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OrphanofGod
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Name: James
Gender: Male
Interests: Listening to and writing music of any kind(accept rap and techno) being an active member in my church youth group. Watching baseball and football games, as well as, exploring the lyrics and music of Mark Heard, and Bill Mallonee, two of the finest songwriters of all time.
Expertise: Understanding the lyrics of ledgendary songwriter Mark Heard
Message: message me
AIM:  orphansofgod6
Member Since:
8/25/2004
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| Every year, as school let’s out, I am always looking for an album that captures the way I am feeling when I’m driving around on sunny afternoons here in Northern Ohio. The weather is usually just beginning to stay warm, and the sun is showing its face almost every day. This year, Wilco’s new album “Sky Blue Sky” was released at the same time that college let out for the summer, and immediately I have fallen in love with this gorgeous laid back rock album.
“Either Way” opens the album with a smooth, relaxed acoustic guitar based three-minute tune. However, as the song nears its close, Tweedy and the gang kick into their first guitar solo of the album, that while brief, sets the tone for what becomes an album filled with guitar solos and other musical goodness!
“Impossible Germany” is certainly going to become another one of Wilco’s guitar drenched masterpieces. It features two guitars kicking out blistering guitar solos back and forth for an extended section at the very end of the song. It is impressive to say the very least and I can imagine it will be a highlight of their upcoming live shows.
The title track is a wonderful soft rock song. It kind of reminds me a little of Starflyer 59 on their “Leave Here A Stranger” and “The Fashion Focus” albums.
“Side With The Seeds” features some more great guitar work. This song features a wonderful mix of guitar distortion and violin string backing.
“Shake It Off” rides blues guitar sounds, as do several of the offerings on this project. Jeff Tweedy has always found ways to blend musical influences, and on songs like these, it is easy to really appreciate just how good he is at doing this. This song arcs back and forth between being noise filled and being quiet, making for a very interesting listen. You will find yourself coming back to this song often.
“Please Be Patient With Me” is a gorgeous folk love song. It’s about a man struggling with depression and telling the person he loves that he needs her patience:
“How can I warn you when my tongue turns to dust
Like we’ve discussed
It doesn’t mean that I don’t care
It means I’m partially there
You’re gonna need to be patient with me”
“Hate It Here” follows the thoughts of a man who has just endured a hard breakup, with down to earth ramblings about feeling lost and directionless:
“What am I gonna do when I run out of shirts to fold?
What am I gonna do when I run out of lawn to mow?
What am I gonna do if you never come home?
Tell me, what am I gonna do?”
“What Light” is the song that is being promoted as the single right now, and it is a good example of the country/roots style that we have seen from some of Wilco’s past material. It rides a very catchy acoustic rhythm guitar base backed up by plenty of slide guitar in the background. This song calls to mind Neil Young in a big way, and that isn’t a bad thing either!
“On And On An On” may be one of the best lyrical moments for Tweedy in years. It is a gorgeous pledge of committed love and comfort to one special woman. The piano base for this song is perfect, and the background organ, guitar and drums, when they kick in, do so in a timely fashion!
For those of us who bought the album on iTunes, a special bonus track entitled “Let’s Not Get Carried Away” is included. This song finds Tweedy and company coming the closest to grunge that they’ve ever been. The guitar work is mixed so that it is up front and raw, and Tweedy adopts a growl in his voice that shows how versatile a vocalist he is!
This is another fine effort for Jeff Tweedy and his bandmates. My only drawback to this project is that they didn’t include a long drawn out rock and roll song on this album like they did on “Yankee Hotel Foxtrot” and “A Ghost Is Born.” There isn’t a song here that even breaks the six-minute mark, which is a shame because this is one of the most talented group of musicians making music today! Other than that, this is one of the more enjoyable releases so far this year!
A Review by James aka OrphanofGod
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| Anberlin have been recording music now for four years. Their first two projects consisted of hard rock mixed with emo style songwriting. They were solid albums and were above the typical hard rock and roll that one hears on mainstream rock stations. However, on their new project “Cities” they keep the rock coming, but explore new territories as well.
“Godspeed” is the first single from this project, and it is a good choice. This song features the Anberlin sound fans are used to. Lots of loud guitar solos and high pitched strained singing from Stephen Christian, that is on the verge of screaming.
“Adelaide” and “A Whisper, and a Clamour” continue in the vein of previous Anberlin work, giving the listener plenty of head-banging rock and roll in the album’s first 10 minutes.
“The Unwinding Cable Car” is the first moment on this project that a listener should pause and say “Is this really an Anberlin song?” It opens with layered acoustic guitar finger pickings and then builds into an absolutely beautiful late ‘80’s sounding ballad. It is a gorgeous song in which Christian writes about the “correlation between Salvation and Love.”
“Hello Alone” is a fine song written to a friend who is struggling with depression. “Alexithymia” follows along in those same lines. It’s a song that finds the protagonist longing for days past spent, “where the family used to sit and conversate to the sounds of a record player with it’s sounds of a jumping needle.”
“Inevitable” is another acoustic guitar song that sounds like a late 80’s ballad, both lyrically and musically. This is a song about young love, and desiring to be a persons ‘last first kiss’ for the rest of their life. It is beautiful, and should make one think back to the first crush he or she ever had. This is definitely another song to add to that love song mix on your iPod!
“Dismantle, Repair” is about being forgiven. It appears to be directed to God who exposes our sin in our lives and then wipes it clean. This is definitely the most direct way to interpret this song, and given all of Anberlin’s members are Christians it would make perfect sense.
“(*Fin)” is the closing track on this project, and it clocks in at over eight minutes and fifty seconds in length. This is by far the best rock and roll song they’ve composed as a band! It features plenty of guitar solos and musical breaks as well as a choir singing the chorus at the song’s middle point. It is another song that is definitely reflective of the Christian faith, as Stephen Christian sings about how God never looks at us as “lost causes.”
This is Anberlin’s most diverse project to date. A lot more acoustic guitar pervades this album than any of their previous work. Some of it calls to mind short lived 90’s band Nouveaux. If you are fan of 1980’s power ballads you will find several songs that appeal to you here. If you are a fan of the music that you’ve previously come to expect from Anberlin, you will find a lot here to enjoy as well!
A Review by James aka OrphanofGod
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Conor Oberst is growing up. His previous efforts have had their share of world wise knowledgeable poetry set to music. However, on this most recent offering, “Cassadaga” we see Oberst turning to powerful self-reflection and self-examination. At 27, it seems he is starting to think heavily about where his place is in the world, and what kind of legacy he wants to leave behind. There is also the usual brilliant lyricism, and much thought provoking culture commentary we are used to from Bright Eyes, here as well.
The opening track “Clairaudience: Kill Or Be Killed” begins with a bunch of what sounds like news real footage overdubbed with synthesizer underpinnings. This continues for about two minutes, until the song begins. In this song Oberst finds himself in familiar territory, political commentary:
“Future Markets, Holy Wars
Been tried ten thousand times before
If you think that God is keeping score, Hooray!
For the freedom-fighting simulcast
The imminent and the aftermath
Draw another bloody bath to drain
Like the polar icecaps centrifuge
First snowman built at the end of June
He slicks his hair for the interview, his fifteen-minute fame
Would you agree times have changed?”
“Four Winds” features some great fiddle moments in an all out bluegrass sounding in a second political tune.
“If The Brakeman Turns My Way” is a song about how life is full of changes, and the cycle of life:
“All this death must need a counterweight always someone born again
First a mother bathes her child then the other way around
The Scales always find a way to level out.”
“Make A Plan To Love Me” continues in this theme, as Oberst writes hear about how short life is, and the mortality of every single person on earth.
“Soul Singer In A Session Band” features young Oberst turning introspective about himself, and the angst that he feels in his own life:
“I had a lengthy discussion about The Power of Myth
With a post-modern author who didn't exist
In this fictitious world all reality twists
I was a hopeless romantic now I'm just turning tricks.”
“Classic Cars” is a great country song that calls to mind Oberst’s finest musical moments.
“Middleman” features a fine fiddle solo that grinds out a minor key solo backed by bongo drums. It is spattered with Oberst’s trademark lyrical obscurity that has attracted fans like me over the past few years.
“No One Would Riot For Less” is by far Conor Oberst’s strongest anti-war song on this album, as it features some hard-hitting dark lyrics:
“Little soldier, little insect, you know war it has no heart
It will kill you in the sunshine or happily in the dark
Where kindness is a card game or a bent-up cigarette
In the trenches, in the hard rain, with a bullet and a bit
He says, "help me out"
Hell is coming
Could you do it now?
Hell is here”
As one listens to this song, with it’s haunting lyrics, it is easy to find yourself thinking of some of 1960’s folk icon Phil Och’s harsh anti-Vietnam lyrics. There is a definite parallel on a song like this that has me curious as to what Oberst is listening to these days on his iPod or whatever he uses to listen to tunes on.
“I Must Belong Somewhere” is the song that best exemplifies how Conor Oberst is growing and maturing as a songwriter. It is on this song that he describes his thoughts on finding his place in society, while mentioning other people and places that have their place in the world:
“'Cause everything it must belong somewhere
Sound stage in California, televisions in Times Square
Yeah, everything it must belong somewhere
I know that now, that's why I'm staying here
Well I know that now, that's why I'm staying here”
Taken as a whole, this is probably Conor Oberst strongest project as far as songwriting goes. He is showing signs of maturing into a songwriter that can write about the world he lives in, and at the same time writes songs that are personal in nature. My one drawback on “Cassadaga” is that there seem to be an overwhelming amount of ballads here, with too few country romps that were so prevalent on previous efforts. Other than that, if you are in the mood for some solid, thought provoking lyrics, then look no farther than “Cassadaga.”
A Review by James aka OrphanofGod
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| Hello folks. Here is a list of some of the major album releases set for this spring and summer. Looks like some good ones! I'm excited about the Elliott Smith rarities compilation, Wilco's newest release, "Sky Blue Sky," as well as the much anticipated new releases from Straylight Run, Mae and Eisley! It should be a sweet summer for music folks!!!!!
Spring/Summer Album releases 2007
Rush- “Snakes and Arrows” 5/1
Derek Webb- “The Ringing Bell” 5/1
Warren Zevon- “Preludes: Rare and Unreleased Recordings” 5/1
Elliott Smith- “New Moon” (2 Disc Rarities/Outtakes album!!!!) 5/8
Wilco- “Sky Blue Sky” 5/15
Linkin Park- “Minutes To Midnight” 5/15
Rufus Wainwright- “Release The Stars” 5/15
Maroon 5- “It Won’t Be Soon Before Long” 5/22
All Star United- “Light And Radiation” 5/29
Ryan Adams- “Easy Tiger” 6/5
Dream Theater- “Systematic Chaos” 6/5
High Flight Society- “High Flight Society” 6/5
The White Stripes- “Icky Thumb” 6/19
Bon Jovi- “Lost Highway” 6/19
Straylight Run- “The Needles, The Space” 6/19
Lifehouse- “Who We Are” 6/26
Velvet Revolver- “Libertad” 7/3 (New Date)
The Smashing Pumpkins- “Zeitgiest” 7/10
Eisley- “Combinations” 7/10
The Rocket Summer- “Do You Feel?” 7/17
MxPx- “Secret Weapon” 7/17
Kids In The Way- “Love Hate Masquerade” 8/7
Mae- “Singularity” 8/14
List compiled by James aka OrphanofGod
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| Here is the latest album from one of Christian music’s top new artists. Their song “Glory Defined” hit the top 10 CCM radio charts a couple of years ago thus launching them into instant popularity among folks who enjoy listening to this genre of music. With their new album, the band hired well renowned CCM producer Brown Banister to produce their new album, entitled “Iris To Iris.”
If it weren’t for the already too populated field of CCM that the music industry is already experiencing, I would say this album is very well done. However, I can’t help but feeling that as I listen to this album, I could be listening to an album by any of today’s best Christian stars. The sound of this album is very similar to work by Casting Crowns, Chris Tomlin, and Michael W. Smith.
That being said, there are some very good songs here. “Power of Your Name” opens the album with a great rock and roll sound that will grab listeners in immediately. “Singing Over Me” builds off a catchy acoustic guitar layering, and talks about how God is always watching out for us, and caring for us.
“Amazed” sounds like a song that Steven Curtis Chapman should record. It has a lot of potential to be a big hit in my opinion. It for me would be my choice for first single for the album. It’s about how God sends trials in our lives to bring us closer to Him:
“You’ve got me right where you want me,
You’ve got me right where I need to be,
And I’m simply amazed”
“Waiting To Shine” is where the Michael W. Smith comparison comes to light. It is a piano ballad that sounds like a song he’d write. It’s a song written as a prayer directly to God.
“Constant” could be the next big worship song to find it’s way into our worship services, as it reflects on our deep need for God.
“Grace is That Is Great” is a modernized version of an old hymn, that is presented here in an acoustic song in the vein of Derek Webb.
So overall here we have a good album, but nothing that stands out in a super fashion.
A Review By James aka OrphanofGod
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