RSSThe Drive-by Truckers' Pizza Deliverance (Soul Dump) designs a country music for low-lifes it sees as modern hillbillies. Raucous rather than slick, its rock feel uncompromised by the odd mandolin or banjo, the album is replete with tales of drunken indiscretion and murderous rage, of smarmy swingers and a guy who hooks up with a woman whose TV he steals only to rut after her daughter 13 years later. There's also The President's Penis Is Missing, which demonstrates a historical grasp not all of their characters share.
Modest Mouse's Building Nothing Out of Something (Up) isn't DIY, but mines an equally woebegotten genre: the indie 45 compilation. Yet this Northwest trio has such a consistent sonic signature that disparate songs hang together as if equipped with dovetail joints. Anyone who admires Pavement's combination of fetching tunes, dissonant guitar, and stop-and-go structures should give it a try. And guess what--they have a "real" album due on Epic.
Nobody's more DIY than a mysterious folkie who's been doing business as Baby Gramps for, some claim, 30 years. His very belated debut, Same Ol' Timeously (Grampophone), will be prized by specialists for an acoustic guitar style that reminds some of Ornette Coleman. Ordinary folks will love its Popeye imitation, worm medley, old blues and kiddie songs, and mind-boggling collection of palindromes.
Playboy, Jan. 2000
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Dec. 1999 | Feb. 2000 |  |