Phosphorescent’s latest release, “To Willie”, is a respectful tribute to one of the most prolific songwriters in music history. Covering eleven of Willie Nelson’s songs, singer Matt Houchuck is faithful, for the most part, to the original tunes. He preserves the bounce in tracks like “Gotta Get Drunk” and the introspection in others like “Can I Sleep In Your Arms?” while adding a little more twang and that rich, “Phosphorescent” sound throughout. The melodies and overall “Willie” vibe of the original songs, however, remain the foundation of this album.

Click here to view the embedded video.Phosphorescent- Reasons to Quit (live)

Of course, covers are rarely as good as the original, and there are a few moments when the ambience Houchuck contributes seems superfluous rather than complementary (the simplicity of Nelson’s own rendition of “Permanently Lonely” is far more preferred from this critic). However, in tracks like  “Too Sick to Pray” and “Can I Sleep In Your Arms” Houchuck’s dreary vocals succeed at drawing closer attention to the lethargic lyrics and the themes of drug addiction, alcoholism, and broken hearts.  All in all, Willie Nelson fans who are protective of the original gems needn’t worry; nothing beats the man himself, but Phosphorescent does pull together a solid effort that remains faithful to it’s inspiration while providing a nice, mellow soundtrack for these last few months of winter. -Jenna Bonenfant

****As a bonus, we have put together all of the original tunes for your listening pleasure. Check ‘em out and let us know if you agree with our review.

I’ll Stay ‘Til After Christmas is a compilation album for indie music lovers who feel ambivalent about Christmas. You won’t find songs about snow flakes or cozy hearths on this digital-only release, which features a track about a holiday breakup as well as one entitled “It’s Christmas and Everything’s Wrong.” What you will find is a thoughtful mix of anxious lullabies. Bosque Brown’s rendition of “Silent Night” evokes child-like isolation while Au Revoir Simone’s version of “Christmastime is Here,” provides a delightful, slightly creepy escape from a fraught family Christmas.  Blitzen Trapper’s “Christmas is Coming Soon” is a standout track about nostalgia, at once wistful and optimistic.

Hats off to Force Field PR chief Daniel Gill for choosing a group of artists who sound diverse, yet surprisingly unified on this compilation. The overall fantastical tone will definitely help you escape any family drama that you may be headed toward this holiday season. All of the proceeds from the album are also going to Amnesty International. So do something good for yourself and others this Christmas and check out this album. – Megan Blanchard

Tracklisting:
1. Au Revoir Simone – Christmastime is Here
2. Le Loup – Shenandoah
3. Figurine – The Holidays Behind Us
4. Sally Shapiro – Anorak Christmas (Piano Mix)
5. Arthur & Yu – My White Elephant
6. My Brightest Diamond – Nature Boy
7. Parenthetical Girls – Festive Friends (Forever)
8. No Kids – Another Winter In a Summer Town
9. Radar Bros. – Baby Jesus
10. Blitzen Trapper – Christmas Is Coming Soon
11. Man of Arms – It’s Christmastime and Everything’s Wrong
12. Au – I’ll Be Home For Christmas
13. The Papercuts – Go Tell It On The Mountain
14. Bosque Brown – Silent Night
15. Turk Dietrich of Belong – Blue Christmas

Little Joy is putting on warm jeans right out of the dryer; it’s realizing that you’re just happy to be here. The big surprise (or little joy, I guess) is that musicians from bands such as the Strokes and Los Hermanos could collaborate to produce something so slow in pace and breezy in style. It is as if Fabrizio Moretti and Rodrigo Amarante are killing time on the slow boat to Christmas Island with an arsenal of chimes, ukuleles, Hammond organs and ethereal background harmonizing. The much larger joy is that this album often works beautifully. Little Joy is a real pleasure to soak into, due to a rare combination of selfless collaboration and well considered production.

Popular music has its own elephant graveyard strewn with the carcasses of collaborations that fall terribly short of their potential; we must be willing to try for the off chance that stars will align and different musical voices combine to make something unexpected and amazing.  For every Paul McCartney/Michael Jackson “The Girl is Mine” or Mick Jagger/David Bowie “Dancing in the Streets” fiasco we must soldier through, hearing a Johnny Cash/Bob Dylan “Girl from the North Country” or a male/female duet couple like Kris Kristofferson and Rita Coolidge makes all the risk and pain worthwhile.

Click here to view the embedded video.Little Joy- Next Time Around

It is remarkable that a good part of this album manages to escape the influence of any one contributor. The first track, “The Next Time Around,” is a bouncy effort that sets the tone for much of the album. This song has a wonderful Ventures-era vintage feel, due to some thoughtful production by Noah Georgeson from Devendra Banhart. It has shades of Pet Sounds pop, and this is consistently one of the influences that paint the impressionism of this album. It is hard not to smile through your first listen to this track. Another star is “Don’t Watch Me Dancing”, one of a couple sung by Fabrizo’s new not-Drew-Barrymore lady friend, Binki Shapiro. The simple guitar combined with her faltering and restrained voice is fantastic. Other excellent tracts include “If We Work it Out”, “With Strangers”, and “No One’s Better Sake”.

Click here to view the embedded video.Little Joy- Don’t Watch Me Dancing

As one would expect, this collaboration does miss in a few places. “Brand New Start” and ‘Play the Part”  are one of a few that are tediously slow. “How to Hang a Warhol” and “Keep Me in Mind” could easily pass as B-Side Strokes songs, though I suppose that is a good thing if you like the Stokes. These two rattle along with extra mustard. Good for the Strokes, but kind of weird for this album.

Click here to view the embedded video.Little Joy- How To Hang A Warhol

Little Joy (out now on Rough Trade Records) is one of the finest male/female duets I’ve heard recently, and I would put it on par with last summer’s excellent the Duchess & the Duke or last year’s Drug Rug. It is certainly worth your time to check out the soft textures and little joys that this collection of songs employ.         – By Dave Harmon

September 9th marked the release of the newly rediscovered Pussycat sessions by the late John Phillips. The sessions, which featured members of Traffic and the Stones and were produced by none other than the Glimmer Twins, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger, were shelved or lost in late ’76 or early ’77. This album is one of a few that began bubbling up to the surface shortly after Phillips’ death in 2001. Lost music that involves some big names in rock sure sounds like an exciting proposition. Unfortunately, anything sounding good about this album ends there.

Before we get to the malarkey, a little history on John Phillips. For those of you unfamiliar with the man, he was most notably a member of The Mamas & The Papas. He went on to live a rock ‘n’ roll train wreck of a life in the late ’60s and ’70s. He hung out with celebrities and musicians in LA. He married models. He shot copious amounts of heroine and did mountains of coke. John Phillips, to me, seems like the kind of guy that was probably a great personality with enough talent to be interesting, but, maybe, not enough talent left through the, um… “lifestyle” to really pull off anything substantial (post Mamas & the Papas that is).

The album is a mess, but I’ve found it a guilty pleasure over the last two months to consider why. The biggest problem is that Phillips lacks any sort of direction in his narrative voice. It’s not like he’s quiet or strong or deliberate or apathetic. He’s just kind of there, sounding very thin, and the production pulls him under like a rip tide.

Good production usually helps an artist by building layers to accentuate their sound and style. Rick Ruben producing the last few Johnny Cash records comes to mind; Danger Mouse has had more than a couple good examples over the past couple of years. On Pussycat, however, I do blame the production and its lack of deliberate thought about playing to his strengths. The Glimmer Twins had some definite thoughts on this album’s sound aesthetic, but I think they forgot to include John Phillips into that equation. The layers pile up and squash poor John. Songs have little splashes of gospel back-up, electric organ, piano, bongos, slide guitar, and anything else Jagger/Richards thought they could use to prop up these weak tracks; you could say they had a fever for more cowbell.

To compound the poor production problem is that fact that Phillips really doesn’t have much to say and sounds incredibly burned out while saying it. To paraphrase the Dennis Leary joke: He used all of the drugs and we had to wait for him to die so we could smoke his ashes. Leary made that joke about Keith Richards. Let’s pause for a moment of silence to imagine the drugs Richards and Phillips must have shared. Some of the songs (“2001″, “She’s Just 14″, and “Susan, Susan”) honestly make me cringe. Consider lyrics from 2001: “It’s only 24 years/until the year 2000/and may all of the people/on this lovely plant/still be here/in the year 2001.” Phillips’s lyrics are mostly like a stoner’s thoughts: brilliant in the middle of the night, but pretty vague and awkward in the light of day. I think maybe these recording were lost because no one was sober enough to remember even making them.

It’s a shame; a few songs really do have a flash of possibility. The tolerable tracks (“Oh Virginia”, “Mr. Blue”, “Time Machine”, and “Feather Your Nest”) stand apart from the remaining crap. With coherent production, these 4 tracks could have been the backbone of a good cohesive album. I like to imagine that in a bizarro world maybe Gram Parsons could have helped produce John Phillips in his pre-seventies-burnout glory and that together, they could have come up with something actually substantial. It is not hard to see the possibility of magic. -Dave Harmon

Wistful lyrics and boisterous music are almost always a winning combo, and on She’s the Dutchess, He’s the Duke (out now on Hardly Art), the Dutchess and the Duke have mixed all those elements with some excellent musical influences from the likes of Dylan, the Stones and the Mamas and the Papas.  They sings songs about lovers’ regrets, underpinned by aching optimism. On some tracks we hear no more than a guitar, a tambourine, and the harmonies of frontman Jesse Lortz and his childhood friend and collaborator Kimberly Morrison; on others the duo is accompanied by a flute, sitar, or congas – instruments reminiscent of the White Album or the Rolling Stones’ “Paint it Black.”

Click here to view the embedded video.The Dutchess and The Duke- Back To Me

Standout track “The Prisoner” is a foreboding tale that will make you shudder, or just want to clutch your lover. The next track, “Back to Me,” completely changes tone, and jumps back another decade to recall Roy Orbison and the earnest love songs of the 50s. It’s a recollection of heartbreak, infused with innocence and nostalgia. “I am Just a Ghost” is a beautiful ballad orchestrated around that familiar, haunting series of chord changes from Pachelbel’s Canon – and updated to evoke a depressing sense of modern malaise.

Click here to view the embedded video.The Dutchess and The Duke- Out of Time

Lortz and Morrison’s vocals and Pixies-like harmonies – intentionally flat, sometimes even blasé, keeps the sound from becoming too precious or directly mimicking the band’s influences. It would be interesting to hear Morrison further develop her voice, as a counterpoint to Lortz’s Mick Jagger-y vocals. Hopefully her voice will become more nuanced over the course of the next several albums – which I can’t wait to hear! I’m keeping my eye on this band, and I’m definitely going to check them out at the Echo on November 10th. – Megan Blanchard

Old Crow Medicine Show has released their first album since relocating to Nashville, Tennessee Pusher (out now on Nettwerk Records). I had the chance to catch them live last Friday with the (very good) Carolina Chocolate Drops at the historic Ryman Auditorium. The tone and feel of their music certainly has developed in a manner that will surprise you, especially if you’ve previously dismissed them as an ol’ timey bluegrass gimmick.

Click here to view the embedded video.Old Crow Medicine Show – Next Go ‘Round

Quick Disclaimer: I am an Old Crow apologist. I grew up listening to bluegrass music, and I could care less if OCMS plays anything that approximates alt-country or whether all string bands are incredibly geeky. To that wit, OCMS took a great step forward to prevent becoming a one-trick pony like, say, the good but otherwise forgettable rock-as-bluegrass Hayseed Dixie. Sure, we may not have any foot-stompers here about blow, but what we do have is a complete album searching for the spirit of the forgotten people in the Tennessee Valley; music about the Wal-Mart set, truck stop hookers, assassination, and methamphetamine. This album does not pander much to past popular fan favorites, but instead pulls the OCMS sound from the past into something much more relevant and real. Ketch Secor’s writing is really superb, especially if you consider it from the angle of a performer like Ryan Adams. I don’t want to stir the pot too much here, but Secor is building one hell of a case as the superior writer of that comparison. Consider Secor’s lyrics from “Highway Halo”: “Shaky Face/ Lily Kimball/ Patron Saint/ Traveling minstrel/ Let her dusty wings unfold/ Forgive her bad luck soul/ Put her in a purple robe/ And a highway halo”

Click here to view the embedded video.Old Crow Medicine Show- Caroline

I should mention that this album was produced by the legendary Don Was, and he really does come through with a sound that is more developed than previous records but still far from over-produced. It works, and this album really gains from Don knowing when to lay off the gas. If you are going to try a few tracks, check out “Caroline”, “Next Go ‘Round” and “Highway Halo”.  I see Tennessee Pusher as a great step forward in sound and style for Old Crow Medicine Show; they’ve consistently evolved in a style contrary to my expectations, while mostly exceeding them as well. -Dave Harmon

The Rosewood Thieves’ Rise & Shine is the best summer album that you’re probably not listening to right now. This effort is a meticulous slight of hand that manages to sound new and fresh, and somehow does so despite lots of borrowing from Bob Dylan and John Lennon’s solo work. When a young songwriter follows in the footsteps of such musical giants, the potential for an overly ambitious crap fest seems inevitable. What results here, though, is an immediately likable and nuanced pop sound that rarely feels trite or wooden.

Click here to view the embedded video.Rosewood Thieves- Honey, Stay Awhile (from 2007′s Lonesome)

Rosewood Thieves- Honey, Stay Awhile (from 2007′s Lonesome)
Chalk the big trick up to singer/songwriter Erick Jordan, who formed this band in 2004. Based in New York City, the Rosewood Thieves have previously released two EPs and have maintained a relatively consistent sound. Who is this Erick Jordan? It is easy to imagine him as some kind of crazy genius with a composition voice that is instantly classic and brilliant. Or he could be a calculated composer whose discovered the method to distill just enough style from the greatest greats. I suspect it’s a little of both, but who the hell cares? It sounds great!

Click here to view the embedded video.Rosewood Thieves- She Don’t Mind the Rain (Live at the Echo)

Rosewood Thieves- She Don’t Mind the Rain (Live at the Echo)
Rise & Shine delivers a complete album of excellent songs. The first three out of the gate set the standard: “Silver Gun”, “She Don’t Mind the Rain”, and “When My Plane Lands”. “Fair Lights Flashing” has interesting timing led by electric organ and percussion that is unusual, but it works beautifully. My advice? Just go ahead and buy the entire album. We still have two months left for summer music.
- Dave Harmon

Directions to See a Ghost, out now on Light in the Attic Records, finds theBlack Angels tightening their sound from 2005′s self-titled EP and 2006′sPassover. The result is a focused and methodical effort reminiscent of older songs like “The First Vietnamese War”, but at the expense of the loose and dirty experimentation that energized their previous efforts.

Click here to view the embedded video.Black Angels- Black Grease

With Passover, for example, it is clear to hear the more-or-less two halves of an album that contrast and define one another: the first half is relatively repetitive with dark lyrics of protest, while the later half, which begins with “Black Grease”, introduces chaos and an experimental psychedelic spirit. Perhaps this is what drains some of the blood from Directions to See a Ghost; without this context of contrast, this new effort often feels one-dimensional.

Click here to view the embedded video.The Black Angels- You In Color

That’s not to say this new album doesn’t have some bright spots. “You on
the Run” and “You in Color” are two great tracks worth checking out.
Hard-core Black Angels fans will appreciate this follow-up as an assertion
of this young band’s direction. To the rest of us however, it may sound like a hangover to last night’s psychedelic binge. 
- Dave Harmon