January 6-12, 2005

music

Best Local CDs of 2004

In no order because love and math are enemies. (And please ignore the glaring omissions.)

Zolof the Rock And Roll Destroyer
The Popsicle (Eyeball)
Bitter breakups have been celebrated for far too long! Ain't it about time to revel in those awkward, funny, hot early days of love? Yes, and nobody does it better than pop superheros Zolof the Rock And Roll Destroyer. "You and me we're like little machines! We run around the room and mess up sheets!" belts out Rachel Minton over jubilant keyboard and guitar hooks. Not every moment on this Popsicle EP is some kinda happy, hip little freak-out, but it's all catchy and it's everywhere you want to be. Is love really like that? Yes, don't you remember?
—Patrick Rapa

DJ Skipmode/DJ Statik
Remixbound (self-released)
If you've ever dripped sweat rocking your body at the Bodyrock, then you know what the IllVibe Collective can do. Statik and Skipmode, two members of the five-man DJ crew, stepped from behind the booth to release these remixes of the most beloved '90s hip-hop songs, including "Scenario," "Just to Get a Rep" and "Vocab." The cuts and blends jog the nostalgia for house parties and junior high dances. Wop it out now.
—Deesha Dyer

The Jane Anchor
Second Wave (Lark Lane)
With her charming combination of vulnerability and resolve, Kara Lafty makes indie-pop songcraft sound effortless. The Jane Anchor's first full-length is sticky sweet with all the boy-girl harmonies, jangly guitars and kinetic energy that Lafty and crew deliver live, but it also shows them occasionally taking a smoother road. They've been heading in the right direction from the start, and it's always good to have an alternate route.
—M.J. Fine

Spoken Hand
Spoken Hand (self-released)
A group like Spoken Hand often works well in performance, where the energy exchange between over a dozen men from very different drumming traditions — samba, batá, tabla and djembe — can carry the evening. Years of weekly rehearsals spawned a group that can maintain that excitement in the studio as well. Fascinating multilayered compositions on this, their debut CD, reveal something new with each play.
—Mary Armstrong

Mia Johnson
Driver (self-released)
She's unsigned, but singer-songwriter Mia Johnson — who wrote every track on her first full-length CD, Driver — remains undeterred. The Walt Bass-produced collection of pop-rock songs shows off a myriad of influences, including roots and world music. (Check out the calypso-flavored duet with Davy Quicks, "Silver Moon"). With her Alanis-meets-Ani voice, Johnson sounds alternately sexy and smart (and sometimes both). She's certainly popular with the local crowd: G. Love shows off his harmonica-playing, while Stargazer Lily's Steph Hayes chips in some backing vocals. And Erin Ryan's cello is way cool throughout.
—Nicole Pensiero

Make A Rising
Battle for New Planet (New Planet Records)
Walls crumbled when Make A Rising cranked out Battle for New Planet: The band's debut album grew from inside a dilapidated asbestos-spotted West Philly house. And it's a dangerous concoction indeed, featuring 45 minutes of addictively earnest chamber rock. Pianos, violins, electric guitars and drums make friends with breaking bottles, dripping water and what sounds like sneakers squeaking against a waxed floor. The melodies are catchy; the Brian Wilson falsettos, disarming and sweet. Somebody please sign this band. They're broke and all out of CDs.
—Tami Fertig

Chief Kamachi
Cult Status (Good Hands)
Cult Status is angry rap for angry people. The raspy, Vinnie Paz-collaborating Chief Kamachi of "Divine Evil" fame wants us genuflecting before his altar of staunch anti-pop whatnots and choking on his thick necromantic knobbery. "I'm a street Christ to rise over the hood in the evening," hails the Chief. We can't help but take his word — the whole record he's holding a tomahawk over our throats.
—Nick Sylvester

Marc-André Hamelin
Nikolai Kapustin: Piano Music (Hyperion)
Don't worry, nobody else has heard of Nikolai Kapustin either. At least not until monster pianist Hamelin came along. The Queen Village resident introduced local audiences to this music two seasons ago before an audience that gasped aloud at the audacious density of the music and Marc-André's giddy virtuosity. Now everyone else can hear it as well. Kapustin, still very much alive, is a classically trained Soviet-era composer who fell in love with American jazz. His music is a heady mix of Peterson, Tatum, Jarrett, Evans and a dash of J.S Bach. This CD will make you smile.
—Peter Burwasser

Espers
Espers (Locust Music)
However much overlooked, Philly's always been a solid folk town. When The Wire decided last year that New Weird America or Freak-Folk or Queer As Folk was 2004's dancepunk, Fishtown future-folkers Espers repped the 215 hard and well. The band's self-titled Locust debut explores medieval melodies with a knack for '60s psychedelia, all meticulously arranged and gorgeously produced. "Byss & Abyss," the track Espers also landed on Devendra Banhart's The Golden Apples of the Sun compilation, is maybe the best song I've heard in five years.
—Nick Sylvester

Outerspace
Blood and Ashes (Babygrande)
This North Philly Latino duo came correct with an album about their street/underground/battle roots. Executive-produced by Jedi Mind Tricks' MC Vinnie Paz, Blood and Ashes matches energetic, sometimes-humorous rhymes with the hardcore beats. This album solidified Outerspace's place as a force on the local hip-hop circuit, and with the completion of a city-to-city tour, conquering the national scene shouldn't be far behind. They are movin' on up.
—Deesha Dyer

Fel Sweetenberg
Lost Dreams, Wasted Talent (Soul Spazm)
All looks quiet on Camden's hip-hop front, but Nuthouse member Fel Sweetenberg is proving his hometown shouldn't be slept on. A double threat, MC and producer Fel delivers consistently diverse lyrics with a smooth flow and a gutter undertone. Re-released this year with extra cuts, Lost Dreams, Wasted Talent is riddled with addictive verses and guest collabos, like Dave Ghetto, Poesh Wonder and Fury (on "The Hierarchy"). It's a futuristic tease of what Camden can lay down.
—Deesha Dyer

Stargazer Lily
Young Professionals (Junogi)
Record No. 3 proved Philly's favorite femme-fronted pop-rockers more than just a kick-butt live act. It was helmed by two producers — Phil Nicolo for seven tracks; Barrie Maguire for four — but there's nothing schizoid about Young Professionals, which focuses on frontwomen Susan Rosetti and Steph Hayes' amazing vocal synergy. Equal measures of charm and quirkiness abound: Rosetti's sweetly lustful "Crush," for example, turns the local pizza boy into a happenin' hunk ("I watch him gently spread the cheese / He moves around with such confidence"). To paraphrase the catchy closing track: If you don't have this record, darlin', you need it.
—Nicole Pensiero

Denison Witmer
The River Bends & Flows into the Sea (Tooth & Nail)
On his own, Denison Witmer is uncommonly good at conveying regret and ambivalence with little more than an acoustic guitar and a gentle voice. With a cast on loan from One Star Hotel, he raises the stakes a bit. The River Bends add heft to Witmer's tunes without losing a lick of the sensitivity that makes him so likable. "Lawyers and White Paper" and "You Could Be Anything" are as strong as anything else he's released, and the full-band arrangement takes them places Witmer couldn't go alone. Go with the flow.
—M.J. Fine

The Bigger Lovers
This Affair Never Happened … And Here Are Eleven Songs About It (Yep Roc)
The songwriter's songwriters in The Bigger Lovers dropped album number three of winsome, hospital-corner-crisp guitar pop. This Affair and its titular 11 tracks chronicle what it's like to be on the business end of a messy elicit tryst. From its contagiously plaintive opener "You (You, You)" to the scorched-earth screed "Blowtorch" to a cover of stylistic forebears The Only Ones' "You've Got to Pay," this is a carefully wrought album of dirty little love songs for adults.
—Brian Howard

Jill Scott
Beautifully Human: Words and Sounds, Vol. 2 (Hidden Beach)
Having turned conventional wisdom on its ear with her 2000 debut Who is Jill Scott?: Words and Sounds, Vol. 1, Jilly from Philly made her long-awaited follow-up. Freed of the need to actually prove that a black woman can make smart, commercially viable music that's neither bling- nor booty-centric, the sultry slow jams of Beautifully Human feel like the work of a woman with a mandate. Taking a stand for love, family and respect, Scott's sophomore effort is neatly encapsulated in its hit single, "Golden," wherein Scott belts "I'm taking my own freedom / Putting it in my song / Singing loud and strong." She's a little bit Oprah and a little bit Minnie Riperton; her expanding appeal is one of precious few things these days that'll make you feel good about your fellow man.
—Brian Howard

Nicki Jaine
Of Pigeons and Other Curiosities (Shaman)
With a clear shushy voice reminiscent of Lotte Lenya and her dancing piano styling, Jaine takes on a mix of sweeping acoustic art song, tender Tin Pan Alley ballads and hard, slow German cabaret with ease. Well, not so easy. Jaine's voice is deeper, duskier and more pointed than most who attempt the fickle fates of cabaret — precise in her lyrics and the cutting directness of her voice's bittersweet tone.
—A.D. Amorosi

Man Man
The Man in a Blue Turban with a Face (Ace Fu)
How's this for a pre-emptive strike: The first sound on Man Man's first album is a gruff warning to a Peruvian monster. That an off-key choir of preschoolers responds with a wordless chant that forms the album's motif is novel, if unsettling. That the whole thing works as well as it does gives Honus Honus and his band of baristas license to pile on the absurdity. Lacking a pleasant voice, Honus does his best Waits-ian croak; his mates nearly drown him out in trumpet, marimba and all manner of percussion. You couldn't dream up weirder rock weaponry.
—M.J. Fine

Various Artists
The Hogan Fam (Karma Response Unit)
When 40th Dimension went on a brief hiatus, producer Happ G kept his Karma Response Unit name afloat by putting out various projects that dipped into the breeding ground of Philly's undiscovered hip-hop. Along with the always-entertaining Louis Logic, Happ assembled rhymers Adlib, Snuff, Jake Lefco, Side Effect and Uncle T, among others, to narrate a journey along the various angles of rap. For the finale, Happ crams 12 MCs into less than five minutes. You could make a drinking game out of guessing who's saying what.
—Deesha Dyer

Susan Watts and Elaine Hoffman Watts
I Remember Klezmer (self-released)
Elaine Hoffman Watts, the first woman to graduate Curtis with a percussion degree, grew up in a family klezmer band. No surprise, then, that she and her daughter, trumpeter Susan Watts, have taken up the Hoffman family klezmer heritage with zest. The two are joined by Rachel Lemisch on trombone and other hot klezmer players who keep the Philly-style klezmer repertory alive for another generation's dancing and toasting pleasure.
—Mary Armstrong

Dieselboy
The Dungeonmaster's Guide (HUMAN/System Recordings)
Not only a hometown hero, but a globally adored rock star and an all-around D&B icon, Dieselboy dishes out a double-disc set of ruthless, theatrical drum and bass remixes. It's a cinematic joyride through darkness, toughness and abrasive energy, like kickin' back and watching a big-budget film or playing the dopiest, freshest video game on the market. It's only apt that Dieselboy enlisted the deep, illustrious voice of Peter Cullen (voice of Transformers' Optimus Prime) to narrate this epic, breakneck escapade. The first disc features hard-hitting D&B remixes of Sasha, Tiësto, Dumonde, BT and Josh Wink interweaved with classics from D&B originators like Tech Itch, Concord Dawn and Usual Suspects. CD 2 is a bonus EP of remixes from Dieselboy's HUMAN label, starring Philly's own Kaos/Karl K/Jae Kennedy trio remixed by lesser-known American artists like Gridlok, KC, Stratus, Evol Intent and Basic Operations.
—Sean O'Neal

Sharron Kraus
Songs of Love and Loss (Camera Obscura)
Recorded in her native Oxford, the second album from Fishtown transplant Sharron Kraus is a dark-folk gem. Listening to her high, clear voice cut through melodies woven from acoustic guitar, banjo and hurdy-gurdy, you may struggle to remember which late-'60s traditionalists beat her to the material. But with one small exception, these murder ballads and forest laments all come from Kraus' pen. Here's one folklore expert whose originals feel both authentic and alive.
—M.J. Fine

Maggie, Pierce and E.J.
Self-Titled (EMP Records)
Unofficially called The Gold Album — Maggi, Pierce and E.J. have assigned all but one of their five self-produced CDs colors rather than titles — this is the record that got these self-described "common-law siblings" the attention they merit. With shades of everyone from Peter, Paul and Mary to their musical hero Jeff Buckley, MPE's polished, idiosyncratic brand of folk-pop is unique in both its flexibility (check out the gently swinging vibe of "Flame" or the '60s pop-leanings of "Jaded") and diverse instrumentation. Listen closely and you'll hear everything from trumpet to tuba to tablas.
—Nicole Pensiero

Nancy Falkow
Clear View (Self-released)
Romantic Nancy, with the voice of a lark — does she still count as local now that she's abandoned us for true love in Dublin? She was still ours when this very pop collection debuted in the spring, so let's claim her and celebrate her and say she's a better songwriter than most commercial music fans can tolerate.
—Mary Armstrong

V.I.P.
Mad Coke (Collision/Collider)
Music is crammed with buttloads of kitschy electrofuck troupes — Fannypack, Peaches and Avenue D are among the relatively new additions — but until V.I.P., none of them were particularly good, particularly gay or remotely from Philly. The duo dropped their five-song CD debut earlier this month (the four-song 12-inch version will follow in January), and like their shows, it's all about partying hard and making sandwiches. This is gay-hop: catchy, steamy and irresistibly danceable.
—Nick Sylvester

John Flynn
Dragon (MettaFour)
For years he was a pretty boy who churned out commercial country songs and funny/smart tunes for kids, but John Flynn came out as a socially conscious being in 2004 with Dragon. While the title song is merely an allegory of political struggle, "Minnie Lou" is an overt mockery of certain politicians who find obscenity in classical statues with naked breasts but not in thwarting civil liberties.
—Mary Armstrong

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