Math Rock – Christian's Music Musings

A busy last week with two back-to-back concerts and time-consuming related posts, unfortunately, left me no choice but to push back this latest installment of my weekly new music revue, which usually runs on Saturdays. All featured songs appear on albums, released last Friday, June 17.

Foals/Wake Me Up

British rock band Foals were founded in Oxford, England in 2005. From their AllMusic bio: Foals emerged in the late 2000s with an off-balance indie rock influenced by catchy new wave, math rock, and atmospheric post-rock. It proved a successful formula; their first album, 2008’s Antidotes, reached number three in their native U.K. Over the next decade, they developed a distinctive balance between jittery dance rock and spacy atmosphere on albums such as 2013’s Holy Fire, 2019’s Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost, Pt. 1 and Pt. 2, and 2022’s Life Is Yours. The group’s current core lineup includes co-founders Yannis Philippakis (lead vocals, guitar, bass), Jimmy Smith (guitar, keyboards) and Jack Bevan (drums, percussion). Wake Me Up, credited to all three members, is the lead single of the above-mentioned Life Is Yours album. While it’s not in my core wheelhouse, the tune’s funky groove drew me in – reminds me a bit of INXS.

Hank Williams, Jr./Rich White Honky Blues

Randall Hank Williams, professionally known as Hank Williams, Jr. or Bocephus, is an American singer-songwriter and the son of country legend Hank Williams. During his childhood, artists like Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, Fats Domino and Lightnin’ Hopkins, visited his family. Not only did they turn out to be major influences, but they also taught young Randall various music instruments. Already at the age of 8, four years after his father’s death, Hank Jr. performed his old man’s songs on stage. In 1964, he made his recording debut with Long Gone Lonesome Blues, one of his father’s classics. By the mid-’70s, Williams, Jr. had stopped covering his dad’s songs and started to develop his own style, establishing himself with his 26th studio album Hank Williams Jr. and Friends. Williams, who is now 73 years, has released more than 50 studio albums to date. Here’s the title track of his latest, Rich White Honky Blues, a tune he wrote. The blues album also features various covers of songs by the likes of Robert Johnson, Muddy Waters and Lightnin’ Hopkins. After I had seen this album, there was no way I was going to ignore it!

Alice Merton/Loveback

Alice Merton is a German-born English-Canadian singer-songwriter. From her Apple Music profile: Merton was born in Germany, but she soon moved with her family to the United States. They later relocated to Canada before returning to Germany, where Merton finished high school. After a move to England, she again landed in Germany to begin studying songwriting. Before releasing “No Roots” [her 2016 breakthrough single – CMM], Merton contributed to the 2015 album The Book of Nature by the German duo Fahrenhaidt. After an EP in 2018, Merton released her full-length debut, Mint, in 2019. Described by The New York Times as a “rousing take on centrist 1980s pop with a disco tempo and the faintest texture of Southern rock,” Mint reached No. 2 in Germany and No. 3 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart in the US. Merton has described her influences as a mix of opera, indie-rock bands like The Killers, and the English singers Florence Welch and Sam Smith. This brings me to her new album S.I.D.E.S. and the opener Loveback – definitely a leap for me, musically speaking, but there’s something about it, and it’s okay to push beyond your comfort zone every now and then!

Fastball/Real Good Problem to Have

My fourth and last pick for this Best of What’s New installment is from the latest album by Fastball, The Deep End, which I almost missed. For the longest time, I had only known The Way, the group’s cool breakthrough single from February 1998. It wasn’t until a few months ago that I explored the Texan band’s music in greater detail. You can read more about it here. Fastball were formed in 1994 in Austin by Tony Scalzo (vocals, bass, keyboards, guitar), Miles Zuniga (vocals, guitar) and Joey Shuffield (drums, percussion). Remarkably, that same lineup remains in place to this day. The Deep End, Fastball’s eighth studio album, sounds great, based on what I’ve heard thus far. Here’s a sample, Good Problem to Have, written by Zuniga. Ironically, the title nicely describes how I increasingly feel when it comes to artists who are new to me: There are many more than I have time to explore!

As usual, following is a Spotify list that includes the above and some additional tunes.

Sources: Wikipedia; AllMusic; Apple Music; Discogs; YouTube; Spotify

This latest selection of newly released music marks a bit of a milestone: It’s the 50th installment of Best of What’s New. With one exception, the recurring feature has appeared each week since I started it on March 21, 2020. While I doubt any new releases can truly reach my favorite artists and songs from the ’60s and ’70s, it’s still encouraging to me that I keep finding new music I like. My picks for this week include contemporary jazz, indie folk rock, rock and a form of post-rock called math rock, a genre I had never heard of before! All tunes came out yesterday (March 5).

Gretchen Parlato/É Preciso Perdoar

Gretchen Parlato is a contemporary jazz vocalist. Her profile on Apple Music describes her as a forward-thinking jazz singer with an emotive, languid style and a bent toward mixing various musical influences into a modern creative jazz aesthetic. A California native, Parlato grew up listening to a variety of musical genres before focusing on jazz. In 2001, Parlato became the first vocalist ever admitted into the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance. Three years later, she won first place in the Thelonious Monk International Jazz Vocals Competition. Subsequently, she has appeared on a bevy of other artists’ albums, including recordings by bassist Esperanza Spalding, pianist Kenny Barron, and trumpeter Terence Blanchard, among others. Since her independent eponymous 2005 debut, Parlato has released five additional albums including the latest, Flor (Portuguese for flower). According to her website, Flor is a gorgeous synthesis of original material, American popular music, European classical music, and Brazilian standards. It exemplifies the many ways in which motherhood has reconnected Parlato to her own inner child, revisiting the enchantment of falling in love with music for the first time, particularly the various Brazilian genres she became enamored with as a young teenager. Here’s the opener É Preciso Perdoar, credited to Brazilian composers Alcyvando Luz and Carlos Coqueijo, and Parlato. Check out her beautiful vocals and the laid back groove of this tune. I love this!

Fruit Bats/The Balcony

Fruit Bats are an indie folk rock band around singer-songwriter Eric D. Johnson. The group was initially founded in 1997 in Chicago as a side project for Johnson who also led space rock group I Rowboat and played guitar in several other bands. Fruit Bats evolved into a band in 2001 when I Rowboat members Dan Strack (guitar) and Brian Belval (drums) joined Johnson’s project. They released their debut album Echolocation in September that year. Since then, the group has had many lineup changes, with Johnson as the only constant member. The Balcony, written by Johnson, is from Fruit Bats’ new album The Pet Parade, their eighth. While according to the band’s website, many of the songs were written prior to the pandemic, Johnson and the other musicians had to self-record their parts separated from each other at their homes. Yet everything came together quite nicely. Here’s the official video for The Balcony. The footage may be a bit creepy, but the music is quite catchy.

Kings of Leon/The Bandit

While the name Kings of Leon immediately rang a bell, I believe this is the first time I’ve actually listened to any of their music. Formed in Nashville, Tenn. in 1999, this rock band has been a family affair for the past 20-plus years. The lineup includes brothers Caleb Followill (lead vocals, rhythm guitar), Jared Followill (bass, keyboards, backing vocals) and Nathan Followill (drums, percussion, backing vocals), and their cousin Matthew Followill (lead guitar, keyboards, backing vocals). Initially, Kings of Leon enjoyed significant chart success in the UK before starting to gain similar traction in the U.S. with their fourth album Only by the Night. It peaked at no. 4 on the Billboard 200 and is their best-selling album to date. The Bandit, a tune from Kings of Leon’s new studio release When You See Yourself, is credited to all members of the band. “I really dug deep into my love of Townes Van Zandt and Willie Nelson and stuff like that,” Caleb told Apple Music. “I was like, ‘I’m going to write a song about a bandit, and then a bounty hunter who’s paid to find this man.’ In the meantime, they become such a part of each other’s life that they’re the two people that matter the most to them. The chase is more thrilling than the catch.” I have to say based on this great song, I’d like to further explore the band.

toe/The Latest Number

Let’s wrap things up with Japanese rock band toe, which were formed in Tokyo in 2000. According to their Apple Music profile, Toe are a primarily instrumental rock quartet…consisting of guitarists Mino Takaaki and Yamazaki Hirokazu, drummer Kashikura Takashi, and bassist Yamane Satoshi. Often categorized as post-rock or math rock, their free-flowing, highly melodic songs feature splashy yet tightly controlled drumming and dynamic guitar interplay, as well as occasional electronic elements and additional instruments such as vibraphone and Rhodes piano…Restless live performers, Toe have toured at home and abroad with bands such as the Album Leaf, Mogwai, and Envy, in addition to notable appearances at festivals such as Japan’s Fuji Rock Festival. Having established their jazz-influenced instrumental sound with several EPs and full-lengths such as 2005’s The Book About My Idle Plot on a Vague Anxiety, Toe incorporated more vocals on later releases such as 2015’s Hear You. The Latest Number appears on the band’s new live album ‘DOKU-EN-KAI’ that captures a 2019 gig at Le Poisson Rouge in New York City. The tune was first included on a 2018 EP titled Our Latest Number. As such, technically, it’s not exactly their latest number. But it’s on a newly released album, and that’s good enough for me. Plus, how often do I get to write about Japanese rock bands? And they’re not just some band from Tokyo; these guys are remarkable musicians!

Sources: Wikipedia; Apple Music; Gretchen Parlato website; Fruit Bats website; YouTube