Quick Hits, Vol. 136 (Queens of the Stone Age, Arcade Fire, Waxahatchee, The War on Drugs)

Back to the joys of listening to the music I know and love!  Well, sometimes I get some stank albums in these quick hit reviews, but this first one is going to be all good stuff because I've been jonesing to listen to these albums but held off until I was done with the ACL bands.  My "new stuff" playlist has 82 hours worth of tunes in it, so I'm pretty stacked up for listening to things I'm interested in beyond the ACL bands.  Right back at it.  I'll have more to talk about with the ACL stuff, just give me a few days to rock out.

Queens of the Stone Age - Villains.  I'm a lover of the Queens.  This brand of swaggering, brawny rock is right up my alley just about any given day.  So I'm loving this album.  The two opening tracks, "Feet Don't Fail Me" and "The Way You Used to Do" are surprisingly danceable rock tracks, but they still keep the new music right in the same wheelhouse as their old albums.  Here is the second of those, the hot one, with 8.9 million streams.

That's a groovy ass love song right there.  I feel the need to see it live and clap along like I'm an extra in that Cry Baby movie and Johnny Depp is doing his thing.  "If the world exploded behind us, I never noticed if it done, Let nobody dare confine us, I'll bury anyone who does.  But it doesn't matter now, Just come and love me how, Like the way you used to do."  There are a couple more introspective tracks on here, but the glorious ones are the crunchy rockers like the above two or "The Evil Has Landed" or "Head Like a Haunted House."  Very fun album that I'll keep listening to.

Arcade Fire - Everything Now.  Hearing this album makes me even more bummed out that I was wrong about them being on the ACL lineup for this fall.  I'm still sincerely bummed out that my prediction was wrong, but especially now that I hear how fun and awesome this new album is.  There is an odd thing they do, where the final song loops around to the opening song, which means that the opening song is kind of oddly half-baked (since it truly belongs with its partner at the end of the album).  But then the next two songs are some amazingly weird disco-fied rocking jams that make me need to boogie.  First, "Everything Now" sounds like an Abba b-side to be used to dance down a street while stealing grapes from a street vendor who, instead of getting mad, will just smile at your cheekiness and give you a high five.  That grape stealing rogue!  *extra hearty laugh*  The lyrics are also a clever indictment of our current societal need for instant gratification.

That video gives you the odd intro from the first song on the album, before you hear the actual track for "Everything Now."  But the tune itself is just so sunny on the surface, and darker underneath.  Its well done.  "Pledge allegiance to everything now.  Every song that I've ever heard, is playing at the same time, its absurd, and it reminds me of everything now, we turn the speakers up til they break, 'cause every time we smile its a fake, stop pretending you've got Everything Now"  and "'Til every room in my house is full of shit I couldn't live without."  "Creature Comfort" is also dark as hell.
"Signs of Life" is another disco-fied party track.  Several of the next ones, like "Chemistry" and "Peter Pan" have a kind of world music flavor to them (I don't know world music well enough to tell if these flavors are Haitian or Jamaican or Senegalese or whatever, I just know they make me think of some sort of world music taste).  I also dig the guitar crunch on "Chemistry," which sounds like something from "We Will Rock You" or something.  That is a good track that I want to bump, because it strangely meanders from a reggae-ish honk to that brawny rock.  Cool sound.  This album is great.

Waxahatchee - Out in the Storm.  Some more good 90's alt. rock crunch from Katie Crutchfield. She came to ACL in 2015 and I had just before then professed how much I enjoyed her 2015 album, so I've discussed previously how good she can be, but this album is even better, I think.  Reminds me of the 90's groups led by ladies, The Breeders or Veruca Salt or when Kim Deal sang for the Pixies. She piles on the crunchy guitar riffs and keeps the songs basic, but I dig them.  The top track is "Silver," with 645k streams.

You get it?  Nice harmonies for the vocals, piles of guitars, and a lyrical poem that I think is maybe about a shit relationship.  "The kiss on my lips, starts to feel unfamiliar, A part of me rots, My skin all turns silver.  You tell a classic story, Smothered underneath formality, I'll portray the old shag carpet, You can walk all over me."  The whole disc is really good, in the same sound vein.  I'm keeping it around.

The War on Drugs - A Deeper Understanding.  This guy alternatively reminds me of Bob Dylan and David Gray, with tunes that sound very much influenced by classic rock.  I reviewed him a few years back when he came to ACL, and really liked his sound.  Its generally pretty relaxed, but still rock edged, and I can't shake the thought that the singer sounds like Dylan.  The top song is an 11 minute long one, so I'm going to give you second place to save you some time.  This is "Holding On," with 3.2 million streams.

Kicks in like a Springsteen song, with the bells ringing and the music ready to be used on a road trip mixtape immediately.  My God I'm such a softie too, that damn video got me right up to the edge of tearing up over the superintendent from Coming to America losing his wife but having a good day reintroducing himself to his town.  Criminy.  But the tunes are good, a lot of them have that same driving feeling, and I repeatedly think that the organ/ synth is just about to start playing the lick from "Walk of Life."  Good album, I like it all.