Carbon Glacier - Laura Veirs

Track list:

1. Ether Sings
2. Icebound Stream
3. Rapture
4. Lonely Angel Dust
5. The Cloud Room
6. Wind Is Blowing Stars
7. Shadow Blues
8. Anne Bonny Rag
9. Snow Camping
10. Chimney Sweeping Man
11. Salvage a Smile
12. Blackened Anchor
13. Riptide

Running time: 39 minutes
Released: 2004

I think my first exposure to Laura Veirs must have been through LastFM. All I remember is that something drove me to pick up July Flame which I absolutely adored and from there I picked up a smattering of her other work, but never went all in. This is one of a number of other Veirs albums I did pick up. If I enjoy this as much as I think I might, I may have to fill the back-catalog holes. Thirteen tracks in thiry-nine minutes is a fair clip, so lets get to it.

Ether Sings has a stronger emphasis on the vocal than I would expect. I am not sure it works that well; Veirs' voice is an odd one and this sort of strong vocal centre does not suit it that well in my view. The backing is a cute little guitar loop and some odd electronics which lend the piece a Jeckyll and Hyde quality to it. I would file the song under interesting rather than good. The second track also has Veirs' vocal as a loud centrepiece. This track uses that better though, with a more piecemeal backing that sort of fits around her. It is immediately more appealing, even though that backing is also somewhat untuneful in places.

It is the day after the clocks went back. 4pm and the skies are already starting to darken. I hate this time of year. It will be worse tomorrow, when I expect it will be largely if not entirely dark before I leave work. Joy. I am hoping that there are some nice songs in here to help take my bitter mind off the impending dark winter. Rapture has a nice echoing effect to it, the vocal is softer, which I think suits it better, and it has a sense of narrative to it - quite apart from the lyrics, the different strands of the arrangement, and different phrases of the composition carry this over. I rather like it.

I can't shake the feeling that this weekend has been a bit of a write off. After a nice evening of boardgames on Friday night I feel that I have managed nothing in the time since. I don't even feel rested after taking advantage of the extra hour to stretch to almost 11.5 hours in bed. My eyes are drooping now as they were yesterday when I listened to Cara Dillon. I find my tired head nodding along with The Cloud Room though - this has a nice energy to it. A simple lyric performed with a distinctive voice, and a strong, if unadventurous, backing makes the chorus very appealing, and the weaving of electronics in the arrangement offset the rest of the sounds well enough to keep it interesting.

What follows that is stripped right back, and feels bare by comparison. There's a hint of the old west to Wind Is Blowing Stars to my ear - probably coming through from the way the fiddle is used to add a strained note here and there under the main tune. The tone of the album has been jumping around a bit, for sure, and it goes dark and bluesy next. The nicest touch is the addition of a deep male voice following Veirs' lead and providing an aural shadow, to go with the name. The haunting nature of the music is nice, but the vocal contrast - her bright and clear, him dark and looming - is what makes the song shine. I sit, largely spellbound whilst it plays out. I'd like to place that shadowing voice but I can't. What I can say is what it reminds me of, and that is the combination of Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan.

That masterful track is followed by a breezy instrumental - again playing with stereotypical western-y themes, with a somewhat honky-tonk key line. It is a brief interlude before Veirs' voice returns, offset by a gentle guitar and cymbals that evoke crashing waves. A sad song I think, though I don't make out enough of the lyrics to be sure. I love it when the arrangement picks up more, rounding out the sound and coalescing it into a stand out track. Snow Camping - you should try it.

Random thought: My fingers smell faintly of vanilla, popcorn eaten before I started this post.

There is a wonderful tone to the guitar on Chimney Sweeping Man. There is a slight echo to Veirs' voice here - an effect I think she must be fond of, but one that works very well with her singing voice so I cannot blame her for that. It contrasts the simple clarity of the melody nicely. I think, with a few still to go, that it is fair to say I really like this disc. Not as much as July Flame, but then it hasn't had the same crack at inveigling its way into my musical consciousness so that isn't really a surprise. Nothing here stands out quite as much as my favourite Veirs track, Summer is a Champion, but the general quality is high.

That said, there is a discordant edge to Salvage a Smile, a tightness to the strings that sets my teeth on edge. It makes for really tough listening, a screech of discomfort behind her words. Thankfully the track is short, and is washed away from my thoughts with the opening breaking waves of Blackened Anchor. This, too, has a tightness in the strings that form part of the opening swell, but here it is controlled - edgy, but emphatic and not unpleasant. It reminds me a little of the opening credits to Black Sails, which I really should get back to as I enjoyed season 1 a lot. The tune is an instrumental, and over quickly so I am into the closer.

Riptide is a simple guitar and voice effort, a nice roll to it, and a bit more depth after the first verse is done. Simple tapping percussion is a nice change, and I love her voice here. Slightly more rounded, very well fitted to the tune behind it. It is a chilled exit to the album, which has flown by. I really should look up her other works and fill out my holdings. There is just something about her take on Americana - for that is the easiest genre label to apply, if not a completely accurate one - that resonates well for me. The song leads out with a long instrumental, strings partnering the guitar and simple rhythm; the end arrives suddenly and without fuss, plunging me into the hum of my CPU and the tapping of these keys.

Laura Veirs (I keep typing Veris - darn fingers!) is great, guys. Check her out.

Bubblegum - Mark Lanegan Band

Track list:

1. When Your Number Isn't Up
2. Hit the City
3. Wedding Dress
4. Methamphetamine Blues
5. One Hundred Days
6. Bombed
7. Strange Religion
8. Sideways in Reverse
9. Come to Me
10. Like Little Willie John
11. Can't Come Down
12. Morning Glory Wine
13. Head
14. Driving Death Valley Blues
15. Out of Nowhere

Running time: 49 minutes
Released: 2004

I can only have this because I adored the contrast that came of the combination of Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan. I would never have come across him were it not for the partnership with Campbell, whose waifish voice is a polar opposite to his gruff drawl. I don't figure that I listened to this much at all, and I suspect I may be cutting a fair bit, but time to give it a shake.

The start is not what I expect. A soft, tinkling piano, isolated and alone. This is soon replaced by a slow and deliberate riff and drum pattern, then Lanegan almost speaking - there is just a hint of musicality in the delivery - a lyric over this low slung considered structure. I rather like it. I am away on holiday, in Greece. I have not got to these pages recently. My nation is imploding - politely and less so. I am trying not to let short-sightedness and xenophobia ruin my break. That is proving tough.

Hit the City is harder, more insistent, more reminiscent of the grungy rock that I was expecting. The edge isn't really there - it has a muted tone, a fuzz, and the hammered guitar chords are subservient to the dueling voices as Lanegan is joined by a female accomplice. It is a short tune, and we're past it before I know, and into a deliberately paced, bluesy structure which, whilst quite simple and unengaging in itself, seems to work really well with the gravel-toned croon that lies above it. There is a definite primacy of the voice here - the compositions are leaving it a lot of space and appear to be kept simple to allow it to shine.

I find myself wanting to vent about the stupidity of Brexit, the ridiculousness of those with the least to gain voting down those with the most to lose. The smug and the vile amongst the leaders. I don't wish to do so, though. Despondency is high on the list of feelings just now, but I am in a lovely climate, not currently at work... more established rants can wait. Positivity is more becoming, in general, though negativity screams loudest. Lanegan has growled his way through Metamphetamine Blues whilst I have been vacillating on that point, and I am now faced with One Hundred Days which has a much lighter feel to it, cleaner and aired well without really shaking up the basic format. A touch more top end, and a touch more duration to explore the theme further. This is really rather nice. Simple, not special, but rather nice.

I think I was off with my prediction of cuts. A third of the way in there is no knife to wield, and no realisation of the apprehension I had that this would be full of harder rock numbers that bored or turned me off. No, this seems to strike a more mellow chord - slower, more considered and crafted, not rocket-fuelled, rage-filled angst. The overall tone has been lighter than I expected, too. There are moments of darkness in the playing, but the application of the voice has been more nuanced. That said, I don't like Sideways in Reverse at all - here the track is taken over by dull guitars, a perfect example of what I just said hadn't been present. Thankfully the following tune appears to head back to sparse instrumentation, crucible for a slower vocal, again a duet.

Lanegan seems to be good at atmosphere, I want to say laconic, but that isn't the right word at all, neither is sardonic. What is the expression for this sort of lazy drawl... deliberate but effective. I can't think of one that encapsulates it right. At moments he sounds Waitsian, at others more like E, from Eels. In all things I find him more interesting the slower he seems to pace his delivery - a quicker roll to Like Little Willie John makes the song less enjoyable, and the less said about Can't Come Down the better. There will be some excisions, just not too many.

Sombre reflection suits him, considered and clear threads of guitar, simple and sparse drum patterns and long vowels. This isn't exciting music, but rather soothing. There is a melodic quality to Lanegan's vocalisation, despite the roughness around the edges; if that roughness was planed out then it wouldn't have half the appeal. I recognise I have a bit of a thing for whisky-soaked, cigarette-smoked, gravel-strewn throats. Huskiness, imperfection... humanity. I even find myself getting into the groove of Head, which is richer in composition.

My immediate reaction to the driving pace of Driving Death Valley Blues is to flinch away. This is a generic American rock form that I am not overly keen on. It delivers on energy and repetition, fine if either of those things are your jam, but not on the interest or craft or construction that draws me towards people with Lanegan's type of voice. The closing track which follows it though... light acoustic lead in, contrast with the voice, and then with bass and drums, it all works much better. Light and dark, substance and shadow. Theme, presence. Not enough vocal - the long instrumental middle is lacking something - but that voice appears again to bring us to a close. Overall I have liked this, though enough of it fell flat to be a bit of a frustration. I'm not about to go look out his work with Queens of the Stone Age, for example, but... when it is geared more towards the cooperation with Campbell... I'd happily take more of that.

Ballad of the Broken Seas - Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan

Track List:

1. Deus Ibi Est
2. Black Mountain
3. The False Husband
4. Ballad Of The Broken Seas
5. Revolver
6. Ramblin' Man
7. (Do You Wanna) Come Walk With Me?
8. Saturday's Gone
9. It's Hard To Kill A Bad Thing
10. Honey Child What Can I Do?
11. Dusty Wreath
12. The Circus Is Leaving Town

Running time: 42 minutes
Released: 2006

So from an oddball to an odd couple. I cannot for the life of me think why I first picked up music by Campbell and Lanegan, neither of whom were on my radar in their other guises before I did so. However I seem to recall fond memories of their chalk and cheese duetting, with some stand out songs (albeit maybe not on this album). This is also, I think, the 100th listen of the project. Go me.

Lanegan is gravel-like, Campbell a waif. Him in aggressive rock, her twee indie-pop. This has no right to work - pretty much what all the reviews said. Yet somehow whatever weird fate drew them together turned up trumps. Right away the contrast works. The music is fairly drab to start with, but the real versus the ethereal, dark versus light, of the two voices sets things apart as intriguing and very listenable. The first two songs, at least, are just as dull lyrically as they are musically, and the second drops Lanegan as a vocalist - which happens a fair bit on their collaborations considering he gets equal billing. Without the two singers contrasting each other Black Mountain really has little to recommend it.

The double act is restored for The False Husband, which takes the stark difference further, but accompanying Lanegan with dark, empty brooding notes, and Campbell with a friendlier melody. It is hauntingly brilliant in its simplicity, with her bits being really enthralling... and then they overlay and it is almost perfect. with 3 or 4 different strands to follow you end up getting lost and wondering at the tangle. It has been a sparse week for me and I should have got to this sooner, except that I have been recaptured by Arrested Development and have prioritised my full re-watch of that series (minus the online-only fourth season). As much as I am enjoying that, I regret not having done this one last night when I was a bit more awake and - in truth - quite antsy for something more active to do. It would have both calmed those thoughts and satisfied the itch. The title track is achingly melancholic - I could see it overlaying end credits as the devastation of a tragedy is revealed.

Revolver continues the cinematic theme, this stark tune, with its echoes of westerns, could likewise be accompanying something on screen - except for the vocal, a true duet, which detracts from that angle a bit. Here our singers are paired but it does not work quite as well as some of the call-response or different vocal pieces. Example - the cover of Ramblin' Man, with Lanegan carrying the song, and Campbell husky underneath his main verse. Oh, and hey... Andrew Bird is not the only whistler. It is just a pity that some of the composition and playing is not a bit more daring. There is a fair amount of dull music here, saved noticeably by the song. I guess this was a conscious decision to not overbear the duet with anything that would detract from it but I just feel it represents a bit of a lost opportunity to do something really special not just a good curio.

Occasionally the tunes do elevate above the humdrum, but not often enough. Saturday's Gone has a much lighter touch, and whilst it remains a very simple piece it feels as though there is a degree more sophistication about the song. Unfortunately it is another with no Lanegan, and the novelty of the lighter touch wears off after 2 1/2 minutes as the dull repetition of the rhythm gets to me. This is a relatively long track at 4 1/2 minutes plus and it definitely starts to drag well before the end. The album is a curious whole for sure. Duets, solo songs, and now an instrumental; when the music has been the weakest part of the disc so far, an instrumental is definitely something it did not need. Oh, it is a pleasant enough piece, in a really bland and inoffensive way and if I heard it whilst out and about I would not mind it. Here, though, it is as welcome as a hole in the head - after all it is a track where our stars are not bouncing off each other. I have a feeling that the follow up, Sunday at Devil Dirt was a better album than this one is. It could be my memory playing tricks again by I hear strains of songs with more urgency, more craft put into the music, in my mind when I call it forth. Ballad of the Broken Seas is, overall, a little too twee and a little too laid back to really shine despite the obvious chemistry between the pair. Nothing gets above walking pace, nothing gets in your face and nothing really embraces the sedation to enhance it. It gets caught in no man's land - interesting, but not as good as it could be, and prone to dropping the interest for idle absent-mindedness.

The tracks with both vocalists are just better, and the more prominent Lanegan is the better. I like his deep, dry voiced delivery and it is a better counterpoint to the gentle strumming that is all most of the music amounts to than Campbell's softer distant trilling. The high points of their interaction make it a worthwhile listen, even if I have culled a full third of it after this. The collaboration promises much, delivers on a little of it, and (I hope - since I have more to come in future) holds some back for later arrivals. It is no less conceptually odd a pairing after listening to them, though - however well their voices link up.