Eels
Soul Jacker
Dreamweavers
HHHH 1/2 (of five)
The Eels are more commonly known as "the band that sings that one song." That one song usually refers to "Novocaine for the Soul," "My Beloved Monster" or "Mr. E's Beautiful Blues." Mention their albums like Daisies of the Galaxy or Electro-Shock Blues and you'll probably be met with a lot of blank stares.
Since the early 90s the Eels' front man (better known as E) has been releasing his music. The Eels' first album, Beautiful Freak, was released in 1995 and contains some of their best music to date. With that album, they began to garner a reputation as a poppy blues band, a label they are likely to shake with Souljacker.
Excluding their recent live CD, Souljacker is the band's first release since signing with Dreamworks, and their style has changed noticeably. Most notably, the band has reverted back to the synthesized style found prominently in Electro-Shock Blues, but combines that style with an upbeat tempo. It's like E found Prozac and his angry style of blues is drowned out by the sounds of the mellotron and stylophone.
These are apparently instruments that E plays on the album, or he just made them up to add to an impressive list of instruments he recorded for the album. As much as I enjoyed the old Eels, if they released another album with the feel of the first three to complete my four-disc changer, I'm pretty sure the combo would have prompted my suicide within the week.
If you haven't given the Eels a listen yet, this album is probably the best one to start off with. It lacks a bit of the emotion found in previous recordings but makes up for it with a guy in the background yelling "aw yeah!" when needed. And if you know anything about music, you know the "aw yeah!" is often needed.
On top of everything else, the first shipments of this CD include an extra 4-track CD with "Rotten World Blues" on it. The poetic melodies that made the Eels famous are as strong as they have ever been and the lyrics are just as blunt. While the last album had "It's a Motherfucker," this one has "World of Shit," so take your pick.
While the album is fantastic, the only drawback is that it seems to have lost some of the rawness of previous efforts. It's kind of a double-edged sword in the music industry, you're either sloppy or overproduced, but this album falls toward the latter. That notwithstanding, the album is a must have for all fans of the Eels, blues or rock.
Reach Josh Deahl at josh.deahl@asu.edu.
Chris Isaak
Always Got Tonight
Warner Bros.
HHHH (of five)
Chris Isaak has always been the guy who almost, but not quite, made it big — the talented singer/songwriter with the croon that made girls swoon. You occasionally hear one of his few hits on the radio and think, whatever happened to that guy?
Evidently he was making music. Always Got Tonight, Issak's new album from Warner is a rich and strong collection of new songs. It may be the album to finally push him over the edge into the full-blown stardom that has always eluded him. It's that good.
The album is slickly produced, with heavy instrumentation on some of the tracks, but Isaak's voice, the true appeal of his music, always comes through strong, clear and confident. Isaak knows he has a good batch of songs here (impressively, he has written them all himself) and he belts them out with plenty of passion and just the right degree of restraint.
Isaak has a gift for a simple but catchy melody, and his ringing guitar is beautiful, a lovely counterpart to his voice, which sounds especially gorgeous on ballads like "Life will go on," "Courthouse" and "I See You Everywhere." In addition to ballads, the album offers plenty of straight-ahead rock 'n' roll tracks, the best of which, "One Day," kicks off the album with plenty of juice.
This is the perfect album to throw on in the morning while having your coffee and reading the paper. It's also great road trip music, windows down, wind in your face, sunlight streaming though the windshield.
If Isaak has one thing working against him, it may be that his record company does not know how to market him. He doesn't fit into any of the under-25 categories so precious to music marketers. And he's not quite ready to be pigeonholed onto the light rock stations, where one time rock 'n' rollers like Don Henley and Elton John have been relegated to finish their careers.
The fact that the songs probably won't get much radio play makes it even more vital that listeners seek out this album, now in stores. If you are a fan of good music, no matter what genre you particularly patronize, you will enjoy Always Got Tonight.
Reach Michael Green at starbury@cox.net.
