoll unter Beweis stellt.

So klingt es, wenn zwei absolute Hochkaräter gemeinsame Sache machen: Hier ist »Years To Burn« von Calexico und Iron And Wine.

Es ist eine großartige Scheibe geworden. (...) Häufiger, etwa bei dem achtminütigen dreiteiligen Stück ›The Bitter Suite‹ oder dem monumentalen ›Midnight Sun‹, die beide mit sonnigen Chorgesängen gewürzt sind, muss man an das kreative Feuerwerk denken, das Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young zu ihren besten Zeiten zündeten. Sehr schön! Bitte nicht wieder 14 Jahre bis zur nächsten Zusammenarbeit warten!

(Good Times, Juni / Juli 2019)

Ever since their 2005 collaboration on the In the Reins EP, Iron & Wine's Sam Beam wanted to work again with Calexico's Joey Burns and John Covertino on another record, and vice versa. The holdup was the busy work and life schedules of the three simpatico musicians; it took many years until they could find time to rekindle the creative spark that they had shown on the EP. They finally were able to clear some precious schedule space and in late 2018 spent four days in a Nashville studio working on songs with the help of members of Calexico (trumpeter Jacob Valenzuela, pedal steel player Paul Niehaus) along with keyboardist Rob Burger and bassist Sebastian Steinberg of the Iron & Wine touring group. Unlike the previous EP, where Beam brought all the songs and the Calexico guys basically served as his backing band, on Years to Burn Joey Burns contributes a couple songs, and throughout the brief session there was a spirit of improvisation and a free and equal exchange of musical ideas. This sense of balance made it a true collaboration where each artist added something important to the other's approach. The wide-screen, wide-open sound of Calexico loosens up the sometimes cloistered feel of Iron & Wine's records, and the lyrical grace and melodic craft of Beam's songs give focus and depth to the sound Burns and Covertino bring to the table. As one might expect, the album is lodged firmly in ballad mode with loads of timeworn wisdom and easy musicianship baked into the arrangements. "What Heaven's Left" is a lilting country-rock gem enlivened by Valenzuela's swooning trumpet and given emotional depth by the heart-rending mix of Beam's lead and Burns' backing vocals; the Burns-written and sung "Midnight Sun" is a shuffling, shimmering track that sounds like Astral Weeks left out to cook in the desert -- especially when the biting guitar leads take over; and the title track is a slow-motion lament made beautiful by Beam's harmony vocals. A few songs ramp up the energy level a tiny amount with some barroom rumble on "In Your Own Time" (an old song of Beam's that is given an update), a little rambling strut on the stately "Father Mountain," and some cinematic grandeur on the middle section of "The Bitter Suite." That song, with its many sonic twists, and the short instrumental "Outside El Paso" are the purest examples here of Calexico's expansiveness and sonic imagination. The whole record is a testament to the skills of everyone involved as writers, singers, players, and arrangers, an upgrade on In the Reins, and exactly what fans of both bands would hope for in a collaboration

(by Tim Sendra, All Music Guide)

On her self-released debut EP, 2017's Thrush Metal, Australian singer/songwriter Stella Donnelly sat alone with just a cheap guitar and her powerful vocals, presenting songs of rage and humor so minimally there was no missing their razor-edged commentary. Lyrics about abusive relationships, misogyny, sexual assault, and other harsh realities cut through tunes that either flitted breezily or scowled with an electricity reminiscent of PJ Harvey's earliest work. For her first proper album, Beware of the Dogs, Donnelly amplifies her sharp and unshakeable lyrical content with enhanced production and fully formed arrangements. The album begins with one of its best songs "Old Man," a light and airy tune juxtaposed with Donnelly's lyrical confrontation of outdated patriarchal norms, sexual harassment, and destructive power imbalances. The sound is light years removed from the dour bedroom rock of Thrush Metal, with layers of bright guitar leads, bouncy drums, and vocal harmonies making the song soar. On "Lunch," a melancholic song about touring, understated string sections, and plinky tandem guitars support Donnelly's precisely controlled vocals, making lines like "I get homesick before I go away" resonate. Much of the album wraps dark themes in a soft shimmer. The title track paints a rich picture of class disparity and political corruption, laying out a story of struggle with catchy melodies that feel far friendlier than the content of the lyrics. "Boys Will Be Boys" is the only song from Thrush Metal to reappear. Stripped down and metered, the song addresses rape and rape culture unobscured by metaphor or allusion, confronting the excuses and apologies made for rapists and sexual abusers head on. Donnelly is a bold lyricist, versatile songwriter, and unfaltering singer, navigating these 13 songs commandingly. The spectrum of moods that ranges from sparse guitar and vocal miniatures to densely arranged nods to chamber pop makes Beware of the Dogs a dynamic debut. Donnelly never wavers in her directness or honesty, but doesn't equate strong statements with volume. Instead, her well-constructed and sometimes weightless songs crush their enemies with a knowing smile and a gentle fist.

(by Fred Thomas, All Music Guide)

Elliott Smith's self-titled second album was his first for the Kill Rock Stars label and also his first major artistic statement. Its sound is fairly similar to that of Roman Candle -- it's mostly just Smith and his gently fingerpicked acoustic guitar, embellished a bit more often with drums, harmony vocals, and the odd additional instrument. The main difference here is that Smith's melodies and lyrics reveal their greater strength and substance with repeated listens. And make no mistake, the songs do require repeated listens -- not just because of Smith's often whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery, but also because of his deceptively angular melodies and chord progressions, which threaten to float away until the listener hears them enough to latch on and know where they're going. Smith is often compared to Paul Simon or the Beatles in their softer moments, but perhaps the best touchstone for this early sound is Nick Drake's even more minimalistic Pink Moon; while Smith's language is rawer and tougher than Drake's haunting poetics, his songs also deal with depression and loneliness, creating an almost uncomfortable intimacy with their bare-bones arrangements. The quiet prettiness of Smith's sound can make it easy to overlook the darker, edgier side of his songs -- many of Smith's embittered characters cope with their dysfunctional relationships or breakups through substance abuse, while some of the lyrics read more like angry, defiant punk rants when separated from the music. Smith would flesh out his sound with the albums to come, but Elliott Smith contains the blueprint for his later successes, and more importantly, it's a fully realized work itself.

(by Steve Huey, All Music Guide)

Fire is coming. »Flamagra« ist ein FlyLo-Album, womöglich sogar sein definitives: Ein astral-afrofuturistisches Meisterwerk zwischen Deep Soul, kosmischem Staub und bedingungsloser Originalität.

Sein letztes Werk »You're Dead« (2014) bescherte ihm eine Grammy-Nominierung, sein Brainfeeder-Label ist zu einem der innovativsten Klanglabors der Welt avanciert, er co-produzierte Kendrick Lamars mit fünf Grammies ausgezeichnetes Meisterwerk »To Pimp A Butterfly« (2015).

Nun veröffentlicht Flying Lotus sein neues Album für Warp: »Flamagra« greift alle kreativen Quantensprünge und innovativen Elemente aus 12 Jahren FlyLo-Karriere auf und denkt sie weiter, größer, epischer und universeller: Hip-Hop, Funk, Soul, Jazz, Electro, IDM, die Ansätze der befreundeten Beatmaker aus L.A., Tribal-Elemente, Polyrhythmen. Aber selbst diese Liste reicht nicht aus, um »Flamagra« auch nur ansatzweise zu verorten, weil es immer wieder ausbricht aus diesem Koordinatensystem.

Die Gästeliste liest sich wie ein Traum: Anderson .Paak, George Clinton, Little Dragon, Solange, Tierra Whack, Denzel Curry, Ishmael Butler (Shabazz Palaces), Toro Y Moi, sein musikalischer Stammesbruder Thundercat, ja selbst David Lynch ist zu hören. Der legendäre Regisseur steuert ein paar schaurige Worte bei, eine düstere Erzählpassage, mit der er uns eindringlich warnt: »Fire is coming«.

»Flamagra« ist die Essenz des letzten Jahrhunderts im Bereich der afroamerikanischen Musik, vollkommen neu und weitergedacht, kollektiv gefiltert und feingeschliffen. Auch wenn Flying Lotus ein Nachkomme seiner ehrwürdigen Großtante Alice Coltrane ist, die mit John verheiratet war (wobei auch Miles und Madlib, Dilla und DOOM als seine Vorfahren gelten dürfen), hat er inzwischen seinen eigenen Kult geschaffen: Eine Gefolgschaft, die alles Geniale aus der Vergangenheit absorbiert und in Bereiche überführt, die sich die genannten Vorfahren nicht mal im Traum hätten ausmalen können. Flying Lotus ist zurück. Fire is coming.

2013 wurde JD Souther in die Songwriters Hall Of Fame aufgenommen und ist eine Legende der Pop Musik. Als Architekt des Southern California Sounds und als großer Einfluss auf das moderne Songwriting hat JD Souther viele der Hits der Eagles mitgeschrieben, darunter »Heartache Tonight«, »Victim of Love«, »New Kid in Town«, »Best of My Love«, Don Henleys »The Heart of the Matter« und den 2007er Eagles Hit »How Long«. Southers großer Hit »You're Only Lonely« erreichte Platz Zehn der Charts und wurde dicht gefolgt von »Her Town, Too«, das JD zusammen mit James Taylor schrieb. Produziert von Larry Klein (Joni Mitchell, Rodney Crowell, Norah Jones, Melody Gardot, Herbie Hancock) setzt »Tenderness« den neuen Weg von Souther in punkto Sound und Stil fort; zugleich ist das Album jedoch ganz anders, als alles, was er zuvor aufgenommen hat. Auf dem Album streckt sich Souther musikalisch und balanciert zwischen Einflüssen aus Pop und Jazz, wobei er sich besonders vor den Großen des 20th Century Great American Songbook verneigt: Cole Porter sowie die Gershwins, Sammy Cahn und Jule Styne, Fred Coots, Yip Harburg bis zu Paul Simon und Bob Dylan. »Tenderness« ist ein spätnächtliches Meisterwerk, eindringlich und klug und eine perfekte Spiegelung dieses rätselhaft-großartigen Meisters.

Der 1995 verstorbene Kult-Jazzer Don Cherry hat der Welt viel Gutes gebracht. Und damit sind nicht nur seine Kinder Eagle-Eye Cherry und Neneh Cherry gemeint, sondern auch seine grandiosen, zwischen Jazz und Worldmusic pendelnden Alben.

Selbst wenn »Brown Rice« der einzige Beitrag des Trompeters zum Jazz gewesen wäre, sein Platz im Pantheon wäre ihm bis heute sicher. Das Album von 1975 ist ein fettes Stück psychedelischen Jazz-Rocks, das Blues- und Funkelemente, sowie afrikanische, indische und nahöstliche Einflüsse enthält.

Neu remastert, Liner Notes des angesehenen Jazz-Autors Stanley Crouch.

... David Scott gehen die Ideen nicht aus, wie dieses neue, überwältigend romantische Album zeigt. (...) ›Love & Other Hopeless Things‹ ist ein fantastisches Album. Unbedingt hörenswert.

(Audio, Mai 2019)

»Titanic Rising« ist die vierte Albumveröffentlichung der US-Songwriterin Natalie Mering aka Weyes Blood, aber ihr erstes Album für Sub Pop Records.

Das Album enthält die Lead-Single »Everyday« und die zuvor veröffentlichte »galaktische Liebesballade« (The Fader) »Andromeda« sowie die Highlights »Movies«, »Wild Time« und »Something To Believe«.

Für das Albumcover von »Titanic Rising« ging die Kalifornierin auf Tauchstation - übrigens ganz ohne CGI.

Verantwortlich für das Shooting war der Unterwasser-Fotograf Brett Stanley, der ein komplettes Schlafzimmer für das Cover von »Titanic Rising« versenkte.

Das Album wurde in den ersten sechs Monaten des letzten Jahres geschrieben und aufgenommen - und ist das Ergebnis jahrelangen Tourens und einer kontinuierlichen musikalischen Weiterentwicklung Merings, die auf »Titanic Rising« deutlich zu hören ist: Transzendente Vocals und schwebende Arrangements, tiefgründige Texte und reflektierte Kommentare über den modernen Zustand unserer Seelen.

»Titanic Rising« schafft es spielend leicht, die Grenze zwischen klassischem Songwriting und post-apokalyptischem Futurismus zu überwinden.

The road that songwriter Natalie Mering and her shapeshifting project Weyes Blood walked was a long and twisting route, leading from weird experimental early days to the high-definition grandeur of fourth album Titanic Rising. Every step of the journey brought Mering's gifts for songcraft into sharper focus, with 2014's achingly beautiful The Innocents losing some of its hush with the soft rock lushness of 2016's Front Row Seat to Earth. That '70s FM radio spirit continues on Titanic Rising, but is expanded with more daring songwriting, larger than life arrangements, and the crystallization of Mering's distinctive take on songcraft. Mering has always been geared toward the big-picture creation of albums more than just writing stand alone tunes. Even her earliest work had a sense of purposeful architecture to the way it flowed between folky dirges and sheets of noise. Here she underscores enormously orchestrated pop songs with eerie experimental ambience, imagining a dreamworld where Joni Mitchell's late-'70s output was produced by Brian Eno. Mitchell's introspective searching is a key reference point for many of these songs, with Mering's self-harmonizing and bounding melodic approach recalling Mitchell on many tracks here. Once album-opener "Lot's Gonna Change" moves from a warped few seconds of synthesizer to its understated piano figure, it embodies the vulnerability and struggle found in so much of the Laurel Canyon songwriting set of the '70s. Co-production from Foxygen member Jonathan Rado might explain the brightly blooming chamber pop arrangements, merging Mering's soaring vocals with orchestral strings and drum fills borrowed directly from the Beatles. This optimistic throwback arrangement is in full force on the infectiously bubbly "Everyday," with lyrics inspecting a confusing relationship over a track as bouncy as a rubber ball. Mering effortlessly switches gears throughout the album, slipping between the synthy melodrama of "Movies" and the cold coffee blues piano ballad "Something to Believe," as well as making space for acoustic folk numbers, ambient interludes, and chamber pop diversions. Easily her most clear-headed set of songs to date, there's a directness here that sometimes got lost in the layers of earlier albums. She sounds driven and confident, asserting an intense control of the emotional flow of her songs without ever rushing things or letting some of the anxiety she sings about seep into the feel of the album. While all of Weyes Blood's albums leading up to Titanic Rising were good, even great, there's something that sets this one apart. Fantastic songs, meticulously detailed production, and a certain, hard-to-name spark of connection all gel into the near-perfect statement that every part of Mering's strange journey before this led up to.

(by Fred Thomas, All Music Guide)

Son Volt wurde 1994 von Jay Farrar in New Orleans, Louisiana nach der Auflösung der Band Uncle Tupelo gegründete. Die Band war sehr einflussreich in der Alternative-Country Bewegung der 1990er Jahre, die der Vorreiter dessen war, was wir heute als »Americana« kennen.

Son Volts Album »Trace« wurde vom englischsprachigen Rolling Stone als eins der besten Alben des Jahres 1995 gewählt. Der Stil bewegte sich zwischen leisen Folk- und Countryballaden, die an Bob Dylans John Wesley Harding erinnern, bis zu Kneipenrock im Sinne von Neil Young mit Crazy Horse.

Auf dem Transmit Sounds (via Thirty Tigers) erscheint nun »Union«. Das Album durchweht der Geist des Blues, aber nicht in seiner Standard-Ausführung. Die beschwörende Stimmung am Mississippi, eines Fred McDowell, Skip James und Nick Drake mögen als grobe Ausganspunkte Farrars gedient haben.

Nicht nur stimmlich erinnert Farrar dabei immer mehr an Michael Stipe, auch stilistisch schließen viele seiner neuen Stücke fast nahtlos an die Frühphase von R. E.M. an. Melodien mit Widerhaken, Texte zum intensiven Zuhören und tolle Arrangements zwischen Folk Rock und Alternative Country: ein starkes Album.

(Good Times, April / Mai 2019)

Das Album ist ein Folk- und Americana-Klassiker auf der Höhe der Zeit ...

(Audio, Mai 2019)

Nach 8 Jahren endlich ein neues (reguläres) Studio-Werk (die 2016er LP wurde ja live eingespielt, bei der ´15er fehlten Bandmitglieder). Ein vielschichtiges, ein ziemlich breites Spektrum! Emotionaler dichter intensiver Rock mit scharfkantigen bis mächtig verzerrten Gitarren, punktuell effektvoller Geige in Schräglage, lose harmonierenden m/w-Vocals. Lustvoll! Rootsig/folkig unterlegt in leicht und locker und transparent, rauhe Poesie und entzückende ganz altmodische Melodien paaren sich zur Schönheit von innen. Ein Pendeln zwischen geheimnisvoll-dunkler Faszination und kraftvoll lebenslustigem 70s-Rock (eine Spur Glam-artiger Einfluß) samt kurzer toller beinahe kakophonischer Phase. Kurzzeitig dezent zerschossener Indie Rock featuret schneidende/Distortion-Gitarren, ein intelligentes Piano grundiert, am Ende lose ausfransend. Bedächtiger (Pseudo-Ethno-) Space-Folk sehr eigener Art, der sich irgendwann bodenständig verdichtet. Alte Post Punk-Traditionen, die nicht unbedingt so klingen wie früher, in roher splitternder zugleich nuancierter und intensiver Spielweise, manchmal am Rande der Atonalität. Entspannter lockerer hochmelodischer einfach schöner teilakustischer Indie Folk Pop inklusive einer kleinen Prise Country, ein nicht so weit davon entferntes Stück (in balladesk) glänzt mit feiner Säuregitarre (und endet in leiser schräger Klangmalerei). 80s-Indie Rock-Feeling gekoppelt mit Desert Rock-Ahnungen, schroff riffende Gitarren stehen neben im weiten Raum hallenden atmosphärischen in etwas verwinkelten Arrangements. Weit mehr elektrische als akustische Gitarren, Piano/Orgel und Synthie wechseln sich ab, die Geige fehlt manchmal (gefällt aber ansonsten sehr), er (Langford) singt mehr als sie (Timms), beide gern zusammen. Und diverse Soundeffekte werden hier und da ganz pointiert und effektiv/musikdienlich eingeschossen. Erstaunlich, wie frisch, immer wieder anders (und gut) sie nach so langer Zeit noch klingen!

(dvd, Glitterhouse)

This legendary group from Leeds, have written contemporary music history for the last 40 years as radical innovators of both first generation punk and insurgent roots music. Their new album was recorded in the desert environs of Joshua Tree, California and is drenched with widescreen, barbed-wire atmosphere and hard-earned (but ever amused) defiance.

The return of one of the planet’s most essential rock & roll bands.

When punk exploded in London, fast and brash and full of fury, up in Leeds the Mekons came blinking into the light at a much slower pace. Singles like “Where Were You” and “Never Been in a Riot” (both from1978) fractured punk’s outlaw myth with the ordinariness of real life. During the next decade, as country singers donned cowboy hats and slid into the stadiums, the Mekons celebrated the music’s rough, raw beginnings and tender hearts with the Fear and Whiskey album (1985) and went on to demolish rock narratives with Mekons Rock’n’Roll (1989). For more than four decades they’ve been a constant contradiction, an ongoing art project of observation, anger and compassion, all neatly summed up in the movie Revenge of the Mekons, which has ironically brought an upsurge in their popularity around the US as new audiences discovers their shambling splendour. And now the caravan continues with Deserted, their first full studio album in eight years.

And desert is an apt word. This time there’s an emphasis on texture and sounds, a sense of space that brings a new, widescreen feel to their music, opening up songs that surge like clarion calls, like the album’s opening track, “Lawrence of California.”

“We were recording at the studio of our bass player, Dave Trumfio,” Langford recalls. “It’s just outside Joshua Tree National Park. Seeing Tom [Greenhalgh, the group’s other original member] wandering in that landscape looked like a scene from Lawrence of California.’ And then, ‘Wait a minute, there’s a song in that.’”

The band arrived with no songs written, only a few ideas exchanged by email between Langford and Tom Greenhalgh, the group’s other original member.

“Things emerged. At one point we had a sheet with a few words written here and there. Everyone added bits and by the time it was finished, it only needed a few changes to be able to sing. Somewhere else there are two lyrics sung over each other.”

Five days of brilliant chaos let their thoughts run free, from the almost-folk wonder of “How Many Stars” and the wide open space of “In The Desert,” to the oblique strangeness of “Harar 1883,” a song about French poet Arthur Rimbaud’s time in Ethiopia, inspired by photographs Greenhalgh has of the period. And then there’s “Weimar Vending Machine.”

“That starts off about Iggy Pop in Berlin,” Langford explains. “There’s a story that he went to a vending machine and saw the word ‘sand’. He put his money in and a bag of sand came out.”

It’s a gloriously unlikely, cinematic image to use as a springboard into the album’s longest song, a piece that shifts between darkness and joy, powered by Rico Bell’s piano and Sally Timms’s clarion voice. It’s one to provoke thought and questions, but that’s hardly unusual for the band. They’ve always revelled in the surreal and the bizarre. What stands out on Deserted, though, is the space and clarity in the sound, with Susie Honeyman’s violin taking a more prominent role on a couple of the tracks.

“Susie’s wonderful,” Langford says. “You play something to her, she thinks for a minute them comes out with this haunting Highland beauty.”

Even the impromptu instrumental sessions find their way into the record, sometimes transformed and spacy to add texture to a song, elsewhere simply allowed to float free and form the tail to “After The Rain,” the album’s closer. The studio itself becomes an instrument here, and much of that is down to Trumfio, whose production credits at his Kingsize Soundlabs include Wilco and the Pretty Things.

“Even during the mixing, Dave pushed us into some new sonic territory all the way through,” Langford recalls.

The tweaking and effects take them about as far as they can go from 2016’s Existentialism, which saw all eight members crowded around a single microphone in a tiny theatre in Red Hook, New York, recording live in front of an audience. Deserted offers a different kind of freedom. Of space and stars and wide-open land. Of possibilities and past. But mainly of the future.

It’s fresh territory. But that’s always been what attracts the Mekons. They show that four decades doesn’t translate to becoming a heritage act. Instead, they keep experimenting, from the jagged, spaced throb that powers “Into The Sun,” revolving around the drums of Steve Goulding and Trumfio’s bass to the barely controlled anarchy that’s “Mirage,” or a countrified homage to “Andromeda.” Everything is possible, everything is permitted. 41 years after that first single they’re still moving. Still defiant, still laughing, still joyful. Never underestimate some happy anarchy, and never write off the Mekons.

Deserted, perhaps, but they’re back to tip the world on its axis. Again.

There's never been a band quite like the Mekons. Unmarred by breakups or breakouts, undefined by genre, geography, or ego-trips … no rock outfit's ever been this committed to behaving like a true band, with all the equanimity and familial bonding implied.

(Rolling Stone)

It's a gleefully elusive yet beautiful composition about a country collapsing into chaotic hostility.

(Ken Tucker, Fresh Air)

Das im vergangenen Jahr erschienene Sons-Of-Kemet-Album »Your Queen Is A Reptile« fand mit seiner atemlosen Jazz-Energie unzählige Fans und steht an der Spitze diverser Bestenlisten 2018. Saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings feierte damit seinen großen Durchbruch. Jetzt legt er mit seiner zweiten Formation einen Elektro/Jazz-Kracher gleichen Kalibers nach.

Mit dem Bandprojekt The Comet Is Coming bringt er auf Impulse! Records einen unerhörten Mix aus Jazz, Electronica, Funk und Psychedelic Rock heraus, der zwischen Jazz Club und Tanzfläche eine verdammt gute Figur macht.

Zusammen mit Schlagzeuger Betamax und Keyboarder Danalogue sucht King Shabaka, wie sich Hutchings hier nennt, einen neuartigen Zugang zum Jazz. In einem Feature im englischen The Guardian wird die Gruppe für ihr »intergalaktisches Mash-Up aus Jazz, Afrobeat und Electronics« in den Himmel gelobt. Die derzeit in allen Medien angesagte junge englische Jazz-Generation hat in Shabaka Hutchings ihr Gesicht gefunden.

England's sci-fi jazz trio the Comet Is Coming have been exploring the cosmos since 2015 when drummer Maxwell Hallett (Betamax) and keyboardist Dan Leavers (Danalogue) were playing a gig as futurist duo Soccer96 when they encountered Shabaka Hutchings (King Shabaka) hanging near the stage with a saxophone. They invited him up and improvised. Received enthusiastically, the trio formed the Comet Is Coming to explore a mutual love of Sun Ra, John and Alice Coltrane, Mahavishnu Orchestra, and future-forward electronica. After issuing the critically acclaimed Prophecy EP in 2015, they followed with the full-length Channel the Spirits a year later and were nominated for the Mercury Prize. Hutchings, one of the U.K.'s most prominent young saxophonists and bandleaders, inked a deal with Impulse! in 2017. His Sons of Kemet project's acclaimed Your Queen Is a Reptile in 2018, a stellar work of modern modal jazz, was internationally acclaimed. Trust in the Lifeforce of the Deep Mystery picks up where Channel the Spirits and its follow-up EP Death to the Planet left off as it attempts to "envisage a 21st century take on spiritual jazz that is part Alice Coltrane, part Blade Runner." Their association with the legendary American label -- home to many of their influences -- raises expectations that are both warranted and met. As evidenced by album-opener "Because the End Is Really the Beginning," these cats have no interest in revivalism; theirs is an evolutionary new thing. A blissful synth drone introduces Hutchings' hypnotic sax before shifting into a more dynamic space as Betamax's cymbal shimmer and kick drum pronunciations signal the arrival of the previously unknown. It remains held in a state of tension before "Birth of Creation," prefaced by the rhythm section, articulates a frame for Hutchings' spidery bass clarinet melody that builds on their multidimensional textures. "Summon the Fire" sounds like its title. Amid pulsing analog synths, Hutchings' distorted tenor horn meets Betamax's overdriven snare in a show of pulsing, hard grooves, and the entire record lifts off in an orgiastic celebration of grime-influenced, danceable destruction and creation. "Blood of the Past" is darker, tenser, and freer, given added dimension via the apocalyptic poetry of guest Kate Tempest. An airy intro gives way to skittering, urgent, dubby electro funk in "Super Zodiac." "Timewave Zero" enters from the margins in a soundscape at once cinematic and intimate before articulating a fusion of spiritual jazz-funk, dancehall rhythms, and punky grime. "The Universe Wakes Up" closes the set and atmospherically evokes the spirits of the Coltranes as CIC attempt to reach beyond the heavens. Hutchings' circular breathing underscores the aggressive pulse of the rhythm section. Trust in the Lifeforce of the Deep Mystery is urgent, sophisticated, and humorous. It actually delivers the music of tomorrow via the traditions of past and present; it's a convulsive exercise in the articulation of inner and outer space.

(by Thom Jurek, All Music Guide)