Music Reviews by Kent Manthie<\/p>\n
John Ralston: \u201cNeedle Bed\u201d (Vagrant Records)
\n In an interview with the Miami Herald recently, John Ralston told reporter \u201cI write everyday\u2026it\u2019s the only thing I do that really is something just for me.\u201d On Ralston\u2019s new CD \u201cNeedle Bed\u201d it shows.
\n A few months back, Ralston was playing in South Florida\u2019s Legends of Rodeo when things suddenly took a nose dive and their label deal fell through and it all fell apart. Ralston took things in stride, however and busily kept writing and writing until he had \u201c1000 songs\u2026\u201d Next he took off with Legends\u2019 drummer Jeff Snow and went to Knoxville, TN where they recorded \u201cNeedle Bed\u201d with producer Michael Seaman.
\n The result is a brilliantly written, lush production whose only fault is that it\u2019s too short, at only 31 minutes. But sometimes brevity is a blessing in disguise, culling a lot of fat from the album to make it lean and leaving listeners wanting more. This has to be the best CD I\u2019ve reviewed yet this year. I listened to it several times all the way through and each time I picked up different nuances and discovered new things. The music has that college-radio, modern-rock jangly, understated angst and cool breezes to it.
\n \u201cNeedle Bed\u201d is just bursting with great melodies; calling it an aural treat is not saying too much. I think the track \u201cGone, Gone, Gone\u201d is due to be a \u201csingle\u201d \u2013 meaning that it\u2019ll be pushed on radio stations, etc. Besides that there is the senescent \u201cWhen We Are Cats\u201d, the lovely \u201cTime for Me to Ruin Everything\u201d and the ringing, ethereal closing song \u201cOur Favorite Record Skips\u201d. The whole CD is great, though, whose shortness makes it much easier to listen to it all in one setting as though it were one long song. Imagine a twist between Brian Wilson and the late Elliott Smith and you\u2019ll get a general sense of what I\u2019m talking about; bittersweet is not an inapt adjective to use here. One can always find more information at: http:\/\/www.john-ralston.com or to find more about the label, Vagrant Records, go to: http:\/\/www.vagrant.com \u2013 KM.<\/p>\n
Klyd Watkins with Family & Friends: \u201cHarp All Made of Gold\u201d (no label)
\n \u201cHarp\u2026\u201d sounds more like something that might\u2019ve come out in the early 1970s, back when there was some very ambitious, experimental, free-form freak-outs that were coming out left and right. It has a psychedelic undercurrent, with trippy synthesizers, jammin\u2019 guitars, sound effects and a little fiddle here and there. I had expected more of some hippie-country kind of thing, but I was surprised to hear a more progressive-rock sound to it. The one kind of odd thing is the way the whole CD is a \u201cconcept\u201d album- all the tracks fit together, meant to be listened to in its entirety at one seating. The lyrics to \u201cHarp All Made of Gold\u201d are more of a \u201cnarration\u201d, which is spoken by Klyd Watkins.
\n The \u201cfamily\u201d here consists of some of Watkins brothers \u2013 Eric, David and Bob. The friends are others such as Loretta McKee on the fiddle, Steve Burgess on bass and Terry Thomas on drums.
\n Klyd Watkins, who does the so-called narration throughout the 19 minute opus has a Johnny Cash-sounding voice, a booming baritone that has a velvet feeling to it; his speaking has a mellowing effect.
\n The spoken word narration has a rhythmic cadence, not necessarily poetic, though. It doesn\u2019t go against the grain of the beat of the drums & bass. When you get into it and get lost in the music you soon start getting entranced by Watkins\u2019s clearly enunciated uttering of the words he wrote that go well to the music in the background. It\u2019s quite a left turn from the average crap that comes out today. This has no pretense of following any kind of trend or bandwagon-esque mediocrities. It would sound especially ethereal if one could be out in the middle of the wilderness on a pitch-black night where the only light comes from the stars and a sliver of the crescent moon in the sky and be listening to this on one\u2019s headphones.
\n It is this sort of creativity and originality that is sorely lacking in general in the world today. Instead of doing anything new or out of the ordinary, most bands just use the same old formulae over and over again, only rarely covering truly new ground. This is definitely a new formula and one with some interesting side effects. I hope that there is more originality to come from Watkinses & Friends.<\/p>\n
Stiff Donut: \u201cI Did It All for the Cookie\u201d (no label)
\n These guys think they\u2019re pretty funny, I bet. I remember years ago the question was put forward by this one guy who used to play the guitar: \u201cDoes Humor Belong in Music?\u201d well, there is a fine line between funny and stupid.
\n Backed by a monotonous and limited range of chords and notes they can play, their lyrics are so damn juvenile, they read like something a seventh-grader with ADD might\u2019ve written. With songs like \u201cWe Love Fat Chicks\u201d, \u201cUrethral Earthquake\u201d \u201cI egged Arnold Schwarzenegger\u201d you can tell the high intellectual concepts are just flying out of here.
\n It plays like an unfunny joke that goes on far too long. But this is one of the negative consequences of the revolution in digital technology that has enabled recording gear to get smaller, easier, portable and so able to record an album in one\u2019s bedroom; you end up with a wide variety of music out in the marketplace from a wide variety of talents or lack of talents; it\u2019s like a pure form of democracy, wherein the littlest people can make CDs and sell them on the internet to eventually compete with the crap that comes out of Warner Bros or BMG or Sony. The concept is good; it allows truly wonderful stuff to get made and to break the monopoly of banality that is omnipresent in America and is numbing the senses of the dead souls who worship American Idol. The only contact info I got was their email (no website); it\u2019s: mrhymson@aol.com \u2013 KM.<\/p>\n
Blood Vessels (s\/t) (Teenage Heart Records)
\n Wild, young and out of control: that\u2019s the milieu one finds oneself in, listening to the new eponymous debut from Boston\u2019s Blood Vessels. After kicking around the Boston club circuit for the last three years, the Vessels have taken their act to the recording studio to lay down something for posterity.
\n To be honest, I didn\u2019t expect this to be so good, for a punk record. It really shines, the talent is there and can\u2019t be hidden no matter how \u201clo-fi\u201d they try to be; you can hear it in the sharp, blistering solos and the tight synchronous way they perform.
\n Blood Vessels have a vibe that harkens back to punk rock\u2019s golden age \u2013 the mid 70s; you can hear the influences from bands like Germs, Dead Boys and Circle Jerks; in fact, Niff, the vocalist, has this scratchy swagger that reminded me of Keith Morris.
\n The first cut, \u201cCatholic Zombies\u201d is a humorous jam that starts it out on a relatively light note; \u201cEscape From My Brain\u201d is a frizzle-fry of a guitar opus and \u201cPrimal Urge\u201d really shines as well; I could really go on and say something superlative about every song, but suffice it to say that it is an above-average punk album and they sound like they\u2019d put on an exciting live show.
\n I don\u2019t know what else to say, really, except that \u201cBlood Vessels\u201d just has this particular je ne sais quois to it; I can\u2019t explain it, I can only say that I liked it a lot. It didn\u2019t have a particular unique sound to it and there isn\u2019t any one specific thing I can name that captures the essence of what I like about it. It just happens to have the right combinations of talent in the right place at the right time; the conditions were just right, apparently, for the sum of these parts to equal something synergistic. Maybe you should just go check out their website or the label\u2019s website: http:\/\/www.bloodvessels.net or http:\/\/www.teenageheart.com \u2013 KM.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Music Reviews by Kent Manthie John Ralston: \u201cNeedle Bed\u201d (Vagrant Records) In an interview with the Miami Herald recently, John Ralston told reporter \u201cI write everyday\u2026it\u2019s the only thing I do that really is something just for me.\u201d On Ralston\u2019s new CD \u201cNeedle Bed\u201d it shows. A few months back, Ralston was playing in South Florida\u2019s Legends of Rodeo when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[297],"class_list":["post-283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive","tag-music-reviews-john-ralston"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":251,"url":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/2007\/03\/01\/music-reviews-by-natalie-kardos-driftless-pony-club\/","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":0},"title":"music reviews by Natalie Kardos – Driftless Pony Club","author":"admin","date":"March 1, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"music reviews by Natalie Kardos Driftless Pony Club Cholera The Driftless Pony Club show off their (modest) mousey roots on this CD that\u2019s characterized by abrupt tempo changes and vocals that alternate between singing and shouting. 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The Fix are both legends and obscurities. Their two singles (from 1980 and 1981) were pressed in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "archive"","block_context":{"text":"archive","link":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/category\/archive\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":330,"url":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/2007\/06\/23\/music-reviews-and-one-podcast\/","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":3},"title":"Music Reviews, and one podcast","author":"admin","date":"June 23, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Music Reviews, and one podcast by Tera Laufer Relentless-Jason Aldean Release 5\/29\/2007 http:\/\/www.jasonaldean.com http:\/\/www.myspace.com\/jasonaldean June 7, 2007 this indie label country singer hit the number 1 spot on the country Billboard. What\u2019s appealing, what sets this guy from the rest? Simple. His story. 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Janis was enamored of this girl, and they\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "archive"","block_context":{"text":"archive","link":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/category\/archive\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":315,"url":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/2007\/06\/13\/music-reviews-by-kent-manthie-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":283,"position":5},"title":"Music Reviews by Kent Manthie","author":"admin","date":"June 13, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Music Reviews by Kent Manthie Renee Zawawi Legends (Sapiens Records) Pop-princess Renee Zawawi is a smart young woman; she has written a bunch of songs, recorded them and the result is \u201cLegends\u201d, her debut CD; 13 tracks of danceable exotic pop-phoria. \u201cLegends\u201d is a CD with some vividly expressive vocal\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "archive"","block_context":{"text":"archive","link":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/category\/archive\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/reviewermag.com\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}