CD REVIEWS BY LOCAL WRITERS
T HE S POT FOR
R.E.M., Around the Sun , 2004 WARNER BROTHERS RECORDS By Kris Bluth
When you love a band as much as I
love R.E.M., you get used to defending
albums that others dismiss. Some people
hated Fables Of The Reconstruction, but
“Good Advices” might be my Favorite
R.E.M. Song. Monster is an underrated
gem, and Reveal can stand alongside
their best work.
And Around The Sun is their worst
album. Some “fans” still want them to
keep remaking Murmur, but R.E.M. has
built a career out of growth and evolu-
tion. I wasn’t crazy about Up and New
Adventures In Hi-Fi, but the band got to
stretch itself out, and R.E.M. was never
boring ...
... until now.
Around The Sun occasionally perks up
(“Leaving New York” and “Wanderlust”), but the rest is just one mid-tempo dirge after another.
This album isn’t bad, it’s worse than bad. It’s inert.
I wouldn’t be surprised if someone from Warner Brothers went to Stipe’s house and pound-
ed on the door.
“Hey! Open up! It’s been three years! Time for a new album!”
The mailslot flips open and a voice creaks out. “Only if I get to namecheck Kyoto in the
lyrics.”
Done, and done.
$2 PBR’s
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writers:
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Adem, Homesongs , DOMINO RECORDS By Tynan DeLong
On Adem’s debut, Homesongs, the latest release from the seemingly unstoppable Domino
record label, this Fridge instrumentalist finds him-
self donning the mask of an earnest troubadour.
Building off the same gorgeously hushed ambience
that made Fridge’s Happiness such a headphone
treat, Adem spends most of the album hunched
over a guitar, sorting the pieces of a failed rela-
tionship.
Nowhere is this more evident than on “Gone
Away,” the album’s centerpiece. Plaintive accordion
drones and whispering xylophones carry Adem’s
soft lament to its stirring middle section, where he
assures himself, “It’s alright/there’s plenty more
left for me.” And the grand strings of the album’s
closer, “There Will Always Be,” provide a touching
backdrop for an understated sing-a-long. It’s a lull-
aby for a campfire on a cloud. Call it Damien Rice,
sans the syrup.
Yet Homesongs never sounds rueful or depressed. Quiet, melancholy even, but not once do
you get the feeling Adem’s going to pull a Richie Tenenbaum behind the bathroom door. Rather,
the album’s a sweet send-off for a lost love. Our hero has the good sense to have a little laugh,
make some fine tunes and move on. Desertion has never sounded so self-assured.
Tom Waits, Real Gone ,
Listening to Tom
Waits’ twentieth album,
Real Gone, is like being
transported to an archaic
circus
fun-house
on
Halloween night with a
full
moon,
and
a
Chupacabra as your date:
Intriguing, beautiful, and
scary as hell.
Waits’ voice is raw and
refined, like railroad spikes
sprouting into rose buds.
The lyrics on Real Gone
are haunted as a saloon in
Mushroomcrow, Wash.:
crooked, dark, aged;
Whittled with betrayal,
love lost, romanticism of
the damned.
This is the album of
the year for freaks, des-
perados, outlaws, individ-
uals, and the un-abashed
un-brainwashed, who love
true Americana.
2004 EPITAPH RECORDS
By Johnny Millionaire
WWW.SQUAREPEGCONCERTS.COM
CHARGE BY PHONE
800-992-8499
The Queen
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BOBBY MURRAY
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OCTOBER 21, 2004 51