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6 THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 11, 2003 Young explores; Vee formulaic Neil Young & Crazy Horse GREENDALE ★★★★ Neil Young tries to weave a story over his simple, tattered rock on Greendale, but he’s not exactly sure how the story goes and how he’s supposed to tell it. Young has created anew album of rambling thickness that, while it might not be musically brilliant, makes for beautifully ambiguous storytelling. Simply said, Greendale needs Cliffs Notes. And Young provides them. He gives explanations of each song in the liner notes, detailed genealogy on his Web site and a bonus DVD featuring a live performance. The consensus found within this information is that Young is as confused with Greendale as the lis tener. “I mean I made (the town of Greendale) up and I don’t know what the hell is goin’ on,” Young states in the liner notes. Despite the fact that it spins one’s head, the confusion doesn’t deter; rather, it propels the listen er deeper into the chaos. Young's lyrics scramble through subject matter such as a news ticker below the talking heads on CNN. The only things that are clear are Young’s feelings. The disjoint ed nature of the album’s story proves better at illuminating these feelings than conciseness and clear intentions ever could. The story revolving around the townspeople of Greendale (the town) is jumbled, with multiple points of view and a cast of charac ters that is hard to follow. It relies on highlighting how a simple town still faces the death grin of life. Through these voices Young alludes to some of the human problems media, drugs, reli gious wars and just pure unkind ness that seem to be causing social decay. He states these problems, but he doesn’t choose to expand on them fine, Pofte/i,*, OiirjiAal Apt, Frumtiuj, fine, Ouijt &. Com, enjoy oooi Bod on patio/in bar nightly ■ t/!•♦** f until I:4sam X TAIN COLLINS BAND S3 gin & tonics, $2 domestic draft with The Tim Smith Jazz Band ~ LIT Specials <6 more. .. gr \vi\t sp!:ci.\i.s • Triangle’s Best Outdoor Bar) Free Chicken Wings Save $2.00 with purchase of 2 Cafe Sandwiches on 2 Cafe Sandwiches before 11 pm nightly. before 11 pm nightly. <&MH- Expires 9/22/03 Expires 9/22/03 like he has on past recordings. Maybe he sees his inability to explain the problems as a stronger statement than an idealistic solu tion. But maybe the quick murmurs of Young’s own voice channeled through Grandpa “That guy who just keeps singin', can't some body shut him up?/I don't know for the life of me where he comes up with this stuff" that maybe he’s just full of crap. The sound of the album is weary in order to overshadow its tone and lyrics. It’s as dirty as Young ever has been, allowing the lyrics to find their absolute truth. Greendale rings anomalously over the characteristically overpro duced format of the rock opera (Tommy, The Wall). Young and Crazy Horse, known for their brand of straight grit-rock that walks at 4/4 time with distor tion and twang fueling its feet, rebel even more against the sound board and find a sound that would scare even members of the retro kickback squad. With lyrics and music, listeners’ ears rest on a bed of overriding cynicism and displeasure. This is a storm you are j ust going to have to deal with. By Kemp Baldxvin Andi Camp THE AWFUL TRUTH irkt: It isn't the music you first notice when you purchase Andi Camp’s The Awful Truth, it’s the packaging individually numbered, in a red cover and tied with a blue ribbon for good measure, all painstaking ly assembled by the artist herself. Impressed by her dedication to the presentation, you put it in the stereo for the first time and are struck even further by its repetitive blandness. By Camp's brand of piano-based confessional pop that sounds like some serviceable Tori Amos outtakes. Diversions But you’re stubborn. Camp labored to make the album look nice, so you’re willing to give it another chance. And only now do you begin to discern the subtleties it offers. The Awful Truth is a charming, intimate affair that blends a night club flavor with Camp’s deft piano work and personal songs. The immediate comparison is to Norah Jones, who has made such music commercially viable again. Though Camp’s voice doesn’t quite possess the seductive allure that Jones’ does, it fits her material effectively enough. The band Camp uses under stands its role, staying where it belongs in the background. Eleven songs breeze by in just more than half an hour, with min imum excess. No self-indulgent drum solos found here; every note sounds like it’s meant to be there. But Camp’s lyrics often straddle the line between clever sentiment and embarrassing melodrama. Consider “The Miss”: “It’s you I should have waited for/I’ve got the miss worse than before/It’s yours for the taking.” A cheesy lyric, to be sure, but it’s delivered with such unbridled sin cerity that you buy it completely. Camp is most compelling when she allows herself, and her songs, to venture out. Certain tracks, such as “Pocketbook,” actually rock harder than you’d expect. There’s also a brief moment dur ing “Tall Drink of Water,” the album's penultimate track, when Camp channels the Ben Folds within and— surprisingly unleashes a piano solo. The solo itself is nothing virtu osic. But since it comes after a long sequence of antiseptic balladry, this foray into instrumentation sounds bombastic and liberating. It’s the high point of the album. Camp has created something pleasant and engaging here nothing more, nothing less. It’s music that warrants a place in your stereo, but simply isn’t distinctive enough to stay there for long. Unfortunately, that’s The Awful Truth. By Michael Pucci Vee REACHING YOU ★★ There is nothing really wrong with Vee’s Reaching You —but HE’S NOT HERE on the Village &een^^ FRIDAY Sept f2... The Side SATURDAY Sept f3... Dread 34 DON’T FORGET TOESDAYS DLUE CUP SPECIALS $2 COWER * $2 DOMESTICS & $3 IMPORTS I 10 Reasons to Shop 1 l LOOK OUT: \ 10. Find great clothes and shoes. SA ■ 9. Outlet prices on the labels you love. Score on sexy club wear, novelty tops 7. Low price on low-rise jeans. ?> I 6. Stuff for him too. I 5. Quicker than ordering from catalogs. 4. Get more for your parents money. 3. Only five minutes from campus* H 2. Prices so low, forbidden to I advertise famous brands. Look good & get lucky. Elliott Road@Franklin St, Chapel Hill i _ / (next to Whole Foods) • 933-3003 1 Visit us at; www.lookoutcasuals.com ipi sc Store Hours: Mon-Sat 10am-Bpm • Sun 12-6 pm La Get $5 off your next purchase of SSO. Simply clip this ad and present it with your student ID T~~ (Limit one discount par customer. Offer expires 9/20/03). there’s nothing special about it either. All of the integral parts are there. Catchy pop-rhythm guitar. A firm bass backbone. Sing-along lyrics. Crisp snare and a high tuned crash. Check. But nothing leaps out or up. There is no experimentation or bravery, and so Vee is reduced to good, low-volume, background pop. The Wilmington trio (Veronica Lasher, Marc Killian and Joe Paris) makes the kind of music it heard on the radio over and over and over. It’s pop rock by numbers. Take six step riffs, A, plug in pretty lyrics, B, and add a struc tured, generic melody, C. A times B times C equals X. If X doesn’t sound like Smash Mouth, Matchbox 20 or the Dixie Chicks, you missed a step. Because Vee adheres so strictly to “the” formula, it’s never able to stretch its legs and show what it can do. Every member of the band is clearly a talented musician, which is more than you can say for half the aforementioned rockers, but they’re so chained by structure, they lose any identity. “California” has a brief guitar solo, and “Thorn” lets Lasher (vocals) off her leash for a bit, but it’s still predictable. Even the electronic, limp-wrist ed attempt at a hardcore cut, “Somebody Help Me,” is a Creed inspired regurgitation of what pro ducers say sells. Chugga, chugga, scream, chugga, scream, wail, fade to heartbroken whimper, pause to look sentimental, chugga. chugga. chugga, crash. The whole album falls into the same trap. It opens with the poppy single, segues into a rocky ballad, and says goodbye with a sentimen tal song of sorrow. Copy... paste ... print perfect. Vee is just selling itself short. It’s lost in a place is doesn't belong and is too smart for anyway like a professor at a nightclub. There are other bands doing the same thing the exact same thing that have prettier smiles, trendi er clothes and better haircuts. So if Vee is aiming for MTV, then it has a world of clones to w 7 ar with. But if Lasher and crew want to be taken seriously as musicians the solution is simple. Just turn off the bloody radio. By Nick Parker Mix of styles makes for bright ‘Morning’ BY PHILIP MCFEE ASSISTANT ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR The combination of sounds that My Morning Jacket, a quintet of Louisville, Ky., rockers, churn out on It Still Moves sounds like the vinyl selection at an indie kid’s yard sale. Based with hesitance in alt country, the band often swings into curious instrumentation and throbbing rock reverb. That, and singer Jim James’ voice is a spot-on match for Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips. Plus, the majority of the songs on It Still Moves, the band's latest effort, stretch on into Mogwai esque crescendos that interweave with canned, distant vocals ala Interpol’s “NYC.” So, this is Sigur R6s by way of Kentucky? My Morning Jacket did play a show Aug. 26 in the Icelandic rockers’ native Reykjavik. Curious. With its third release, the first on a major label, My Morning Jacket finally could gain the noto riety it deserves —a criminally underappreciated band hailing from a long-overlooked region for rock. It wouldn’t be at all misplaced to refer to It Still Moves as epic. The 12-song, 72-minute album not only evolves throughout its dura tion, but offers a spectrum of sound in each track. Take “Easy Morning Rebel.” The rollicking cowbell rhythm features background organ while James’ thin, metallic tone soars above the mix. At two-and-a-half minutes, a horn section emerges, playing back and forth with slide steel guitar. Two minutes later, the complex instrumentation resolves into an all-out, straight-rock ending. “Golden,” a marked change of pace, throws some airy synth and guitar picking into the light foot stomping mix. Present, as always, are James’ wailing harmonies and drifting lines. The sounds of It Still Moves can echo like residual notes through an DIVE dutch, Slow Hole to China Regarding Clutch, think classic rock in the vein of Mountain... but heavy 7. As difficult to define as they are for record companies to market, Clutch again has opted for the route of independent release. Slow r Hole to China includes outtakes from Pure Rock Fury, a few new tunes and a cover of John Coltrane’s “Equinox.” Most of these tracks have float ed about online in demo format for more than two years after Clutch curiously omitted them from its disappointing last album. But with Slow Hole’s release, consider amends made. Nab it at Clutch concerts or its merchandise site http://store.merch.com/clutch while awaiting the crumble of U.S. corporate radio. “Adaptation” You’re probably ,walk-ir^*942-7 606 * $25 haircuts | Rosemary New Klezmer Trio 4 Tuesday, September 16 £ Bpm • Hill Hall Free with UNC Student One Card tWm General Public \s*J $5 at the door Traditional klezmer music jazz in this rare performance by the legendary pioneers of the New Jewish Renaissance Sponsored by Carolina Union Activities Board, j NIC Hillel, Carolina Center for Jewish Studies, : Alpha Epsilon Pi Fraternity ft WXYC (Thr Qailq (Tar HM MUSIC SVIEW MY MORNING JACKET IT STILL MOVES empty dance hall. Frequently, as on the fourth track, “Master Plan," the lonesome highway yearning meets heavy rock, just begging for a live show. True, that show would be long. Very long. It’s rare that a song on It Still Moves will dip below six min utes. Listeners not accustomed to the style of the My Morning Jacket’s afore-mentioned Icelandic counterparts may find the buildups too excessive. It’s all part of the final effect, though the band effectively uti lizes every second of sonic tension. My Morning Jacket cut a split EP with Songs: Ohia in 2002, and its latest release comes over as a type of split LP, with the band switching styles almost every track. For all its versatility, the Kentucky bunch never forgets its Southern roots. On “Dancefloors,” James bleats like a wounded, country Thom Yorke: “dancefloors, headlights, in my blood there’s gasoline/ for an urban boy on a dirty tour I never felt so clean.” The winning backcountry pas tiche My Morning Jacket weaves has the same engrossing effect that the Allman Brothers once pos sessed. The mourning is over. Contact the ACjE Editor at artsdesk@unc.edu. asking yourself why Nicolas Cage would do a movie like “Adaptation" aTOr “don Air" and “Gone In 60 Seconds.” Oh yeah because those two movies were terrible! Regardless, Cage proves that he can act, playing two nuanced char acters the timid Charlie Kaufman and his goofy twin broth er Donald in this 2002 Spike Jonze release. Adapted from the book “The Orchid Thief” “Adaptation” is a movie about the adaptation of that book into this movie. It’s as amusing to watch as that sentence was to write an ironic and self-referential unfolding of wit, love and introspection. Uh, the movie that is not that amusing sentence. Contact Brandon Whiteside at whithran@email.unc.edu.
Daily Tar Heel (Chapel Hill, N.C.)
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Sept. 11, 2003, edition 1
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