A more forceful Volcano Choir

My review of Volcano Choir, the weird mutant offspring of mega-indie star Justin Vernon and the Table of Elements vetted experimentaists in Collections and Colonies of Bees runs today at Blurt. Can you tell I used to be a drummer?

More explosive than 2009’s Unmap, this second album from the combined Collections and Colonies of Bees and Justin Vernon takes the machine-like intricacy of instrumental post rock, the airy spirituality of Bon Iver into a more forceful direction.

Like the National, Volcano Choir drapes its indie rock anthemry over unusually sharp and interesting drumming. Here’s its Jon Mueller, an intense and brilliant percussionist, one of the few drummers able, really, to carry a solo album. In Repave, Mueller seems to have moved slightly forward in the mix, not dominating, certainly, but putting his mark on nearly every track. Most of these tracks start in restraint, a drone and vibration building, a few beautifully realized sounds sketching mood and melody, a thread of vocals…and then explosion. Mueller is the force behind these volume shifts, an exhilarating push into overdrive.

More

I decided to review Repave after seeing Volcano Choir on Fallon (a video which is, sadly, not available anymore). Here instead is a concert that the band did for NPR about a week ago.



One more thing, when I saw Sam Amidon in September, he had just come off a show with Volcano Choir and he went off on a long riff about Jon Mueller the drummer. The essence was that Mueller looks just like Christopher Walken and also plays the drums exactly like Christopher Walken would, if he played drums. I think we can all think Amidon for the abiding image of Christopher Walken playing drums (with intensity, I imagine, slightly demented humor and weird, pause-filled cadences).

Cool stuff I won’t be reviewing…

I’ve been listening to a big pile of CDs lately, most of them too late, too obscure or too popular to be reviewed…I seem to be off for the month at Dusted, so maybe I’ll just start posting about them here.

Volcano Choir, Unmap…Bon Iver was certainly the most popular record on my last year’s best list, and to be honest, I felt a little uncomfortable being on the same page with all those hipsters, no matter how lovely the record was. Here’s the cure, a new collaboration between Justin Vernon and the very avant Collections of Colonies of Bees. It has the same ghostly falsetto as Bon Iver, but a more open-ended and freeform instrumental structure…very beautiful and strange. It’s on Secretly Canadian, which is giving away this mp3 of “Island, IS”


The Reigning Sound, Love and Curses…another great one from Greg Cartwright, mixed with a lot more emphasis on the melody than Too Much Guitar…this guy is one of the best musicians working right now, and damn, I’m only halfway through the first time before I start to think about reshuffling my top 10. The turning point was “If I Can’t Come Back,” BTW. Here’s a preview video.



Shannon Stephens, The Breadwinner...really wonderful songwriter album by a long-time friend and former band-mate of Sufjan Stevens (where has he been, anyway?) Out next month on Asthmatic Kitty.

“In Summer in the Heat”