Album Reviews
Toad the Wet Sprocket– New Constellation
Toad the Wet Sprocket’s whimsical pop songs created an incongruous yet intriguing fit for radio and MTV programmers during the heyday of 90s alternative rock. Imagine the tenable pop hooks of “All I Want” and “Something’s Always Wrong” sandwiched between the sonic grunge fest of Pearl Jam and Nirvana.
Hit singles and platinum albums were the norm before “musical differences” split these high school friends from California in 1998. Now older and possibly wiser from the experience, Toad the Wet Sprocket returns with the wistful New Constellation, its first collection of new material in 16 years.
The album reflects the themes of balancing self-doubt and regret with second chances. “Is there anyone out there/’cause I don’t know how to reach across the breach/so deep between us,” Glen Phillips sings on the shimmering guitar pop of “Is There Anyone Out There?”
Sporadic touring coupled with time away from recording hasn’t dulled the band’s sense of melody and strong musicianship. Musically, the songs have a relaxed, easy feel, as if the band played barefoot, sipping peppermint tea in the studio. Free of label and industry demands, what you have is Toad the Wet Sprocket, the 2013 model.
The songs on the Kickstarter-funded album are more direct than previous efforts, and the band doesn’t stray too far from its guitar-bass-drums-vocal setup. That opens room for Phillips to expand his vocal palette and clear a path to the emotional core of these songs.
On the genial “Rare Bird,” Phillips warm tenor glides to a falsetto as he sings of setting a lover free. Phillips stretches himself even further with his trip through the cosmos on “New Constellation.” Over a bouncy guitar riff and a rush of “oh-ohs,” Phillips name checks patron saints and declares his “love to all creation.”
The album’s four up-tempo numbers, “Is There Anyone Out There?” and the rousing “I’ll Bet on You,” among them, are propelled with uplifting choruses that bring a majestic quality thanks to the backing vocal work of guitarist Todd Nichols (who also sings lead on “Life is Beautiful”) and bassist Dean Dinning.
Lyrically, Phillips is a wheeler and dealer with a gift of language and observation. He continues on his journey of spiritual self-reflection that began with Fear. “God loves a madman/but I wore his patience through,” Phillips softly sings on “Golden Age” as a gentle fingerpicking and piano melody trickle by.
The song offers a swirl of lyrical allusions touching on an angel, a kitchen knife, and a peacemaking saint. And that’s all in the second verse. Alluding presumably to personal and professional loss, Phillips yearns of a redemptive return to a more tranquil and harmonious period. “Walls and barricades surround our golden age/we will return again someday.”
Quite a promise from New Constellation, an album whose melancholic edges are lightened with the hope that comes from starting anew. And somewhere along the way, Phillips and his band mates discover the journey toward reconciliation and forgiveness, like the album, is a rewarding one.
Young Empires – Wake All My Youth
The Young Empires’ debut EP, Wake All My Youth, celebrates the exuberance of youth with a dance-pop flair that affirms these Toronto lads’ faith in the power of the beat.
Guitars shimmer, beats pulsate, and Euro-house synthesizers glide through the mix. All of it grooves; none of it falters by the trio’s ambitions. After all, it is the forebearer of its own genre, haute rock, which singer Matthew Vlahovich explains is the “sound of a cosmopolitan experience.”
It’s really a sound that resonates from the clubs of Europe to the fashion runways of Paris. It’s not a soundtrack of the privileged; it’s fit for consumption on all levels. It’s carefree and beguiling stuff from a band whose members approach 30.
Most of the songs on Wake All My Youth are familiar to Canadian fans, as the original has circulated in the Great White North for a few years. On this second go-round, the band expands its compositions with a heavy dollop of synthesizers for a cleaner pop sheen.
Big choruses rule the roost, however, as these Canucks display the sensibilities forged by their forefathers like New Order and Violator-era Depeche Mode. The songs are wrapped up in the band’s romantic investment in the vitality of youth and the sense of optimism afforded to those less jaded souls.
On the opener, “Rain of Gold,” a distant flute ushers in a flood of African percussion and synth before the track mutates to an anthem of sorts for Vlahovich, who calls out: “Echo, echo/when you call my heart/when you call my love/when you call my youth.”
Drummer Taylor Hill packs a percussive wallop on the new EP, enhancing the melodies of his band mates in the rapid boil of “Enter Through the Sun” and the urgency of “We Don’t Sleep Tonight.”
The middle track, “Beaches,” is like a soundtrack to a Caribbean sunset as it drips with lustful intentions before a rush of guitars and percussion breaks free. The band invokes some Pet Shop Boys-esque synth-pop on the reflective “Earth Plates Are Shifting.”
This may be nitpicking, but sometimes the band tinkers and noodles with the knobs of the mixing board a bit too much. The two remixed tracks that close the collection lean toward self-indulgence. On the new release, the synthesizers step forward on “White Doves,” slightly varying the bristling guitar and crackling beats that make the original such a joy.
Still, when Vlahovich implores, “In the sun, when you’re young/you find a way back home,” he’s making it clear the band’s home is on the dance floor and that all are invited to join him.
Johnny Marr – The Messenger
Johnny Marr has certainly played well with others in his musical sandbox since leaving the Smiths in 1987. Just check out any number of his collaborations with artists ranging from THE THE to Bernard Sumner to Modest Mouse to composer Hans Zimmer on the “Inception” soundtrack.
And for that body of work, NME recently bestowed the Manchester-based songwriter with its Godlike Genius award. Quite an honor for an artist whose economical and restrained guitar style is imprinted on songwriters from Noel Gallagher to John Squire.
With his first proper solo record, The Messenger, Marr steps forward as a singer and sole songwriter with a collection of bright and fun pop songs. In turn, he makes amends for the sluggish Boomslang (2003), his first full-length debut leading the trio, Johnny Marr and the Healers.
Recorded in Manchester and Berlin, The Messenger sounds like a road record charged with big riffs and funky solos wrapped around Marr’s narratives on city living and making connections in a digital world. “Love fights love/invading my zero gravity/the crowd grows/and grows illusions/down on quality street” Marr sings on “The Right Thing Right” as he unleashes a flood of guitars and pounding drums before relenting to a soaring chorus.
The album offers more of a punk edge as compared to Marr’s work with the Smiths and the dance-pop records he crafted with Sumner in Electronic. Marr offers some Iggy Pop attitude and buzzing guitar work on “Word Starts Attack” and “Sun and Moon”, the latter sounding like a song Oasis should have recorded for Be Here Now.
Marr certainly had some fun writing and recording the album. He delves into New Wave territory with a Moog synthesizer in hand on “The Crack Up” and his daughter, Sonny, offers background support on four songs.
Marr said he fancies vocal melodies and hammering out fast songs. To that end, he’s succeeded, but his voice is thin and nondescript as he narrates more than sings. Still, try to resist the wistful charm of “New Town Velocity”, the most personal song on the album and whose chord progression resembles New Order’s “Ruined in a Day.”
“Left home a mystery/leave school for poetry/I said goodbye to them and me” Marr sings about leaving school as a teen for a perceived better life in music. When Marr later boasts how “it turned out like I said it would/can I get the world right here?” it doesn’t take a genius to believe he already knows the answer.