By Adrienne Casey

Josephine Foster & The Supposed
All the Leaves are Gone
Locust Music, 2004

It begins harmlessly enough, like the sort of late ‘60s, slightly off-center folk music your parents probably missed the first time around but now like in retrospect. Foster’s voice is the first thing you notice. You can’t quite place the accent (affected British? natural?), although it’s clear that she’s pulling off some tricks without begging for attention. Go figure, she’s a trained opera singer. The band, similarly, sounds like they were trained in avant-rock and recently discovered the power in turning down or unplugging altogether (don’t fuss, they plug in). This is all to say, All the Leaves are Gone is wildly fascinating. Its reservation justifies the moments of excess, amounting to one fine balancing act. By the time she starts on the jailbird who is destroying her friend, hypnosis kicks in and she could probably get you to jailbreak the delinquent in question. It’s a good thing I don’t take drugs.


Oren Ambarchi
Grapes From the Estate
Touch, 2004

Brian Eno probably had no idea in 1978 that his ambient music series – music made for a specific environment – would be responsible for one of the two limbs on the electronic music tree, which is admittedly oversimplifying things. Eno's half is, of course, the one that can’t be danced to. Much of his spawn is great, but there’s too much to ever hear. Ambarchi forgoes laptops for real instruments even though it’s often hard to tell; guitars are tweaked to sound like keyboards and the sustained effects could come from any number of objects. This is an extremely patient recording, taking Eno’s minimalist vision to its near end. At times you want another note, anything small. As though catching that request, Ambarchi reaches a beautiful stride by the third track, “Remedios of Beauty.” It’s like watching the vine grow and finally getting a grape in return.


Diane Cluck
Oh Vanille
Self Released, 2004

More under the radar folk, this recording is apparently from Cluck’s apartment. The wonderful homemade packaging is worthy of a review itself and makes you wish there was this much love in every CD released. I guess this is Cluck’s third release, but I know little about her and it seems there’s little out there in the way of a story. A Google search leads you first to antifolk.com, but there’s really nothing anti-anything about what Cluck does. The quote there says, “I like to play different instruments and sing and write songs.” Ok, modest enough. There’s something very circular about the songs patterns, and at times they suggest the classical round. The power here is stark, just guitar and voice and carefully considered songs. Who knows, she might get popular, and with songs like these I wouldn’t be shocked.

Destroyer
Notorious Lightning and Other Works
Merge, 2005

Notorious Lightning finds Daniel Bejar, a.k.a. Destroyer, reworking six of his most recent songs less than a year after they were first released on Your Blues. And radical reworkings they are, inspired by Bejar’s recent tour in which Frog Eyes became Destroyer and Bejar’s MIDI symphonies became sloppy barroom epics. Which is exactly what this release documents – though these versions were recorded in a studio over the course of a weekend. As any Destroyer fan knows, this is par for the course with Bejar; almost Elvis Costello-like, each release parts sharply from the last, each announcing itself as Destroyer’s take on this style or that one. I naturally played the different versions side-by-side. The verdict? The new versions mainly make me want the old ones, but ask me in three months and see what I say. If Bejar can change his songs I can change my mind.


Six Organs of Admittance
School of the Flower
Drag City, 2005

Prolific Ben Chasny, who is Six Organs of Admittance, takes a break from Comets on Fire, where he was once a part-time member but now rounds things out full-time. Whereas with Comets it’s acid and whiskey, here it’s pot and wine; there it’s jump-out-the-window, here you don’t need to leave the couch to leave your mind. This is his seventh or so release under the moniker and not much of a departure from the previous ones. Echo and back-of-the-room reverb ties it all together, while up front the spirit of John Fahey’s finger-picked acoustic presides. At time there’s a bit of aimlessness that’s probably meant to pass as contemplation, which for me signals the point I leave the couch and wash the dishes. The most focused track, “Home,” is also the most engaging, with Chasny’s brilliantly controlled noise backdrop proving he’s not fried enough to be committed.


The Red Krayola
Singles 1968-2002
Drag City, 2004

That the Red Krayola even released singles might be one of the oddest things about them, and if you've heard them you know that's odd. They were always one of the most unapologetically political pop groups, often academically so – they have songs called "The Mistakes of Trotsky" and "The Principles of Party Organization" – while the 7-inch single, of course, has always represented the hyper-capitalist essence of the record industry. But 12 or so singles, all included here, aren't many for a career that's now in its fifth decade. Organized chronologically, listening to this is like watching a plant grow in time-lapsed speed; they move from idiosyncratic garage rock, to fractured art-punk, to something singularly strange and sometimes impenetrable. In other words, these singles probably didn't keep any of their labels in the money. For me, the brightest period in their long and uneven tenure is the supergroup lineup featuring Mayo Thompson (Red Krayola himself), Gina Burch, Lora Logic and Epic Soundtracks, which lasted for a few years during the late '70s and early '80s. That group is heard here on eight tracks, many of which deserve a place alongside the best agit-prop punk songs from the era.


Antena
Camino Del Sol
Numero Group, 2004

Antena started a genre of their own and, so far as I know, are still the only contributors. I'm speaking here about Franco-Tropicalia, French cool meets Brazilian optimism, or "Electro-Samba" as it was labeled when the record first appeared in 1982. Antena didn't last long, and the voice of the group, Isabelle Powaga, went on to record a series of solo albums as Isabelle Antena. But this buried classic stands alone perfectly well without a sibling – it may even be better off by itself. Like their single-album peers, Young Marble Giants, Antena reduced everything to its essence; rudimentary synthesizers and drum machines back-up shy chanteuse Powaga. They weren't quite musical enough to compete with Brazilian masters, but that didn't stop them from trying. The result, at last on CD, is a mini-masterpiece of naivete, fun, and inventiveness. It’s not simple emotion to say the world is a slightly better place now that this walks among us.


Old Crow Medicine Show
O.C.M.S.
Netwerk, 2004

Every once in while, I admit, I roll my eyes at the mention of another group of young musicians with the right instrumentation who have come along to lay flowers on Bill Monroe’s grave and “keep the tradition alive.” What happened to destroying something in order to save it? This can always be done out of love, you know. Old Crow Medicine Show aren’t too profane but they do have a magnificent sense of playfulness that is at times missing from their peers’ approach. Plus, they write much of their own material, which comes off more Bad Livers than Holy Modal Rounders. Yeah, they’ve been to the church of the Bluegrass Boys, but I’ll bet they sit in the back and talk.


Mia Doi Todd
Manzanita
Plug Research, 2005

First she rocks, then she turns somber, and later still she channels reggae and lightens up; Mia Doi Todd is all over the place here and why shouldn’t she be. Her major label release for Sony, The Golden State, was supposed to deliver her to more people but it mainly seems to have amounted to an anecdote, Todd now back at an indie. In the meantime she seems to have gathered material for her strongest record yet. Not every song grows wings, but the ratio of brilliant to boring is shifting in favor of the former. While “Luna Lune” has me fumbling for the skip button, “Tongue-Tied” has me reaching for repeat. Just love the space and the handclaps on that one. Like Chan Marshall’s voice, which Todd’s resembles minus much of the affliction, emotion is born from emotional detachment. As it should be, it’s also a voice in demand, just try tracking down all its cameos.

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