Baroque Social

The Suburbs is a polished album that evokes memories from the band’s childhood. “If I could have it back” sings Butler at the end of it all in a quiet reprise of the title track.

There are no anthems in this recording, as with previous efforts, but what it does offer is a lot of hidden details in each of the songs that with each hearing makes it extremely good.

A favorite for not only the season but for the ages.

It does require constant effort to really appreciate the album as a whole, instead of just a couple of singles, it is quite a strong concept album and it deserves to be heard in its entirety each time if possible.

Andrew Kenny offers a musical heaven in the form of his new band, The Wooden Birds with this release.

The album indeed has a lot of the textures, weird lyrics, and sounds found in his previous band, The American Analog Set, but with a slight difference, the songs are completely acoustic and feature minimal percussions.

The male & female voices blend beautifully in some instances while the mellow guitar strikes each note with a such delicate manner that keeps each song interesting enough to continue until the very end.

This is a very subtle record that shows the honest nature of his members and capacity to smooth the very saturated space in the music world that sometimes uses too much to give us so little.

The new album by the Black Keys certainly feels like a long and pleasant romance, because their classic rooted style seems intact but they keep doing interesting things with each song in a way that you don’t feel ripped off, it does feel fresh and different, almost like an evolution.

The energy of each song flows nicely through out the whole album, we have a nice rocky instrumental (black mud),  the nasty rocker (sinister kid) and the love songs , it’s like the band is making us an offer we can’t refuse from beginning to end.

Just like the last full recording from the Scene, the band releases yet another EP at the same time that, like the last EP, features mostly instrumental songs.

This time around we get a lot of short acoustic sounds that are very very light but have a lot of heart. This short recording is really a winner, the 1st chords that strike when you hit play are just right and they carry the same calm sense all the way to the end. This is mostly experimental material that instead of using heavy electric machinery, it relies on the simple and organic instruments.

Many people will hit the new LP first, but I think this short record deserves as much attention as, let’s say, the father.

For some, Jimmy LaValle plays it safe with each release, but I try to keep it simple and truly enjoy his records every time.

His new offering does not disappoint and takes us to familiar places once again to just relax, though, I know his mayor weakness has always being the vocals I’ve learned to just accept it, like in the track There Is A Wind, they might not be great but it does not in any way bring the song down in flames. The official video released for this track is amazing, kinda reminds me of some mid 90’s video.

It might need a couple of listens, cause by nature slow songs demand more attention and sometimes the 1st listen just won’t cut it, but trust me, if you are a fan, you will like this record eventually. If not, give it a chance.