Robert Christgau: Dean of American Rock Critics

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This was originally published as exclusive content, in Robert Christgau's And It Don't Stop newsletter. You can have Christgau's posts delivered to your mailbox if you subscribe.

Consumer Guide: April, 2024

A blatant genius given to unassuming meditations; one of rap's most eloquent; a bootleg (gone legit) documenting a definitive band becoming such; and musical intelligence vs. the world falling apart.

BKtherula: LVL5 P2 (Warner) Do I repeat myself?/Very well then, I repeat myself/I am cute, I purvey pulchritude ("Tatti," "Woman") **

Buck 65, Doseone, Jel: North American Adonis (Handsmade) Initially brainstormed by injury-plagued Nova Scotian Yankee signee turned quick-lipped Anglophone rapper Richard Terfry a/k/a Buck 65 and Idaho-born Anticon cofounder Adam Drucker a/k/a Doseone, a version of this album was put aside by both principals circa 1998 as they focused on CBC talk radio and US alt-rap respectively. But now they've revived it decades later with beats that had to be reconceived because the originals got lost and lyrics that needed light refurbishing, like when Kendrick Lamar goes Anticon. For a while I winced at the congenial introductory "North America is where the United States of America is." Now I smile every time I hear it. Not just white but Canadian for Pete's sake, Buck 65's two-part hip-hop career makes him one of the most eloquent rappers ever. Of course hip-hop is quintessentially African-American, actively resisting the racism that remains such a poison in the land of the not so damn free. But these two prove it's also so adaptable it can make a fella hope if not always believe that we'll get on the other side before we all go down in infamy or up in smoke. A

The Cucumbers: Old Shoes (self-released) A couple and a band since 1983, so long ago their baby son Jamie Fried is now their drummer, Hoboken lifers Deena Shoshkes and Jon Fried report that they worked hard on their new although not therefore unfamiliar acoustic sound while spending the pandemic "drinking tequila and waiting for a little spark." Of course the seven songs that resulted are lightweight--that's been their sonic signature forever. They're also stalwart, as after three decades of marriage comes naturally. But their tunes are so fetching and distinct that designating them melodies would miss the point. A MINUS

The Damned: The Best of the Damned (Big Beat) A little late, I admit--going on half a century after Britpunk's heyday, actually--an album by this well-named, overpraised band songful and rocking enough to play three times and squeeze into the A shelves ("Jet Boy, Jet Girl," "New Rose," "Hit or Miss") ***

Dan Ex Machina: Ex's Sexts (self-released) Both hooky and disgruntled and he wants you to know it ("I Just Want to Get Your Mother High," "Oldest Prick in the Book"); **

Four Tet: Three (Text) Electrophonic background music in his all too well-established mode, though I do have a weakness for the cat, I think it is, who sneaks into the studio while he finally finishes the thing off ("Daydream Repeat," "Loved") **

Kim Gordon: The Collective (Matador) Textural rather than hooky, midway between hard rock and cacophony hence closer sonically and conceptually to classic post-grunge Sonic Youth than not just 1990's major-label debut Goo or 2006's idiosyncratically tuneful Rather Ripped much less 1998's polemically if all too fleetingly connubial A Thousand Leaves. Those put off or feeling contrary have every right to slot this one as a noise album, but if so it's a striking and courageous one. When Gordon is so inclined she can be songful enough, and here "enough" stretches that parameter a little. But her natural avant-garde affinities not only dominate the musical gestalt her solo work tends toward, with melodies not to mention tunes given short shrift. And here, unlike so many avant-gardists, she achieves what is recognizably her own sound. A MINUS

Heems/Lapgan: Lafandar (Veena Sounds) "How does my accent sound when I'm crying?/How does my accent sound when I'm dying?" the Flushing-raised Punjabi-American half of Wesleyan-spawned rap legends Das Racist wants to know. Aiming his first album in seven years at a novelty market so callow it "wasn't born when I saw those buildings vanish kid"--and to be clear, said buildings were the twin towers, their collapse all too visible from Stuyvesant High School, to this day one of the choicest public education venues in the five boroughs. His rhymes so smart and funny if not therefore so coherent, his flow making the most of its own race-specific New York accent, Heems remains a pleasure to hear. I doubt either Stuyvesant or Wesleyan can figure out what to make of him, and sometimes I'm not so sure what I make of him myself. But he was always fun and still is. A MINUS

Adrianne Lenker: Bright Future (4AD) There's a fragility to the 31-year-old Big Thief chief's solo album that seems to disorient admiring contemporaries who can't figure out how to reconcile her blatant genius with her sweet, thoughtful, unassuming meditations. "I don't feel strong," she whispers or murmurs or reflects as she recalls being a seven-year-old whose dream was to invent a portal that would enable her to soar "high over the crowd" while at the same time not really knowing "where I'd go without you." Which is to say that high among many other things this transcendent collection of poetic melodies is a breakup album. If you missed the point somehow, she acknowledges simply "I don't know what I'd do without you," because when it comes down to it "I wanna be your lover and I want to be your man"--or is it just "I wanted to be the one/That you could understand"? Truth is, in her insuperably melodic way, she wants it all. But she'd rather stick to being be lovely than make a big deal of it. A

The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis: The Messthetics and James Brandon Lewis (Impulse!) Forty-one-year-old tenor sax man melds his jazz wares with hardcore-identified bass-and-drums two decades older than that as all three work (plus guitarist Anthony Pirog) at proving that beat music needn't swing to groove its loud ass off ("That Thang," "Fourth Wall") **

Rail Band: Buffet Hotel de la Gare (Mississippi) Discographically I'm somewhat hornswoggled by what would seem to be the fourth U.S.-available album by this government-supported or do I mean state-railroad-supported Malian band, not least because legendary lead vocalist Salif Keita, an albino not to be confused with the football star of the same name who died last September, is said to have retired decades ago. But I can responsibly report that there's a relaxed yet impassioned feel to this particular collection that achieves a simple sweetness I don't find on the Rail Band CDs I'm happy to have acquired over the years. For Afropop adepts only, you could say if so inclined. But also an excellent reason to get on board. A MINUS

Sonic Youth: Walls Have Ears (Goofin') As a respectful-to-admiring skeptic as regards what steadily evolved into the quintessential NYC postpunk-as-"rock" band, I initially skipped this highly unofficial circa-1985 U.K.-performed and -released live bootleg. Little did I realize that it documented a crucial shift, from stalwart drummer Bob Bert to definitive drummer Steve Shelley, not as crucial a presence as Keith Richards, say, but as we look back at almost as essential as they evolved into the definitive band they remain even with Kim Gordon gone the separate way she had every right to. Now fully aware of what was to become of them, I find the very crudity that put me off slightly in the '80s a crucial part of their heritage. It's in my cart at Amazon as I write. A MINUS

Vampire Weekend: Only God Was Above Us (Columbia) The intricacy of both their music and their thematics are evidence of this NY-to-LA quartet's well-manicured skill set. Absolutely they rock; absolutely they think as well. About what they do so remains not so much murky as diplomatically inexplicit, pretty much unacknowledged when they get down to cases only somehow they never quite do. The first words Ezra Koenig utters here are "Fuck the world," but that's a feint. They've always assumed that their brief was to make said world a better place. Problem is, now it may just be falling apart instead and that worries them plenty. "Your consciousness is not my problem/And I hope you know your brain's not bulletproof," they declare intricately, not least because they're smart enough to be concerned about their own brains as well. Good luck to them, and to all of us. Here's hoping celebrations of musical intelligence will help a little, because that much and not a lot else they're clearly still good for. A MINUS

Waxahatchee: Tigers Blood (Anti-) At 35 going on 40 (when did that happen exactly?), Katie Crutchfield still can't catch a romantic break while continuing to nurture an untextured vocal affect that sounds not teen, too practiced and thought through for that, but direct, unvirtuosic. Even now, she reminds her male singing partner, "I imprint all your ideas on mine." Yet the guy remains "a wrangler keeping the pace/Hunting for open space," leaving Katie's heart "strung up like a flag" and she herself "too weak to just let you drown." Good metaphor, gal. Take it as literally as seems meet--you know very well that's what he deserves. A MINUS

And It Don't Stop, April 12, 2024


March 20, 2024 May 15, 2024