Iggy Pop -Post Pop Depression

This is the album 2016 has been waiting for, Iggy Pop joining forces with Queens of The Stone Age’s Josh Homme to release Post Pop Depression.  Take everything you love about Iggy and all your favorite QOTSA moments, mix them in a bag and dump them out on vinyl and you have the best release of 2016.  By far.  Aided by QOTSA and Dead Weather bassist Dean Fertita and Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders, this is not just Iggy singing QOTSA songs, but a diverse musical landscape highlighting all of Pop’s strengths.  Opening with “Break Into Your Heart,” the acid trippy rock vibe is established immediately.  The way Homme’s riffs blend with Iggy’s voice is so perfect one might think they have been writing together for decades.  Just under four minutes long, the song feels so much longer with the way the grooves carry it.  Then it was like Iggy said to Josh “you think that songs sounded great, wait until you hear this.”  “Gardenia” feels so perfectly Iggy that you aren’t sure which decade this song was written in.  With a good mix of singing and spoken lyric, this is one of the album highlights.  Homme’s backing vocals offset the harsher side of Iggy nicely forming some great melodies.  Then we get what can only be described as a song that harkens back to the Bowie/Pop song writing days of the eighties in “American Valhalla.”  The soundscape formed is appropriately Valhalla-esque in it’s beautiful honesty.  Lyrically it may be the strongest song with words questioning whether one has done enough for the American Valhalla and just where is it.  Another album highlight, “In The Lobby” has a more of that QOTSA edgier sound.  The guitar work stands out the most with Iggy delivering strong verses like “it’s all about the dancing pricks, and it’s all about the clowns and it’s all about done.”  The guitars are so funky that one of the heaviest songs on the album makes you want to get up and move.  “Sunday” brings together all the influences of the artists with hints of the Artic Monkeys and Dead Weather mixing in to the most layered track.  Ironically this song takes the listener back to the church of Iggy Pop in every way.  Near the songs end the trippy guitars give way to female vocals accompanied by horns and strings cascading out with an almost waltzing ending to the song.  With a desert western sound and hypnotic sounds, “Vulture” sounds like Iggy just finished a showdown with any musician dumb enough to think his best days are behind him.  Perhaps the weakest song, nevertheless it is a nice change of pace before the album begins it’s accent to it’s climax.  Just when you thought the Queens-esque sound couldn’t be stronger, “German Days” feels like it was plucked right out of the studio from “…Like Clockwork.”  Alternating rhythms with hidden piano coursing through the guitars, the listener feels like they are falling further into the creative minds of Iggy and Josh.  That lasting seconds of the song highlight Josh’s funky guitar work.  A tongue-in-cheek ballad, “Chocolate Drops,” is deceivingly beautiful.  “When you get to the bottom, you’re near the top where shit turns into chocolate drops” is not exactly the most heartwarming words.  The way Homme echoes Iggy’s words in his falsetto is the perfect accent to the song.  It just works in ways it shouldn’t.  Then we reach the end with “Paraguay.”  If you had forgotten that Iggy was the father of punk rock music, this song will remind you that he is still the man.  Opening with the group singing together transitioning to just Iggy singing about getting away from all the daily grind and not really giving a shit, the sarcastic honesty plays well with the Africana influenced sounds.  Just when you thought things are about to fade out into peace, the guitars turn angry and volatile.  Accompanying the intensity level increasing, Iggy goes on a spoken word tirade that would make Henry Rollins blush.  This is the Iggy Pop we have been waiting for since Raw Power defined a sound and a movement.  Clocking in around 40 minutes, the songs never stay too long, but they get to the ass kicking point.  Listen to this album over and over again.

David Bowie -Blackstar

David Bowie.  Ziggy Stardust.  The Thin White Duke.  Call him whatever you like, but call him one of music’s most influential artists of all time.  With the release of his final album, Blackstar, just days before he passed away, Bowie left the music world a diversely beautiful kiss goodbye.  Don’t get me wrong, the album isn’t great because it is his last.  It is great because it is Bowie at his eclectic best.  To simply call Blackstar a synth jazz album is a bit short sighted and lazy as some reviews have described it.  The opening of his final opus is the title track, clocking in at nearly ten minutes.  The first half is dark and moody with his distorted “I’m a blackstar” vocals layered around lyrics of someone coming to grips with their mortality.  The music creates an atmosphere of space reaching out into the words.  About midway through, the song changes pace to be more mellow with lyrics sounding almost like a eulogy.  Then as quickly as the sound change came, it is gone replaced with more sax taking center stage during this haunting space trip.  By songs end, once the blackstar has said goodbye, sax and flute playfully end the journey.  “Blackstar” is more of an experience than it is a song.  More upbeat is “‘Tis A Pity She Was A Whore.”  Very sax driven, it has a very strong sound reminiscent to early eighties Bowie.  Short on lyrics, but still very catchy, this song could easily be a radio hit single.  Probably the happiest song on the album.   In contrast, “Lazarus” is the most haunting song on Blackstar.  By far an away my favorite song on the release, it paints Bowie as a figure letting go.  The opening line “look up here, I’m in heaven” just transcends words and feelings, especially once he past two days after the release.  It is such a powerful piece, words fail to do it justice.  The way the song fades out with the bass leading, most of the other instruments becoming rhythmically sporadic fills the listener with a sense of death and life.  I highly recommend viewing the video just to see how powerful the song truly is.  Going back to more a classic Bowie vibe, “Sue (Or In A Season Of Crime)” feels like it had it’s roots planted in 1995’s Outside release.  The electric sound accompanies his voice flawlessly.  There is once again sax to be heard, but it isn’t the focus of the fast paced moving song.   “Girl Loves Me” plays right off the electric sound of “Sue,” but with more attitude both musically and lyrically.  Opening with a run of events occurring on varies days, lyrically the big question becomes “where the fuck did Monday go?”  Is it a love song?  Is it about lost time?  I certainly don’t know, but it is one of my favorites.  It does have some more of the haunting sound with dark keyboards washing over the musical landscape.  The truest blues-jazz-esque track is “Dollar Days.”  Infused with piano and sax taking the lead, I can almost picture this song being performed during the “China Girl” days in some club.  It has it’s own up tempo beauty to it that none of the other six songs have on this album, making a unique song in this collection.  “I Can’t Give Everything Away” ends this album in a very beautiful light.  Jazzy and up beat, the words are almost as if Bowie is apologizing for not being able to give more.  Sax solos, followed by guitar solos, followed by flute solos, every instrument gets a moment in this song.  His voice sounds as confident and young as ever in this song.  “Seeing more and feeling less, saying no but meaning yes, this is all I ever meant, that’s the message I sent.”  Simply beautiful.  Ever the poet, musician, and human being, Blackstar allows Bowie to say goodbye without ever having to leave us so long as we continue to listen to his amazing musical art he gifted the world.

2015: Alternative Music Makes A Comeback

With new releases from Faith No More, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Living Colour, Modest Mouse, Rob Zombie, and Marilyn Manson all slated for this year, one might think they found a hot tub time machine back to the early nineties. Unfortunately no time machine, but a shit load of some really good music to look forward to this year. While I was sharing my excitement with my wife, I mentioned how lucky I thought music reviewers were. Right or wrong, they get to share their opinions with others. She asked why don’t I do the same thing with a music blog. And here we are. My ambitions are simple; blog about music both past and present hoping to turn others on to new sounds or maybe remind us about a really good album we have forgotten about. But most of all, share my love of some of my favorite sounds.