Review 1 of 6

thisglimpse writes:

Not Rated

When will music critics learn to write comprehensible reviews?

To comprehend David Fricke's review, you must listen to:

Radiohead - OK Computer (album)
Radiohead - My Iron Lung off the album "the Bends"
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Seventies Dixie-rock (whatever that is)
The Who - Happy Jack off the album "A Quick One"
Brian Eno
Mercury Rev
Soul Train (live music TV Show)
Pink Floyd - Careful with that Axe, Eugene, from the album "Relics"

Take out all that self-congratulatory "I know more about music than you do," nonsense, and the review reads like this:

My Morning Jacket, from Louisville, Kentucky, have been on the road to their [masterpiece album] for a while. A major lineup change on the way to Z apparently inspired My Morning Jacket's prime mover, singer-guitarist-songwriter Jim James, to mess with his template, to impressive effect. He is now writing actual pop songs, like the two and a half minutes of "What a Wonderful Man," which jumps and crackles. And there is an emphasis on keyboards, in pulse and architecture, that adds buoyancy and color to James' writing and flatters his keening, stratospheric tenor. The flutter and gentle bump of the electronics in "Wordless Chorus" bloom, with the addition of some tick-tock guitar, into something. In "Off the Record," the band's loose, rough strut dissolves into reggae-dub shadows, while the closing "Dondante" builds, explodes and expires: It's a long, riveting psychedelic death scene. Except James, as a lyricist, for all of his free-associative spray, is plainly focused on life and how to hold on to it. "Tell me, spirit -- what has not been done?/I'll rush out and do it," he declares in "Wordless Chorus."

Now - isn't that so much easier to understand? I feel like a I know a bit about the album now.

Now, if someone could explain to us what a music critic means by "actual pop songs" and "pulse and architecture"
Maybe us Joe Musiclovers could make sense of music critics' reviews.

Jun 12, 2006 15:42:49

Review 2 of 6

AngryEwok writes:

5of 5 Stars

There may be nothing more telling of My Morning Jacket’s music in both quality and diversity than the fact that, in just about every album review or biographical article, chances are the author will compare the band’s sound to both Radiohead and Lynard Skynard. While Mr. Fricke of Rolling Stone, among so many other reviewers, suggests that in MMJ’s latest effort, Z, the band still possesses “too much bluegrass” and “Lynard Skynard in the riffing” - I wholeheartedly disagree.

Unless, of course, you mean too much to be just like Radiohead.

I read these articles and reviews and wish I could ask the authors, “If My Morning Jacket were to release another album that sounded exactly like a production from Radiohead, would you be any less critical? Or would you criticize them for lacking a sound of their own?” Being a fan of My Morning Jacket, and being familiar with its entire discography - I can testify that criticizing My Morning Jacket for it’s hint of bluegrass sound (please keep in mind that the band originates from Kentucky), is much like criticizing Jim James’ vocals for being heavy drenched in reverb.

These very things that many reviewers seem to dislike about My Morning Jacket, are the very things that I consider a unique part of the band - it provides them a flavor of their own that, above all, makes them worth listening to above so many other bands. If you were to explore even My Morning Jacket’s earliest works, you would discover that the bluegrass flavor and heavy southern-rock riffing is not a recent development, by any means - and that beyond the directional change in production (compare the bands’ first album, Tennessee Fire, to Z), the band has very much stuck closely to its roots in essence…

To change that much about the band would be to change the band in a way that would rob it of its identity.

As an album, Z to flows nearly seamlessly and hypnotically from song to song, but is still classified in my mind into two parts. You find yourself spending the first half of the album in a complacent trance, until the 6th track, Into the Woods, wakes you up with a gentle nudge. This song stands, to me, as one of the band’s strangest ever. It’s an absolutely bizarre string of smooth sung lyrics atop an addictive circus-like theme and wailing steel guitar. The hallmark here is the men‘s choir at the end… It’s pretty whacky, but it does a good job of pulling you back into consciousness for the next track...

The next track, Anytime, takes the energy of the last track and runs with it - shaking you up and getting you moving with some of that awesome riffing the band is so well known for... This kicks off the second portion of the album, which I find markedly more fast paced and energetic.

The best visual I could provide as to the transition this album takes, is to describe the energy like that of a diabetic cat with a fresh shot of insulin - the album goes from cooing you into a trance, to providing you the source of energy to scale the walls and hang from the ceiling. The two halves of the album accent one another, and flow so well together that you don’t realize you’re at the end of your ride until you recognize the breakdown of Dondante - which is among the greatest songs My Morning Jacket has performed.

In closing, I find it hard to pin-point any specific track from this album that stands out as my favorite. The album’s transition works so well, that upon finishing the album, you often find yourself listening to it all over again - right from the beginning. It’s only on rare occasion a record does that to me.

-Brad Smith
www.TheArtOfBradSmith.com

Mar 28, 2006 22:06:58

Review 3 of 6

arthur40190 writes:

5of 5 Stars

Grand, accept, I disagree with that dumbass that told the first review.Off the Record is not the worst song, I dont undestand how you can say that. My morning jacket's Z, is a very good cd, but there are no shitty or weak songs. As a band, you can classify them with some little weaknesses, like they have too much bluegrass in their tunes. The only way a cd can have band songs is if the band sucks and that making the cd of "suckiness." There are no weak songs on the cd. My morning jacket has some "weaknesses", but thats it. The cd is a breakthrough hit. Even though im only 15, I think im making a pretty good fucking point.

Dec 27, 2005 21:52:11

Review 4 of 6

No Screen Name writes:

5of 5 Stars

This album gets better every time I listen to it. Honestly, it's just highly enjoyable on many levels. Musically,lyrically, vocally... And there is no body alive that can howl like Jim James and on Z I can't count how many times his bands creation sends chills down my spine. This is the sound of a band that always had the potential to be one of the best, actually doing it. The albums weakest track is "Off the Record", which pails in comparison to the rest of the album which comes up all aces. The Ok Computer of this decade? As crazy as that sounds, it just might be that damn good.

Dec 7, 2005 01:08:05

Review 5 of 6

Fathoms writes:

5of 5 Stars

This album gets better every time I listen to it. Honestly, it's just highly enjoyable on many levels. Musically,lyrically, vocally... And there is no body alive that can howl like Jim James and on Z I can't count how many times his bands creation sends chills down my spine. This is the sound of a band that always had the potential to be one of the best, actually doing it. The albums weakest track is "Off the Record", which pails in comparison to the rest of the album which comes up all aces. The Ok Computer of this decade? As crazy as that sounds, it just might be that damn good.

Dec 7, 2005 01:08:05

Review 6 of 6

marnr67 writes:

5of 5 Stars

Let “Alt-Country” be thrown in the closet full of shitty names that constitute pop rock—as with anything “alternative”. Jim James and his band of reverb addicts make the Frankenstein pop record of the year, that pulls away from the roots-y jams of their breakaway smash 2003’s It Still Moves. One can’t help but compliment the smooth-hum space vibes of The Zombies mixed in with Achtung Baby vs. Odessy and Oracle adventurism and Harvest–era Neil Young-style song structures through Pearl Jam-style sessions. After tramping around electronics for years, MMJ make a Sgt Pepper of sorts that acts on a comfortable non-all-consuming ambition. In that case, “What a Wonderful Man” is the uplifting paralleled anecdote of “Getting Better” here, and the creepy circus ride of “Into the Woods” compliments the all-too-familiar three-beat organ pulsation of The Beatles’ “Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite”.<p>

However Z, is not an all-world experience, it is purely an American journey, where the earthy roots-country is counteracted by the digital age. Albums like OK Computer tackle such a present and future with caution, social panic, and neurosis, My Morning Jacket welcomes this with open arms, and an ignorance-is-bliss chiseled smile. With a title like Z one would expect a destructive, perhaps an apocalyptic album, where the letter Z is the English equivalent to the Greek omega, endlessly symbolic of the end of all things. Perhaps in a move of irony and cheeky humor, Z is contrarily as stable and delightful as an unassuming, trippy PBS puppet show….with Barney and Big Bird playing razor edge blues guitars, and Animal wreaking all hell on his drum kits. If all this is, this is the most delightful and ironic album about the destruction of all things ever made. <p>

For its simplicity, one can sense of painstaking calculation. Sliding from the animation of U2 in the late 80s on their lead-off single, “Gideon”, into the slide guitars and tranquilizing piano line of “Knot Comes Loose” is, after all, risky business—James and the gang realizes this. They move cautiously and quickly, keeping it all in an easy forty-plus minutes. How they find time to extend into some captivating and pulverizing improv breaks and still feel cut short by the thirteen seconds of noiseless audio concluding the final suite, “Dondante” is beyond me. That signature at the end of this charming essay, is a bit misleading (there’s no empty-ness just annoyed confusion in that emptiness), but MMJ can get away with it.<p>

In all intents and purposes, Z could’ve been too much and alienated us in a narcissistic trip to the moon. All the echoes, space tonics, and low-fi Bonham drumming of this disc take me back to Soft Bulletin, which in contrast is bloated and empty in the faux-psychedelic, wall-of-casio-synthesizer sound it toys around with. That album (sorry Flaming Lips fans) is a freak-show circus. This on the other hand, is a grand ol’ opry, probably the grandest alt opry of 2005.

Dec 5, 2005 20:40:19