Category: Smooth Bananas

Fleet Foxes’ new album “Shore” released after much anticipation from the indie rock band. However, the album is about as interesting as watching the tides come in and go out. 

The album, released by Warner Records, features a sound that the band is known for: easy listening indie folk rock. There are 15 tracks on the album, encompassing approximately 47 minutes of music with songs each anywhere from four to two minutes in length. “Shore” is the band’s fourth studio album. 

Fleet Foxes has a successful history of easy-to-listen-to folk music starting all the way back on their first album in 2007. This album should be a culmination of their sound given they’ve had a roughly 15-year career in music but frankly, this album leaves much to desired. Each of the short tracks sound very similar to the point of disinterest. It’s not that the songs are bad; it’s that the songs don’t change from one another. I’m confident most would not be able to discern one track from another on a first round of listening to the whole album, but of course, you’d have to make it that far. 

The band doesn’t really change its instrumentation, timbres, or lyrical content between songs. The band’s frontman Robin Pecknold described the album as “an album celebrating life in the face of death, honoring our lost musical heroes in the lyrics…” Unfortunately, Mr. Pecknold, you forgot to honor those musical heroes in the music. The whole album sounds like background noise from a dingy dive bar in Seattle, which makes sense given that’s the band’s hometown. There’s something to be said about the musical evolution of Seattle and the Pacific Northwest as a whole. It was pretty much the musical Mecca in the 90s and early 2000s creating bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Rage Against the Machine. It may seem unfair to compare an indie folk band to the grunge greats, but those bands knew how to step it up musically. Fleet Foxes does not. The lyrics are only half of a song and if interesting lyrics are supported by blandness, the whole effect falls apart. 

One of the bigger issues in their musical content is there’s clearly an ounce of musical genius underneath the bland exterior. There are very brief outcroppings of great musical ideas that are quickly swept under the rug of bland folk music. For example, Fleet Foxes like to double their own voices to create a lush, almost choral sound at parts. That’s a great technique but if its only done to make your sound bigger, then it can come off as a waste especially with a band like Fleet Foxes known for their acoustic aesthetic. 

Ultimately, it’s great music to just have on in the background while studying or as the soundtrack of a non-descript movie but as far as groundbreaking developments in music, “Shore” definitely isn’t it. It’s not bland. It’s just poorly executed which is a shame. “Shore” receives a C-rating.

Indie artist Sufjan Stevens is preparing for a hot album release on Sept. 25 and he’s released three critical tracks. They are evocative of his style but also hinting at something new. 

The album, titled “The Ascension,” is the eighth studio album from Sufjan Stevens planned to release under the Asthmatic Kitty label. The album is planned to have 15 tracks in varying styles as is typical of Stevens’ particular style. The album is be approximately an hour and 20 minutes long. 

The three tracks released “America,” “Video Game,” and “Sugar” are all very much in Stevens’ usual style. Stevens has always been quite experimental in his approach to music and this can be tracked across his releases. He has had a small cult following for most of his career, but it has only been in recent years that he has received wider acclaim. This is probably attributed to him writing and performing the title track on the soundtrack to “Call Me By Your Name” starring Armie Hammer and Timothee Chalamet. 

“America” is the longest of the three tracks and is by far the most experimental in terms of form and compositional elements. It starts out with an ethereal white noise effect before kicking off into the sung portion of the song. Most of the song is actually instrumental in a style that gives off the perception of randomness but of course, the song isn’t random at all. Stevens incorporates sampled sounds that replicate various strife sounds. This track will be quite striking with the context of the full album when it releases. 

“Video Game” is a stark contrast from “America” in the regard that it’s like something out of an 80s movie or at the very least it’s attempting to emulate this style. The music video released with the song has wild disco imagery combined with digital line aesthetics like that in the movie “Tron.” The song’s musical content is a standard 80s dance beat but, like many of Stevens’ output, the lyrical content is where he shines. Stevens often incorporates religious imagery into his music and this track is no different. One repeated line goes “I don’t want to be your personal Jesus, I don’t want to be your video game.” The interest in this line is two-fold: he repeats it several times throughout the song, and it’s clearly a metaphor for those that use religious imagery and themes as a tool to achieve agendas. 

“Sugar” is just as exciting as “Video Game” but it combined with the music video, it’s clear the message of the song is about domestic life and how happiness is not the same thing as joy. The music video depicts interpretive dance of a family demonstrating the struggles of families who don’t relate well to each other and have underlying issues that are tough to resolve. The musical content is closer to that of “America” in that there are many noise elements, but there is also more clear melody. It’s a nice blend of the two different aspects of Stevens’ music. 

Avid fans and new listeners should find much to love in the upcoming album if the three tracks already released are any indicator. Sufjan Stevens’ “The Ascension” preemptively receives an A rating.   

English pop/rock fusion band the 1975’s “Notes on a Conditional Form” has a little something for every music lover from the decidedly simpler “Birthday Party” to the poignant and complex spoken word track “The 1975.” 

The album was released in May 2020 after a long recording period of Aug. 2018 to Feb. 2020. This is the band’s fourth studio album, and it blends features of many different genres from more traditional pop and folk to more modern dance and electronic music. The album is approximately 80 minutes long and features 22 tracks, seven of which are singles. 

The album opens with a pointed message delivered by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg. She reads a climate essay dedicated to the dire nature the world is currently in with regards to man-made climate change. She is underscored by a complex array of quasi-noise made of repeating figures, moving in cycles to new material. The band desired to make a “modern statement” according to Apple Music with the album’s opening track and it can certainly be said they did it. The unapologetic nature of Thunberg’s words is a nice contrast to the white noise-like background music. 

The album’s composition is quite varied in terms of the personnel and the types of sound the band employs to get their message across in their music. For example, in the song “The End,” underscored as “Music for Cars,” the track is entirely instrumental and not just instrumental, but entirely orchestral. There are obvious acoustic sound tricks being employed but the sound of a live orchestra playing what would be more at home on a film score than an English pop album is refreshing. The track also has the benefit of having an easy structure to follow with themes evolving into one another and chord progressions smoothly transitioning to one another without being boring or cliché. 

In addition to “The End,” the album features several different aesthetics. Some songs seem more at home on an album by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts than for the 1975 but one of the tracks in question, “People,” immediately follows the opening track so the angst and frustration in the track’s rough exterior are warranted to drive home the point of climate destruction. Additionally, there are several tracks that give off an easier listening vibe that one might hear in a teen comedy or romance movie. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, because it’s incredibly rare to have an album where every song is a knockout, but it should be noted that as the album goes on, these specific aesthetic divisions become less and less varied within their own domains. The band also ventures into folk music, dance music, light electronica and house music. 

Ultimately, the band took their time with this album and it shows. The varied musical textures and tapestries on display in this album serve the band’s position well. The album shows a heavy amount of artistic maturity and clear experimentation. “Notes on a Conditional Form” receives an A rating. 

Rising alternative R&B artist MoonLander released an EP entitled “Crash20” in July, but did the 3-song EP crash and burn or did it crush the charts? 

The EP, while only released for a couple months, is taking off with his dedicated fans and fans of his associated acts but not so much with those outside his sphere of influence. That’s honestly a shame because he seems like a strong up-and-coming artist. However, the EP is not as strong as it could be. 

MoonLander, also known as Dillon Houston Church, is originally from Concord, N.C. and has been working on music since the age of 14. According to First Avenue, his music has been streamed more than 100,000 times. However, this in the grand scheme of music in the digital age is not a huge splash. He should be commended for the effort though. 

The EP suffers from what I like to call startup sickness. Beginnings are hard, after all. Each of the three tracks starts off with one groove and then quickly transitions to another more commercially viable aesthetic. This tells that MoonLander has ideas, just not a lot of confidence in every single one. That’s okay for a young artist but it’s certainly something to work through as he gets older. His style is only going to develop from here. 

We open with “Ring Around the Rosé” that opens with an intimate toy piano intro but as mentioned, quickly brings in the bass and drums to give it that R&B, modern rap aesthetic. This track is probably the strongest musically but that’s not actually saying much. The opening track also introduces MoonLander’s particular use of autotune while singing. Something about the balance of the filters on the effect is quite jarring but after some listening, the negative aspects seem to disappear and bring an enjoyable listening experience. This is also the only track that provides a little timbral difference during the interlude between verses, bringing in some more pad sounds to smooth out the sound. 

The second track “Swish” is probably the least satisfying of the three. The narrator of the song is talking about messing around in the bathtub, but the chorus talks about the metaphorical “shooting your shot” and missing. To any thinking person, it would seem that the shot has already been shot and the shot was not missed but I digress. On top of that cognitive dissonance, the middle track is generally boring musically. Easily forgettable. A song that would easily get lost on a playlist of other R&B artists and rappers. 

“Old News,” the final track, starts out the most interesting but quickly transitions to his normal style again. MoonLander’s “singing” doesn’t really have much of a clear direction on this track, neither do his lyric choices. There’s a lot of potential in this one for growth over time but right now, he’s just not it. 

MoonLander is certainly an act to watch and many big-name artists agree. Artists such as Wiz Khalifa, Machine Gun Kelly, and Juice WRLD. However, this EP does leave a little too much to be desired. It’s not bad per se, but it’s certainly got room for improvement. “Crash20” receives a C-plus rating.  

After a long hiatus from music, international superstar Taylor Swift gifted the world with a brand-new voice, a brand-new album, “Folklore.” 

The album, written and recorded in its entirety during the shutdowns related to the COVID-19 pandemic, is Swift’s eighth studio album and is simultaneously a stark turn from her typical style and return to her roots in indie and singer-songwriter music. Many of the tracks don’t feature much in the way of thick instrumentation but rather strip Swift’s presentation down to just her, the piano, and occasionally a guitar or some light percussion. The album dropped suddenly on July 24 without much warning at all, but it certainly took off. 

The approximately hour-long album has 16 tracks all with very personal, almost poetic lyrics. In the opening track, “the 1,” she starts off with the line, “I’m doing good/I’m on some new “sh*t,” signaling her return to music after leaving the limelight. The album takes a journey into Swift’s psyche that we haven’t seen before. Like many young artists, she is boxed into record deals and producing music that will veritably sell very easily or be played constantly on the radio. Swift’s approach in this album seems to leave that all behind. She’d rather go back to telling personal stories, the reason she wanted to be a musician in the first place. Swift’s next few tracks in “cardigan,” “the last great american dynasty,” and “exile” all tell very clear stories, and definitely the standouts of the album. The first chunk of the album from “the 1” to “tears ricochet” is very story oriented. That is not to say they follow a very clear arc between them, but they are the flagship tracks on the album. Many of the tracks following amount to other love song formats with the exception of “betty.” “betty” is something else. 

As far as composition goes, the album takes similar ideas from track to track creating an overall unified sound. Swift tends to stay in the lower part of her voice, creating a speech-like register that is extremely easy to listen to while not being mind-numbing. Swift also uses the piano in economic ways, whether the piano be entirely acoustic or have some minor effects applied to it. The change in timbre specifically in the piano and piano-like sounds is usually tied to the structure of the music which is a refreshing take on the indie/folk music genre. 

The themes of the album are widely applicable, and Swift’s particular style of lyric writing is engaging. It allows the listener to take a trip right into Swift’s psyche and her thoughts as she comes into her own as a modern singer-songwriter with fame and the world in front of her. These come through particularly strong in “exile” and “betty.” The former features indie/folk singer Bon Iver in conjunction with Swift singing a duet, a lament to lost relationships. The defeated pain in Swift’s voice and the lush bass sound of Iver carry the emotional message that it’s quite difficult to move on from relationships. The latter is a love letter to a classmate named Betty and the death of their close friendship. Swift has stated that the narrator in the song is intended to be a heterosexual boy speaking to Betty but that hasn’t stopped LGBT youth from running with the track. Swift has often taken a stance on LGBT rights, and even by admitting that “betty” is about a boy singing to a girl, she has also stated that LGBT fans are more than welcome to interpret the song however they like for them.  

“Folklore” is an album that everyone should check out. It has a track (or a few) for everyone. The album is eclectic to the perfect degree and is welcome surprise from Taylor Swift. We can only hope her style continues to evolve in this direction in the future. “folklore” receives an A-plus rating.