|   No
Doubt that "Life is a Train", the first track from Maren Ord's new EP,
Not Today, is as wonderfully infectious and surging in rhythmic bliss as anything
I've heard recently. I purposely capitalized the 'd' in 'doubt' because it reminds
me of the best of that band, and Maren's voice even has the spunky jazz of Gwen
Stefani. What a blast this song is! I suppose the general idea has been done before
with Tom Cochrane's "Life is a Highway", but like that song dominated
the airwaves for a few months with it's catchy and upbeat musical tonic, so is
"Life is a Train" bound to carry me for a while in the boxcar of its
delight. I was going to have more of a "train" metaphor here, but that's
more than enough of that, eh?
So, I've mentioned Tom Cochrane and said
"eh", so we must be talking about Canadians, right? Well, I've always
loved a good chunk of Canadian music, what with Rush, the Tragically Hip, Neil
Young, BNL, Sarah MacLachlan, Leonard Cohen and so many other great artists hailing
from that country with the national anthem better than ours, so I'm only too eager
to acknowledge the Canadian-ness of this music if I can. That Canada's favorite
sport is hockey also endears it to me, though I'll never understand their love
of curling. But back to the subject at hand... To add to Maren's Canadian citizenship,
we have the producer of this collection, Mr. Randy Bachman, the singer and guitarist
for Bachman Turner Overdrive ("Takin' Care of Business" and that famous
Russian anthem, "You Ain't Seen Nothin', Nyet!") and one of my favorite
classic rock groups, The Guess Who ("Laughing", "She's Come Undone",
etc.). Bachman also co-wrote four of Not Today's six tracks with Maren, who wrote
the other two on her own.
Yes, there are only six tracks on Not Today,
so I suppose that would make it an EP (extended play), that curiously-lengthed
release that falls somewhere between an LP (long play) and an, uh, what's the
abbreviation for a "single"? SP, perhaps, for "single play"?
I don't know, and frankly I'm not sure if anyone even uses the terms EP or LP
anymore, but suffice to say that this isn't quite a full-length work. There's
nothing wrong with that, as sometimes it's better to have fewer solid tracks than
a bunch of filler that makes you reach too often for the little fast forward arrow
on your CD player, but you should know before you buy this that it's more of a
half-album than a full album. And it's about a quarter of the length of a double-album,
if that's what you were expecting, and I don't even want to try to compare it
to a box set. But I digress... It's long enough for what it is, okay?
The
second track, "Thanks for the Memories" has a driving rhythm propelled
by snappy drums, chugging acoustic guitar chords and a nice thick bass that pushes
everything along nicely. Another very catchy refrain, which is both good and bad.
Bad in that it builds up with a host of chorus voices and becomes something of
a cacophony. I've never been a big fan of Celtic music because although I can
appreciate the talent involved, after a while everything seems to sound like a
constant drone of noise to me, with violins wailing over and over in the same
rhythm. It makes me want to grab my head and open my mouth like MacCauley Culkin
imitating that "Scream" painting. And that's the effect this song has
on me after a while, which is a darn shame of the arrangement because the song
itself is wonderful and would have made a great track if produced a little more
gingerly. I find myself humming and singing the chorus of this song in my car
and at the regular singing engagement I have every morning in my shower, but after
hearing this recording a few times, I have no more desire to hear it in its recorded
version.
After the manic overkill of the "Memories" chorus, we
get more of the same with "Say Goodbye", but unfortunately with a less
memorable song. It starts promising with some jangly R.E.M. kind of guitar, and
then kicks into some heavy muted guitar riffs, but it's a lot of heaviness without
any real impact. And though the whole CD seems to have been mastered with the
now typical method of "squash and compress all of the dynamics out of it
just to make everything as loud as possible," this song is really the most
painful result of that. It's almost tiresome to listen to, even quietly. And I
like good heavy music as much as anyone, but it's got to be able to "breathe".
It's kind of hard to make a song out from all of the bombast, so although the
first two songs were clear winners (the 'Celtic chorus' of "Memories"
notwithstanding), this one just doesn't really work in any kind of affecting way
for me. This is very reminiscent of the heavier side of No Doubt, and Maren does
some typical vocal yodel breath gymnastics and again sounds very much like Gwen
Stefani. But without the kind of memorable hooks of No Doubt (and of the previous
two tracks), this is just too loud for its own good.
Next up is the mellower
"Hiding Place". This has a nice 80's style rhythm and guitar texturing
to it, and has some pleasing melody and chord changes. After the previous track
this is a welcome change-up.
The title track is next, and picks things
up again. This song has some funky guitar and band stops, and has a really nice
verse and pre-chorus, as Maren powerfully declares her determination not to let
someone get the best of her. This time, there is a catchy hook of Maren yodeling
(yodeling must be all the rage now, eh?) and though it is repetetive and also
includes a chorus of background singers, it's not grating like the "Memories"
chorus becomes. All told, this is a terrific song, and would probably be a big
hit for No Doubt.
Sorry to mention No Doubt yet again, but I can't help
but keep thinking of Gwen Stefani when I hear Maren sing on this CD, and I think
that's bound to be a problem in terms of her getting noticed and breaking through
as a unique artist of her own. But then again, it may actually help her to find
a bigger audience and get distribution from labels looking for "the next
Gwen Stefani". Of course, I'd much rather hear her sound like something more
unique when she sings, but singing is such a personal thing to develop that if
this is what she sounds like, then that may be what we get. She's got a powerful
delivery and some great tone to her voice, and she's proved that she can write
some very memorable songs, so I would really like to see her succeed, though with
this EP and her debut album she still hasn't reached the quality of music that
some of the hype I've heard about her had me expecting.
I do think the
collaboration with Maren and Randy Bachman was a successful one. At least three
of the songs are very memorably written and the execution and production is generally
top-notch. I do have to gripe again about the ultimate result in terms of the
overblown loudness, which is evident even on the mellow songs. There has been
a terrible trend in audio production over the past several years where every CD
master is fighting to be louder than the next, with the perception that louder
is better both on the radio (which is a fallacy due to radio compression) and
in comparison to every other album in your multiple CD changer. So many perfectly
good mixes are being squashed to the point where the audio file ends up looking
like a flat loaf of bread, and instead of having real dynamics and a pleasing
mix of tone throughout the tracks, the sound is tedious and wears on the ears
and the brain. I've got a nasty headache from listening to this CD a few times,
and that's even with the volume turned down considerably. I can tell that this
mix had a lot of nuance in the tones of the instruments and the arrangement, but
it's so much of the same loud blasting of everything for so long that it just
becomes a wash of compression and limiting. IT'S LIKE SOMEONE TYPING WITH CAPS-LOCK
ON ALL THE TIME. I know Maren is a great singer and songwriter, so I would like
to hear her more naturally, sonically speaking, without merely being hit over
the head with her music.
***
- three stars out of five
(Eric Endres) -----------------------
Eric
Endres |
