The Cat Empire - Steal the Light - released May 2013 (Two Shoes)

 Genres: Ska, R&B, Afro-Cuban Jazz

Mixing a whole bunch of styles into a cohesive sound must take a lot of effort but this Melbourne band pull it off with splendidly. The percussion is right up-front in the mix and it keeps the music bopping along nicely. There are no tracks that have big standout instrument solos but the Cuban jazz influence is very present, especially from the type of Afro-Cuban music from the late seventies and early eighties.There are times when the music dips into dance music of the House variety (see the opener 'Brighter Than Gold') and other times were it is straight-up Rhythm and Blues (see 'Am I Wrong' and 'Don't Throw Your Hands Up') but the whole album retains the same good-natured extroverted vibe.  'Prophets in the Sky' has a Afro-Cuban jazz and slightly kitsch Mexican vibe mixed into a Ska groove. 'Steal the Light' is more in a Ska vibe but has a big horn-led chorus that shuffles in a way that suggests dancing and lots of it, accompanied by a wordless chant. 'The Wild Animals' is the closest to a manifesto for the album with lyrics about escaping the office and getting in touch with your wild-side, with a lot of turntable work and a percussive hip-hop feel. 'Still Young' is a bouncy ska song with a simple message 'while you're still young, find your heart and find your song'. The song 'Like A Drum' is more in line with Brazilian or Afro-Cuban music and the lyrics are mostly sung in language. 'Go' is probably the most driving song on the album, detailing how you've got to let go of your 'omnipresent phone' as staring at it is letting the real world's beauty pass you bye, to Mexican horns and a Ska beat. 'All Night Loud' is a great end coming down from a good time.

Happily mixing styles from everywhere, this was a thrilling and fun release. I don't particularly like the cover-art but the music inside is quite winsome. The message is clear, be as weird and as mixed-up as you really are and don't let it stop you.

4.5/5 STARS 

  Below is video link to 'Brighter than Gold' by the Cat Empire

Paul Kelly - Spring and Fall - released November 2012 (Gawdaggie)

Genres: Folk, Singer/songwriter

Paul Kelly knows exactly which buttons to push on this superb batch of very short understated songs. Kelly spends equal time writing about love's joy and the coldness when it ends, literally spring and fall. All the songs are driven by his voice accompanied by guitar but there is a large amount of instrumentation behind him packed into what seem at first to be quiet folk songs. The album feels like it was written for intimate rooms rather than large pop audiences as the arrangements are bare-bones and mostly acoustic. The set is over in a little over a half-hour totaling 12 songs (one is a hidden track at the end of the 11th) which detail new love, continued devotion, new hope, despair, infidelity, broken relationships and change. Kelly crafts intricate detail into all the characters in his lyrics on this disc but there are no longer story songs, here he is focused intently.

All the songs on this album find their marks. Brilliant.

Rating: 4.5/5

Here is a video link to 'New Found Year' that kicks off the album Spring and Fall. 

Melbourne Ska Orchestra - self titled - released 8th March 2013 (Four|Four/ABC Music)

Genres: Ska, R&B

This record is a hoot! You can really hear on all the songs that the band has been practicing these for some time because the arrangements are just right and although there are like 26 (possibly more) members of the band the sound never sounds crowded. Every song is extroverted and joyous.

The linear notes of the record have a little context to what 'ska' is for all the kids who weren't around when it was last popular which would probably be the eighties. There were plenty of 'ska-punk' or 'trumpet-punk' bands through the nineties that played a version of 'ska' but the genre has fallen away a little since it was last heard from bands like Madness and The Specials. Ska has influenced much of popular music today as it was a logical step from melding Rhythm and Blues with Jamaican Mento to give the music the distinctive synchopated rhythm.

The first hearing of this band was on the Freeview Advertisment that plays on free-to-air television on most channels here in Australia, which is accompanied with the song 'The Best Things in Life Are Free". This song  comes towards the end of the set and it a great way to see out the show. There are plenty of gems that crop up before this with 'Lygon Street Meltdown', 'Time to Wake Up', 'The Diplomat','Learn to Love Again',  'He's A Tripper' and 'Papa's Got a Brand New Ska'. The opener is a version of the theme from the T.V. show Get Smart and it gets everything cooking.

The band can be charged with being a little too reverent and not pushing boundaries of ska music but they show how flexible Ska music is, journeying from times that step closer to Rock-Steady and other closer to Latin music. You could also say that the approach is a bit shallow but that isn't the point, the point is to lose yourself in the music and enjoy it on its own level. 

RATING: 4/5

Here is the video to 'Lygon Street Meltdown' 

(Italian food is delicious after all!)

Queens of the Stone Age - ...Like Clockwork - released June 2013 (Matador)

 

Genres: Alternative Rock, Hard-Rock, Heavy Metal

Queens of the Stone Age seem to be moving away from louder music and into more restrained hard-rock with an edge and they seem all the better for it.QOTSA have always been a band that was too skilled to be confined to underground status but to studied to sell-out. I have listen to this album for a bit over two weeks and this some of their best work. The sound and feel is more like the music heard on their album Rated R from 2000 and I found this welcoming as the last time I heard from these guys was 2005's Lullabies to Paralyze which was fine but not very exciting. I didn't hear much from 2007's Era Vulgaris which may have been a mistake I will attept to change on my next trip to the music store. 

There is no wasted space on this album with gimmick tracks like 'Feel Good Hit of the Summer' from 2000's Rated R or pointless interludes such that were heard on 2002's Songs For The Deaf . Every song here is worth hearing and is packed with versatility with amazing restraint. There is less focus on guitar workouts on this album and it reveals that the band can actually write songs. 'Heavy Metal' is the lesser part of the band's sound but within their sound is still the evidence of that loud and wild music.

I found that the tracks 'If I had a Tail', 'My God is the Sun' and 'I Appear Missing' were the best distillations of the music on this album but that isn't to take anything away from the other music which is all high quality. 

RATING 4.5/5

Below is a youtube link to the video for the song 'I Appear Missing' (th animation in this one was used for some of the cover art)

 

Poppa Chubby - Universal Breakdown Blues - released May 28th 2013 (Mascot/Provogue)

Genre: Blues

The real selling point for Popa Chubby is his ability to play the guitar which he is quite amazing at.  The way I heard about Popa Chubby is not through his skills with the guitar or to gawk at his silly stage name but through his association with Sim Cain who used to drum for the Rollins Band until the 2000's rolled around. Cain had always been workman like behind the drum-set in that band but quietly had pushed the intense but insular vibe of the leader of that band, Henry Rollins, outwards into wholly more interesting music incorporating blues and jazz  on their albums The End of Silence (1992), Weight (1994) and Come in and Burn(1997). It was no surprise that the free-jazz saxophonist Charles Gayle turned up on some of their sessions for Weight that were later released on the companion album Weighting (2004). That sense of versatility and under-stated adventurous playing is present here while maintaining the driving intensity of a hard-rock band.

The album sort of stumbles early on, the opener 'I Don't Want Nobody' is good but there are moments on track number two "I Ain't Giving Up' and three 'Universal Breakdown Blues' that weren't up to the opener. Thankfully by the end of track three I was hooked as it was all pulled together later in that track with excellent guitar work. '69 Dollars' has the stock-in-trade variety of blues but it is carried off with passion that the track is memorable. Both of the cover tunes are well done. Firstly there is an intense workout through the blues staple 'Rock Me Baby' that is very close to the Jimi Hendrix version and secondly there is 'Over the Rainbow'  which is a eight minute instrumental and is the best showcase of the phenomenal guitar work this man can do. The second half of the record is devoted to outlaw type songs where the attitude is the draw.'Danger Man', 'Go'in Back to Amsterdam (Reefer Smoking Song)' and the hilariously crude 'Finger Banging Boogie' are the best of these cuts.The second half of the album was the strongest material here.

This album wasn't consistent all the way through but in patches it was brilliant!

RATING: 3.5/5

track listing 
1/ I Don't Want Nobody
2/ I Ain't Giving Up
3/ Universal Breakdown Blues
4/ The People's Blues
5/ Rock Me Baby
6/ 69 Dollars
7/ Over the Rainbow
8/ I Need a Lil' Mojo
9/ Danger Man
10/ Go'in Back to Amsterdam (Reefer Smoking Song) 
11/ Finger Banging Boogie
12/ Mind Bender

Here is the video for 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' by Popa Chubby