Chilly Gonzales – A Very Chilly Christmas
The caustically witty Canadian pianist returns with a timely take on 2020's strange festive season, giving traditional carols and some pop covers with an icy, sad, melancholy hue by playing them solo in minor keys. This is particularly effective on Silent Night and Jingle Bells, We Three Kings meanwhile already has that eastern minor, desert feel. Meanwhile there's a rather dark hilarity in this method towards the George Michael and Mariah Carey numbers Last Christmas and All I Want For Christmas Is You, stripping back all the hair, glitz and glamour of the original hits, showing how underneath the ice, they are rather beautiful tunes. Chllly is also helped by old friend Feist and Jarvis Cocker, who contribute three songs, including Snow Is Falling In Manhattan written Silver Jews frontman David Berman, who sadly left us earlier this year, the sole new number, The Banister Bough, with a beautiful, bittersweet vocal by Feist. Throughout this album is a mischievous melancholy makeover that is profoundly moving. Out on Gentle Threat.
Chilly Gonzales - Snow Is Falling In Manhattan (feat Jarvis Cocker and Feist)
Mark Lanegan – Dark Mark Does Christmas 2020
The gravelly voiced Lanegan follows up May's release, Straight Songs of Sorrow, with a second for the year, but this time in the guise of 'Dark Mark', as if he doesn't do dark enough already. Six of these tracks were originally released on a now very rare 12-inch in 2012, and there are now four more to make this LP. The theme is twist traditional Christmas numbers, and covers, and stir in some originals and with darkness and melancholy, banjo and guitar. It is certainly the year for it. Standouts include O Holy Night, The Cherry Tree Carol, Burn The Flames, Down In Yon Forest, originally recorded by Roky Erickson making a sinister song even more sinister. The Everley Brothers Christmas Eve Can Kill You is hauntingly stripped back, while the Lanegan original A Christmas Song is delicate and heartbreaking.
Mark Lanegan – Down In Yon Forest
Drive-By Truckers – The New OK
Another apposite 2020 title and wistful, but very likeable stuff from the southern-alt-rockers from Georgia, releasing additional tracks to create a whole new album after sessions that made The Unraveling, the one they had hoped to tour throughout 2020 when it was released in January. A familiar story for the year, but something else good has come out of it here. Other tracks to enjoy include Tough To Let Go, Sarah's Flame, Watching The Orange Clouds, and The Distance. Out on ATO Records.
Drive-By Truckers – The New OK
Marie Davidson & L’Oeil Nu – Renegade Breakdown
Earlier this year, title track was highlighted on our New Songs section, but the album was eventually released in the autumn, a clever mix of disco, house, funk and pop with a dash of rock guitar by the trio L’Oeil Nu, three old-time friends and long-term collaborators with shared roots in Montreal’s DIY scene – Pierre Guerineau and Asaël R. Robitaille alongside singer Marie. Other standout tracks include Worst Comes To Worst, the slow, melodramatic Back To Rock, and influences as diverse as Fleetwood Mac, Kraftwerk, Billie Holiday and Chet Baker. Out on Ninja Tune.
Marie Davidson & L’Œil Nu - 'Worst Comes To Worst'
Kacy & Clayton and Marlon Williams – Plastic Bouquet
Canada meets New Zealand in this collaborative folk-country-psych-pop debut between Kacy and Clayton from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan and the Christchurch singer-songwriter Marlon Williams. There's a dreamy 50s and 60s vibe to this lovely release as their voices switch between and sometimes within songs. Standout tracks include I Wonder Why, Your Mind's Walking Out, Old Fashioned Man, Light of Love, the Hammond-based I'm Unfamiliar, and the country-style ballad title track. Out no New West Records.
Kacy & Clayton and Marlon Williams – I Wonder Why
Beethoven – The Creatures of Prometheus
It would be remiss not to flag up something during, and even close to the 250th anniversary of the great composer's birth, and from a year of various recordings, The Philharmonia's release of Beethoven's only ballet suite comes with a novel and rather fine mixture of media – footage of Esa-Pekka Salonen conducting the score, interwoven with a narration by Gerard McBurney, drawn from the ballet’s synopsis, and spoken by that accessibly high-minded voice of clarity and narration, Stephen Fry, alongside illustrations with animations by Hillary Leben. A tale of creation on so many levels, this mixture of story and music is wonderfully engaging, enlightening, ethereal and entertaining.
Philharmonia Sessions – Beethoven's Prometheus
Oh! Gunquit – Why Haven't You Watered The Plants?
The London-based sci-fi surf-punk rock'n'rollers formed by American singer Tina Swasey and British guitarist Simon Wild return with another fabulous LP to match their superbly entertaining stage shows. Dirty sax, scorching surf riffs, throbbing bass, Tina's stylishy sneering, sleazy drawl alongside echoes of Dick Dale to The Cramps and the B-52s - it’s all there to be enjoyed. Standout tracks include Last Day On Earth, Whiplash, Attack Of The Killer Cranes, Commander Salamander and The Splank! Out on Oh! Gunquit.
Oh! Gunquit – Last Day On Earth
The Puppini Sisters – Dance Dance Dance
With the flavour of another era entirely, a new dozen deliciously delivered numbers by the impeccably smooth and dexterous vocal trio of Marcella Puppini, Kate Mullins and Emma Smith backed by Pasadena Roof Orchestra are just the uplifting tonic this unusually downcast season of 2020 requires. This new LP's theme turns elegantly around a variety of traditional dance styles, but every cover is given a quintessentially classy twist, just like the perfectly served martini. Standout tracks include a variety of swing jazz, Latin and more versions of well known numbers from Dolly Parton's 9 to 5, Whitney Houston's I Want To Dance With Somebody, the 1940 Italian number Ba Ba Baciami Piccini, originally by sung Alberto Rabagliati and later Rosemary Clooney, and the finale – Dee-Lite's Groove Is In The Heart. As ever, giving familiar songs a special icing and look, a menu guaranteed to lift spirits and stretch limbs. Out on Millionaire Records.
Puppini Sisters – Groove Is In The Heart / I Wanna Dance With Somebody
Dylan Henner – The Invention of the Human
Released in late summer, this absorbingly odd album by the British electronic artist is a series of instrumentals with pleasingly quizzical titles, such as I Was Reading The News But Was So Sad I Had To Stop, A Racoon Cut Loose In The House And Fell Asleep In The Laundry, or Little Frogs Swam By Every Now And Then. Water is a running theme - appropriately then this an album that needs gradual immersion to enjoy its strange, ambient world, gradually soaking in for increasing enjoyment. As Henner puts it, in a sophisticated human civilisation, but also troubled, miserable world, his approach is: "Taking the thought of man's relationship with technology as a measure of humanity, I asked the computer ‘what do you think a human sounds like?’, and with that I built this album of synthesised vocals, wondering if technological development can help explain what we are." It certainly delivers a refreshing voice. Out on AD 93.
Dylan Henner – Little Frogs Swam by Every Now and Then
This week's selection is by The Landlord.
New to comment? It is quick and easy. You just need to login to Disqus once. All is explained in About/FAQs ...
This is only a selection of recommended listens not a catalogue of releases nor full reviews. Feel free to recommend more and comment below. You can also use the contact page, or find more on social media: Song Bar Twitter, Song Bar Facebook. Song Bar YouTube, and Song Bar Instagram. Please subscribe, follow and share.
Please make any donation to help keep Song Bar running: