Core Samples for August, 2005, features reviews of Tracy Bonham, The Cloud Room, Adam McIntyre, Moe's Haven, New Estate, Michael Penn, Josh Rouse, Smallspace

The Cloud Room
The Cloud Room
Gigantic Music

Oh oh oh, don't you wanna go
Oh oh oh, to the days when all the plans we'd make were
laws we'd yet to break? (Beautiful Mess)

Don't let the name fool you into thinking this is some ethereal ambient band. Nothing could be further from the truth. Instead, this NYC band mixes up indie pop/rock with a dash of glam, a hint of Motown, a ghost or two from the original punk their city spawned, and sing-along worthy choruses.

Much is being made in the press of the bright, catchy opener, "Hey Now Now," and it's a fun tune, but there are better songs on this album. The breathless, sensual, manic "Blackout!" vies with "Beautiful Mess" as my favorite. "Devoured in Peace" is pretty, summery pop with a hooky punch and goes through a number of changes in its 3:41. In fact, it's the longest song on the album, with five of the eleven songs clocking in at under three minutes, but they pack a lot into those short spans.

"Beautiful Mess" is, well, beautiful, and hardly a mess. It's expertly arranged, full of hooks, tasty and tasteful. The quiet, spare arrangement of "Sunlight Song" focuses on strong songwriting and J.'s good vocal instincts, and vampire ode "The Hunger" shows off his versatile, interesting voice well.

The two songs up on their website should give you a good idea whether or not you will like this album. I think it makes for great summer listening, and with temperatures soaring across much of the US these days, we may yet get to "shake shake shake shake shake it on down in the blackout."
[www.thecloudroom.com]
Jen Grover

Adam McIntyre
Nothing Means Anything
Headphone Treats Records

Featuring sensitive, sentimental pop songs about relationships. And baby noises on the last track.

You've been warned.

[http://adammcintyre.headphonetreats.com/][http://www.headphonetreats.com/]
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Moes Haven
Introducing Moes Haven
Moternmusic

Moes Haven are a duo, Matt Farley and Tom Scalzo, who started writing songs together in 1996 when they met at Providence College. They have written over 500 songs, enough for several albums, including one with 24 hours of music on it, but have only played live twice, in Rhode Island in 2000, and Wisconsin in 2004. I found out about them by accident, when a CD of highlights from these albums showed up in my mailbox one day.

The duo sounds like They Might Be Giants, but without TMBG's sometimes irritating cuteness and inscrutability, although their sense of humor is just as goofy. That's not what makes them great, it's their willingness to be more serious, straightforward, and emotional than TMBG that makes them so.

That's them lyrically. Musically they are rather weird folk/rock. That's also what makes them great, their willingness to meld folk/rock to their singular lyrical stance. So you have acoustic guitars, and sometimes drums and electric guitar, very bare bones, as folk/rock can be, but it's the basics that also make them indie rock, which is also good.

Here are the highlights. "Well Regarded Serenade," which starts off the disk is a fast moving love song that also takes on writing love songs. "Papaphobia," about being afraid of the Pope, is silly as anything, but it's strummed very well, you could march to it, and its goofiness is very endearing in the end. "Stay With Me" is a serious love song, downtempo musically and lyrically, and you hope the character in the song will get his girlfriend to stay, so he can cheer up.

"Beautiful" is an indie rock jam, with lots of electric guitar, that is, well, beautiful, a lot of fun to listen to, and at over five minutes, the longest song on the album. "I'm So Jealous Of Ashton Kutcher (And I Love Liz Phair)" is literally what it's about, midtempo folk/rock played in a way that makes you hope the character does find a way to meet Liz, and much more. "Arizona's Flat" ends the album on a strange note, jagged indie folk that rolls along in fits and starts, with a lyric that is exactly what the title says it is, and a perfect way to finish. Oh, and by the way, Moes Haven will write a song about you if you send them the info.
[www.moeshaven.com] [www.cdbaby.com]
Andrea Weiss

New Estate
Considering. . .
Kittridge Records

According to the band's promotional material, "Considering. . ." was recorded in band member Mia Schoen's house. Of course, that doesn't mean very much these days, when for the cost of a couple month's pay you can have a better home studio than any of the pro studios used to record the pop masterpieces of the '60s.

By necessity or intention New Estate kept it simple. Drums, two guitars, bass and vocals. Warm, tuneful songs that start, continue until they're over, and then end. Fuzzed guitar that weaves in and out of the music. Rough edges? Sure, "Considering. . ." has a few, but this is plain, honest music.

Do yourself a big favor and head over to the Kittridge Records web site. Look up the page with song samples. There's a nice long, one to two and a half minute sample from each song on the album. You'll easily be able to tell if you're going to like it (and you will, if you have any soul at all).

Take a good look at the album cover while you're there. The cover art is a painting by Mia Schoen, who is featured on this month's Art Seen page. So do yourself another big favor, follow the links and check her paintings out. They're also very cool.
[http://www.kittnet.com/] [song samples: http://www.kittnet.com/catalog/019.php] [http://www.geocities.com/new_estate/]
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Michael Penn
Mr. Hollywood Jr. 1947
Mimeograph Records/Spinart Records/United Musicians

This wonderful, refreshingly clear, straightforward power pop record takes its theme from the year in the album title. Lots happened that year. The GI's returned to civilian life from WWII, the CIA was formed, the Blacklist began, as did the Cold War, the transistor was invented, and Chuck Yeager broke the speed of sound. But all of that is merely the backdrop for songs about relationships, some romantic, some not.

The two songs that aren't about relationships mostly are about inventions, such as "The Transistor," or "The Television Set Waltz." Both are instrumentals, one sinister and electronic, to point out what a revolution, good and bad, the transistor caused, and the other celebrates TV broadcasts going national, or if you don't like TV, mourning that fact.

The relationship songs bring to mind another album, a rather unlikely one, but a good comparison nevertheless, Donald Fagen's The Nightfly. Fagen, the former Steely Dan lead singer, made this autobiographical album in 1982, about a young man growing up in the late 50s and early 60s, fantasizing about what he'd like to be, his place in the world, who he'd love and like. Lyrically, those songs were topical, about being a DJ at a station that played jazz all night long, or a diplomat working in Cuba just as Castro was coming to power.

What that album shares with Mr. Hollywood Jr. 1947 is that Penn is wondering how he'd fit in with what was happening in 1947, who he'd meet, love or like, and his reactions to world events. A good example is "On Automatic," a song that zooms by gracefully in three minutes, all jangly guitars, flowing drums, and optimism. Fagen's "I.G.Y. (International Geophysical Year)" has those same qualities, although his song was jazz/pop. There is the same optimism, sense of hope for the future and discovery of it, the same buoyancy.

There is one song, though, on Penn's album that could be interpreted as a dig at the times we live in now. "Walter Reed," the opener, is indeed about the famous Army hospital which cared for injured soldiers in WWII and is serving the same function for soldiers wounded in Iraq. Penn might be saying that he's mad another war is on, and unlike WWII, a war that never should have been fought, that he's had enough of war and the horrible changes it brings. It's that melding of WWII and this new war that gives this mid tempo, nicely swinging and eloquent power pop song a darker cast than some of the songs of the album. That Penn is also looking at today in this song is a nice way to balance the past, and what the past means today.
[www.michaelpenn.com] [www.spinartrecords.com] [www.unitedmusicians.com]
Andrea Weiss

Josh Rouse
Nashville
Rykodisc

Every song on this album, very loosely about Nashville, has something to offer. It's not about the country music side of that city, but those who aren't involved with country at all. Rouse casts a friendly eye at these people, as he knows their quirks maybe a little too well, and has to get away and find people who are different. He did too. He lives in Spain now.

The songs that have the most to offer are "Sad Eyes," which offers comfort to a friend, and "Saturday," about a certain Saturday where a lot happens, like romantic break-ups and losing friends. "Winter in the Hamptons" is the only song where the main character wants to get back to Nashville, where it's warm. Topping them all is "Carolina," about a lonely woman who lives vicariously through celebrities and the media. She goes to sleep and dreams of living in a mansion in California. One day she wakes up and that dream is real. She hasn't gone insane, her dreams have come true. She lives in California, in a mansion, and is famous.

Musically this is old school jangle pop/college rock, coming from the mellow side, flowing smoothly from one song to the next, and if there is one flaw on this album, it's that some of the songs sound alike. That is a minor flaw, though. At its best, this album soars, carried on a glorious cloud of sound that will remind you of the best of Let's Active, the Judybats, or REM songs like "Shiny Happy People." So if you need something relaxing, but that won't insult your intelligence, this is the album for you.
[www.joshrouse.com] [www.rykodisc.com]
Andrea Weiss

Smallspace
No Matter
Speedywagon Records

Despite some buzz in the press, as far as I know, this album is only available from the the Grand Rapids, MI band's website. At least that's the only place I could find it, but it's well worth the trouble I had hunting it down. Hearing a couple of tracks on 3wk internet radio was enough to send me on that hunt. "Come Down Wake Up", one of those tracks, and my favorite on the album, mixes lush, experimental soundscapes with interesting vocal harmonies. The other, the dancy, but understated "Right Here", with its snaking keyboards, is another winner, with a sound that would slot in nicely beside the latest Hood release. Not that there are any losers on this disc. The title track puts me in mind of The Electric Soft Parade in all the best ways.

There's a decidedly nocturnal sound to this album, an edge to even the most dreamlike tracks. Interesting sounds or noises keep even slower songs like "Put Down" from floating off into the ether, or, as in the case of "Don't Go (The Cosmonaut)", at least they keep you tethered to the ship when they do. The vocals, while subdued, are interesting, pretty, and textured to blend well with the instrumentation.

You can listen to the whole thing on their website, albeit in diminished sound quality and disconcertingly out of track order, but it should clue you in as to whether it might be your thing.
[www.smallspacemusic.com]
Jen Grover