popwreckoning

Collaboration albums tend to be hit or miss with ratings and reviews, and this collaboration is no exception. Sure, there are some albums, like Alisson Krauss and Robert Plant’s Raising Sand that are wonderful, not to mention collaborative projects like The Liquid Tension Experiment that are musical genius, but pairings like Eminem and Elton John make most audiophiles cringe. Lonely Avenue is a great collaboration between Ben Folds and Nick Hornby and is definitely one of the best collaborations I have ever stumbled across.

Ben Folds is known for both his solo work and the work of Ben Folds Five, the band that started out of nothing and topped indie music charts for a good chunk of the mid-to-late 90’s. After breaking up, Folds pursued a solo career, touring the country and charming audiences multiple times over. Nick Hornby is a British author who is famous for his groundbreaking novels, such as High Fidelity and About a Boy. Combine these two great artists and you have an album that just screams for attention, attention it deserves to the highest degree. Filled with both complex lyrics and breathtaking music, the entirely of Lonely Avenue is a masterpiece from start to finish. It doesn’t pull punches and leaves you gasping for air, for the very meaning of everything and anything, and leaves you wanting for more.

The lyrics are completely Hornby through and through- reminiscing on life, touching on sports, love, being a guy and everything that entails. Captivating as his literature and screenplays, the songs bloom with the kind of down-to-earth and heart-wrenching passion that many aficionados have come to expect from his novels. There’s a little something for everyone and singing along to the addictive tunes is not a challenge at all, as the hooks are definitely there in spades. Not at all unlike Folds’ previous lyrics, they still hold a lot of the raw emotion that his lyrics tend to convey, just a with a twist that is all Hornsby.

Couple this with the legendary genius of singer-songwriter Benjamin Scott Folds, Ben to the rest of the world, and you have one hell of an album. Heavy on piano and other more orchestral sounds, it piggybacks on the sound that Folds’ has been building for years- indie alternative rock with a tiny bit of old school jazz (no doubt leftover from his musical education at University of Miami’s Frost’s School of Music) and some seriously classical structure. Beautiful tunes spill forth to entice you in a time when things weren’t so good but they weren’t so bad either- the times when all of us were young and thought we knew how to conquer the world. From dance songs about young love to the bittersweet ballads of heartbreak, the album is perfect from start to finish.

From wonderful lyrics to the signature sound that accompanies the name Ben Folds on an album, this is a perfect fall release to grab. Pick it up tomorrow, September 28th and check out the entire album streaming live at http://www.myspace.com/benfolds

Track Listing:

1. “Working Day”
2. “Picture Window”
3. “Levi Johnston’s Blues”
4. “Doc Pomus”
5. “Your Dogs”
6. “Practical Amanda”
7. “Claire’s Ninth”
8. “Password”
9. “From Above”
10. “Saskia Hamilton”
11. “Belinda”

Website: http://benfolds.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/benfolds

Welcome back, readers!  Last week we noshed on Sacramento’s finest CAKE and had ourselves a little e-ball (well, I sure as hell did.  You may have too).  This week’s post was about as contrived as an unplanned pregnancy scare considering I recently stumbled upon Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore‘s 50 First Dates, their second RomCom collab since The Wedding Singer (one of my all-time favorites), and I definitely drew inspiration from it.  In fact, the movie was surprisingly enjoyable and dare I say cute as hell.  Normally, I enjoy the RomCom’s that require you to think with a more intellectual heart (See: High Fidelity, About A Boy… basically, anything that was once a Nick Hornby novel), but this no-brainer’s killer soundtrack effortlessly kept me from hitting the power button off.  Maybe it was the fact that the movie takes place in beautiful Hawaii, but the entire soundtrack consists of sunny cover versions of songs that were originally recorded in the 1980s.  If this weren’t intriguing enough, all the delightful interpretations are upbeat and of the reggae and/or ska persuasion.  What?  My once hepcat ass was reeling as I made it through the movie cataloging which songs they chose for each scene.  It’s a good thing the film was actually worthwhile because if it was half as awful as I’d originally suspected, 50 First Dates would have climbed very high on my “Movies That Should Have Gone Straight To Soundtrack” list.

Considering the fact that my 50 First Dates viewing pleasure was recent, I did not have sufficient time to properly listen to the entire soundtrack, so you know what that means.  Yes, this will be a 2-parter.  And what better way to satiate my readers than kicking things off by getting the heavily commercialized 311 cover of The Cure‘s “Lovesong” out of the way.  And to the folks at home, mahola nui loa for reading…  and, as always, stay tuned.
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The Cure’s “Lovesong” (original: 1989)
Quasi-Cure fan, über-Cure fan or just plain musically oblivious, I could probably never have a meaningful friendship with someone who has never, at the very least, heard this classic love song.  You’re probably looking at a superficial connection at best.  Hell, the chances of a potential relationship would basically be DOA, too.  Yeah, that’s really a testament to how incredible this song really is.  Written for then fiancee Mary Poole as a wedding present, lead singer Robert Smith once again sets the relationship bar very high for clueless men who think half-assed pick up lines will do just fine.  I’ve read that Poole not only inspired “Just Like Heaven” as a friend, but got “Lovesong” too… just for being more than his friend!?  Sigh, what an honor.  “However far away, however long I say, whatever words I say, I will always love you…” Damn, that’s romantic.  And a much more eloquent way of assuring your lady that you won’t cheat on her when your band is on tour, no matter how much boy band ass is lined up outside the tour bus.  Teenage Twi-hards probably think Robert Pattinson is responsible for putting the brooding, British male on the map.  Ahh, silly youth of today.  I wholeheartedly disagree since Smith’s been making a career out of this for several decades and probably looks twice as good in guyliner than Pattinson.

311 – “Lovesong” (cover: 2004)
Don’t you love it when a reggae-meets-alt-rock band like 311 scores a #1 hit on the Modern Rock Track chart with a Cure cover when the original only made it to #2 on the same chart back in its heyday?  WTF?  Just another non sequitur of the modern music world that makes it hard to keep the faith (or whatever’s left of said faith) alive.  In keeping with the tropical, ethereal feel of the movie, lead singer Nick Hexum takes things down a notch with a slower-paced, melodic “Lovesong” that fits in seamlessly with their catalog of easy, breezy stoner surf-rock.  I expect nothing less than relaxing reggae-rock from the band that brought us the beautifully hazy “Amber,” a song that practically serves as the musical equivalent to laying in a hammock in an island paradise.  This Cure cover is dripping with heavy mood and contains all the same longing, yearning, promising, and professing of the original.  The shreds of guitar cut through the track like a knife, the bass line could lull the sleepless better than Ambien, and Hexum’s lazy vocals calm the stormiest of souls. If a pot-smoking couple is looking for a song to soundtrack that fleeting moment when you are admiring your significant other’s sparkly eyes and dilated pupils in the moonlight (regardless of the fact that his/her inability to yet master the “puff, puff, pass” etiquette grates on you), this lovely song is probably as good as it’s going to get.