Album review: ‘Positive Rising Part 2’ by rock trio DZ Deathrays
Album No 5 from Brisbane trio DZ Deathrays offers punk without the nihilist sneer, metal minus the moronic posturing, and classic rock stripped of its own self-conscious poseurism.
Album reviews for week of July 10, 2021:
ROCK
Positive Rising: Part 2
DZ Deathrays
I Oh You/Mushroom
The fifth album from DZ Deathrays shows just how far the trio has come from its humble 2008 origins as a raucous party band. Back then it was a duo, two mates – guitarist/singer Shane Parsons and drummer Simon Ridley – from the regional Queensland sugar town of Bundaberg who moved to Brisbane and eventually formed DZ, later renamed DZ Deathrays. Since adding second guitarist Lachlan Ewbank to the line-up the band found its metier with 2019’s Positive Rising: Part 1. Now, almost two years to the day (delayed by the plague) comes Part 2, which develops the theme of its predecessor. One constant that remains is the all-enveloping sound of DZ Deathrays, a sometimes surprisingly melodic squall of guitars, voice and drums (no bass) that takes zero prisoners. Right down to its apocalyptic cover art, PR2 spins on a loose concept of opposing forces. Even the love songs, if you could call them that (the riff-driven All Or Nothing, majestic pop anthem Golden Retriever, the guitar-crosstalk of Run The Red and Swept Up, with its satirical nod to Joan Jett’s I Love Rock’n’Roll), are couched in conflict.
But most of the others maintain positivity in the face of societal doom, true to the album’s title. Influences such as Rage Against the Machine and Nirvana are becoming less obvious as the band consolidates its own sound. It’s built on the intuitive interplay between Parsons and Ewbank, whose heavily textured playing doesn’t always sound like guitars — more like a twin malevolent force that every so often waxes celestial, like sunlight spearing through storm clouds. This effect is best illustrated on Kerosene, urgent opener Skeleton Key and the even punkier riff monster Fear the Anchor, anti-social media rant Make Yourself Mad and the Clash-flavoured Fired Up, with its totally unexpected guitar solo referencing Queen’s Brian May, of all people. It typifies the band’s sense of humour, as does the following Riff City, a frantic one-minute instrumental tribute to DZ’s roots: punk without the nihilist sneer, metal minus the moronic posturing, and classic rock stripped of its own self-conscious poseurism.
Phil Stafford
FOLK
Just Transforming
Miriam Lieberman
Independent
Motherhood, metamorphosis and environmental matters are to the fore as Miriam Lieberman endeavours to empower and uplift her followers. Apart from an opening piece about the power of imagination that’s propelled into pop parody by an overly elaborate strings and choral arrangement, the Sydney singer-songwriter’s sixth album is the equal of anything in her fine back catalogue. Lieberman’s luscious, velvety singing is as soothing as ever, while her guitar and kora (African harp) playing and the musicianship of her regular associates Lara Goodridge and Kate Adams on violin, cello and vocal harmony is exemplary. Companion songs prompted by maternity — one a lullaby, the other a philosophical piece on the cycle of life — are accompanied by subtle kora arpeggios. A title track that promotes personal development is perfectly punctuated by violin pizzicato. Joni Mitchell comes to mind as Lieberman soars into upper register on several songs. Elsewhere, gentle Caribbean and African rhythms suggest Paul Simon’s influence.
Tony Hillier
BLUES
Delta Kream
The Black Keys
Warner Music
To have messed with the Southern blues classics featured here would have been musical blasphemy, but Black Keys bandmates Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney have respectfully bowed their heads to past greats while also infusing these works with new life. There’s rich pickings for the band’s younger fans, who may be unfamiliar with the likes of R.L. Burnside, John Lee Hooker, Junior Kimbrough and the many bluesmen who were formative in shaping the Ohio duo’s sound. Their 10th album was unrehearsed and only planned days ahead of recording. It has all the bristling, raw energy of a passionate jam by two veteran rock ‘n’ rollers. Crawling Kingsnake is a masterclass in steely blues guitar, Going Down South is all twangy chords echoing into the humid Mississippi air, graced by Auerbach’s soulful falsetto. Hill Country Blues artist Ranie Burnette’s Coal Black Mattie is channelled into 2021 via a mid-’40s juke joint. Two decades after forming in Ohio, Auerbach and Carney have come up with a tasty and memorable anniversary treat.
Cat Woods
ROCK
You and Me
Nancy Wilson
Carry On Music
As guitarist, co-writer and backing vocalist in the hugely successful American band Heart, Nancy Wilson usually plays second fiddle to her older sister, virtuoso lead singer Ann. On You And Me, her first official solo album, Wilson the younger steps out front, with mixed results. Four of its 12 tracks are covers – Springsteen’s The Rising, Paul Simon’s The Boxer, the Cranberries’ Dreams and Pearl Jam’s Daughter – but, barring the latter, none of them shades her own material. Her voice, while hardly as potent an instrument as her sister’s, shines on the Heart-like Walk Away, The Inbetween, Dragon — a dark tribute to departed Alice In Chains singer Layne Staley, who died alone in 2002 after a long struggle with drug addiction — and the title track, a hymn to her late mother. Wilson’s guitar work is solid throughout, with her acoustic finger-picking skills to the fore on the closing 4 Edward, an instrumental eulogy for Eddie Van Halen, who passed last year. From one guitar hero to another, it’s a fine tribute and an apt conclusion.
Phil Stafford
ELECTRONIC
Reprise
Moby
Deutsche Grammophon
Following a well-travelled course, US musician Richard Melville “Moby” Hall has “reimagined” a collection of songs from his 30-year career. It’s a hit-and-miss affair. While some new versions won’t cut the mustard for fans familiar with every tiny detail of the original recordings, his linking with the Budapest Art Orchestra to create orchestral and acoustic arrangements does create some magic. Classics like Natural Blues are given new depth via sensational vocal efforts from Gregory Porter and Amythyst Kiah, while Everloving combines acoustic guitar and a soaring string section for a rework that both honours and builds on the original. Similarly, The Great Escape is a faithful take built upon the gorgeous vocals of Nataly Daen, Alice Skye and Luna Li. His breakthrough dance track Go, however, is unable to reach the rave heights of the 1992 original. Many, too, would prefer he leave timeless chill-out classics like Porcelain alone, but he perseveres, enlisting My Morning Jacket’s Jim James for an orchestral take that, while valiant, falls short of the original.
Tim McNamara
Album reviews for week of July 3, 2021:
ROCK
Flesh and Blood
Jimmy Barnes
Bloodlines
These days Jimmy Barnes is less a musical artist than an Australian institution. The release of his 20th solo album comes off the back of tours for 2019’s twin releases of Cold Chisel’s Blood Moon and his solo album My Criminal Record, which were in turn following the release of his best-selling Working Class Boy and Working Class Man autobiographies (and the related stage tours and tie-in media), until 2020 hit and … well, you know.
This album, a lockdown project made with the help of his massively talented brood, can be seen as an audio third instalment – Working Class Family, anyone? – with songs about home and love and family. If that sounds like he’s going soft, that unmistakeable voice still has enough gravel to make even the loveliest sentiment seem like a veiled threat. There are plenty of highlights, from the close harmonies of the countrified I Move Slow, where Jimmy is joined by his children Jackie and Elly-May, or the almost Crowded House vibe of Gateway To Your Heart, complete with chugging piano and chiming 12 string guitar. In a different world, this would be the album that finally broke Barnes in the US via two perfect soundtracks for long drives on endless American interstates in the ballads Til The Next Time and This Is The Truth.
The opening title track, meanwhile, is a big, heartfelt AM radio anthem in classic Barnes vein, although it keeps seeming about to burst into a guitar solo which never comes. There are few artists who could pack Danny Boy bagpipes into a song and get away with it, which Barnes (almost) does on I’m Coming Home. After eight new songs, Flesh and Blood winds to an end with a couple of covers which feel a bit like bonus tracks to the album proper. First, he offers a take on the classic Love Hurts with his wife Jane, a choice that feels like a callback to their popular series of lockdown duet videos begun last year. If it can’t hold a candle to the original version, that’s because nothing can. And the album ends with daughter Eliza Jane on Tennessee Waltz and a return of the bagpipes because, hey, why not? It’s not his most electrifying record, but Flesh and Blood is warm, assured and sounds like Barnes is spending his 65th year in a state of grace. Who saw that coming?
Andrew P. Street
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POP/SOUL
Life By Misadventure
Rag’n’Bone Man
Sony Music
Big man, big voice, and a hard opening act to follow up: British singer-songwriter Rory Graham arrived fully formed in 2017 with his debut album under the moniker Rag’n’Bone Man. Human has since amassed five billion (!) global streams and, four years on, the Man himself has married and separated, become a father and tried to deal with sudden wealth. Life By Misadventure covers all three bases, though Graham’s earnest attempts to address his angst more often make him come across like a midlife Meatloaf. The album finds its feet with Somewhere Along the Way and Time Will Only Tell, songs which both recapture the epic, soulful quality that made Human such a success. But the clever vocal phrasing of Lightyears and the deftly arranged Party’s Over — the latter featuring former Prince & the Revolution guitarist Wendy Melvoin — can’t rescue a record that’s summed up by the acoustic ballad Old Habits (Die Hard), where once again Graham counts the cost of what he’s lost.
Phil Stafford
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ELECTRO-FUNK
Daddy’s Home
St. Vincent
Loma Vista/Virgin Music Australia
Jaunty piano and vintage funk strut and slither on debaucherous album opener Pay Your Way In Pain. Annie Clark’s sixth album as St. Vincent gives way to a sexy, folksy ballad on Down and Out Downtown that recalls the spiritual-folk of Carole King’s Tapestry. There’s a cabaret vibe with playful 50s-style girl group harmonies on Daddy’s Home that is nostalgic, but vaguely creepy, much like a David Lynch movie. The absinthe-induced nightmare lullaby of Live In the Dream layers Freddy Mercury-style harmonies on thick. It’s vivid, psychedelic and strange. Clark is ably partnered again by co-producer Jack Antonoff, who helmed her 2017 hit album Masseduction. His ability to mesh orchestral sounds with 60s bubblegum melodies, power-pop rock and Nancy Sinatra-style crooning is a perfect match for the chameleonic Clark, who here weaves 70s era influences into a rich modern tapestry. On album No 6, St. Vincent has proven her musical mettle once again, with Antonoff bringing out her creepily compelling best.
Cat Woods
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ROCK
A Ton of Colours
Ryan Downey
Dot Dash
Ryan Downey’s 2018 debut Running introduced both his voluminous baritone and high-wattage romance, but it feels downright restrained next to this aptly titled follow-up. Here the Melbourne singer-songwriter leans into melodrama like a modern Roy Orbison, brooding and booming his way across larger-than-life ballads. Such conviction makes potentially naff lines like “Your heart is an onion / It’s making me cry” land with surprising force. Downey steps up the potent imagery on tracks like Sors De Ma Tete, invoking a “kaleidoscope horizon” and “my night-long crave cycle.” Despite much reverbed guitar and other vivid effects, though, he doesn’t always seek satisfaction in excess. Contact retreats to a buttery simmer and Patterns proves more delicate on all fronts, though they’re punctuated with striking guitar and eerie whistling, respectively. And on the electronics-flecked Edge of U, Downey delves even further into the richness of his voice, recalling the tandem flutter and prowl of Bryan Ferry.
Doug Wallen
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AMERICANA
Leftover Feelings
John Hiatt
New West Records
The 24th album from an acclaimed troubadour whose songs have been covered by everybody from Bob Dylan and BB King to Joan Baez and Joe Cocker has John Hiatt accompanied by another Nashville-based legend in Jerry Douglas, whose incomparable dobro playing has graced some 1600 long-players and accumulated 14 Grammy gongs. Not unexpectedly, these giants of American roots music deliver a set worthy of their lofty status in Leftover Feelings. With no drummer lending momentum, the veterans generate sufficient traction via contrasting guitars — with assistance from Douglas’s band — to propel a travelogue that references Mississippi, Ohio, Asheville, Catskill and their beloved Music City. While Hiatt’s voice wavers to new world-weary lows here and there as he reflects on his life, the songwriting is of sufficient quality to sustain an album that falls some way short of Hiatt’s benchmark 1980s releases Bring the Family and Slow Turning, yet still commands the listener’s complete attention.
Tony Hillier