New music

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This article was published 31/10/2019 (2490 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

 

POP & ROCK

Neil Young with Crazy Horse
Colorado (Reprise Records)

It’s almost 2020 and we still have Neil Young making recordings.

This album, with a rejuvenated Crazy Horse, is the 39th by Young and follows the previous Crazy Horse release, 2012’s Psychedelic Pill. Young is in a rarefied zone shared only by other longtime never-quitters such as Van Morrison and Bob Dylan, and while Colorado is a reasonably fine-sounding set of songs, it in no way compares to any of the other high-water marks in the former Winnipegger’s catalogue.

Crazy Horse’s sound has always derived its specialness from the quartet recording mostly live in the studio in an effort to preserve its indisputable sonic clout in real time. Such is the case here, yet no songs really knock you on the head and pull you under the swirling waters of feedback and wallop as on previous Crazy Horse outings like classics Sleeps With Angels (1994) and Re•Ac•Tor (1981).

She Showed Me Love weighs in at a protracted 13 minutes-plus, and the band makes a valiant attempt at getting intense but ends up sounding bored. Olden Days and Shut It Down are both worthy grinders, to be fair, but any Young trainspotters will have to admit that Shakey’s guitar solos are running low on creativity. It’s like the pieces of the musical puzzle are all fitting together nicely, but you don’t really care what the final image will be.

Young’s recurring theme of ecological awareness is in full flow in the lyrics on Shut It Down (“What about the animals, what about the birds and bees, what about the bookshelves, what about history?”) and Green Is Blue (“We saw the polar bear, she floated on a piece of ice, from another time”), and newlywed Neil sings charmingly about fresh romance on Milky Way and album closer I Do. Colorado is worth a listen, but there’s really nothing here that significantly advances the legend.

★★★½ out of five

Stream these: Help Me Lose My Mind, Shut It Down

— Jeff Monk

 

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POP & ROCK

Richard Duguay
Bad Juju (Independent)

“In these troubled times, you must decide. Are you living or just killing time?”

That’s the cut-the-crap question posed by Richard Duguay in the opening monologue to Death Defy, the first cut from Bad Juju, his 12-song album released on Oct. 22. His own answer is clear. The former Winnipegger has hardly been killing time at Into the Black, his North Hollywood studio, where he has taken 45 years of guitar-based, guttersnipe rock ’n’ roll influences and distilled them into a hard-hitting, dynamic and dramatic magnum opus.

Bad Juju is a journey through the apocalyptic undercurrents of modern life, ebbs and flows that Duguay knows all too well. In his early days as guitarist with Winnipeg punks Lowlife and Personality Crisis, Duguay endured the hard-living, hardscrabble life of North America’s touring underground. His Vancouver and Hollywood years have seen him recording with the Gunners, flirting with major labels (and frustration) as part of several bands, touring as bassist with Duff McKagan’s solo band and, in recent years, becoming a self-reliant singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer, happy and determined to do things on his own terms.

For Bad Juju, Duguay transforms himself into the notorious Dr. Silver, an all-seeing shaman bent on finding salvation through wrecking-ball destruction of all that lies in his path. In this world, people firewalk through beds of fiery lies, are chased by the hounds of hell, wreck cars in futile death races and emerge from the journey, tattered and scarred, only to find that paradise is gone and the few lucky survivors must find their own paths home.

The album as a whole is a powerful metaphor, while its songs are individual scenes, expressed as densely packed, operatic rock ’n’ roll moods whose arrangements and musical layers reveal more and more with each listen.

It’s well worth the effort to seek this out. Find it at richardduguay.com.

★★★★ out of five

STREAM THESE: Death Defy; Dr. Silver; Paradise is Gone

— John Kendle

 

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JAZZ

Joshua Redman & Brooklyn Rider
Sun on Sand (Nonesuch)

Saxophonist Joshua Redman has released great quartet albums over the years, and his Winnipeg International Jazz Festival appearance in June was outstanding.

This album is a departure from the quartet format, as it features Brooklyn Rider, a groundbreaking string quartet obviously based in Brooklyn, along with two Redman colleagues: bassist Scott Colley and drummer Satoshi Takeishi. The music is composed and arranged by Patrick Zimmerli, whose work has straddled classical and jazz for years.

While having works performed at classical venues around the world, Zimmerli is also a winner of the BMI/Thelonious Monk Composers Competition. This collaboration therefore was almost a foregone conclusion. Indeed, the increasingly vague line between jazz and modern classical music is perhaps made even more vague here.

The overall mood is a swirling rhythmic dance with the partnership of strings and jazz trio a seamless match. The first bars of the opening track, Flash, are reminiscent of the opening track of Stan Getz’s classic 1961 album Focus, albeit with a quick development into a completely modern attack.

There are melodic and lush tracks, such as Soft Focus, along with strong uptempo romps. While leaving room for all his colleagues, Redman simply owns the music with soaring and intricate solos. I am impressed with Zimmerli’s arrangements (again, reminding me of Eddie Sauter’s work for Getz’s Focus). They truly demonstrate knowledge of the artists involved, as the music moves and shifts in total comfort with the strengths of all the musicians. I sincerely hope there are more collaborations in the future with this group.

★★★★½ out of five

Stream these: Flash, Sun On Sand

— Keith Black

 

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CLASSICAL

Angela Hewitt
Bach: The Six Partitas (Hyperion)

Ottawa-born pianist Angela Hewitt, who is hailed worldwide for her performances of J. S. Bach’s timeless music, has just released a new album featuring a full set of the baroque master’s six solo keyboard partitas. They further demonstrate not only her pristine artistry, but also enduring appeal for her legions of fans.

Having first ricocheted to international fame after garnering top prize in the 1985 Toronto International Bach Piano Competition, held in memory of the legendary Glenn Gould, Hewitt continues to perform around the globe, with her ongoing series of Bach recordings on the Hyperion label regarded pillars of the classical music discography.

In her latest offering, she articulates each of the six works’ tightly woven contrapuntal lines with precision, while bringing out the joyful dance-like quality in their respective courtly movements. Highlights include her assured delivery of Partita No. 1 in B flat major and No. 4 in D major.

She also tosses off their fierce technical demands with aplomb, including the cross-handed effects of Partita No. 1’s Giga, or dizzying figuration including lightning-speed scalar runs in No. 2 in C minor’s Capriccio.

Hewitt brings her renowned graceful sensibility to Bach’s more lyrical movements, such as during the Sarabande of No. 3 in A minor, replete with gossamer-light ornamentation, or its more dramatic counterpart, heard in No. 6 in E minor. The penultimate No. 5 in G major further showcases Hewitt’s luminous tone contrasted with her ability to instil strong rhythmic pulse into brighter dance styles, including its good-natured Passepied, which is delivered with gusto.

★★★★½ out of five

STREAM THIS: Partita No. 3 in A minor, Sarabande

— Holly Harris