MadfaMusic Feature Albums October 2013
Best Coast - Fade Away (Feature Album 28 October 2013)
Cass McCombs - Big Wheel & Others (Feature Album 21 October 2013)
Zeahorse - Pools (Feature Album 14 October 2013)
Mazzy Star - Seasons Of Your Day (Feature Album 7 October 2013)
Cass McCombs - Big Wheel & Others (Feature Album 21 October 2013)
Zeahorse - Pools (Feature Album 14 October 2013)
Mazzy Star - Seasons Of Your Day (Feature Album 7 October 2013)
Best Coast - Fade Away (Feature Album 28 October 2013) By Fee B-Squared
 Image courtesy of Rolling Stone
It’s cold today, so before I put the heater on, I’m putting on the new Best Coast album Fade Away. Why? Because I know that it will almost feel like summer is finally bloody here, and a California sun soaked one at that!
With Bethany Consentino delivering reverb drenched vocals, guitars and keyboard, and multi-instrumentalist Bobb Bruno (bass and guitars) keeping everything on track, they have the ability to make the sun shine. The duo sound primarily like a modern day version of 50’s/60’s surf rock, whilst referencing an array of subgenres from surf pop, garage rock and garage pop to lo-fi, stoner rock and indie. |
Image courtesy of thelineofbestfit.com
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 Image courtesy of nashvillescene.com
Fade Away is being referred to as a mini album at just 27 minutes long, but considering they’re yet to put out an album that runs beyond 35 minutes, I don’t see a point in making the distinction. It will be interesting to see if there’s any difference time wise when their next full-length album is released in 2014.
It is also the debut release for Consentino’s Jewel City label. She explained the label name to Rolling Stone: “I grew up in Glendale [California] and there's a bowling alley, Jewel City Bowl, where I used to have my birthday parties. I wanted to have the name of the label be reminiscent of something that was L.A.-related. I thought that was just some cool thing, that one out of five people that see the label title could be like, oh, that's Glendale.” Cute. |
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Image courtesy of glamour.com
I think Best Coast are really smart to keep their releases short and punchy because the tone and dynamic of their albums tends to stay relatively the same from first track to last. Too long could be too tiresome, and I don’t feel that here at all as I’m listening for the third time. This album carries more of the unpolished, demo sound delivered on 2010’s Crazy For You, rather than the slicker production values of 2012’s The Only Place. This makes me happy as I much prefer the former.
It’s sometimes a revelation to find the lyrics are not always so bright and shiny given the music sounds so sunny, but the vast majority of their songs are actually about heartbreak. I think the simplicity of their lyrics lends itself to the fact that you don’t get bogged down in the emo side of the songs. I mean, Consentino can take the most emotional of scenes and pair it right back to basics, as if there’s no point in dwelling and wallowing because everything will eventually be ok.
“The fear of my identity is standing right in front of me/I want to run but I can’t see/I want it to be you, but I know it’s me.”
Rhyming words can sometimes sound a little too easy, but what I think Consentino does is quite clever. Perhaps part of their charm is that feeling that you know precisely what the next word is going to be. You can finish their sentences, but is that because you’re gifted at rhyming or is it because it’s particularly familiar and it’s exactly how you feel? Is it simply pathos for teens, or does it resonate with the most jaded of adults because they’ve all been there before? It doesn’t need to be deep, we don’t always need answers, sometimes it’s just comforting to know that other people feel the same way you do at times, so you may as well shake your butt while you’re at it. I think it’s all of this while sounding like Mazzy Star, Neko Case and Patsy Cline so how can that be wrong?
Beach towel? Check. Sunscreen and hat? Check. Esky? Check. 80’s Ghettoblaster with Fade Away cranked to 11?
Check.
By Fee B-Squared
It’s sometimes a revelation to find the lyrics are not always so bright and shiny given the music sounds so sunny, but the vast majority of their songs are actually about heartbreak. I think the simplicity of their lyrics lends itself to the fact that you don’t get bogged down in the emo side of the songs. I mean, Consentino can take the most emotional of scenes and pair it right back to basics, as if there’s no point in dwelling and wallowing because everything will eventually be ok.
“The fear of my identity is standing right in front of me/I want to run but I can’t see/I want it to be you, but I know it’s me.”
Rhyming words can sometimes sound a little too easy, but what I think Consentino does is quite clever. Perhaps part of their charm is that feeling that you know precisely what the next word is going to be. You can finish their sentences, but is that because you’re gifted at rhyming or is it because it’s particularly familiar and it’s exactly how you feel? Is it simply pathos for teens, or does it resonate with the most jaded of adults because they’ve all been there before? It doesn’t need to be deep, we don’t always need answers, sometimes it’s just comforting to know that other people feel the same way you do at times, so you may as well shake your butt while you’re at it. I think it’s all of this while sounding like Mazzy Star, Neko Case and Patsy Cline so how can that be wrong?
Beach towel? Check. Sunscreen and hat? Check. Esky? Check. 80’s Ghettoblaster with Fade Away cranked to 11?
Check.
By Fee B-Squared
More about Best Coast
Check out the reviews of Fade Away by Pitchfork, The Music and LA Times.
Read interviews with Best Coast by Rolling Stone and Refinery 29 or watch the MTV interview.
Read interviews with Best Coast by Rolling Stone and Refinery 29 or watch the MTV interview.
Cass McCombs - Big Wheel and Others (Feature Album 21 October 2013)
By Fee B-Squared
 Image courtesy of au.timeout.com
I’m a fan of Cass McCombs, but I’ll be honest, as soon as I saw that his seventh album Big Wheel And Others is a double album of 22 songs, I kind of thought “uh-oh”. I mean, I know he’s good, but if I had a dollar for the amount of times an album could be strengthened just by making it shorter, lets just say I’d have many, many, many dollars. So I guess you’re now thinking I’ve been proven wrong here, but unfortunately I’m not so sure that’s the case. My feeling about this album though, is that there are more than enough excellent moments here to make it a great album (as a side note, this was apparently almost a triple album, so he has done a bit of editing.)
Ok, for those who came in late, Cass McCombs was born in Northern California in 1977 and details of his earlier life are not that easy to find. He made a decision long ago not to anchor himself so much in the past, instead choosing to move forward, always looking ahead as he continues to document what he sees and hears. What is well documented though is that his adult life has been lived primarily as a nomad of sorts; a drifter. |
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Image courtesy of Spin
He has educated himself whilst crashing on couches, sleeping in cars, campsites and on the streets throughout the U.S, taking on a bunch of jobs from cleaner to truck driver and movie projectionist, to working in a NYC deli, in a horse stable, in a bookstore and even in construction in New Jersey. During this time he’s always carried his guitar, sometimes singing for his next meal out of necessity. In an interview with Spin recently he said of the 90’s and 00’s "I cut my teeth on the streets, you know. I don't see that too much anymore. I don't think it occurs to people that they need to pay their dues on the sidewalk. You just bring your guitar, and you try to sing for your supper. I was inspired by hunger. A lot of people don't know what it's like to actually be hungry. I do.” He’s listened to all kinds of people with all manner of stories and in turn he has become the teller of these stories. While he does tell the stories of others, it still gives us an insight into who McCombs is somehow, just knowing what he’s interested in regardless of whether the perspective is his own. If you’re looking for a narrative on this album, you might be left scratching your head. These songs were all written over a lengthy period and McCombs hasn’t felt the need to tie them into anything other than a collection of varied stories. That will bother some people, but I’m not one of them.
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Amongst the 22 tracks are three spoken pieces lifted from the 1970 Ralph Arlyck documentary Sean. I didn’t feel they were at all necessary, but it did make me go and have a look at the documentary. Disc 1 contains the rolling, bluesy and dirty sounds of “Big Wheel”, quickly followed by the gentler “Angel Blood” and “Morning Star”. The latter contains one of my favourite lines: “What’s it like to shit in space?” Come on, I know you’ve probably spent time pondering this too. Cass sings “Brighter!” on his own here, which is followed by the simply beautiful “There Can Be Only One”. Disc 2 contains the rockier sounds of “Satan Is My Toy…” on which I was surprised to hear a touch of Soundgarden’s “Spoonman”. I’ve fallen in love with the dulcet tones of the late Karen Black on the revisiting of “Brighter!” on Disc 2, which truly gives the song new life. I can’t help but prefer this version, as Black’s delivery is perfect.
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I was also quietly surprised to hear Cass doing a beautiful rendition of Phil Lynott’s “Honesty Is No Excuse” which originally appeared on the debut self-titled Thin Lizzy release back in 1971.
McCombs is the quintessential folk singer. He has a constant hankering for travel, a healthy, well measured, and at times hilarious disdain for the press and social media, and no doubt quite the aversion to settling down. On the track “Joe Murder” he sings “Such a frugal drifter, But not all who wander are lost” and I can’t help but think he is absolutely right.
By Fee B-Squared
McCombs is the quintessential folk singer. He has a constant hankering for travel, a healthy, well measured, and at times hilarious disdain for the press and social media, and no doubt quite the aversion to settling down. On the track “Joe Murder” he sings “Such a frugal drifter, But not all who wander are lost” and I can’t help but think he is absolutely right.
By Fee B-Squared
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You can stream "Big Wheel and Others" in full here courtesy of The Guardian.
Check out the reviews of Big Wheel and Others by Pitchfork, Drowned in Sound, Pretty Much Amazing and Consequence of Sound. There's a video of Cass McCombs sharing his guitar moves with Matt Sweeney here. Check out interviews with Cass McCombs from Spin, Stereogum, and The Village Voice. 
Image courtesy of directcurrentmusic.com
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Image courtesy of Spin
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Zeahorse - Pools (Feature Album 14 October 2013) By Fee B-Squared
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Zeahorse are a four-piece band from Sydney. Morgan, Max and Ben all went to school together in Hornsby, hanging out in the school’s music department writing songs and doing whatever else you do in a music department. They moved to Lismore to study Audio Engineering and that’s where they met their drummer, Julien. Ben officially joined the band to play bass after they quit uni to move to Sydney. What I take from all that is, they’ve been around for quite a while and have a pretty good idea about how things should sound, or more pointedly, how they want things to sound. Solid start.
Although I’m yet to see them perform, I’ve heard their live shows are awesome, with Faster Louder making this comment “Zeahorse should come with a warning along the lines of ‘Danger: do not perform after us.” |
Image courtesy of musicfeeds.com.au
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I’m looking forward to checking them out when they tour soon. Sometimes the thing with amazing live acts is that their sound doesn’t always translate to the recording. Well this album has a very live sound, which it seems they’ve managed to achieve by recording live to tape. That means committing to an entire take of a song and not piecing together three or four versions of that song to make it all pretty in the end. It’s not like it can’t be done, but that’s not what they’ve done here. These tracks were recorded by Steve Law at Sunroom Studios, with the band all camping out in the backyard for the entire six days that Pools took to make. It’s all very old-school, and man, it really works.
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Image courtesy of Zeahorse
They write about the ‘burbs, which can be pretty bleak at times, but it’s the stuff they feel they know, and so do I. Before listening to the album I’d already heard enough musical comparisons about who Zeahorse sound like, from Fugazi, Slint and Nirvana though to The Mark of Cain, The Jesus Lizard and Alice In Chains, and to be completely honest, not one of them is shy of the mark. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with any of that, I mean I’m enjoying the shit out of this album, but I don’t I suppose it means they’re breaking any new ground either right? Think stoner, psychedelic and grunge rock then add some punk, throw in some sludgey guitarmonies, and you’re close to the mark.
What I think separates Zeahorse from the crowd is that they actually cross all of these music genres effortlessly, and in just one album. I mean, I’m listening to the Tool-esqe “Forty Six and 2” bass driven sounds of the opening track “Career”, then I’m washed away by the swampy and delayed shoegazer type vocals on the title track “Pool”, next thing I know some dude is jamming on the banjo and whistling like Sufjan Stevens just cruised in off the street to join the crew for a doob and a quick two minute jam on “Junktown Train”. The journey finishes with a track they apparently fluked while filling their leftover studio time. “Pesto”, is a beautiful Sunday morning coming-down track about some guy named Whitey who made them pesto pasta during their stay. “Pesto” doesn’t sound like it was fluked at all. The fact that it was tells me that they’re a cohesive unit that know exactly what they’re doing and as the album closer, this track only served to make me hungry for more.
By Fee B-Squared
What I think separates Zeahorse from the crowd is that they actually cross all of these music genres effortlessly, and in just one album. I mean, I’m listening to the Tool-esqe “Forty Six and 2” bass driven sounds of the opening track “Career”, then I’m washed away by the swampy and delayed shoegazer type vocals on the title track “Pool”, next thing I know some dude is jamming on the banjo and whistling like Sufjan Stevens just cruised in off the street to join the crew for a doob and a quick two minute jam on “Junktown Train”. The journey finishes with a track they apparently fluked while filling their leftover studio time. “Pesto”, is a beautiful Sunday morning coming-down track about some guy named Whitey who made them pesto pasta during their stay. “Pesto” doesn’t sound like it was fluked at all. The fact that it was tells me that they’re a cohesive unit that know exactly what they’re doing and as the album closer, this track only served to make me hungry for more.
By Fee B-Squared
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Zeahorse discussed the album, track by track with Mess + Noise. Check it out and listen to the album in full here.
There's an in-depth interview with Zeahorse here courtesy of Purple Sneakers, and one here from Happy. You can read a review of Pools here courtesy of Acid Stag. 
Image courtesy of Zeahorse
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Mazzy Star - Seasons Of Your Day (Feature Album 7 October 2013) By Fee B-Squared
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I fondly remember the dream pop sounds of Mazzy Star but it has been a while so I guess you could easily be mistaken for thinking they had called it a day somewhere along the line and you just missed it. Hell, you may not have even been born when they were around. The last time Hope Sandoval and David Roback released a full length album was back in 1996 with “Among My Swan”.
Seemingly out of nowhere, in 2011 they released the singles Common Burn and Lay Myself Down, and then performed a late Friday night set at Coachella in 2012 to mixed reviews. It’s now 17 years on from “Among My Swan” and Mazzy Star have put out “Seasons Of Your Day”. According to guitarist David Roback “We were always recording and writing, we just didn't release any of it publicly.” I’m not entirely clear on why that is, and they don’t seem to want to elaborate, so you can choose your own adventure on this. As with most albums released after a lengthy hiatus, I get a bit nervous for the artist (and for my ears), and sometimes I’m probably a little too one-eyebrow-raised-and-crossed-armed, almost waiting for the fail. |
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Image courtesy of www.twentyfourbit.com
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I’m steeped in new music daily, it’s my job and my saucy mistress, so although I like to dip into the old and nostalgic as much as anyone, I guess there’s a point where I tend to move forward and leave some of my favourite bands and performers behind in a different time. Sometimes it only serves to make way for the newer version of said band - Baltimore’s Beach House immediately come to mind. It’s not because I don’t care, I always do, it’s just that my tastes change, and sometimes daily. I didn’t love “Among My Swan”, so I wondered if this new album would be worth it. I threw it on and soaked in the hazy sounds that drew me to Mazzy Star all those years ago when they released “She Hangs Brightly” in 1990.
I’m relieved to say “Seasons Of Your Day” is a beautiful album. That said, I’m happy to concede that I might just like the way it makes me feel when I put it on, I mean it doesn’t always have to be because of it’s technical qualities does it? The first time I listened to this album in it’s entirety, I thought I hadn’t really heard a word Hope had sung. I’d heard her voice more as another instrument that kind of washes over you. Some albums just make you feel things, and this is one of them. It makes me feel warm, a little heady and slightly woozy at times, and yes, sometimes it makes me feel nostalgic. They’ve always had a dreamy sound that lends itself beautifully to lazy Sundays or road trips where you end up feeling like you’re almost caught in that part of refracted light that forms a heat shimmer or mirage on the highway, and this is still all of that. They’re not trying to reinvent the wheel here, they’re just doing what they do best. Trainspotters may be interested to know that Colm Ó Cíosóig from My Bloody Valentine turns up on drums here, and for guitarists and fans of the late Bert Jansch, you will no doubt enjoy the track he features on, Spoon. When I first fell in love with Mazzy Star, they were a welcome aural respite from say Soundgarden and Nirvana, the difference for me here now is that they will be a respite from perhaps Earl Sweatshirt and Pissed Jeans. By Fee B-Squared You can stream Seasons Of Your Day here. |
Listen to the MadfaMusic Feature Albums from September here
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Adalita - All Day Venus (Feature Album 30 September 2013)
Sebadoh - Defend Yourself (Feature Album 23 September 2013) Ty Segall - Sleeper (Feature Album 16 September 2013) Washed Out - Paracosm (Feature Album 9 September 2013) Horrorshow - King Amongst Many (Feature Album 2 September 2013) |
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Listen to the MadfaMusic Feature Albums from August here
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King Krule - 6 Feet Beneath the Moon (Feature Album 26 Aug 2013)
Laura Veirs - Warp and Weft (Feature Album 19 August 2013) Pixies - Doolittle (Feature Album 'from the vault' 12 August 2013) Pond - Hobo Rocket (Feature Album 5 August 2013) |
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Listen to the MadfaMusic Feature Albums from July here
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Pluto Jonze - Eject (Feature Album 29 July 2013)
Ben Mason - Holes and Corners (Feature Album 22 July 2013) Jessica Pratt - Jessica Pratt (Feature Album 15 July 2013) Kieran Ryan - Kieran Ryan (Feature Album 8 July 2013) Jagwar Ma - Howlin' (Feature Album 1 July 2013) |
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Listen to the MadfaMusic Feature Albums from June here
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Tricky - False Idols (Feature Album 24 June 2013)
Junip - Junip (Feature Album 17 June 2013) Jen Cloher - In Blood Memory (Feature Album 10 June 2013) Laura Marling - Once I Was An Eagle (Feature Album 3 June 2013) |
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Listen to the MadfaMusic Feature Albums from April & May here
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Hanni El Khatib - Head in the Dirt (Feature Album 27 May 2013)
James Blake - Overgrown (Feature Album 20 May 2013) Super Wild Horses - Crosswords (Feature Album 13 May 2013) Matthew E. White - Big Inner (Feature Album 6 May 2013) The Black Angels - Indigo Meadow (Feature Album 29 April 2013) Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Mosquito (Feature Album 22 April 2013) Kurt Vile - Wakin on a Pretty Daze (Feature Album 15 April 2013) Unknown Mortal Orchestra - II (Feature Album 7 April 2013) |
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