Jay Wrote

Fontaines DC at 1st Av the other night. They were supposed to be here in fall 2019 but canceled due to a nomination for best new band or album in Britain.  Other successes since then including the featured quote in my end of the year sum up for 2020.   The song I quoted is: A Hero's Death with the refrain "Life ain't always empty."  The band is a hard rock outfit from Dublin with social commentary, punkish and poetic tendencies. Clash. U2. Patti Smith. Sex Pistols.  They played the best songs from their 1st 2 albums and what I assume are songs from their brand new album. I think the earliest are the best. Boys in a Better Land, Hurricane Laughter, Television Screens, A Hero's Death, I Don't Belon g.  The show was notable for the lack of band-to-crowd communication. Lead singer Grian Chatten's voice gave out 10 days ago and so Fontaines DC cancelled some shows. Chatten understandably saved it for the music. He prowled the stage between ...

Music Appreciations, February 2019 Illuminati Hotties! At the Turf Club last night. https://illuminatihotties.bandcamp.com . Very good show(wo)manship, voices, guitars. A similar sophisticated approach to fun and thoughtful rock that I heard in the band Bodega, 7 months ago at Turf. Nice use of dynamics, nice to have understandable lyrics and a hard rocking performance. 2 guitars, bass, drums. Sarah Tudzin and fellow guitarists appeared in shorts, a daring fashion choice in Minnesota this month. A bit more polished in approach than Courtney Barnett but not lacking in grit at all. (She takes the label “tenderpunk” - not bad…) You can hear the Barnett parallels here: https://illuminatihotties.bandcamp.com/track/youre-better-than-ever .  Expect a bigger venue next time in town. Sad that there were so few to hear Illuminati and sad that the loud clowns back by the bar didn’t take their sloshy laughter downstairs. Pretty good local opening R&R act, Prothloons (?) w...

Courtney Barnett - Tell Me How You Really Feel,  An Appreciation by Jay Wilkinson   Thanks to daughter Sara for this variegated purple and gray lp.  First things first:   Know that this is a guitar rock album and that Barnett drives the album hard with her lyrics and guitar.   For the moment just let the lyrics speak for themselves - without compromise, feminist, ironic, caustic, poetically doubtful, powerful. But first this is a guitar album.   I’ll give the Patti Smith Band, Nirvana, Hendrix, L7, Byrds, Neil Young as reference points and probable influences.   Especially Nirvana and Young in her disregard for traditional tunefulness.   Barnett’s tendency is to burst forth with angular slashing chords and solos.   Several of the faster songs seem to have been deliberately fuzz-toned in comparison to other sharply-reproduced, expanded sonically, slower but equally emphatic slow songs. I’ll listen more to see if there is a call f...