It’s not every day that I get a music recommendation from my parents.
Certainly, my exposure to some of the greats — Frank Sinatra, Bob Dylan, Carly Simon, Carole King — is thanks to their influence when I was a kid. And my mother famously introduced our family to Billy Joel (or, as she referred to him, Billy Joe).
But since I turned 15, I can probably count on one hand the number of musical artists they’ve sent my way. I might not even need the one hand.
In my post on Guster’s new album, I praised their willingness to stretch their sound and try new things. On the opposite side of that spectrum is Ron Sexsmith, who just released his 13th album (in 24 years).
Not much distinguishes Carousel One from the dozen albums that preceded it. It’s packed with smart, melodic pop that’s equal parts The Beatles and Elvis Costello. A winning formula, to be sure, and one Sexsmith has never abandoned.
Like yesterday’s featured artist, Josh Rouse, Guster is a moderately popular indie act that has quietly amassed an impressive discography. The band’s new album, Evermotion, is their seventh.
This record finds them a god distance, sonically, from their early work even as the songwriting sticks to the same tried and true folk pop formula. Guster’s calling card in the late 90s was acoustic guitars and stick-free percussion, a very lo-fi organic vibe. Evermotion, in contrast, is synth-heavy — almost distractingly so in some cases.
I’ve spent the past couple of weeks exploring the new Courtney Barnett album, but it’s not the only new record I’ve picked up recently. I won’t go through the others track by track, but I will give them some love the rest of this week.
I’ll start with Jose Rouse’s The Embers of Time. This is Rouse’s 11th studio album in 16 years — he’s a lot more prolific than I give him credit for.
And so we reach the end of my 11-day discovery of Courtney Barnett’s album, Sometimes I Sit and Thing, and Sometimes I Just Sit. As I suspected, the final song on the album is a short one, juxtaposed with the nearly 7-minute epic that preceded it.
No clue what it will sound like (yet) and based on the blend of styles on the album so far, I’m not sure I can even venture an educated guess.
