New music: Kim Petras, David Virelles, The Japanese House, Baseball Project

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This article was published 14/07/2023 (1146 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

POP

Kim Petras

Feed the Beast (Republic Records)

Better late than never, and surely worth the wait. Fifteen years after launching her music career, the German singer Kim Petras has released a glossy, full-length major-label debut, filled with Eurodance and trance-informed pop music.

Not to say that the delay was her fault, or that she hasn’t been hard at work. This year, Petras became the first openly trans artists to win in a major category at the Grammy Awards for her playfully sacrilegious collaboration with Sam Smith, Unholy, in the best pop duo/group performance category. The same song, re-released as a bonus track on Feed the Beast, went No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, making her the first trans artist to occupy the top spot.

So why the postponement? In 2021, after signing to major label Republic Records, Petras recorded a debut LP titled Problematique — but it was scrapped, and ultimately, leaked. In the interim, she reimagined herself a student of Eurodance and ’90s house music. Lead single Alone, featuring a punchy verse from rapper Nicki Minaj, is the exemplar: she samples the 1999 Alice Deejay hit Better Off Alone, appealing to Y2K cultural nostalgia for vocal trance and neon nightlife.

Throughout Feed the Beast, Petras demonstrates a deep understanding of the many nuances of hi-hat-heavy, club-ready anthems. Even the slow burn Thousand Pieces is recorded over a trap beat. As Petras sings on Uhoh, “Everything I drop is a banger.”

At the centre of Feed the Beast are two sex-positive synth-pop stompers: Sex Talk and Hit It From The Back, tracks that strike like an R-rated take on Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream era — up-tempo pop tunes meant to earworm their way into the listener’s heart and transgress in equal measure.

The influence of Perry appears again on the campy Coconuts, a summery ode to her chest. That’s likely because much of Feed the Beast was produced by Dr. Luke, as was the case with Teenage Dream.

For all the fun and flirtiness of Feed the Beast, there is a subtle restraint. Electric songs ripe for the dance floor burn bright and fast — a sprint, not a marathon — and lack the kind of edge listeners have come to expect from Petras. Where are the explicit, breathy harmonies of 2022’s Slut Pop EP? The Madonna-worship of Broken from 2021’s Do Me? Her entertaining hedonism persists, to be sure, but how long will it resonate?

Across 14 original tracks, Kim Petras’s beast has been fed — and hopefully soon, it will be unleashed. ★★★½ out of five

STREAM THESE: Thousand Pieces, Alone

— Maria Sherman, The Associated Press

JAZZ

David Virelles

Carta (Intakt Records)

Cuban-born pianist David Virelles first performed in Winnipeg as a teenager with Jane Bunnett’s Spirit of Havana band at the West End Cultural Centre. Bunnett was his mentor and bridge to North American jazz. His English was fairly rudimentary then, but his playing was absolutely not. Since then Virelles has moved into an important part of the wider jazz world especially in the current interpretation of “Latin” jazz.

The underlying rhythms and mood of Virelles’ music are unmistakably Latin jazz influenced, but within a fabric of very complex and modern harmonies that enhance it in unexpected ways. His trio on this album has Ben Street on bass and Eric McPherson on drums. Together they explore terrific tunes that move all over the range of tempos and mood.

Confidencial has an engaging melody that moves through dissonant riffs over a slow Cuban beat. The title track, Carta, begins with quiet maraca-like shakers before settling into a slow and gentle melody that once again has complex harmonies.

Tiempos has perhaps the most familiar Latin jazz opening statement before it too allows Virelles to add more and more depth and dissonance to the rhythmic base. It’s a great track that is familiar and new all at once. That basically describes David Virelles.

The rhythmic complexity is evident on many tracks that, like Island and El Tivoli, display Virelles’ wonderful creativity. The music is refreshing and entertaining while in fact reaching ahead in the development of Latin jazz.

The whole trio here is in perfect sync. While Street’s bass is a full participant, McPherson’s drumming is essential to the messages and scope of Virelles’ compositions. This is modern jazz that works perfectly at several levels and continues Virelles’ challenge to any idea of acceptance of earlier ideas about Latin jazz. He is now eloquent in every way. ★★★★½ out of five

STREAM THESE: Lamento Taino, El Vitoli

— Keith Black

POP

The Japanese House

In the End It Always Does (Dirty Hit)

More than four years have passed since the first studio release by Amber Bain, known professionally as the Japanese House. Her second album, In the End It Always Does, was conceived in a burst of creativity after the disintegration of a relationship. The result is a sweetly melancholic chronicle of a cycle of falling in and out of love, and a celebration of the dog who got her through it.

The album slides smoothly between dreampop, ’70s-infused folk rock and a half dozen other genres to fit comfortably into an emergent London sound alongside artists such as Arlo Parks and Etta Marcus. Bain produces and writes or co-writes all of the songs, and plays nearly all of the instruments, including bass, guitar, keyboard, piano and percussion.

George Daniel of the 1975 and Chloe Kraemer share production credit. The 1975’s Matty Healy adds production, vocals and guitars on some tracks, and Muna’s Katie Gavin sings on one. But this album is largely the product of Bain’s singular talent and vision, and she establishes coherent musical and emotional themes.

The opening track, Spot Dog, sets the rules on Bain’s terms, blending analog instruments with intermittently heavy production and distortion. It is slow to resolve, starting with jazzy piano noodling, and adding in other instrumentals that search for and usually find their melodies.

Sad to Breathe highlights the extent of her toolkit. It starts soft and simple but confidently layers rhythms and complex instrumentation under the chorus, “it’s sad to breathe the air when you’re not there.” Throughout the album, lyrics are consistently simple, devastating and relatable.

Sunshine Baby is a lovely bit of summertime sadness with bright instrumentals and wistful delivery. She sings, “I don’t know what’s right anymore/I don’t wanna fight anymore,” but finds her grounding, “Sitting by the seafront/Lying with my sunshine baby.” (Sunshine is her nickname for her dog.)

The homestretch features a trio of songs that are reminiscent of ’70s artists such as Rickie Lee Jones and Joni Mitchell. But feather-light Auto-Tune manipulation places them squarely in the present, in an uncanny valley specific to current anxiety over what is real and what is AI.

The final track and emotional core of the album, One for Sorrow Two for Joni Jones again comes full circle with her most faithful companion: “No one’s ever gonna love me like this dog lying on my lap,” and it’s easy to believe that little Joni Jones is enough for now. The album closes with a soft click — maybe a door closing, maybe a stylus reaching the end of a vinyl LP — and the circle has been completed. ★★★★ out of five

STREAM THESE: One for Sorrow Two for Joni Jones, Sunshine Baby

— Jim Pollock, The Associated Press

Baseball Project

Grand Salami Time! (Omnivore Recordings)

Baseball’s anthem Take Me Out to the Ballgame was crafted by two Tin Pan Alley songwriters who had never attended a game. By contrast, the tunes on Grand Salami Time! come from a band with extensive knowledge of the sport.

The album is the fourth by the Baseball Project, and the group — Scott McCaughey, Steve Wynn, Linda Pitmon, and former R.E.M. members Peter Buck and Mike Mills — mines nostalgia and esoterica to find fresh subject matter for 16 songs.

We’re talking inside baseball: a tribute to pitcher Jim Bouton makes a veiled reference to his career record of 64-64. The song New Oh in Town salutes Japanese heroes past and present. Screwball cleverly merges two subjects as it recalls players who pitched more than a century ago.

Most topics are paired with garage rock that gives Buck a chance to serve up some delightful guitar squall. Also contributing is co-producer Mitch Easter, who worked on R.E.M.’s early albums.

The band finds room for such contemporary clatter as launch angle, exit velocity and WHIP, but the best songs involve a different kind of analytics. The bluesy Erasable Man laments the colour line, while the acoustic folk of That’s Living contemplates life’s short season.

As on previous albums, a few lyrics could use a sports editor, or any editor. “Eight-hundred-sixty-eight longballs would fly” just isn’t singable. But no band bats 1.000. ★★★★ out of five

STREAM THESE: Erasable Man, Screwball

—Steven Wine, The Associated Press