Jordan Pruitt
No Ordinary Girl (1 star)
Ashley Tisdale
Headstrong (1 1/2 stars)
This is what Radio Disney hath wrought: a song called “Who Likes Who” on No Ordinary Girl, the debut album from 15-year-old Disney-approved singer Jordan Pruitt. Simply a litany of people's crushes that sounds like a sequence of begats from the Bible, it may very well be the most inane song ever written, but it's also a near-perfect distillation of the air-brained concerns that Disney sells to teens and tweens through its pop-star factory and TV movies like High School Musical. Pruitt's version of rebellion crops up on the song “Teenager,” in which she asserts her right to do naughty things like talk on her cell phone and hang out with her friends at the mall. Pruitt wasn't in the insanely popular High School Musical, but Ashley Tisdale was, and her debut, Headstrong, is nearly as mind-numbing as Pruitt's, only with a higher profile and some more prominent songwriters and producers. The two blondes share pop-diva ambitions and disingenuous attempts to keep it real, as well as clichéd song titles (both musically profess to being “Over It”). Pruitt is a little more low-key, with mostly guitar-driven tunes in the Avril Lavigne mode, while Tisdale embraces club beats, prom-ready ballads and a more mature tone (she's 21 to Pruitt's 15). But both of them brag about their hotness (“All the girls in the club got their eyes on me,” Tisdale boasts on “Not Like That”) while simultaneously claiming to be outsiders (Pruitt's first single is “Outside Looking In”), covering all the bases and moods of the tween girls who make up their audience.
As terrible as they are, it's hard to think of these albums as anything more than insubstantial, forgettable confections, despite their occasional sexual overtones. If we're lucky, they'll act as musical gateway drugs, leading their audiences to more accomplished pop, even if that means taking a Hilary Duff detour along the way.
– Josh Bell
Dean & Britta
Back Numbers (3 1/2 stars)
A website I came across incorrectly identified the upcoming release by former Luna pair Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips—the latest in indie wet-dream duos—as a “covers album.” In fact, only three songs are covers (Donovan's “Teen Angel,” Lee Hazlewood's “You Turn My Head Around,” and The Troggs' “Our Love Will Still Be There”), but in terms of overall aesthetic the description isn't so far off: Back Numbers plays like one giant cover version (a mash-up, if you will) of a very particular sound and period, one best typified by the records Hazlewood made with Nancy Sinatra in the late '60s. The details of this aesthetic—the swirling merry-go-round choruses, the wide-open orchestral folk-rock sound, the hazy feeling of innocence slipping just beyond one's grasp—are adhered to with extreme diligence. So much so that it occasionally mutates into mere kitsch (“Crystal Blue R.I.P.” inspires hallucinations of a Saturday Night Live David Lynch parody).
That said, it's a great aesthetic to build a franchise on, and the fact is I'm seduced by the quiet majesty of these songs, the sterling arrangements of producer Tony Visconti and the he-said/she-said track sequencing, a tiny conceptual coup that really works (even if what she says is inevitably of more interest than what he says).
– Scott Woods
Explosions in the Sky
All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone (3 stars)
The Texas quartet best known for contributing songs to the Friday Night Lights film and TV franchise suddenly sounds as if it intends to punctuate touchdowns by dousing the gridiron with gasoline and igniting a stadium-sized bonfire. Fourth proper album All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone appreciably ramps up the tension of previous efforts, evidenced by the menacing rumbling at the start of aptly titled leadoff track “The Birth and Death of the Day.” Explosions in the Sky's instrumentalists are still new to the whole apocalyptic fury bit, however, and the group has a ways to go if it hopes to match the weighty impact of post-rock peers like Mogwai or Godspeed You! Black Emperor. At times, as on 13-minute centerpiece “It's Natural to Be Afraid,” the three-guitar soundscapes boil up slow-burning turbulence before climaxing in storms of noisy rapture. But in other spots, such as the piano-aided “What Do You Go Home To?,” ominous strains never pay off, feeling too much like unfinished ideas.
The EITS boys might try listening to the six artists who rework All of a Sudden for an expanded-version bonus disc, particularly electronic maestro Four Tet (Kieran Hebden), who lights up the scoreboard by wrapping “Catastrophe and the Cure” in warm IDM tones without sacrificing any of its intensity.
– Spencer Patterson
The Frames
The Cost (4 stars)
You might only know The Frames for their lead singer, Glen Hansard, who played the shaggy, red-haired guitarist Outspan Foster in The Commitments and currently can be seen in the Sundance award-winning movie Once. But if that's your only frame of reference, check out his band's sixth album, and second release on indie imprint Anti-, to find out why they've been critical darlings in Europe for years.
The Irish quintet has drawn comparisons to countryman Damien Rice for its moody meld of folk, rock and atmospheric bombast, and The Cost delivers with understated elegance balanced with bursts of gut-punch gusto. The first single, “Falling Slowly,” doesn't jump through the speakers the way some other tracks will, but its subtle strings and Hansard's delicate falsetto reward repeated listens.
That's followed by the hypnotic drone and soaring vocals of “People Get Ready,” and the showpiece of the set (recorded live in-studio), “When Your Mind's Made Up.” The driving rage of the rhythm section and a caustic guitar lick complement the contempt in Hansard's voice on a track that's as cerebral a kiss-off as you'll ever find.
–Patrick Donnelly
Trans Am
Sex Change (3 stars)
The mostly instrumental songs on Trans Am's new album are, for the most part, decidedly retro. A lot of them sound like they should have been played during the credits of some long-lost John Hughes movie. You can totally see Anthony Michael Hall doing the robot to these tunes, in an era before The Faint existed. There are also moments that share musical DNA with, say, Herbie Hancock or Melle Mel and Grandmaster Flash's “White Lines.” The trippy “North East Rising Sun,” meanwhile, is closer to Pink Floyd, and “Conspiracy of the Gods” and “Triangular Pyramid” are the kind of head-banging numbers Mike Patton could have whipped up for one of his many projects.
So even though Trans Am (perhaps the closest thing indie rock has to a veteran jam band) can sometimes lull you into a stupor, you have to admit that these guys have range. And this album has its share of shimmering moments, especially on “4,738 Regrets.” Like much of Mono's best work, this song takes you through a range of emotions without any words at all. You hear dejection and hopefulness, and then you hear joy and hope, and for a few glowing minutes, Trans Am sound decidedly modern.
– Andy Wang