There are few things in rock and roll I appreciate more than
\nreally good harmony vocals. Sure, there are moments when the raw
\nsound of a single voice growling through the night air is the right
\nchoice, but the unique potency of lovingly arranged and
\nenthusiastically sung harmony vocals has been a key ingredient of
\nrock and roll acts from the Everly Brothers all the way down
\nthrough Evan and Jaron.<\/p>\n
This is the first thing that comes to mind listening to the
\nBoDeans’ new disc
\nResolution<\/i> as the band’s co-masterminds Sam Llanas and Kurt
\nNeumann harmonize beautifully on Neumann’s rollicking anthem “(We
\nCan) Live,” alternating lines between Neumann solo and the pair
\nsinging together.<\/p>\n
“(We Can) Live” is also emblematic of this album’s emphasis on
\nbigger, bolder, more anthemic songs. Though the BoDeans scored
\ntheir biggest chart hit with the wide-open jangle-fest “Closer To
\nFree” (off 1993’s
\nGo Slow Down<\/i>), the song was less than typical of their
\ngenerally thoughtful, literate roots-rock.<\/p>\n
This time around, after a long layoff for solo albums, a
\ngreatest hits collection, and a thankfully successful search for a
\nnew label, the BoDeans are feeling expansive once again. The first
\nfour songs on this disc are all big, loose, energetic rockers —
\nnot to mention fun. Yes, cuts like Llanas’s brooding rocker
\n“Marianne” lean to the serious side, but exuberant numbers like
\nNeumann’s “Wild World” are full of welcome, playful touches that
\ndisplay the joy the guys poured into this album.<\/p>\n
Among the other things the BoDeans excel at is using accordion,
\nmandolin, Hammond organ and the occasional loop to add sweet highs
\nand bright textures to their basic guitar-bass-drums arrangements.
\nCase in point: the bluesy dynamics of “Two Souls” and the 4\/4
\nbackbeat of “Wild World” would sound only half as sweet in the
\nabsence of Michael Ramos’s accordion.<\/p>\n
This album also features some of Neumann’s most aggressive,
\nout-front electric guitar work, and it’s tremendous stuff, full of
\nboth intensity and nuance. Llanas points to an example of how this
\naffected the disc on the band’s Web site; his own “Nobody Loves Me”
\nstarted out life as a slow country ballad, until Neumann got ahold
\nof it, ran a sinuous electric lead through it and turned it into a
\nsteady-burning revelation, one of the most genuinely passionate
\nlove songs I heard in 2004.<\/p>\n
Other notes: “If It Makes You” is a terrific album-opener full
\nof vision and urgency; “Slipping Into You” is surely the prettiest
\nsong ever written about driving around New Orleans; “Said ‘Hello'”
\nis giddy fun; and the brilliantly-crafted, Springsteen-esque “617”
\nbrims with potent details that resonate emotionally.<\/p>\n
Listening to
\nResolution<\/i>, it’s hard not to conclude that Neumann and
\nLlanas belong together, singing songs of purpose and passion. On
\nthis album, they re-establish their musical partnership with a disc
\nof buoyant rockers and thoughtful story-songs that will stay with
\nyou long after the music fades.
\nResolution<\/i> is, quite simply,
\none of 2004’s best<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":26910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5778],"rating":[5646],"class_list":["post-38211","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-bodeans","rating-rating-a"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38211"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38211\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38211"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38211"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}