Young Widows - Old Wounds

The drumming on this Young Widows album is unique because in essence it is very minimalist, but there is so much power behind it you don't really notice. Take the first track for example, Took a Turn. The drums come in nice and solid with a slow and steady rock beat, but Jeremy McMonigle chops it up and drops out parts here and there, accenting the few hits he makes. I found a Youtube video of someone playing the drums along to this part, and he does a great job of coming in and out at the perfect time, so you can see what I'm talking about.

The tension in McMonigle's playing is held in perfect balance with short bursts of release, it's like he's riding his drums at the rodeo and trying to keep them roped in the whole time. Every shot is so forceful and precise, there is not a hint of excessiveness in his playing.

He also has a keen ability to throw in things like quick cymbal chokes or off-time rhythms, and in 21st Century Invention we get a little taste of both. You can tell Jeremy is playing a set of drums with massive toms, and I hope that means we're starting to get more into the John Bonham style of a huge drum sound, rather than the trend of the mid-90s to have really tight, quick sounding drums. A drum has a tone and a decay people, and both sound fine if you record them properly. One thing is for sure, McMonigle is beating the piss out of his drums, and no matter how big they are, they sound like their 2 stories high.

I saw Young Widows at the Halifax Pop Explosion probably two years ago, and I saw them blow a roomful of minds. Most people were either there to see Canadian math-rock heroes Metz, or the wild band from Isreal everyone was talking about (Monotonix), but since then I hear mention of the Young Widows set more than either of them.

I hope someday you'll be at some random show where Young Widows is playing and when they start their first song you'll think, "Ok, this is pretty good, I'll stick around." And then they'll kick on their stage lights, and you'll feel like your being blinded by some post-hardcore alien spaceship, and for the next 45 minutes you don't know what the hell is going on, but it's awesome.

Maserati - Pyramid Of The Sun

While I already wrote about Jerry Fuchs' playing on the Maserati record Inventions For The New Season, it should be known that the new album, Pyramid Of The Sun has recently been released and is his last performance in studio before his untimely death.

The pulse and style of Fuch's playing is something that will resonate for years to come, and the band were right to take their time with the post-production on this record to make sure the quality of his drumming is matched by all other aspects of the recordings. He was a well timed, hard hitting, drumming machine, and he will be missed.

Go pick up this album and pay your respects.

Komeda - The Genius of Komeda

While it's fairly pompous to label yourselves geniuses on your own album, I gotta admit that this Komeda record is fairly infectious. I threw it on after finding it in a pile of junk CD's someone gave me, I figured I'd see if anything caught my interest before I dumped the lot of them. I noticed that the album was produced by Pelle Henricsson who had produced the masterpiece that is Refused's The Shape Of Punk To Come, so I figured I would give it a shot. Warm, lush indie-pop sounds hit my ears, reminiscent of other European pop bands like Stereolab and Laakso, but with a slightly darker twist. The songs take a steady rhythmic pulse and expand on it with jazz-like melodies and sultry vocals, a nice blend of everything.

Jonas Holmburg's drumming spans lots of styles, from the noisy straight rock beats on More Is More to the latin infused patterns on Rocket Plane (Music To The Moon) that build and swell with well placed cymbal crashes.

Boogie Woogie/Rock and Roll has a really cool New-Wave feel to it but with much smoother rhythms, Holmburg's playing never jolts you, it always feels very methodical. In Disko he takes a few bars to really play some cool off time shots, and they feel as organic as everything else.

Maybe I should have listened to more CD's in that pile before tossing them, I could have found a bunch of hidden gems.

Nah, probably not. One out of twelve ain't bad.

Most music sucks.

Joe Jackson - Look Sharp!

I got this album from my landlord when he found out I was into records. He brought Look Sharp! over one day while doing some light repairs. I was a little put off, but he seems to know his stuff, so I put it on.

It turns out I like Joe Jackson. Who knew? You probably like him too. We've all heard Is She Really Going Out With Him? on the radio time and time again, and if your into metal you might know Anthrax's version of Got The Time, the last song on this record. Think about it, Joe Jackson was a pale englishman in a suit and tie, and of all bands, Anthrax wanted to play his music. You can imagine he probably had his shit together. The hits on this album aren't even the best part, there's some cool stuff all over this record, and Dave Houghton is nice little drummer discovery I've made because of it.

As with most New-wave drumming, Dave Houghton's playing reminds me a little of Pete Thomas on this album, but a little more focused. I find he's locked in a little more. on Happy Loving Couples he keeps his playing really minimal, the bare essentials required to keep things moving. Sunday Papers has a cool sort of swagger to it, but Houghton keeps it tight so that it never steps out of line. and Throw It Away is just a balls out rocker with a 60's psych feel to it. Houghton beats the hell out of his drums and manages to nail the stop before the chorus as tight as ever.

Houghton's drumming is a prefect example of a melding of the very precise 50s style rock drumming and the more bombastic style of the early 70s. Baby Stick Around or Pretty Girls could have easily come from Buddy Holly without really changing anything but the volume of the playing.

Houghton really shows his stuff during a break in the title track Look Sharp! He gets about 8 bars of a solo in over a unaccompanied staccato piano line, and it's a brief glimpse of his speed and technique.

Dave left Joe Jackson's band in 1980 but eventually returned years later and has been with Joe ever since. If you get the chance to see him play some of these song, take it. His minimalist approach to rock drumming is rarely seen in finer form than on some of these songs.