Music Library: Okkervil River, Ol' Dirty Bastard, Old 97's, Olivia Tremor Control

Okkervil River - Don't Fall In Love With Everyone You See (2002), Down The River Of Broken Dreams (2003), Sham Wedding/Hoax Funeral EP (with Shearwater, 2004), Black Sheep Boy (2005), The President's Dead (2006), and The Stage Names (2007). Okkervil River is a band that I like but do not love.  I wish it were otherwise, especially now that they have added the ultra-talented Lauren Gurgiolo to their line-up. Actually, that is unfair, as I have heard nothing from the new album, which the one she plays on. I might love it. These albums, unfortunately, have not given me much of an incentive. I really like Down The River of Broken Dreams, which sounds like a kaleidoscope version of some amalgam of The Band and Neutral Milk Hotel.  The next few albums and EPs, though, give me diminishing returns down to The Stage Names, which moves me not at all.

Ol' Dirty Bastard - Return To The 36 Chambers: The Dirty Version (1995). Yeah, this is fun.

Old 97's - Wreck Your Life (1998), Fight Songs (1999),
Satellite Rides (2001), and Blame It On Gravity (2008). Like Wreckless Eric, The Old 97's are a power pop band masquerading as a flavor of country.  As a power pop band, they are pretty good if never hands-down great.  As an alt-country outfit, they're a bar band.  The best of these is Satellite Rides, which abandons most of the country for some pure pop hooks.

Olivia Tremor Control - Music From The Unrealized Film Script, Dusk At Cubist Castle (1996), Explanation II: Instrumental Themes And Dream Sequences (1996), Pre-Cubist Castle Demos (1996), The Opera House EP (1997), John Peel Session 3/18/97, Live At Terrastock 4/27/97, Live in Chicago 5/1/97, Live In Atlanta 11/22/97, Live At The Emmaboda Festival (1998), Black Foliage: Animation Music (1999), Live In San Francisco 4/23/99, Live in Toronto 11/5/99, tracks from Smiling Pets (1999), "European Son," and Presents: Singles And Beyond (2000). As this list might indicate, I love the hell out of The Olivia Tremor Control. Dusk At Cubist Castle was a favorite way back in 1996, when I was just starting to figure out the greatness of the Beach Boys and quite into 60s psychedelia in general. I enjoy OTC's forays into electronic weirdness, too, although too much of it at once can tip it into boredom.  All of these live bootlegs are somewhere between fun and disposable, though.  The OTC is best at studio-level production.  If you're just looking for one or two albums, I think you will be plenty happy with Dusk At Cubist Castle and Singles And Beyond. Leave the rest for fanatics.

At The AV Club: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Episodes 2.9, 2.10, and 2.11

In which I review three great episodes before our TV Club Classic Avatar coverage goes on hiatus for a few months.

At The AV Club: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Episodes 2.7 and 2.8 plus Masterpiece Mystery: Inspector Lewis

In which I review "Zuko Alone," which is my favorite Avatar episode, and "The Chase," which is pretty well close.

In which I review the latest episode of Inspector Lewis.

At The AV Club: Avatar: The Last Airbender, episodes 2.5 and 2.6

In which I review the mediocre "Avatar Day" and the excellent "Blind Bandit."

Music Library: O Bando, Jim O'Rourke, Obsessed, Octopus Project, Of Montreal, Oh-OK, Ohio Express

O Bando - O Bando (1969). Tropicalia from the psych-garage side.  It's okay, but it's nowhere in the league of the identically named (given the translation) The Band.

Jim O'Rourke - Long Night (2008). From O'Rourke's experimental side, this is a single work split into two parts, each about an hour and 20 minutes long. While I like it, I'm not sure that I got enough out of it to justify the time I put into it.

The Obsessed - Lunar Womb (1991). Scott "Wino" Weinrich's band prior to St. Vitus was The Obsessed, based out of Maryland. When The Obsessed's original album from the early 80s was finally released in 1990, Wino left St. Vitus, pulled together a new rhythm section, and called this new band The Obsessed.  This is the second Obsessed album, therefore, but it's the first with the band as it was comprised in the 90s. Anyway, it's typically great doom metal, like most everything Wino does.  And the cover, one of Goya's dark period paintings, is metal as fuck all.

The Octopus Project - One Ten Hundred Thousand Million (2004). Oh, this is just great. Indie-pop from Austin with a killer electronica coloration.  Fantastic stuff.

Of Montreal - The Sunlandic Twins (2005). Bowiesque indie pop. I sorta like it, but I'm not crazy about it. I generally love the Elephant 6 bands.  Of Montreal, though, I don't love,  Maybe someday.

Oh-OK - The Complete Recordings (recorded 1982-1984). Now this is an Athens band I love. Led by Michael Stipe's sister Lynda and Linda Hopper, Oh-OK was a fascinating band.  At first, they featured Stipe on bass and vocals, Hopper on vocals, and a drummer pumping out dance beats.  Later they added Matthew Sweet on guitar, and that's great, too, but I like 'em best with the more stripped-down sound.

Ohio Express - "Yummy Yummy Yummy" and "Chewy Chewy." Bubblegum music is the naked truth! Some folks don't take these songs seriously, but you can hear a whole lot of punk and post-punkish pop in them.

At The AV Club: Avatar: The Last Airbender, episodes 2.3 and 2.4

In which I cover Return to Omashu and The Swamp.  In the comments, I mention my recent health problems.

Music Library: Nirvana, No Age, No Man/No Man's Band, NoMeansNo, NOMO, Norman Blake, Notwist, Nouvelle Vague, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan

Nirvana - Bleach (1989), Nevermind (1991), In Utero (1993), MTV Unplugged In New York (1994). Is there a point to writing about these guys at this stage?  I think everything that I could possibly say has been said ad nauseam.  I will say that my favorite of these is the Unplugged album, not least because it has the Meat Puppets on it.

No Age - Weirdo Rippers (2007) and Nouns (2008).  Great indie rock band. I always love these guys when I listen to them and completely forget about them later. And then I'm surprised when they come up again.

No Man/No Man's Band - Damage The Enemy (1989). Art-rock from Mission of Burma's Roger Miller in the between years.  It's alright, but it ain't no Mission of Burma.

NoMeansNo - 0 + 2 = 1 (1991) and In The Fishtank 1 (1999). Solid SST-style punk rock.  The Fishtank EP is one of the early ones, before they hit on the idea of bringing in two different bands to try to merge their styles.

NOMO - New Tones (2006), Ghost Rock (2008), and Invisible Cities (2009). An instrumental band with a healthy dose of afrobeat melding with jazz, tropicalia, post-rock, and avant-rock, NOMO is fascinating. Their cover choices are extraordinary, too. New Tones features, besides - it should be said - the killer originals, the most unlikely cover of Joanna Newsom's "Book Of Right-On." Invisible Cities, which does add quite a bit of tropicalia madness, includes a cover of Tom Zé's monster track, "Mã." All in all, all three of these are fantastic.

Norman Blake - Live At McCabe's (1976), Whiskey Before Breakfast (1976), Norman Blake and Tony Rice 2 (with Tony Rice, 1990).  Blake, who is not the guy from Teenage Fanclub, is one of the major bluegrass guitarists alive today. He's played with pretty much everyone, including Dylan, Cash, and Steve Earle. His solo work features astonishing virtuosity presented with utter relaxation. That tension is amazing to hear. His collaboration with Tony Rice has the two greased-axle players trading licks with more notes than every other album released in 1990 combined. And it's only 30-something minutes long.  If these guys didn't have such feel for their material, this would be Yngwie-style wanking, but they play with not just speed but nuance, and that means everything.

The Notwist - Neon Golden (2002).  The formula of indie-rock-plus-electronica-percussion has been copied by a gazillion bands by now, but The Notwist were early adopters. These songs are excellent, and the unusual sounds they add are quite pleasing to my ears. I think Pitchfork stuck the song "One With The Freaks" on their best-of-the-00s list.

Nouvelle Vague - "Too Drunk To Fuck." French cabaret-style cover of the Dead Kennedys song.  Yawn.

Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan - Mustt Mustt (1990) and Bandit Queen Soundtrack (1996). Khan was one of the major practitioners of the traditional devotional music of the Sufis, Qawwali.  He's an amazing singer, but even in these albums, which are somewhat Western-oriented in their production, I find that I am sadly indifferent to his charms. I can hear his talent, but it doesn't speak to me.

Music Library: Nick Lowe, Nicky Hopkins, Nico, Nina Nastasia, Nina Simone

Nick Lowe - Jesus of Cool (1978), "Let's Eat," Labour of Lust (1979), Nick Lowe and Dave Edmunds Sing The Everly Brothers EP (1980), Nick The Knife (1982), Nick Lowe and His Cowboy Outfit (1984), "I Knew The Bride When She Used To Rock and Roll," Party of One (1990), The Impossible Bird (1994), Dig My Mood (1998), The Convincer (2001), Untouched Takeaway (2004), At My Age (2007), and Quiet Please: The New Best Of Nick Lowe (2009).  It seems there should be a genre name for the type of songs that Nick Lowe writes, even though it's clear that, at least in the early days, he's working against multiple genre conventions.  They're all somewhere between country and pop, deeply informed by the protopunk-ish pub rock of the 70s, but still hard to shoehorn in any subgenre other than just plain rock.  What Lowe does is craft extraordinary songs, built around a central conceit that is generally simple and rich at the same time.  As much as I like the younger, more rockin' Lowe, I really love the older, more mature songwriter that he grew into around 1990 with Party of One. That and every album after is a near-perfect collection of songs.

Nicky Hopkins - The Tin Man Was A Dreamer (1973).  Hopkins was a session musician for many classic rock tracks, especially with the Stones. Considering how talented he was as a sideman, I hoped that  this would be an excellent album, but unfortunately, I was a little underwhelmed in two listens.  Perhaps I'll change my mind over time.

Nico - Chelsea Girl (1967) and The Marble Index (1969). She may not be much of a singer, but these chamber pop pieces are gorgeous and powerful.  She wrote very little on the first and almost all of the second, but they seem of a piece.  Consider how instrumental Jackson Browne was for the first album (even writing the amazing track "These Days," which is my favorite Nico song). I can't believe I'm complimenting Jackson Browne, but there you go.

Nina Nastasia - Dogs (2000), The Blackened Air (2002), Run To Ruin (2003), On Leaving (2006), You Follow Me (with Jim White, 2007), and Outlaster (2010). Nastasia is possibly my favorite underappreciated songwriters currently working. These songs tend to come across as folk revival tracks at first, but Nastasia is an odd bird of an artist.  Her tracks veer off into odd tangents, chasing the emotion far beyond the bounds of traditional songcraft.  With only six albums to her name, it seems unfair to say that three are my favorites, but it is true.  The Blackened Air is a horror story masquerading as folk music, as if Flannery O'Connor and Shirley Jackson were collaborating on songs.  You Follow Me features stunning interplay between Nastasia and Dirty Three drummer Jim White, who makes the most of Nastasia's lovely, unsettling songs. Outlaster is a heartbreaker with Nastasia's trademark near-perfect songs.  Only "You're A Holy Man" stands out as a less-than-great track, and I'm even on the fence about that one. Seems appropriate that she should come up in a post that also includes Nick Lowe and Nico.

Nina Simone - Little Girl Blue (1958), Verve Jazz Masters 17 (1958-1967), Wild Is The Wind (1966), The Essential Nina Simone Vol. I (1967-1973), and The Essential Nina Simone Vol. II (1967-1971).  A singer of neither pure jazz nor R&B, Simone was extraordinary for her ability to combine many different styles into something uniquely her own.  Her deep, sometimes-brassy, sometimes-bassoony voice is like no other.  I'm not crazy about all of the rock covers on the last two albums, neither of which seems all that essential, but there's enough pleasure to justify them, anyway.