Litvar, Being Here (self-released)
As anyone who’s ever tried to achieve it knows, going internet-viral in a positive way through a song or a TikTok isn’t nearly as easy as becoming infamous for doing or saying something so stupid that it goes viral simply for setting all humankind acringe simultaneously. Luck is a major factor in that nonsense; years ago I lost track of all the doomed-to-obscure songs I’d encountered that were so good they actually rewired my head, so nowadays I’ve just accepted the fact that some artists couldn’t buy a break for all the wintergreen Skoal in Alabama. Add this Connecticut-based Americana-meets-emo band to that tragic list: Four years ago these guys released a single, “No One Tastes Like You,” that combined the jangle of Tom Petty’s “American Girl” with Hoobastank’s face-punchiness, and amazingly no one’s heard about it. In this one, instead of throwing up their hands and going in a straightforward emo direction like most bands would have, they want to be Goo Goo Dolls-ish, which works half the time and not the rest. The songs are fine, but more layering and another couple of months futzing in the studio would have added more to the songs; this feels like a demo for label interest, which it may well be, and if that’s the case, then bravo. B–
Stare Away, In Absence (á La Carte Records)
Oh, how this New York City dude (Ben Nelson) wants it to be the ’80s again, not that anyone could blame him when there’s so much corporate-designed, 3D-printed suckage in the pop sphere. Problem for Nelson is that the goth-rock world has, for better or worse, a massive array of sounds to choose from nowadays and therefore doesn’t need a teardown-rebuild; it’s not enough to try sounding exactly like The Cure, which this record accomplishes during its first four songs, with quite a bit of verisimilitude over the first two, droning churners that are fast and kind of neat but start wearing out their welcome when it becomes obvious not a lot is going to happen. Then along comes the fifth entry, “Midnight Martyr” (oh come on already, goths, for once, try not to sound like you get all your ideas from early Aughts manga comics), in which Nelson remembers that he loves Depeche Mode too, oh, and Dead Or Alive’s “You Spin Me Round,” let’s go disco! At least his heart is in the right place, OK? B-
PLAYLIST
A seriously abridged compendium of recent and future CD releases
• And on we trudge to the new CD releases of Friday, Aug. 14, what am I even doing, I’ve only been to the beach once this summer, what about you? I’m kind of surprised I haven’t been alerted to any upcoming new holiday albums yet, but there’s still time, 134 days to be specific, until Christmas, will there even be one this year, or will we be randomly bombing the Zagros mountains totally winning the war in wherever-it-is again that week? It’s too early to tell, but what I do know is that we have albums to discuss, starting with Comes In Waves, the 24th album from one of America’s most well-known nepo babies, Carly Simon, daughter of Richard, co-founder of publishing giant Simon & Schuster, don’t you love how giant piles of money can make someone into a famous singer even though their voice sounds like an ostrich yelling for saltines? No, I do have to hand it to her, though; even though Carly is at the stage of her career when most of her formaldehyde-pickled A-list peers are doing all-duet albums with people like Engelbert Humperdinck and Ed Sheeran and Pope Leo XIV and actual Santa Claus, this album is just another one in which she palms off a bunch of songs she actually wrote or bought or whatever she usually does, like the only guest feat is from Andreas Vollenweider, a Swiss guy who won a Grammy for playing the harp at yoga conferences or whatever his deal is. But all snark aside, I always liked some of her songs, “Haven’t Got Time for the Pain” in particular, and she’s still a very good songwriter, evidenced by the new single “Howl,” sounding as 1970s-radio as ever aside from Carly’s voice, which is about 80 percent gone, like she sounds like a female Willie Nelson, not that she doesn’t have every excuse for that.
• Cool, let’s keep it going with something else that doesn’t actually suck for once, the new one from Pasadena, California, folktronica lady Phoebe Bridgers! The record is called Lost Weekend, and it showcases the multiple Grammy winner at the top of her game; she started out with Brooklyn-based avant-rock band Sloppy Jane before hatting out on her own, which led to feats on tracks from Taylor Swift, The Killers, Kid Cudi and others. So yeah, folktronica, indietronica and guitar-tronica tuneage usually rubs me the right way, and that goes for the sample track from this one, “Lost Boys,” a joint that combines Fleetwood Mac and acoustic-mode Taylor Swift, powered by a chorus that’s so lush and wide it almost makes me want to say nice normal things. She’ll be at TD Garden in Boston on Oct. 6.
• Aaand so much for this week’s streak of decent songs, but your mileage may vary with regard to You Say I Romanticize, the new LP from Sweeping Promises, a female post-punk duo originally from Boston and now based in Kansas. This new album features a song called “Cocoon,” which will make you think of early Cars, Lydia Lunch, New Order and Gang Of Four all at the same time, or at least it did to me. It’s grungy and slovenly and angular enough, which is nice, but there’s a Pavement element that turned me off. They’ll be at Deep Cuts (formerly Carroll’s) in Medford, Mass., on Nov. 6.
• We’ll put a bow on this week’s mixed bag with Australian chanteuse Grace Cummings, whose influences include Irish folk music, Townes Van Zandt, Bob Dylan and Lucinda Williams in case you’re curious (I’m sure none of this stuff sounds like any of those people, that’s what always happens). Bloodhorse is the album, the push single is “I’m Not Crazy,” just imagine Lana Del Rey trying krautrock on for size and you’ll know whether you can stand it or not, I certainly can’t.
Featured Photo: Litvar, Being Here and Stare Away, In Absence
