The Wombats, 'The Wombats Proudly Present…A Guide to Love, Loss & Desperation' (Roadrunner)
Forlorn Brit trio snap off one-liners, cry tears of a clown.
By Jon Young 06.23.08 6:05 PM
Despair rules on this Liverpool threesome's crackling debut, wrapping loneliness in spiffy power pop.
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Alejandro Escovedo, 'Real Animal' (Manhattan/Back Porch)
Soulful survivor ponders loss and redemption, keeps rockin'.
By Jon Young 06.23.08 5:51 PM
Alejandro Escovedo has tackled a bit of everything during the past three decades, and the enthralling Real Animal presents a concise overview of the man's art and life, encompassing the punk fury of the Nuns, the country-rock twang of Rank and File, the rootsy guitar assault of True Believers, and the late-era tortured, string-quintet balladry that showcases his unbearably sad voice.
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Sloan, 'Parallel Play' (Yep Roc)
Indefatigable Canuck combo make pure pop for mild people.
By Jon Young 06.15.08 2:30 PM
After dropping a 30-track extravaganza last year, Sloan return with this more digestible 13-song opus, but their essential blandness remains unchanged. While all four members write, the result is just different shades of competent, predictable power pop, from vaguely bluesy ("Burn for It") to icky sweet ("Cheap Champagne") to slightly psychedelic ("The Other Side").
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The Fratellis, 'Here We Stand' (Cherrytree/Interscope)
Raucous blokes calm down, misplace mojo.
By Jon Young 06.15.08 2:13 PM
It's called "the difficult second album" for good reason. Use your best ideas on the first record or there may not be another chance. Then what? Repeat yourself, evolve, or panic? Though hardly a disaster, the sophomore effort by the Fratellis shows one way that things can veer off track.
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Shearwater, 'Rook' (Matador)
Sensitive Texans aren’t quite as fragile as they appear.
By Jon Young 06.02.08 5:36 PM
No longer a cloistered chamber-folk band, Shearwater follows the startling variety of 2006’s Palo Santo with their even more stimulating fifth album. While Jonathan Meiburg’s uneasy high quaver has always generated the kind of simmering intensity that made Jeff Buckley so gripping and unnerving, canny tonal shifts give his introspective songs a bristling, heightened urgency.
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I see Hawks in L.A., 'Hallowed Ground' (Big Book)
Urban cowboys play tour guides at Gilded Palace of Sin.
By Jon Young 05.30.08 1:17 PM
While I See Hawks sound like refugees from the '60s/'70s L.A. country-rock milieu that spawned Poco and the Flying Burrito Brothers (one of the scene's founding fathers, Chris Hillman, even played on their previous album), the earnest songwriting duo of frontman Rob Waller and guitarist Paul Lacques enhance the band's earnestly shopworn sagebrush grooves with a shot of timely anxiety.
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