New Release Round-Up 09-14-18

Thrice - Palms - Epitaph
Thrice created Palms with a free-form and fluid approach to the album’s sonic element. The result is their most expansive work to date, encompassing everything from viscerally charged post-hardcore to piano-driven balladry. To carve out that eclectic sound, Thrice enlisted trusted producer Eric Palmquist for the recording of the percussion and vocal tracks, and self-produced all of the guitar parts on Palms. “When we track our own stuff we tend to be far less neurotic about getting every note perfect,” says singer Dustin Kensrue. “It’s more about getting the right emotion out of the performance, so that it connects on a deeper level.” Kensrue, co-founded Thrice with guitarist Teppei Teranishi, bassist Eddie Breckenridge, and drummer Riley Breckenridge in 1998. Hailing from Orange County, California, the band formed when three of its members were still in high school, making their debut with the kinetic punk/hardcore hybrid of the 2000 album Identity Crisis. Their breakthrough arrived with 2003’s The Artist in the Ambulance—Thrice’s third full-length, whose singles “All That’s Left” and “Stare at the Sun” each landed on the Billboard Alternative Songs chart. Palms is the band’s first release since signing to Epitaph in early 2018, and the album matches its raw passion with a measured intensity, a rare feat for an album so informed by the volatility of the times. “Even though some of these songs are really aggressive-sounding, I wanted to make sure they never felt like finger-pointing, especially at a time when there’s so much talking past each other,” says Kensrue. Within that approach, Thrice reveal their profound commitment to making an enduring impact on the listener.

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Carrie Underwood - Cry Pretty - Capitol Nashville
Multi-platinum global superstar and seven-time Grammy Award winner, Carrie Underwood releases Cry Pretty, her first studio album on Capitol Records Nashville. The title track and lead single was released worldwide on April 11. The title track, “Cry Pretty” reached the Top 10 on the Media Base & Billboard charts.

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Paul Weller - True Meanings - Parlophone
True Meanings is an album characterised by grandiose-yet-delicate, lush orchestration: an aesthetic to which Paul Weller's better-than-ever voice, singing some of his most nakedly honest words, is perfectly suited. A dreamy, peaceful, pastoral set of songs to get lost in, it is both an album that his faithful audience has been wanting him to make for a long time, and an album that many new people outside of that audience will relate to. True Meanings was recorded in just over three weeks at Weller's own Black Barn Studio with the aforementioned revolving cast of characters dropping in for a day here and there. The orchestration was added soon after and that was that. It is always a good sign when the recording of an album is swift, and here you can just hear that the man at the center of these songs is more focused and inspired than he has ever been.

Tony Bennett & Diana Krall - Love Is Here To Stay - Verve
Tony Bennett and Diana Krall celebrate their shared love of the music of George and Ira Gershwin on their new collaborative album, Love Is Here To Stay. Love Is Here To Stay is a subtle, sophisticated and beautifully rendered love letter to The Gershwins’ music and their status as one of the premiere songwriters of the American popular standard. It is a masterclass in vocal delivery and phrasing and the command that Bennett and Krall display of the material in both their duets and solo tracks makes it appear effortless, belying the honed skill of the vocalists. The duet tracks include “S’Wonderful,” “I’ve Got Rhythm,” “They Can’t Take That Away from Me” and “Fascinating Rhythm,” among them. “Fascinating Rhythm” was Tony Bennett’s first physical recording in 1949, made under his then stage name, Joe Bari, which he revisits as a duet with Krall for this project.

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Richard Thompson - 13 Rivers - New West Records
Richard Thompson's new album, 13 Rivers, is the artists first self-produced record in over a decade. 13 Rivers is a very stripped down, bare-bones recording and according to Thompson the album is a reflection of current events that have happened in his life. This has been an intense year for myself and my family, getting older doesn't mean that life gets easier! There are surprises around every bend. I think this reflects in the immediacy of the stories, and the passion in the songs. Sometimes I am speaking directly about events, at other times songs are an imaginative spin on what life throws at you. The music is just a mirror to life, but we try to polish that mirror as brightly as possible. The album was recorded at Boulevard Recording in Los Angeles, California. 13 Rivers features Richards regular accompanists, Michael Jerome and Taras Prodaniuk, as well as Thompsons guitar tech, Bobby Eichorn, on second guitar. Each track on the album was recorded in analog, with minimal overdubbing. Boulevard is a really funky-looking studio, says Richard, but it sounds great. It used to be called The Producers Workshop, and was owned by Liberace, whose ghost is reportedly still hanging around. Steely Dan records were done there, and The Wall by Pink Floyd was mixed there. Clay Blair, the engineer, is a Beatles nut, and has every piece of Beatles gear he can lay his hands on - so if things sound a bit like Abbey Road, so be it! 13 Rivers consists of thirteen tracks. It is an album as much about growth as it is about reflection. Says Thompson, I don't know how the creative process works - I suppose it is some kind of bizarre parallel existence to my own life. I often look at a finished song and wonder what the hell is going on inside me. We sequenced the weird stuff at the front of the record, and the tracks to grind your soul into submission.

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Cold War Kids - Cold War Kids - Downtown
Cold War Kids is the self-titled compilation album by the American indie rock band from Long Beach, CA. Forming in 2004, and signing with Downtown Records in 2006 where they released 5 stellar albums, Cold War Kids compiles their biggest hits from the Downtown Records years and features 14 tracks including “First”, “Hang Me Up To Dry”, “Miracle Mile” and many more. 

Marc Ribot - Songs Of Resistance 1942-2018 - Epitaph
With his new album Songs Of Resistance 1942-2018, Marc Ribot—one of the world’s most accomplished and acclaimed guitar players—set out to assemble a set of songs that spoke to this political moment with appropriate ambition, passion, and fury. The eleven songs on the record are drawn from the World War II anti-Fascist Italian partisans, the U.S. civil rights movement, and Mexican protest ballads, as well as original compositions, and feature a wide range of guest vocalists, including Tom Waits, Steve Earle, Meshell Ndegeocello, Justin Vivian Bond, Fay Victor, Sam Amidon, and Ohene Cornelius. Over a forty-year career, Ribot has released twenty-five albums under his own name and been a beacon of New York’s downtown/experimental music scene, leading a series of bands including Los Cubanos Postizos and Ceramic Dog. Since his work with Tom Waits on 1985’s Rain Dogs album, though, he is best known to the world as a sideman, playing on countless albums by the likes of Elvis Costello, John Mellencamp, Norah Jones, the Black Keys, and Robert Plant and Alison Krauss’ Grammy-winning collaboration Raising Sand.

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UPCOMING RELEASES

Richard Reed Parry - Quiet River Of Dust Vol. 1 - Epitaph
Richard Reed Parry's Quiet River Of Dust, is a meditative, widescreen musical experience with Beach Boy harmonies and a hypnotic pulse. Layered songs that move in a linear fashion, following a current rather than circular composition. Japanese folk myths, death poems and British folk music are tributaries flowing into a river of avant-garde composition and traditional song craft, written and performed by a member of the Grammy-winning rock band, Arcade Fire. Being released as two volumes, Quiet River of Dust Vol. 1 will be available on the start of the autumn equinox, September 21 2018. Quiet River of Dust Vol. 2 is coming out next year on the spring equinox 2019. 

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Joyce Manor - Million Dollars To Kill Me - Epitaph
Joyce Manor are back with a new album, entitled Million Dollars To Kill Me. Frontman Barry Johnson along with co-founding guitarist Chase Knobbe, new drummer Pat Ware—(“Awesome new drummer,” adds Johnson)—and longtime bassist Matt Ebert, wrote enough songs to fill a full-length, and then worked to get songs lifted from emails between Johnson and one of his musical hero Impossibles’ guitarist/vocalist Rory Phillips, with whom he had been co-writing long distance, to match the ones written at full volume. (“Bedroom charm versus live rock band,” Johnson explains.) Their next step was a new step: their first time recording outside their L.A. hometown, at Converge’s Kurt Ballou’s GodCity studio in Salem, Massachusetts. They recorded daily 10-to-6 and then slept right upstairs in bunk beds: “Kinda felt like camp,” says Johnson. “It was a pleasure—I would recommend it to anyone.” If 2016’s Cody was about growing up, then Kill Me is about what happens next—the reckonings with love, money, doubt and confusion, and the hope that persists despite it all. 

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William Fitzsimmons - Mission Bell - Nettwerk Records
Singer/Songwriter and music producer William Fitzsimmons' album Mission Bell is a chronicling of the tumultuous last year of his life - particularly of the separation from his second wife. Sonically, Mission Bell is Fitzsimmons' first analog tape-centric album. The sounds are raw, real, and tangible. The familiar comforts of acoustic guitars are present but now joined generously by synthesizers, electric guitars, drum loops and violins. 

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The Paper Kites - On The Corner Where You Live - Nettwerk Records
"On The Corner Where You Live" is the latest album from Australian band The Paper Kites, a follow up to "On The Train Ride Home" which was released earlier this year. Produced by Peter Katis (The National, Interpol, Middle Kids) the album builds upon the romantic, dusky mood the band perfected on twelvefour (No. 1 debut on the ARIA chart) and includes standout tracks “When It Hurts You" and "Deep Burn Blue". The album is also available as a Deluxe Double Edition 2LP which includes "On The Train Ride Home".

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For more information on these and other releases out this week, check out our New Releases charts by week section.

New Release Round-Up 09-07-18

Paul McCartney - Egypt Station - Capitol
Paul McCartney invites you on a musical journey to Egypt Station, arriving this week, by way of Capitol Records. Sharing a title with one of Paul’s own paintings, Egypt Station is the first full album of all-new McCartney music since 2013’s international chart-topping NEW. Preceded by two of its tracks just released as double A-sides--plaintive ballad “I Don’t Know” and raucous stomper “Come On To Me”—Egypt Station was recorded between Los Angeles, London and Sussex, and produced (with the exception of one Ryan Tedder track) by Greg Kurstin (Adele, Beck, Foo Fighters). Of the forthcoming album’s enigmatic title, Paul says, “I liked the words ‘Egypt Station.’ It reminded me of the ‘album’ albums we used to make.., Egypt Station starts off at the station on the first song and then each song is like a different station. So it gave us some idea to base all the songs around that. I think of it as a dream location that the music emanates from.”

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Eminem - Kamikaze - Aftermath
The surprise release from the Detroit rapper features guest appearances from Joyner Lucas, Jessie Reyez, Royce 5'9", and Def Jam Records president Paul Rosenberg.

Paul Simon - In The Blue Light - Sony Legacy
Produced by Paul Simon and Roy Halee, who have worked together since the 1960s, the album features collaborations with a diverse array of artists who have joined Simon to lend fresh perspectives on 10 of the artist's favorite (though perhaps less-familiar) compositions drawn from the five-decade span of his illustrious solo career. Revisiting his repertoire, Simon has selected songs originally appearing on There Goes Rhymin' Simon (1973), Still Crazy After All These Years (1975), One-Trick Pony (1980), Hearts and Bones (1983), The Rhythm of The Saints (1990), You're The One (2000) and So Beautiful Or So What (2011), refreshing and transforming the compositions through new arrangements and a talented cast of guest musicians. Among the many artists joining Simon on In The Blue Light are jazz icons trumpeter Wynton Marsalis, guitarist Bill Frisell, drummers Jack DeJohnette and Steve Gadd and chamber ensemble quintet yMusic.

Lenny Kravitz - Raise Vibration - BMG
Raise Vibration will be Lenny Kravitz's 11th studio album released on CD and 2 LPs in multiple standard and deluxe formats. The record promises to be one of Kravitz’s most eclectic. “Low,” the song that got the whole process started, developed into a smooth funk showcase; what Kravitz calls “my Quincy Jones school” complete with horns and a string arrangement. The title track is lean power-trio rock, while the ballad “Here to Love” features Kravitz backed only by his piano and a string section. “Johnny Cash,” inspired by an encounter with the late legend, is what Kravitz jokingly calls “psychedelic funk meets country.” As usual, Kravitz plays most of the instruments himself, with longtime guitarist Craig Ross. Lenny Kravitz has transcended genre, style, race and class into a 20-year musical career, one which revels in the rich influences of '60s and '70s soul, rock and funk. Kravitz's talents as a writer, producer and multi-instrumentalist have resonated now through eleven studio albums into a timeless catalog. He has also won four consecutive GRAMMY Awards, setting a record for the most wins in the "Best Male Rock Vocal Performance" category.

Clutch - Book Of Bad Decisions - Weathermaker Music
Book Of Bad Decisions, Clutch's 12th studio album is released via their own Weathermaker Music label. The album was recorded at Sputnik Sound in Nashville, TN by producer Vance Powell (Jack White, Chris Stapleton, The Raconteurs, The Dead Weather) and consists of 15 new tracks. Professional observers in both the industry and media are intrigued by the band's consistent growth over the last couple of albums. From Earth Rocker to Psychic Warfare to now Book of Bad Decisions the band's output of quality music and relentless touring has never been greater. This release has had a very lengthy setup period. It is accompanied by four IG tracks all with their own videos and a social media campaign that has brought the four band members even closer to their old and new fans. Book of Bad Decisions is a cornerstone release in Clutch's long history of successfully reinventing themselves at every new turn.

Mothers - Render Another Ugly Method - Anti
Mothers attempt to exist in two places at once - both singular and collaborative, sprawling and concise, present and distant. Kristine Leschper, songwriter and founding member of the project, explains that it is in the space between opposites that she finds herself. The multifaceted is, by nature, fragmented - each facet reflecting a slightly different perspective of the whole. On their latest record, Render Another Ugly Method, the band attempts to gain an expanded view of its surroundings through splintered sound, thought, and image. Leschper began exploring songwriting when she moved to Athens, Georgia as a teenager. Inspired by the growth that studying art allowed her and energized by the buzzing southern town, she started to perform publicly in 2013 and quickly developed local acclaim for her stark, unflinchingly vulnerable songs. During this time, she met many local artists and musicians, among them Matthew Anderegg, whom she quickly recognized as an artistic kindred spirit and friend. The following year they began working together to flesh out and arrange a collection of songs she had written, which would become the project’s 2016 debut release, When You Walk A Long Distance You Are Tired. Released in 2016, the album kicked off a sprawling eight months of touring across the US, UK and Europe, as the group honed their take on left-of center indie rock with an explosive and surprising live show that displayed how forceful the songs translated to a full-band setting. " Within Mothers, Leschper and Anderegg have remained a creative constant, with other collaborators changing over time. Render Another Ugly Method sees the remnants of Leschper and Anderegg, Chris Goggans and Drew Kirby in musical conversation, through cut-up songs that were torn apart and rebuilt over and over again.

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Milo Greene - Adult Contemporary - Nettwerk Records
Adult contemporary is characterized by its exceptional euphony. In skill, it effortlessly mingles sounds. In intent, it envelops itself in harmonies. In spirit, it has the beguiling ability to disarm listeners. That’s why L.A.’s Milo Greene, the always-evolving indie-pop band, chose the genre as its muse—even naming their third album, Adult Contemporary.

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UPCOMING RELEASES

Carrie Underwood - Cry Pretty - Capitol Nashville
Multi-platinum global superstar and seven-time Grammy Award winner, Carrie Underwood will release Cry Pretty, her first studio album on Capitol Records Nashville on September 14. The title track and lead single was released worldwide on April 11. The title track, “Cry Pretty” reached the Top 10 on the Media Base & Billboard charts.

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Tony Bennett & Diana Krall - Love Is Here To Stay - Verve
Tony Bennett and Diana Krall celebrate their shared love of the music of George and Ira Gershwin on their new collaborative album, Love Is Here To Stay, set for a September 14th release. Love Is Here To Stay is a subtle, sophisticated and beautifully rendered love letter to The Gershwins’ music and their status as one of the premiere songwriters of the American popular standard. It is a masterclass in vocal delivery and phrasing and the command that Bennett and Krall display of the material in both their duets and solo tracks makes it appear effortless, belying the honed skill of the vocalists. The duet tracks include “S’Wonderful,” “I’ve Got Rhythm,” “They Can’t Take That Away from Me” and “Fascinating Rhythm,” among them. “Fascinating Rhythm” was Tony Bennett’s first physical recording in 1949, made under his then stage name, Joe Bari, which he revisits as a duet with Krall for this project.

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Richard Thompson - 13 Rivers - New West Records
Richard Thompson's new album, 13 Rivers, is the artists first self-produced record in over a decade. 13 Rivers is a very stripped down, bare-bones recording and according to Thompson the album is a reflection of current events that have happened in his life. This has been an intense year for myself and my family, getting older doesnt mean that life gets easier! There are surprises around every bend. I think this reflects in the immediacy of the stories, and the passion in the songs. Sometimes I am speaking directly about events, at other times songs are an imaginative spin on what life throws at you. The music is just a mirror to life, but we try to polish that mirror as brightly as possible. The album was recorded at Boulevard Recording in Los Angeles, California. 13 Rivers features Richards regular accompanists, Michael Jerome and Taras Prodaniuk, as well as Thompsons guitar tech, Bobby Eichorn, on second guitar. Each track on the album was recorded in analog, with minimal overdubbing. Boulevard is a really funky-looking studio, says Richard, but it sounds great. It used to be called The Producers Workshop, and was owned by Liberace, whose ghost is reportedly still hanging around. Steely Dan records were done there, and The Wall by Pink Floyd was mixed there. Clay Blair, the engineer, is a Beatles nut, and has every piece of Beatles gear he can lay his hands on - so if things sound a bit like Abbey Road, so be it! 13 Rivers consists of thirteen tracks. It is an album as much about growth as it is about reflection. Says Thompson, I dont know how the creative process works - I suppose it is some kind of bizarre parallel existence to my own life. I often look at a finished song and wonder what the hell is going on inside me. We sequenced the weird stuff at the front of the record, and the tracks to grind your soul into submission.

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Thrice - Palms - Epitaph
Thrice created Palms with a free-form and fluid approach to the album’s sonic element. The result is their most expansive work to date, encompassing everything from viscerally charged post-hardcore to piano-driven balladry. To carve out that eclectic sound, Thrice enlisted trusted producer Eric Palmquist for the recording of the percussion and vocal tracks, and self-produced all of the guitar parts on Palms. “When we track our own stuff we tend to be far less neurotic about getting every note perfect,” says singer Dustin Kensrue. “It’s more about getting the right emotion out of the performance, so that it connects on a deeper level.” Kensrue, co-founded Thrice with guitarist Teppei Teranishi, bassist Eddie Breckenridge, and drummer Riley Breckenridge in 1998. Hailing from Orange County, California, the band formed when three of its members were still in high school, making their debut with the kinetic punk/hardcore hybrid of the 2000 album Identity Crisis. Their breakthrough arrived with 2003’s The Artist in the Ambulance—Thrice’s third full-length, whose singles “All That’s Left” and “Stare at the Sun” each landed on the Billboard Alternative Songs chart. Palms is the band’s first release since signing to Epitaph in early 2018, and the album matches its raw passion with a measured intensity, a rare feat for an album so informed by the volatility of the times. “Even though some of these songs are really aggressive-sounding, I wanted to make sure they never felt like finger-pointing, especially at a time when there’s so much talking past each other,” says Kensrue. Within that approach, Thrice reveal their profound commitment to making an enduring impact on the listener.

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Marc Ribot - Songs Of Resistance 1942-2018 - Epitaph
With his new album Songs Of Resistance 1942-2018, Marc Ribot—one of the world’s most accomplished and acclaimed guitar players—set out to assemble a set of songs that spoke to this political moment with appropriate ambition, passion, and fury. The eleven songs on the record are drawn from the World War II anti-Fascist Italian partisans, the U.S. civil rights movement, and Mexican protest ballads, as well as original compositions, and feature a wide range of guest vocalists, including Tom Waits, Steve Earle, Meshell Ndegeocello, Justin Vivian Bond, Fay Victor, Sam Amidon, and Ohene Cornelius. Over a forty-year career, Ribot has released twenty-five albums under his own name and been a beacon of New York’s downtown/experimental music scene, leading a series of bands including Los Cubanos Postizos and Ceramic Dog. Since his work with Tom Waits on 1985’s Rain Dogs album, though, he is best known to the world as a sideman, playing on countless albums by the likes of Elvis Costello, John Mellencamp, Norah Jones, the Black Keys, and Robert Plant and Alison Krauss’ Grammy-winning collaboration Raising Sand.

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For more information on these and other releases out this week, check out our New Releases charts by week section.

Ten Bands One Cause

Four years ago, the charity initiative Ten Bands One Cause began with a diverse array of artists releasing 10 albums in limited quantities on pink vinyl with the goal of raising awareness for Gilda’s Club NYC, a charity that provides free support for everyone living with cancer along with their families and friends.

The Ten Bands One Cause program, which includes notable past participants Run The Jewels , Red Hot Chili Peppers , Sturgill Simpson , Jason Isbell , The Black Keys , and Anthrax , coincides with National Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October. Since 2014, nearly $200,000 has been raised for Gilda’s Club NYC.

Starting on Vinyl Tuesday September 25th and running through October 26th , The Orchard will release a fifth annual run of pink vinyl, featuring titles by Silversun Pickups, Modest Mouse, Local Natives, Black Moth Super Rainbow, EL-P, Tyler Childers, Soccer Mommy, Daryl Hall & John Oates, The All-American Rejects and The Rocky Horror Picture Show Soundtrack. These limited releases will be available for purchase at vinyl-selling music retailers nationwide, and proceeds benefit Gilda's Club NYC.