ShareThis"BARE BONES," Madeleine Peyroux (Rounder)
Madeleine Peyroux's breakout 2004 release "Careless Love" was like a new attraction at a theme park: Her saucy jazz stylings, wry personality and complex voice delivered a fresh kind of excitement at just the right time. But if "Careless Love" was a thrill ride, 2006's "Half the Perfect World" was more like a cozy recliner in which to snuggle and fall into a dreamless nap: unstimulating, albeit comfy.
Peyroux's new "Bare Bones" still has a recliner-like feel to it, though now there seems to be some deep-massage apparatus installed so the singer can throw the switch periodically to get her listeners' circulation going.
Aided by Peyroux's droll declaratives plus charismatic piano and brushed rhythm, the new song "To Love You All Over Again" recalls the character of the "Careless Love" track "Don't Wait Too Long." And her languid new "Damn the Circumstances," which pits shimmering vibes against her heartbreaking tones, has an air similar to, but not as good as, her penetrating remake of Elliott Smith's "Behind the Bars," featured on "Careless Love."
"Bare Bones" offers other somewhat paler approximations of Peyroux's past highlights. She swaggers through opener "Instead," dispensing pointers for positive thinking, and she throws cute jabs on a more upbeat "You Can't Do Me." Her sometimes-cockeyed perspective is still intact (Peyroux co-wrote every song on the new release), and she sings lines such as, "Without your love and treachery, the calm is all I feel."
Most importantly, Peyroux's singular voice -- mysterious, wrenching and multifaceted -- is solid, even if she seems hesitant to share its many dimensions on the new release.
All in all, "Bare Bones" isn't magical, though it's a decided improvement on Peyroux's 2006 slump.
Rating (five possible): 3-1/2
"BLUE LIGHTS ON THE RUNWAY," Bell X1 (Yep Roc)
Bell X1 is showing a little tarnish with its new "Blue Lights on the Runway," a step down from its previous "Flock."
The Paul Noonan-led Irish band still displays much of the artistic brilliance it revealed with "Flock." "Blue Lights on the Runway" makes creative use of layered elements of epic rock, progressive rock and electronica. And Noonan is a stylishly diverse front man, honing a singular perspective with a variety of methods of vocal delivery and a complicated set of lyrics that are multidimensional and trans-emotional.
The sometimes-big sound may prompt listeners to compare the trio with much larger theatrical bands like Broken Social Scene or Arcade Fire, though Bell X1 bears more blatant similarities to Radiohead during its slower, electronic-oriented cuts and Talking Heads on the vivacious tracks "The Great Defector" and "One Stringed Harp" (both of which find Noonan doing a dead-on David Byrne).
There are tales of heartbreak, such as the sunny-on-the-surface opener "The Ribs of a Broken Umbrella," and other, less-subtle times, as when Noonan sings, "You're so pretty, and I'm so lame" on "Breastfed." Mostly, however, "Blue Lights on the Runway" mixes it up, making a sexy/creepy brew of "How Your Heart Is Wired," for instance, and underscoring the darkly sedate "The Curtains Are Twitchin' " with a New Orleans horn section that gradually rises to the surface.
Yet the rewards of Bell X1's sonic adventures are tempered by the fraying of focus that occurs with the gratuitous and protracted drifting of "Breastfed," "A Better Band," "Amelia" and "How Your Heart Is Wired."
Bell X1 is still enlightening with "Blue Lights," but its purpose is dimmer.
Rating: 3-1/2
"RE: GENERATIONS," Nat King Cole and various acts (Capitol/EMI)
"Re: Generations" proves that just about anything can happen when a producer repurposes a classic tune.
The compilation features 13 Nat King Cole songs revamped by an army of contemporary producers, including Cee-Lo of Gnarls Barkley and will.i.am plus members of The Roots, TV on The Radio and Brazilian Girls.
A few semi-tragedies resulted, including Cut Chemist's butchering of Cole's vocals at the end of "Day In Day Out," The Roots' inept song-ending fragmentation of "Walkin' My Baby Back Home" and TV on the Radio's transformation of "Nature Boy" into amped-up ambience.
But in general, even those who manhandle Cole's original material make it oddly interesting, as when cosmically surrealistic overhauls emerge in the orbiting layers of Cee-Lo's spin on "Lush Life," when Nas knifes a swaggering rap into the zip of a Salaam Remi-produced take on the peppy "The Game of Love" and when Brazilian Girls process the tango of "El Choclo" into an echoing romp. And the obscure "Pick-Up" is given a droll boost with Just Blaze's addition of sassy female retorts to Cole's lines.
The collection also triumphs with its more authentic-sounding tracks, such as will.i.am's jumping take on "Straighten Up and Fly Right" -- featuring the infusion of scat singing by Cole's daughter, Natalie -- and a "Brazilian Love Song" that ingeniously incorporates the vocals of Brazilian singer Bebel Gilberto, courtesy of the collection's executive producer, Michaelangelo L'Acqua.
The point of "Re: Generations" is that Nat King Cole's cool endures when his work is treated reverentially.
Rating: 3-1/2
(E-mail Chuck Campbell of The Knoxville News-Sentinel in Tennessee at Campbell(at)knews.com.)
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