Oh...K?
Greetings everyone! Once again, it’s been a long, long time since I sent my last A-Z music review, and a lot has happened since the last edition. As you all know, my younger brother Paul has tried to steal the wind out of my sails by starting his own music A-Z music review series. And dammit if the boy ain’t efficient, and a good writer to boot. In the time it took me to get through about one average letter, Paul has already made it to C, and he sent trash-talking word that D is on the way, too. At the same time, Paul’s a good rival, and he even set up a page on his website that links all of the reviews that he wrote, as well as links to all of mine. Good sport, old boy! You can find the links by going to this page:
Paul's Review Page.
Alas, rivalries like this are a story as old as time. However, this isn’t an elementary school field day; not everyone gets a feel-good yellow “participation” ribbon. Since these
are music reviews we’re dealing with here, let’s use a musical analogy: The entirely excellent and competent Paulieri continues to produce music reviews of the highest quality and virtue, but they will never match the soul, wit, and sheer fickleness of the reviews written by his contemporary, Wolfgang Ryandeus Sitzart.
Having said that, let me don my powdered wig, and let’s get Baroque on this batch!
KEANE – “HOPES & FEARS”
Of the four albums reviewed here, this is the second best. I’m pretty sure Keane is popular somewhere, but I’m also pretty sure that “somewhere” is not Costa Rica. So when I saw the CD in the store, I recognized the group’s name, but I didn’t know what type of music they sang. Interestingly enough, as I was putting this album onto my i-tunes, I realized that I already had an entire Keane album, “Under The Iron Sea.” I actually don’t know where that came from, but for some reason I think my brother Paul may have had the CD in Colorado, and I indiscriminately added it to my hard drive when I was there. As a result, the musical style sounded vaguely familiar the first time I listened to this CD.
In fact, “vaguely familiar” is a very good description of Keane. Ronny, the guy who owns the (only) music store in Palmares, described the group as “Britpop,” and said it was like Coldplay. Fortunately, it’s not too similar to Coldplay, because I don’t like Coldplay. There, I said it. I believe Paul and I talked about this before, but it seems like we agreed that both Coldplay and “hardcore” Coldplay fans are only slightly better than mediocre. That’s too bad, because basically everyone likes Coldplay (except me and my brother, it would seem). For me, Coldplay is like jazz: for some reason, you have to like both to be considered acceptable by the majority of poseurs in the western world, but in the end, both types of music will leave your ears as well as your musical soul feeling sonically underwhelmed. So, I suppose that if Coldplay ever releases a jazz album, I’ll be royally fucked.
But hey! This isn’t a Coldplay review. It’s a Keane review. Like I said, “Hopes & Fears” delivers the goods, and it does so in a relatively unpretentious way. And—I’m sorry, but I can’t resist drawing a comparison between Keane and yet another British band—it’s easy to sit back and relax while listening to this album, and to think, “Hey, Travis has still got it!” Because basically, Travis and Keane are just two different flavours of the same Limeypop. Not that that’s bad. When my votes are counted, “Under the Iron Sea” is better than “Hopes & Fears,” but both are better than most Travis albums. I guess that every Keane needs its Travis, just like every Nolte needs his Busey, and just like every Denzel needs a sad, sad Snipes. (A similar effect has been described in both the Malkovich/Lithgow Theorem and the Bateman/O’Connell Postulate).
Oh, and the last song on the album, “Bedshaped,” sounds like a song by a Pink Floyd that was trying to get in touch with its sensitive side.
So, I guess all British music is basically the same, yeah?
This CD is best listened to if you ever find yourself smack-dab in the middle of an emotional breakup scene in the second season of Smallville (or any TV show from the WB, for that matter).
KISS – “THE VERY BEST OF KISS”
Oh, freaking KISS. I have to admit that while I went into this review with a previous bias against KISS, I nevertheless tried to keep an open and positive mindset when listening to this album. After all, I did like a few KISS songs--like“Rock and Roll All Nite”—when I was in high school. But remember, I went to high school in the late 1990s, and that was a time when people liked all sorts of shit from the 1970s, for whatever reason.
In college, however, I gradually moved into the anti-KISS camp, and my status there was solidified by conversations with my friend Andy Parsons about how much KISS sucked. I don’t really remember why he hated KISS so much, but it seemed to make sense at the time.
Generally-speaking, then, I remained contra-KISS until last Christmas, when I read Fargo Rock City and a few other great books by Chuck Klosterman, who is an adamant KISS lover. That sort of awakened my curiosity, since I admire Klosterman’s writing style and his musical opinions (He has a great snippet in one book about how a Radiohead album foretold the events of September 11th). Around that same time, I also noticed that there were strong societal undercurrents based on admiring and obsessing about KISS. This love is evidenced by the strange phenomenon of the “KISS Army.” You know, I’m just doing some impromptu thinking here, but Costa Rica hasn’t had an army since 1948, and many Americans--especially KISS fans—really like their guns…Let’s just hope that the KISS Army never goes in search of a defenseless country on which to perform a military coup and establish their new homeland.
Um…where was I? Oh yeah, so I thought, “Maybe KISS isn’t that bad.” Unfortunately, that thought was wrong. KISS kind of sucks, when it comes down to it. I know that the standard argument against them is that they’re basically a bunch of dumb, brutish S&M clowns that can’t play their instruments or write intelligent lyrics to save their lives. I also know that the standard counter-argument to this idea is that a viewpoint like that is elitist and snobbish, and that music isn’t about intelligence, it’s about evoking a feeling. My personal take on KISS is that they’re dumb, brutish S&M clowns that actually can play their instruments and write lyrics, but the songs and lyrics that they write, although supposedly rocking or shocking, are actually just dull. The two times that I tried slogging through this album while driving in my car gave me two of the most boring, mundane, and restless commutes that I’ve experienced in a long time.
Oh, by the way, here’s a brief commercial pause, paid for by one of our sponsors:
“KISS ALBUM FOR SALE! ONLY SLIGHTLY USED, GREAT CONDITION. PRICE NEGOTIABLE. CONTACT RYAN AT RYANSITZMAN.COM FOR DETAILS.”
So, we’re back. This album is best when listened to the volume turned really low, with some good music playing loudly to drown it out.
KLASSE KRIMINALE – “INTERNATIONAL SOLDIER”
When I was at the music store in Palmares, this album caught my attention straight off because of the doubling-up of K’s in the group’s name. It kept my attention when I noticed that many of the song titles were in Italian, and that the album seemed to have been produced in Germany. Hmm, could I have possibly stumbled on a bona-fide Fascist punk album tucked away in the middle of Central America? As it turns out, the album actually has a little badge on the back that says: “We support Cable Street Beat; Strictly Antifascist.” So, in terms of avoiding the moral implications that come with buying music that was literally made by Fascists, this was a good thing, but in terms of having interesting things to write about in a mock music review, this was a negative development.
Basically, this album appears to come from what seemed at first to me like a brilliant, unexplored genre: Continental-Eurotrash Punkrock! However, when I actually listened to the songs, I wasn’t as psyched. See, the songs actually are mostly in Italian, and I don’t know crap about Italian. If you couple that with the fact that I usually have trouble understanding song lyrics in any language, plus the fact that punk lyrics are nearly indecipherable anyhow, then you basically have a fairly loud album with a lot of unintelligible shouting.
The style is mainly a ska-ish style of punk; it’s not unlike an unpolished Ska-P, which is a Spanish ska band whose lyrics I also can’t understand. The songs on “International Soldier” are individually pretty decent, but after listening to 3 or 4 of them, it’s hard to tell if you’re still listening to “Me Wanna Change Le Monde,” or if you’ve moved on to “Tu Vieni Da Garageland.” By the end of the last track (“Oi! Fatti Una Risata”…whatever the fuck that means), you just feel like putting on some good, old-fashioned Eurotrash Girliepop to cleanse the palate.
This album is best heard when played loudly over the speakers in a shitty Fiat on the way to an anti-fascist rally in Genoa featuring bad Clash cover bands and 1-Euro cups of grappa.
BEN KWELLER – “BEN KWELLER”
It has recently come to my attention that everyone named Ben is a good guy. Or, at least every Ben that I’ve ever heard of is. Maybe you have childhood stories about some asshole Ben who pinned you on the ground and dangled loogies over your face. If you do, I’ll thank you not to share them with me. But enough theoretical anecdotal evidence aside; let’s look at the facts:
-Ben Kingsley is a great actor, at least judging by “Gandhi” and “Sneakers,” the only two movies of his I’ve seen.
-Ben Schneider is a friend of mine, and he’s a great guy.
Good enough for me!
Also, on the musical front, Ben’s been kicking some ass. You’ve got Ben E. King, Ben Harper, Ben Folds, and Ben Kweller.
This self-titled album is actually Kweller’s third album, and it’s arguably his best. It’s also arguably his worst. How can this be, you ask? Well, Kweller’s style is all about putting out ditties that are solidly-enough rooted in rock to bring in the guys, but poppy and quirky enough to keep the girls from leaving mid-album. This has been the case for his three albums, and the resulting musical style seems to have remained consistent throughout. So, there are definitely songs that I like more than others, but they all generally fall into the category of “Sincerely Semi-Ironic Acoutsi-Pop” (Somebody get me a trademark for that term, stat!).
For evidence of this, just look at his album covers, and when you spy his curly brown mop-hair, you’ll know what I mean. For his first album, “Sha Sha” (a great album that my buddy Dustin turned me on to), Kweller’s wearing a Soviet-style fur cap with earflaps, and he’s even brushing his freaking teeth! To up the irony ante for album 2 (“On My Way”), Kweller had to actually be more subtle: He appears standing in the mountains, and he’s wearing cowboy boots and a sweater vest. Oh yeah, and he’s standing next to three wolves! (Or dogs that look like wolves…I’m not a freaking veterinarian). For the album “Ben Kweller,” his irony was already so thoroughly established that he just has a very simple torso-and-head shot. The only overtly ironic element is the red bandana around his neck, with the calculated effect being that it would be so lame that it would be cool again.
Wow, wasn’t I talking about music a minute ago?
OK, musically-speaking, this album is good. Unfortunately, I don’t think it’s quite as good as his first two albums. Of course, his style and playing has surely matured a bit, and maybe the lyrics on this one are as sophisticated as the ones on the others, if not more. But there are still a few songs that happily putter along without really shining, and there are also a few issues with his choice of lyrics.
The opening song, “Run,” begins with the words, “Over hills / over dales / I’ll run / to you.” This isn’t terribly enlightening to begin with, but in the song it actually sounds like he’s saying “Over here / over dere…” That may be a calculated cuteness, but it’s kinda stupid in the end. Also, the third song, “Sundress,” is just a downer to me for some reason. I know it picks up the tempo mid-song, but by then it’s too late. Sometimes, however, the goofy lyrics can work in Kweller’s—and the listener’s—favor, as in the song “Penny On The Train Track,” which opens with a bouncy, piano-infused beat and the line: “I’m-a just a penny on the train track, waiting for my Judgment Day / C’mon girl let me see those legs, before I get flattened away.”
All these critiques, however, overshadow the end result: this is definitely a good album that I would recommend to my friends. I just bring these points up to help. It’s called “Constructive Criticism.” Look it up.
If you see a Kweller album in the stores, grab it up. Also, I hear word that he’s got a new album called “Switching Horses” coming out, and if you happen upon it in that industrialized and audio-fied nation up north between Mexico and Canada, I’d be happy to hear what you think of it. He’s also great in concert (In the BK concert I went to, he opened with a solo, which was an acoustic guitar version of Vanilla Ice’s “Ice Ice Baby” with customized lyrics). And as a final note, many thanks to Bobby Majzler for giving me this album as a Christmas gift!
Well, folks, that’s about it for this edition. You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here. So in the meantime, listen to some music for me!
--Ryan Sitzman