Getting Out of Having Gotten Out

People have trouble pigeonholing The Avett Brothers' (myspace) sound, which is good, but resort to calling them stuff like "prog-folk" or "grunge bluegrass," which is bad.  Despite surprising tonal shifts and an emotional rawness - they keep so much on-their-sleeve that they're likely to need a few extra pairs of arms before long - there's nothing on their latest album, Emotionalism, the least bit impenetrable or off-putting.  If you like the earnest, bright pop of The Format, you'll like this too.  They're forthright, upfront, but not in your face.

The acoustic North Carolina threesome - vocalist siblings Seth (guitar) and Scott (banjo) and upright bassist Bob Crawford - isn't the most technically proficient, but the songwriting is generally strong(*) and the arrangements often put things in opportune and interesting places.

The Avett Brothers - Salina (mp3) (buy)

The best song on the record's probably, improbably, "Pretty Girl from Chile," in which a concerned ballad is transformed via voice-mail to celebratory faux-Latin rock-out.  But "Salina" - which ends in a sad piano trio daydream - is just purdy.  You could be sitting in the house you'd been raised in, surrounded by all the friends and family you ever had, wearing your warmest, fuzziest pair of socks, and this song'd still make you homesick for wherever these boys wish they was.

(*)There are plenty of great lines - "She's fighting with the sky" ("Die die die"), "Could you add some somewhere to me?" ("Salina") - but "The Ballad of Love and Hate" (ugh) starts off with "Love writes a letter and sends it to hate." And that's about all I can stand of that song before I skip to the next track.  It's the sort of line that has me reaching for a bucket.  Gag factor five!  Remember that old story where War sits down next to Peace on a park bench and says, "What a stupid fucking scenario this is!"  That old story?

*

Rough day?  Been at the PC so long yer woogie has atrophied?  Get over to AOL - yeah, I know! - where they're streaming the first third of Norton Records' digital-only - yeah, I know! - singles collection, I Hate CDs.  It ain't doin' nothin' but The Rock and Roll, and while it's not all as weird and greasy as Jack Starr's "Chicken," it mostly is.  (The Dictators and Ramones tracks are the most polished.)

Yeah, I know!

So stream the first fifteen tracks, then download the whole crazy crazy lot at Amazon.

Also:  Norton's hosting a big Xmas to-do at Southpaw with Mary Weiss and the Reigning Sound, The Mighty Hannibal, and the ever-lovin' Much, Much More.  All the righteous fun you can fit under one roof.  No Sufjan Stevens!  It's December 15th, and tickets are here.

tags: avett brothers  norton records  

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