Top Ten Countdown Continues with No. 4, Cat Power - Sun (Matador)

In previous years Reverberations conducted a marathon, day by day, countdown of the top 25 albums from the waning year. This year, between today and the end of the month, we will take a bit less ambitious approach, chronicling only the top 10 releases of 2012.  In January, in addition to reviews of brand spanking new music, we will also make occasion to reflect on some of the year's other fine recordings. 

For our top 10 countdown, many of these selections will have been covered previously in Reverberations, in which event we will simply link you to the earlier review. A few of these, however, will require new reviews. 

Here, however, is a new review of the No. 4 title:

 Cat Power - Sun (Matador)

Since it arrived in my mailbox I have listened to Sun almost daily. Always a fan, this Cat Power album especially touches me. Yet I had not been moved to write about it. It’s one of those albums that you “get” without necessarily having the capacity or inclination to explain. But then when you make it your No. 4 album of 2012 … well, say something you must.

Throughout her early career, Cat Power was painted into the corner of suffering female icon of indie rock. With 1998’s Moon Pix Chan Marshall’s (Cat Power’s given name) inchoate longing began to take on form. On her Covers Record she gave highly personal interpretations of familiar songs, including a quietly killing version of “Satisfaction,’ which bravely eschewed the song’s familiar chorus.

Marshall showed a wider range and quietly soulful touch on albums like The Greatest, recording with the same musicians Al Green used at Hi Studios in Memphis. Jukebox, her second ‘covers’ album, was a step back in terms of authority and consistency, but still had some winning interpretations, especially her Stones-y take on Dylan’s “I Believe in You.”

Throughout her journey, it was Marshall’s wounded, and deeply human voice that commanded attention. Sun turns those wounds into ecstasy and the embrace of our shared humanity. It was a long time in the making and not without travail.

Marshall tried using her live band to record these tunes, but felt the sessions didn’t click. In fact, she halted them to cut Jukebox instead. Then, personal issues intervened. Her record company Matador expressed frustration with her lack of progress and tried to assign her a producer. This irritated her, of course; she lamented "telling [a musician] they need a producer is like telling someone that they need a nose job. It activates something in you that makes you feel like a loser."

After some time away from the concept Marshall heard some Beastie Boys mixes by Philippe Zdar, a member of the band Cassius. On intuition she approached him to help her with these songs. Since she was paying for the sessions herself he worked on contingency, given his belief in the product. Long story short … it worked. Sun combines elements familiar to any Cat Power fan, but combines them with new splashes of electronic sound, creating a new kind of Cat Power music that is brazenly non-idiomatic and powerfully universal. 

For a song like “Ruin” Marshall combines a Latin piano riff with Keith Richard’s style guitar punctuations, all on top of a dance-rock groove, supporting a lyrical travelogue that says “we’re sittin’ on a ruin” but lamenting “bitchin’, complainin’,”  - making an implicit argument against Mayan Calendar catastrophe whining. The following track “3, 6, 9” rolls out easy funk, its piano and synthesizer lines sinewy and sensuous, the perfect complement to her tale of ravaged love.

Marshall’s existential credo is clear in “Real Life,” a series of character negations (“I met a doctor, he want to be a dancer/I met a mother, she want to be alone”) with the tough truth that “sometimes you gotta do what you don't’ wanna do, to get away with an unordinary life” – a bit Nietzschean, a bit dharma, all sexy conviction.

But while “Real Life” may flirt with homo superior assertions, “Human Being” asserts everyone’s need for fulfillment and identity. A downbeat cousin to the song of the same name by the New York Dolls, “Human Being” is a chanted claim to the availability of transcendence for all of us.

“All the friends there we used to know, ain’t comin’ back” Marshall coolly opines in “Manhattan.” A beat box rhythm framed by a repeated three chord figure circles through and around the “never leave Manhattan” phrase, insinuating an emotional abyss.

A bluesy riff insistently drives “Silent Machine,” as Marshall sings “you lie, you lie, you lie.” The bluesy wallop surrenders briefly to a bridge that sounds like electric aural cubism.

At 10:57 “Nothing But Time” shares some chords and communion with David Bowie’s “Heroes.” Another amalgam of acoustic piano and synth sounds, Marshall stretches out vowels and words into something like a mantra, culminating in a simple declaration of ‘you wanna live, your way of living.” Simple stuff, but powerful, even ecstatic as it builds; Marshall is joined by Iggy Pop, sounding like some avuncular Buddha. The song ends at about 8 minutes, fades out, then into a coda; all of it too long, but seductive, never feeling like a cheat.

On Sun Chan Marshall is a scarred celebrant, and not just of her own identity and vision, but of a common destiny. In locating her touch, Marshall also composes her most direct set of songs ever – accessible and highly personal at the same time. “Marry me, marry me to the sky” she sings on “Cherokee;” and it’s hard not to be swept away. It took a long time to deliver, but Sun does, making it Cat Power’s (and Chan Marshall’s) strongest song cycle ever. 

Reverberating: 9.0

Allo Darlin' - Europe (Slumberland Records)

In the Eighties a generation of kids raised on punk, stirred by its independence and spunk, turned inward, knowing they were not emotionally suited to punk’s more aggressive/transgressive qualities. Moved by its amateurs-having-a-go tendencies, by dispostion they gravitated toward kinder, gentler sounds - British folk, Merseybeat, Bacharach-ian pop craft, jingle-jangle, and girl-group sounds. 

At its worst this trend produced mewling drivel; at its best it gave us the Smiths, Orange Juice, Josef K, the better parts of NME's C86 cassette collection, and the sweeter offerings on the Sarah label. Beyond all that, it was an aesthetic that permeated much of the era, including some of the gentler moments of noise merchants like My Bloody Valentine, Stones Roses (tracks like “Sally Cinnamon”), and much of the Byrds-smitten works of bands like Go-Betweens and the Church. 

Which leads us to Allo Darlin’. Based in London, Allo Darlin’ are clearly children of this Eighties indie aesthetic.. They are also fellow travelers with contemporaries like the Lucksmiths, Camera Obscura and to a lesser extent Belle And Sebastian. On their second album Europe they sound like a band arrived. 

Australian born singer-songwriter Elizabeth Morris is breathy, but assertive. More of a rocker than Camera Obscura’s Tracey Anne Campbell, she has a similar voice and phrasing. Her lyrics are ‘dear diary’ stuff, but their sunny, sanguine qualities are sensible and sharp, while her melancholy is poignant, seldom indulgent. Combined with the band’s blithe, follow-the-bouncing-ball big beat it’s, well, just plain charming. Guitarist Paul Rains throughout is an understated master of all that makes this sort of winsome rock fetching. Bassist Bill Botting and drummer Michael Collins are driving, spare, and right there. Elizabeth Morris as singer and lyricist is the soul of the band, but these gents are its all important bones and skin.

Morris is besotted with a bittersweet nostalgia. In “Neil Armstrong” she dreams of a “simpler time.” The Dylanesque “If You Gotta Go, Go Now” chord changes cheerily undercut any possibility of the maudlin, and reinforce Morris’s meditations. The track features a lovley mix of Rains' twelve-string and Morris's rhythm ukelele. Personal nostalgia also underscores “Europe” (“haven’t felt this way since 1998”); here, Morris has some of the strong, but wistful quality of Bettie Serveert’s Carol Van Dyk, as the band reprises the Smiths gossamer guitars; the song fading over strings and hand claps. A Marr-ish sensibility also informs “Northern Lights,” a busker romance about “the sound of lines drawn in the sand.” ‘Lights” has an assertively awkward charm that evokes classic Modern Lovers. 

Melancholy married to romance abounds on Europe – on “Wonderland” Morris sings that “the world is ending, but I'm with you and I don’t care.” The band makes folk-rock gauze that spins visions of lonely overcast days, as seductive as it is sad. Rains slips a nifty quotation from the Beatles' "I Feel Fine" into his gorgeously arpeggiated rhythm work.

Robert Pollard - Lord of the Birdcage (Guided By Voices Records)

Robert Pollard shreds any previous conceptions of the prolific. It’s possible to argue that his output has been prolific to the point of excessive. I tried once to compile a list of all of the albums (to say nothing of the odd seven-inches, eps, etc.) that Pollard has produced, either as solo artist or as a member of Guided By Voices, Boston Spaceships, the Lifeguards and a number of other ensembles. I gave up. It’s mind-blowing, nonpareil – with the possible exception of John Zorn.

Perhaps his output might have been more brilliant had he been more focused and self-editing. While indie-philes, protectors of their lo-fi underground legacy might object, Guided by Voices were possibly at their best when they signed to the quasi-major label TVT and worked with producers who did more than roll tape and nod their heads (Ric Ocasek for Do the Collapse, Rob Schnapf for Isolation Drills). Sure, Bee Thousand was awesome. And the several records that GBV cut for Matador, before and after their TVT stint, were often terrific and contained some of their best songs and performances. But I would suggest that Isolation Drills, in particular, was not just a great indie rock record, but a world class rock ‘n’ roll set. And there’s a difference - the former can reach an audience primed to respond; the latter can seduce the casual fan. Of course their fan base expanded only incrementally during their TVT period. And Pollard, the kind of guy who likes to keep working, clearly began to envision a future, not unlike the very early days of GBV, in which he could work as much as he wanted and release whatever struck his fancy. He’s done so on his own Guided By Voices label and on a variety of one-off and short term deals with labels. He’s worked fast and furious, almost compulsively.

Pete and the Pirates - One Thousand Pictures (Stolen Recordings/U.K.)

I guess they’re called Pete and the Pirates because they have two guys named Pete in the band. Otherwise, who knows, they might have been called Tom and the Tyrants (the lead singer’s name is Thomas Sanders). Frankly, it doesn’t seem like a name that was given a lot of thought. But what’s in a name; it’s what’s in the grooves, as they used to say when there were grooves. But I digress.

It’s their second album, you see, and it’s entitled One Thousand Pictures. And a stumble or two notwithstanding it’s really, really good. I suppose by the industrial standards of British rock they’d be considered an ‘indie’ band. But let me tell you right now – that means something very different with respect to music than it does in the States. Where Amer-indie rock is dominated by post-graduates cooking up genre jokes and goofball aesthetic strategies, young British musicians by and large aren’t afraid of: a) melody and b) making records that sound like they were actually trying to make the songs sound good. Crazy, I know. Hell, I’m even getting aural fatigue from my beloved American garage-rock. Seriously, does everybody have to shoot for a sonic spectrum that tries, usually in vain, to aspire to the sound limitations of a scratchy Sixties rhythm ‘n’ blues single? A Thousand Pictures, without being in the least ‘over-produced,’ sounds big. You can hear all the parts, distinguish the voices – the production enhances the performances. End of rant.