Quick Hits, Vol. 22 (The New Basement Tapes, Fall Out Boy, Belle & Sebastian, Tove Lo)

I have never really listened to Ed Sheeran, but he apparently killed it on the Grammy Award show, so maybe I need to go give him a look.  In addition, this tune right here is a freaking killer jam mashup example of why music in the internet age is awesome.

The New Basement Tapes - Lost on the River.  A super-group of sorts - Elvis Costello, Jim James (from My Morning Jacket), Marcus Mumford (Mumford & Sons), Taylor Goldsmith (Dawes), and Rhiannon Giddens (apparently in a band called Carolina Chocolate Drops) - making music with long-lost Bob Dylan lyrics from the 60's.  "Down on the Bottom," the album opener, is a beauty of a Jim James vocal.  I love me some MMJ, so his tender voice makes this song a keeper for me.  I also love the dude from Dawes - his voice is fantastic and he makes the very strange "Card Shark" into a cool goof and "Liberty Street" into a tender meditation.  "Florida Key" is also a simple little beauty.  Not sure why Kansas City is such a touchstone for Dylan in these lyrics, but there are three songs on here ("Kansas City," "Six Months in Kansas City," and "Liberty Street") that all heavily reference KC. Weird, but I'm sure one of the many Dylan obsessives out there has written a seven volume reference set all about Kansas themes in Dylan's music.  I'll just have to miss out.  Here is Down on the Bottom:

Anyway, this disc is a good one.  The one I didn't like was "Duncan and Jimmy," kind of a brassy ho-down.  T Bone Burnett is really a pretty amazing dude, who can just take this random group of artists and set them loose on a stack of unfinished lyrics to turn out a cohesive project.  Cool stuff.

Fall Out Boy - American Beauty/ American Psycho.  These guys were a big fat guilty pleasure for me.  Actually, their From Under the Cork Tree album still is.  After moving back to Austin and finding that album, I used to listen to it a ton while mowing the yard and on my extremely infrequent jogs through the neighborhood.  Their need to ridiculously name songs was annoying, but they were really good at pop-rock hooks, heavy riffage, and great sing-along choruses.  However, I think they missed the mark on this album.  The majority of the song titles are one or two words, with no cheeky clever word play right there in the title.  C'mon guys.  "Centuries" is catchy, but nothing nearly as good as their older work, even while stealing from "Tom's Diner."  "Fourth of July" was actually stuck in my head for a day or two - good beat and catchy chorus.  But then "Uma Thurman," which samples the Munsters theme (for reasons I can't comprehend) and keeps talking about his girl wanting to dance like Uma Thurman (presumably in her Pulp Fiction role?) is cheesy and lame.  Not going to hold on to this album.  I'll stick with the old albums.

Belle & Sebastian - Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance.  Well, hell.  I crapped on B&S back when reviewing them for ACL 2014.  I find their music to be pretty reliably boring and uninteresting. BUT, parts of this album are totally different - instead of twee little indie-coustic, extra-wordy tunes, you get a dance party.  Check out "Party Line," which makes me think of LCD Soundsystem:

Heavy-duty disco hand-clap dance party fest, all up in there.  That jam is anything but boring.  I'm sure loads of people hear this song and are mad that B&S has changed their sound and isn't doing sleepy coffee house snoozers anymore, but I think this new direction is actually fun.  Get 'em.  But then, just to make sure no one mistakes them for something awesome, B&S makes sure to follow that song up with a few nice bland tracks like "The Cat with the Cream."  I'll save "Party Line," but the rest of the album can go.

Tove Lo - Queen of the Clouds.  Swedish gal with electro backing tracks.  Some of these songs, like the hit "Habits" or "This Time Around" have pretty dark lyrics, but others are just dumb bouncy pop things, like "Like Em Young" or "Talking Body."  "Habits" is kind of disturbing - its a song about getting high all the time to keep from missing her honey, she's generally singing about doing sad and gross things because she's alone, including: "Pick up daddies at the playground, how I spend my day time, loosen up their frown, make 'em feel alive, make it fast and greasy, I'm numb and way too easy, you're gone and I got to stay High, all the time, to keep you off my mind."  Wow.  And the video is also a super depressing trip through her sad party time life.

That does not look like a fun time!  But the beat and feel of the song is pretty dang cool, even if it should be depressing and terrible if you listen to the lyrics.  Overall, the album is pretty forgettable.