Ben Sollee & Daniel Martin Moore

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Ben Sollee & Daniel Martin Moore
Dear Companion
2010

I wrote one word and jabbed a period. I stared at it for three seconds. Underlined it. The review was complete.

Stirring.

This is one of those refreshing albums that renew your faith in humanity, that give you an exaggerated sense of love for others, that wrap your soul in a snuggie© and wet kiss a golden retriever by a fireplace. How exactly can something as intangible as music do these things? If there were an answer to that, you can bet that Clear Channel and the Major Labels would have it in a tattooed formula for all their artists to follow. And judging by the state of mainstream radio, that just hasn’t happened.

Dear Companion, the collaboration of Ben Solle & Daniel Martin Moore, including Jim James on production, illustrates what can be accomplished when proficient songsmiths embrace an efficiency of space and allow music to breathe, while providing a palpable tension from its contrasts. It’s the cello quarter notes vs. the sixteenths on the hi-hat; the spirited and agile banjo vs. the half-time drag of the drums; the most beautiful vocal parts that turn out to be the inseparable amalgamation of two voices.

This is an album that continues in the rich heritage of Wednesday Morning, 3 A.M. and Summerteeth, an album that demands you immediately take a road trip through the Great American Southwest in a dusty convertible, Thelma & Louise style, your destination a covered back porch in Knoxville overlooking a forested ravine with a steaming cup of coffee to counter the nip in the air.

Something, Somewhere, Sometime is the opening track that sets the tone for the album, showcasing that intensity of contrasts, the building anticipation that ends the same way as most songs here: too soon. From here, the album settles into its lower-key theme of savory songwriter goodness. Sollee and the warm intonations of his cello are in fantastic form here, especially on Only A Song and Try, from which you know after the first six notes that it will be one of your favorites on the album. You’re also sure to hear the title track Dear Companion quite a bit, hopefully as a future single, as it’s one of the standouts.

These Kentucky artists come together with a common passion and mission of raising awareness of Mountaintop Removal coal mining. According to Sub-Pop, a portion of their proceeds will benefit the organization Appalachian Voices. The album does manage to avoid any heavy-handedness, relying on the artist’s responsibility to raise thought provoking questions, and in the end succeeds in creating as beautiful a landscape as the one they’re trying to preserve. As Mr. Sollee sings, “It’s only a song, it can’t change the world”. But I honestly can’t think of a better place to begin.

Brian S. Meurer

Vampire Weekend

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Vampire Weekend
Contra
2010

Vampire Weekend is really taking it on the chin these days. It seems that their ability to divide people into virulent camps rivals left-leaning politics at one of those tea bagger parties. Maybe like those events, it wasn’t necessarily representative of the majority, but the critics were loud and obnoxious enough to make it seem so. I’m pretty sure that Vampire Weekend will be number one on Billboard this week with their new album Contra, so maybe they’re rightly unconcerned about a few hyper vocal critics.

Contra turns out to be a mélange of mid-eighties pop-centric Caribbean/African experiments, with nods in all directions, from Elvis Costello sans-attitude, to the Police’s Synchronicity, a bit of Zep’s Fool In The Rain, and the ubiquitous comparison to Graceland. The premise seems to have been: “What if a cocktail shaker could hold Mento, Latin, African, Calypso, Caribbean and American Indie Pop, and what if a calypso breakdown weren’t a breakdown, but an entire song?” It has all the bloops and bleeps a modern indie record with smart production requires, contributing to what in the end will be a very successful record, and rightfully so. It’s also a bit of a genre-bender, with its’ aforementioned ethnic tangents given a ska-dub-electro-pop twist. Contra succeeds if only because it reaches for something different than everyone else right now.

The album opens with Horchata, an upbeat island number driven by the backbone of a straight kick drum with the fluttering of vocal melodies and plunky keys that, like half of the album, make you long for your old Casio keyboard you had in the late eighties. That theme continues throughout, incorporating strong, anxious rhythms with frenetic melodies, often throwing in a swirl of wispy ethereal background vocal breaths. Standouts include the understated, groovy dub in the tasteful use of space of the palette cleansing Taxi Cab, as well as the gyrating Giving Up The Gun. Cousins is the first single, with Run sure to follow, both fitting in the context of the album as a whole. Occasional trouble arises in the squeaky upper register falsetto, essentially bits of White Sky and Run, but overall the melodies are strong and memorable enough to hold their own.

Controversy and critics aside, Contra is a solid album, especially given the fact that it was so highly anticipated and the pressure was on to deliver. And they seem to take more than a bit of joy at bringing that cocktail shaker to the middle of a Tea Party and serving any who care to join them.

Brian S. Meurer