Quick Hits, Vol. 57 (Frazey Ford, Chvrches, Silversun Pickups, Wildlights)

Frazey Ford - Indian Ocean.  From the Talking Heads-esque start of "September Fields", this is a fine sound, steeped in old school Memphis soul.  And for good reason, as this was recorded with Al Green's old band, in Memphis.  A friend sent me this video months ago, before the ACL schedule came out, so I have been too long in getting back to this and checking it out.

Yeah, baby.  Those horns and that organ, right on.  Her voice reminds me of Rihannon Giddens, Norah Jones, that kind of light touch and soulful tone.  The whole album is this kind of folky soul, and it is really nice chill music.

Chvrches - Every Open Eye.  When these cats came to ACL last year in support of The Bones of What You Believe, I was all in.  That album is great, and "The Mother We Share" is still a top notch song.  A bunch of good music on that album, so I was pretty excited about this new one coming out. There is nothing quite so great on here as the highs of the last album, but I am still really enjoying the disc.  I think the obvious best track is "Clearest Blue," with its Depeche Mode homage synth line in the middle.

You have to imagine hearing that live would be a jumping, reeling party.  The most popular track on the album is "Leave a Trace," with about 12 million spins on Spotify, and it is pretty good too, but "Clearest Blue" sounds even better to me.  I just think I aim for the fun songs with this type of music - see also "Empty Threat."  Good album that I'll keep around to work with for a while longer.

Silversun Pickups - Better Nature.  I was a fan of Carnavas, their 2006 album.  Had enough Smashing Pumpkins feel without being a straight ripoff, as well as its own cool sound. I listened to that album a ton.  This one isn't doing it for me.  Kind of whiny, a little too electronic, and very long. I felt like the album just kept droning on for hours underneath my work for the past few days.  Not bad by any means, I'd much prefer this to other music I've heard recently, but with so much good music out there in the world, why waste more time on this?

Kurt Vile - b'lieve i'm goin down...  To the extent I didn't talk about this new album much in my review for ACL 2015, know that this album is excellent.  Shaggy and smart and fun.  I like it alot.

Wildlights - Wildlights.  I don't know if you listen to Band of Horses, but the lead singer of this band sounds just like the dude from Band of Horses.  But then the music is some kick ass riffage rock more in the Queens of the Stone Age/Fu Manchu class, and it is actually pretty sweet.  I have no recollection of how I came across this stuff, but I like the album quite a bit.  Amazingly, their most listened-to song on Spotify has only 4,746 streams, which seems wrong, but I am obviously on the BLEEDING EDGE of cool music, man.  Here is that track, "Anchors," which is in heavy rotation with the band's family and, apparently, just me.

Seriously, is that the guy from Band of Horses?  Even better example is "Lights Out," but nope!  He apparently sings for a band called ASG, which I will now be throwing into the queue as well.  But this band has a great heavy groove - they get locked into a repetitive groove and just jam it.  More poppy than something like Tool, not nearly as dark, but cool music.  I like this album.