|
Fractures
Swift
With their new album Fractures, Last Charge of the Light Horse successfully brings to the music scene what so many artists attempt. This album is full of thought-provoking lyricism and mind altering instrumentation. Covering many styles from song to song, Last Charge of the Light Horse has created a complete chronicle of the mundane happenstances of life.
Starting out slow with tracks like The New Year and Face to Face, the listener is gently introduced to the tale about to unfold before them. With unparalleled harmonies the group captures their audience early on, setting the stage for what's to come.
Something Out of Nothing has a tone similar to A Perfect Circle with heavy bass lines and dark melodies questioning everyday activities and what they seem to add to human creation.
Going further through this album, the listener is constantly confronted with thinking out of the box and questioning everything they take for granted. Vocalist Jean-Paul Vest sounds like a mix of Tom Petty and Billie Joe Armstrong with an edgy vocal style sure to capture listeners with familiarity and encourages a deeper look into the meaning of this story to each individual.
This album ends with 100,001 which is once again very cleverly written and composed. Adding a conclusion to this epic tale, 100,001 seems to look toward the future with a new understanding and new perspective aiming for progress and achievement. Fractures is the kind of artistic creation that exponentially delivers more and more every time you listen.
4.5 stars out of 5
Heavier Than Air
Following a passionate live set at Spike Hill in Brooklyn, I was lucky enough to get my sweaty mitts on a copy of their 2008 CD 'Fractures'. I'll no doubt be writing more on this as one that escaped me last year, but for now the video gives a good idea of their roots-tinged rock. A band doing it for the love of music and creating honest, impassioned rock music with real depth. Hear that you majors in your death throes? The ride's over.
Heavier Than Air
Lost in 2008's (pt II)
Now that we're waist high in April, this is the last I intend to hark back to 2008....at least in terms of dedicated posts. It was a half decent music year and, although there may be a few more undiscovered gems, this year has proven to be more than a little bit special already. Spend much more time peering into the cracks of '08 and I'll be writing about this year's wonders in 2010......that's next decade and I don't want to get that far behind myself now, do I?
So the first two releases are those that prompted me to write this one, with the rest being honourable mentions. Last Charge of the Light Horse I've been posting about plenty recently, with good reason…
This is an inspired, atmospheric album chock full of rootsy, unassuming American rock songs. Unassuming in the best possible way, in that they rely on quietly winding guitar lines, a skilled but subtle underlying rhythm section, and honest, world-wise lyrics. Fractures could be played in the background and remain a pleasant listen, but it's when you dive in with headphones that the songs reveal themselves fully, revelling in a quiet complexity and deeper meaning that more than rewards the efforts of the more careful listener. There are obvious influences from the hey day bands of US roots rock but this is also an album I hesitate to recommend a specific song, because the whole should really be heard, but starting with Face-to-Face or 100,001 would give a happy introduction.....just use those headphones, please!
Wildy's World, Wildy Haskell
Last Charge Of The Light Horse is no stranger to praise. The New York trio's debut CD, 2005's Getaway Car was named Independent Album of the Year for 2005 by The Daily Vault. Their song The Second Time Around was even featured on the PBS show Roadtrip Nation. Not afraid of the sophomore slump, Last Charge Of The Light Horse barreled into 2008 with Fractures, a Folk/Americana celebration of life's trials and tribulations. Vocalist/guitarist Jean-Paul Vest, Bassist AJ Riegger and drummer Jimmy Romanelli have captured lightning in a bottle the second time around.
Vest is a true wordsmith, creating aural oil paintings in music and lyric. The depth and movement of the music is surprising given that we're talking about a bare-bones trio. Fractures opens with The New Year, a wonderfully dark celebration of the turning of time with highly melodic and ethereal effects. This song is very catchy but in a quiet way that will surprise you. Face To Face has a Dire Straits feel to it. Vest has a similar vocal sound to Knopfler at times, and his guitar style goes there at times, although he never quite captures the level of subtlety Knopfler is capable of (who does?). Something Out Of Nothing is a poignant vignette that sounds like it might have been born of jam session between Dire Straits and Toad The Wet Sprocket.
One of my favorite tracks here, sprinkled with wry humor, is A New Expression. This is a song about being in the doghouse that will hit home for those in the know. Even if you're not it's a great song. The Switch Is On is a great rhythmic rock song, expressing change both in the lyrics and in the movement evident in the musical arrangement. Time is a great Americana/Rock song. Fans of The Cash Brothers or Skydiggers will love this tune. The last three songs on the CD are perhaps the best songwriting of the bunch. These aren't flashy songs in any fashion, just good, solid songwriting with a touch of magic. A Song Like Yours couldn't be any plainer but in its ordinariness finds a subtle beauty that shines out of its plaintive arrangement. Spring Ahead is aural painting, perfectly framed; a vignette on a relationship forever captured in song. 100,001 is story song about the day-to-day details of life that can bog people down, but turns the tables to find magic in the mundane.
Last Charge Of The Light Horse keeps it simple, and in simplicity finds magic and a complexity that is amazing. Fractures is a thing of beauty, a musical aesthetic that is destined to be under appreciated in a music business with an attention span shorter than that of Tom from 50 First Dates. The overall dynamic here will be too mellow for some, but there is an incredibly vibrant energy that runs through even the coolest of moments on Fractures, but it’s a disc that really requires your full attention. You'll get out of it what you put into it. Fractures is a Wildy's World Certified Desert Island Disc; A classic.
Rating: 5 Stars (Out of 5)
GOOD TIMES MAGAZINE
The Best of 2008
Here's our annual list of the best of local, indie, and national album releases of the year. Obviously, it was a horrific year for the music business-wise, yet the quality of music released this year was actually above par, with several local artists doing stellar work. Here are albums you should do your best to pick up on; you'll be doing your ears as well as the local economy a world of good by buying music from these local artists…Last Charge of the Light Horse - Fractures - The usual off-kilter, indescribable originality from Jean-Paul Vest…
THE DAILY VAULT, Jason Warburg
Indies of the Year
First it was one, then three, and this year five independent albums made my “Best Of” list, every one a gleefully unique concoction created by an artist with genuine vision and soul.
1. Last Charge Of The Light Horse -- Fractures
So many terrific independent albums crossed my desk this year that it’s truly a challenge to pick one that rose above the rest. But if I have to, then it has to be Fractures. Jean-Paul Vest and his band Last Charge Of The Light Horse make what I can only describe as thinking-man’s rock and roll, lyrics that demand you invest your full attention to their nuances and poetry even as the coiled intensity of Vest’s guitar work continually ups the emotional ante. Forget about calling this “a record album” -- this is rich, wonderfully multilayered art.
100.9FM, The Indie Revolution, Scott Kuchler
Those of you who have been listening to the program for a while probably know that I love this band…If there’s any justice in this world, this is a band and an artist who will get signed and have great success in the world of adult alternative radio.
LI PULSE, Michael Isenbeck
Local Focus: The muse of Last Charge of the Light Horse’s frontman Jean-Paul Vest leads him towards examinations of relationships throughout the band’s latest album Fractures. The leadoff track “The New Year” dives into this theme with an offering of moody, orchestral underpinnings and keening, pained vocals. Bust just when you think you have this band pegged, they offer “Time,” a rollicking Americana tune. The band engages in a variety of moods and tones and successfully draws the listener into their unique world.
GOOD TIMES, Syl Nathan
This group’s previous album, Getaway Car (2005), received nearly unanimous praise from the regional press, and this effort manages to top the previous release…In all, those who enjoyed Getaway Car will find lots to like with Fractures, as Vest delves deeper into his refreshingly oddball songwriting sensibility.
THE DAILY VAULT, Jason Warburg
Lyric sheets are a dicey business for a writer-geek like me. I’m often so hung up on the quality of lyrics that I’ve learned not to look at them before I listen to a disc, because a weak turn of phrase or clichéd idea can color my whole view of the album before I’ve heard a note of music.
In this case, though, I’ve been around the block with singer-songwriter-guitarist Jean-Paul Vest twice already -- once with his former group Blue Sandcastle and more recently with his newer trio Last Charge Of The Light Horse -- and both times his songs have completely captured me. Yes, the singing is strong, the playing is excellent, and the production usually strikes a nice balance between raw and sharp, but the words are what’s ended up pulling me headlong into Vest’s universe each time we’ve met.
And so, when the new Last Charge disc Fractures showed up in my mailbox just a few minutes ago, the first thing I did was pop it in the computer to rip it onto my iPod… and what did I do while the CD drive was busy spinning zeroes and ones but sit here and read the lyrics to an entire song.
Big mistake.
Because, you see, the song is the last one on this disc, “100,001,” and the lyric is not just brilliant but truly profound in a way that only a man of a certain age and station in life can appreciate. Being one myself, I am now stuck in a purgatory of my own making, waiting forty minutes to hear Vest sing said lyric because I do NOT cheat, I treat an album’s run order as sacred, especially the first time through, and especially if I’m going to be reviewing the thing.
Yes, you read that right. I haven’t heard a note of music yet, and I’m already frustrated about waiting half an hour to hear a song whose lyrics I’ve just read for the first time. If that suggests to you that this album might just be extraordinary… it should.
It’s time to listen now. More after the break.
* * *
If you think being a teenager is hard, try staring middle age in the face. All those big dreams you had have been reduced to life-sized reality -- this is your job, this is your family, this is your life. No do-overs allowed. You’re past halfway from cradle to grave and this is IT and what exactly do you have to show for it? A boatload of responsibilities, a household full of stress, and your friends and siblings all grappling with similar strains and doubts.
Having already established himself as one of my favorite lyricists working today, Jean-Paul Vest is back, and neither he nor father-son rhythm section Artie (drums and background vocals) and A.J. (bass and background vocals) Riegger have lost a step. Fractures is a genuine Everyman American gothic, a spare, intense song-cycle that reaches into the mid-life male’s closet of anxieties and drags them all out one by one.
“The New Year” quickly establishes the album’s themes of restlessness and concern about time passing, the trio’s skittering arrangement foreshadowing trouble as Vest sings “Look out ahead / we’re coming, coming fast / ready for the good old days to start at last / kick off the party with a laugh and a bang / leave your secrets in the closet / your failures where they hang.”
“Face To Face” digs deeper yet as Vest explores the nooks and crannies of a sibling relationship on the rocks (“I can only speculate why you never call here anymore / could be advice I gave came back to bite me / could be you mean to but never write me… the distance between us increases as the years accelerate / we used to share a bedroom, now we live in separate states / with less to laugh about, more to tolerate”). The music is another jumpy rhythm section over which Vest and producer Bob Stander layer urgent, repeating chords, winching up the tension with each powerful verse.
The thing you notice only as the disc progresses is that there truly is an arc to this album’s story, but once you see it, no other run order could really work for these songs. “Something Out Of Nothing” accelerates the tempo another notch before finally releasing pent-up tension at the chorus of a song about the leap of faith that’s required both in creating a family and in keeping it going when times get rough (“All those magicians / they pull the dove from their sleeve / you and I pay down the mortgage / and try to believe”).
“One Kind Word” looks farther into the future of a similar relationship, Riegger’s drums rumbling gently in the back as Vest decorates his precise lyrics with stark, authoritative guitar strums: “One kind word shouldn’t have to last me so long / you leave me sucking on a happy memory until the sweetness is gone / I can’t walk away from my faith in a good thing / even if it never comes.” Ouch. An extended outro lends an epic, elegiac feel to this quietly devastating tune about losing faith in a relationship that’s built on it. Sequel “A New Expression” takes a more playful, sardonic look at what feels like the same relationship, set to a sing-songy electric blues arrangement.
The middle three tracks push the tempo, with “The Switch Is On” sounding initially like the album’s first upbeat song, handclaps and sunny acoustic strums setting the mood. And then the last verse comes along and offers what might actually be the album’s saddest moment, a vignette about filling the empty spaces in a relationship that’s suddenly full of them (”We’re grateful now for any little errand / marker in the void / but you forget your wallet / and we’re driving back and forth / what’s a repetition / in the context of a loop / or a needle in a groove”). Damn.
On the next cut Vest takes on one of his chief tormentors directly, calling out “Time” to a catchy, Byrds-influenced jangle-rock beat: “Waiting like a bully / at the edge of the beach / kicking down castles / ready to bury me in the sand of history.” Next up, the Springsteen influence comes on strong as “Worth In Trade” puts the album into fourth gear, an expansive electric track in which our narrator reaches outside himself to be the sounding board for a friend whose troubled relationship is “going nowhere in a lifetime flat.”
Setting up the album’s closing volley, “A Song Like Yours” backs things off to just Vest and his acoustic for a pretty tune about seeking your muse. The intense “Spring Ahead” unclenches gradually from there, narrating the last bitter fight in a doomed relationship over Vest’s rather eerie piano and the rustling rhythm pattern set by A.J. Riegger and guest drummer Larry Eagle (of Springsteen’s Sessions Band).
And then it’s here: the closer I’ve been waiting for. “100,001” does not disappoint; to the contrary, the way Vest speak-sings the lyric frames its poetry perfectly, a kind of hymn to the search for meaning that (hopefully) every sentient being goes through at some point. “The odometer flips to a hundred grand / and it feels like progress / the vague taste of accomplishment helps you feel a little less lost / but it’s a random number / you’re treading water / it’s visually pleasing / but grossly misleading / the accumulation of mundane errands over time.”
Fractures displays a more contemplative side of the band that made Getaway Car, a carefully contained intensity that contrasts with the previous album’s untethered nervous energy. It’s indisputably a more difficult disc to inhabit, and I’m honestly not sure what this disc might sound like to a 20-year-old – maybe a bit dour and over-analytical. But for this 45-year-old, Fractures hits like a target-locked cruise missile.
Fractures can be brutal at times, but that just makes the accomplishment that much greater when Vest succeeds in capturing the restlessness, doubt, yearning and recrimination of mid-life and making it into a beautiful, messy, painful and compassionate piece of art. Albums that challenge you this directly to think and feel and get caught up in another person’s perspective are rare today, but Fractures is one -- a wrenching, magnificent, thoroughly memorable one.
Rating: A
Getaway Car
WYRR, July 2006
Bands You Should Know – Last Charge of the Light Horse
We can't say enough good things about this group. In a sea of boring college/alt rock drivel, this trio really stands out. Their latest, Getaway Car, has songs that will breathe hope into even the most jaded alt rock fans. Worth a listen!
THE DAILY VAULT, Interview January 2006, Jason Warburg
FM, June 2, 2006, Diane E. Amov
Ah, the business of indie rock.
You put out your own CD. You tour only as far as your vintage van and limited funds will take you. Your unapologetically American, straight-ahead rock accompanies dark, literate, emotionally raw lyrics. And when some hipster newspaper critic allows that he likes you, he compares you to Cream because you're a three-piece band with an old guy. Even though it's couched in a highly favorable review, this comparison does you no favors, because your 20- and 30-something target audience would rather swear off Internet porn for a month than listen to something their parents might dig.
I'm hoping that New Yorkers in particular are reading this, because local trio, Last Charge of the Light Horse, deserve a fairer shake.
Their controlled cacophony recalls James McMurtry, Steve Earle, Uncle Tupelo, and Rank & File (at least in this track). But Last Charge of the Light Horse are much more than the sum of their parts. Every member of the band pulls his weight and then some to put down a driving, brawny sound. Father/son rhythm section, A.J. (bass) and Artie (drums) Riegger provide the stormy hand-in-glove underpinning for the panoramic guitars, story-songs, and alt-country vocals of Jean-Paul Vest, and there's not a bad track on the album.
And not a single one of them sounds like Cream.
NEWSDAY, February 9, 2006, Rafer Guzman
Last Charge straight ahead
Straight-ahead rock doesn't find its way into this column very often, and there are a couple of reasons. Most of it just rehashes the sounds of bygone decades, and it's easy to overlook when so many young bands are experimenting with more up-to-date genres such as punk and emo. That doesn't leave much room for all the singer-songwriters and traditional-minded rock groups out there.
But here's room for one: Last Charge of the Light Horse, a basic trio led by veteran singer-guitarist Jean-Paul Vest and rounded out by drummer Artie Riegger and bassist A.J Riegger (his son). The Coram-based band may have a highfalutin name, but it isn't trying to do anything fancy. Instead, it just creates and plays good music.
A warning: Last Charge's latest disc, "Getaway Car," isn't upbeat. It starts out angry, with the rolling drums and powerful bass of "Cartwheeling." Vest sings bitterly: "Maybe it's coincidence/My boy fell down the stairs/The same day they dropped our jobs to boost the market share." The mood lifts on "Here We Go Again," but the downbeat lyrics contradict the jaunty melody.
A few tracks in, the clouds really begin to gather. "Miracle" has an ominous drone beneath the chords; "Getaway Car" feels wind-blown and dusty. The five-minute "Au Clair" ends with a long, wordless reverie: Vest lets his guitar do the pondering while the rhythm section rustles quietly behind him.
Vest's somewhat fragile voice can't quite conquer every song; he has the reedy tone of a folkie, rather than a rocker.
But at other times (as on "Au Clair") this fragility serves him well.
Overall, "Getaway Car" is a rare disc that creates something original out of the traditional.
Copyright 2006 Newsday Inc.
THE DAILY VAULT, December 2005, Jason Warburg
"Maybe it's coincidence/ My boy fell down the stairs/ The same day they dropped our jobs/ To boost the market shares/ Lucky nothing's broken/ Just a hell of a scare/ We're cartwheeling down/ Through the atmosphere/ Spinning through the air"
-- "Cartwheeling"
So opens my favorite independent release of 2005. Yes, that's right, just four weeks after I called Danelia Cotton's absolutely terrific Small White Town "the indie album of the year," I'm calling a do-over. Getaway Car is simply too good to be denied.
Last Charge Of The Light Horse conquers its unwieldy name with this brilliant, passionate roots-rock tour de force. You may remember Last Charge's guitarist/singer/songwriter Jean-Paul Vest from his previous incarnation as Blue Sandcastle; this time out he's backed by father-son duo A.J. Riegger and Artie Riegger on bass, drums and background vocals.
The above-quoted "Cartwheeling" opens the album with a drum pattern that rumbles like thunder as stormclouds surround the narrator, with guitar, bass and background vocals barreling in right after to send this track into the emotional stratosphere. By the time the narrator goes out to "search my empty mailbox / for a blessing in disguise," the arrow has flown straight from Bruce Springsteen's seminal Darkness On The Edge Of Town to this disc (a comparison I don't make lightly).
A little later, in "Miracle," the weather takes a turn for the better as love appears, in spectacular fashion: "It was like a cloudburst, like rain / all I ever wanted… and the less you said, the more it meant to me." Late in the song, the bass drops out, leaving Vest singing "You were so good / I just can't believe it" like an exaltation, with the drums rat-tat-tatting scattato underneath and the Rieggers' chorused background vocals rising over the top, nailing that magic nexus between love song and devotional hymn.
Next up is the title track, a truly remarkable entry in the time-honored genre of love as a troubled soul's redemption. "You give my lightning / a path to ground," goes the verse, leading into a keening chorus that Vest sings, in his reedy but deceptively strong voice, with utter conviction: "You are my escape / My getaway car / My soul and my strength / You are." Screw the Grammies -- if there was any justice, this would compete for song of the year.
This album never lets up; if anything, the songs grow deeper and stronger as you move into its second act. "Au Clair" is a gentle plea with alt-county overtones; "The King Is Dead" follows with perfect contrast, a big, beefy blast of dark-edged rock and roll, as well as a thematic twin to "Cartwheeling" ("Cleaned your desk out / took your name down off the door… the music stopped / And every seat was spoken for"). "In the Balance" is an electric, propulsive rocker about reaching a critical point in a tense relationship: "I'm just a step and a half / to the good side / of willing to live and let live."
Getaway Car finishes with a trio of gems. "Wonderful" (not the Everclear song) is a ballad of slumbering power, full of hard-won wisdom that rises and falls like the tide. "Circles" is a thrumming meditation, a character sketch with the depth and texture of good fiction, full of rich lines like "a strand of cool air / escapes out from under / the big, still heat of August / that winks and rights itself / like a candle flame disturbed." Putting a gorgeous, epic finish on the proceedings is "Come And See," in which the laid-back confidence of Vest's vocals meshes with his plain-spoken poetry to create an unpretentious majesty.
If Springsteen was less self-conscious, if Dylan was more grounded, if Mellencamp was more of a poet, or Hiatt less of a joker, one of them might have written an album like this one, a set of beautifully crafted songs about love and work and passion and loss that grows richer and more resonant with every listen. There's a word for this sort of thing: masterpiece.
RATING: A
COUNTERPUNCH.ORG, December 2005, Jeffrey St. Clair
Last Charge of the Light Horse -- Getaway Car
Energetic and subversive rock with literate lyrics reporting from the ruins of the Bush economy by a new Long Island band with Texas roots. If the Labor Movement in this country had a lick of sense, it would make a video of "Cartwheeling" and splash it before the nation during halftime of the Super Bowl, before people nod off during the Stones' geriatric set. Last Charge is propelled by a rumbling father-and-son rhythm section and the speed-demon lead guitar of Jean-Paul Vest, which just might remind you of the late Freddie King.
GOOD TIMES, February 2006, Syl Nathan
Hey, Mr. A&R man, striving to find the next Carrie Underwood or Bo Bice or whatever–there are artists out there with something to say and an original way to express it. Last Charge of the Light Horse certainly qualify.
This area three-piece – their next scheduled show is at The Hairy Lemon in Selden on Friday, February 10 – consists of vocalist and guitarist Jean-Paul Vest, bassist A.J. Riegger and drummer Artie Riegger. This beautifully packaged, 12-track introduction to these musicians is about as well thought-out a local album that has been offered for review here in many a month.
There are so many introspective, tightly-performed songs here that it is hard not to want to lay down the plaudits a bit too thickly. But any album with the lover's plea "Now You Know," the Bob Dylan-ish "The Second Time Around," or the opener "Cartwheeling" is tempting to want to praise to the high heavens.
The overall sound here is what some are calling "emo," but the influences here are veiled so well that the overall sound is completely original and riveting. Once again, the team at Vu Du Studios has produced a debut that sounds wholly major league; kudos to Bob Stander, who helmed the project in every facet of the recording.
Last Charge of the Light Horse has done the near impossible here; coming out of nowhere, this act and this record are ready to go national. Chalk up another big score for Long Island's burgeoning rock scene.
If You Only Knew…
Press from Jean-Paul's previous project Blue Sandcastle:
INDEPENDENT SONGWRITER WEB MAGAZINE, January 2004
"Heavy-hitting songwriting and musicianship"
SOUTH OF MAINSTREAM, October 2003
"There are so many great tracks on this disc that it's difficult to immediately choose those that stand out."
IMPACT PRESS, August 2003
"If you hate bands that just play a song instead of making it their own, you'll love what Blue Sandcastle can do."
PLUG IN MUSIC, June 2003
"By the end of the album, you’re looking for the repeat."
DAILY VAULT, May 2003
"...a heady mix of intelligence, fallibility and damning self-knowledge."
AIDING & ABETTING, June 2003
"...these guys simply make fine roots-flavored rock."
POPMATTERS, April 2003
"A definite winner, these songs are beautifully written (especially "All for Nothing" and "Sooner") and similarly produced."
NEWSDAY, February 2003
"It was worth the wait."
FRIGID EMBER, December 2002
"...excellent musical performances...and insightful lyrics make 'If You Only Knew' an album that should get peoples attention."
NY ROCK, May 2003
"... interesting rock, with intelligent lyrics that tell a story."
NEWSDAY, September 2001
"Blue Sandcastle, a trio with Lone Star roots, comes out with its guns blazing..."
NEWSDAY, September 2001, Kevin Amorim
Blue Sandcastle, a trio with Lone Star roots, comes out with its guns blazing on "I'm Sorry Now." Think mid-80s Replacements or R.E.M., full of driving guitars and a raspy singer. Jean-Paul Vest is responsible for both the chords and the voice. Vest shares songwriting duties with drummer Erik Schuman, with whom he met up in 1993 in Denton, Texas. They played around for a spell, put out a disc and then called it quits. The pair met up again in '99 in Manhattan and decided to re-form Blue Sandcastle, adding bassist Wendy Walters. Lucky for us. "Paradise Misplaced" is a rollicking collection of rootsy rockers. Between the forlornness of "Second Place Waltz" ("Maybe I'll spend the next 20 years or so wondering what I was thinking") and the Golden Palominoes lushness of "What Would You Have Me Say," the trio includes a jittery, roughed up version of Willie Nelson's "Crazy." "Sooner" closes out things in much the same way as they started. The only nit: there are only five songs here.
Performance: A
Songwriting: A-
Sound Quality: A
INDEPENDENT SONGWRITER WEB MAGAZINE, January 2004
ISWM INDIE PICK OF THE MONTH
Heavy-hitting songwriting and musicianship combine for an effect reminiscent of the Beatles-Boxtops-Randy Foster kind of sensibility. Creative touches to solid rhythms lends itself to a project worthy of music industry adoration. Fast-paced music can get tedious if it goes on to long without any changes. No monotony here. Incredible musicianship keeps the ear happy with those sweet nuances scattered throughout. And the production is one of the best heard so far.
SOUTH OF MAINSTREAM, compgeekgirl, October 2003
Ten years ago, when I was finishing up my senior year in college, I was a big fan of REM and the Gin Blossoms. There wasn't anything unique about that at the time. One of my other favorites was was a little known Irish band, the Levelers. Blue Sandcastle, in 2003, sound like a perfect mixture of all that was good about these three bands. In the new millennium, when so many rock bands are slamming their collective heads against the wall trying to be the next rap-core sensation, it's refreshing to come across a band that looks back to a time when music was a craft that required skills as both a lyricist and a songwriter/musician.
Lead singer Jean-Paul Vest has a voice that immediately seems familiar. It's warm, comforting and friendly. It's comfortable with the slow sumptuous balladry, yet facile with intricate wordplay. He's also comfortable covering the work of legendary artists like Willie Nelson and George Harrison. His voice is consistently good, though chameleon, at times sounding like each of the front men of the bands I used as comparisons above.
There are so many great tracks on this disc that it's difficult to immediately choose those that stand out. I particularly enjoyed the low key beauty of "Closing Time At The Fair". The music is reminiscent of mid-eighties REM...think Driver 8.
"What Would You Have Me Say" sounds much like my favorite early Levelers tracks, with a light folk sound and dynamic vocals. "Guard Rail" continues much in the same vein.
"Starting Gun" is a real 90's style rocker with catchy, intelligent, tongue-in-cheek lyrics. "I Went Away" picks up where the Gin Blossoms left off.
This album is an exemplary offering, showing without a doubt that looking into the past, even the recent past, for musical style and quality can reap huge benefits when done correctly. My only criticism is that the band put the worst track on the disc as the closer, which ended a great listening experience on a slightly sour note. Otherwise this is a rock-solid release.
Favored Tracks:
#1 | Starting Gun
#6 | Closing Time At The Fair
#7 | What Would You Have Me Say
IMPACT PRESS, August 2003, Sean Helton
It happened again. Every damned time I look at a CD and think, "Oh hell, this is going to suck," it totally kicks my ass! I don't know why, but I looked at the cover of Blue Sandcastle and thought the worst. What I got was flat-out awesome. This is music! Think faster, more reckless Matthew Sweet. Think Wes Cunningham. Think of Son Volt on speed. Think Neil Young after a bender. This is great straight-ahead rock. Really clean songs but they're still noisy enough to make you feel like you're listening to something meant just for you. There are two great covers on here – "Crazy" by Willie Nelson and "Art of Dying" by George Harrison. If you hate bands that just play a song instead of making it their own, you'll love what Blue Sandcastle can do. This is going into instant rotation in my changer. (SH)
PLUG IN MUSIC, June 2003, Corrine
The way to sell country-influenced music to the rock fans who swear up and down to hate the country genre is to mix it in with what they like. Don’t let them know. To some extent, this is what Blue Sandcastle has done on their 2002 release, “If You Only Knew…” And while Blue Sandcastle are by no means a country band, there are tip offs of their country influences: a rocking cover of the Willie Nelson song that Pasty Cline made famous (“Crazy”), song titles like “This Here Changes Everything” or “Closing Time at the Fair,” and there’s something about singer/guitarist/bassist Jean-Paul Vest’s vocals that lean ever so slightly towards that country sound.
But let’s not get hung up on that. “If You Only Knew…” is fourteen modern rock sounding tracks that are catchy – in lyrics, melody and rhythm – and are performed well. Opening with the poppy, driving rock of “Starting Gun” and “I’m Sorry Now,” Blue Sandcastle get your attention and hold it through the familiar sounding “Second Place Waltz” and “What Would You Have Me Say.”
Offering up two covers, Blue Sandcastle earn respect. Their rock infused “Crazy” cover sounds little like the original, save for the final line, but works well. And accept for some extra distortion and turning the bass up, on their cover of “Art of Dying,” the band pay tribute to the late, great George Harrison by preserving the song’s original sound – including the great guitar leads throughout the song.
Unquestionably “Guardrail” stands out on the album. With jangling guitar and emotions bubbling, “Guardrail” has many elements and it sounds great. (One that is, perhaps, worth dog-earing to rerecord acoustic.) Closing with the understated “Winter,” Blue Sandcastle almost sounds like a different band, adding deeper, darker percussion in the background. “If You Only Knew…” showcases Blue Sandcastle in variations of their sound, offering something for everyone. The build throughout the album is balanced and natural. By the end of the album, you’re looking for the repeat.
Grade: A-
DAILY VAULT, May 2003, Jason Warburg
Does the world really need another singer-songwriter who trolls the aisles of the great Supermarket of Regret, throwing down beer-soaked tirades and wounded laments?
It's a question worth asking after coming across a debut album like this, so rife with pain and ringing guitar riffs that you half expect to find Paul Westerberg lurking in the liner notes. Despite that obvious (and frankly acknowledged) influence, though, this piece of work stands strong on its own.
Blue Sandcastle is a group that's just barely a group; the two members and co-writers of the album are Jean-Paul Vest (vocals, guitars, bass) and Eric Schuman (drums). At some point along the way they enlisted additional help from Wendy Walters (bass, backing vocals). You'd never know the band began as a studio creation, though, for the tracks that make up If You Only Knew... sound both refreshingly organic and surprisingly complete.
The music relies heavily on muscular guitar lines -- very Replacements/Gin Blossoms -- but with lyrics both literate and self-flagellating enough to remind of James McMurtry or Matthew Ryan. Tracks of note include: the opening "Starting Gun," with its mythic lyric and fat, driving guitar line; "Second Place Waltz," with its Dylanesque vocals and a bluesy feel that builds to a powerful finish; and their frankly brilliant cover of Willie Nelson's "Crazy," where the music rocks out to the edge of control like Marshall Crenshaw on a serious drinking jag, while the vocals hold things together with a dreamy Chris Isaak feel that somehow works perfectly. There's a dash of John Hiatt to the whole thing as well, a heady mix of intelligence, fallibility and damning self-knowledge.
To be fair, there is a least one happy song on here, the bouncy shout of "This Here Changes Everything," which -- one last namedrop -- has a bit of a BoDeans feel to it, albeit with extra punch on the guitars. It just happens to be the exception. On the opposite extreme is the other cover song here, BS's fuel-injected, nearly psychedelic remake of George Harrison's "The Art Of Dying." More typical of Blue Sandcastle are sharply-drawn relationship portraits with lines like "We're speeding but I'm in no hurry / to see how far I've come undone" and brutal self-examinations like "Guardrail," which could be subtitled "Why I Always Fuck It Up."
All of which brings us back to my opening question: does the world really need another album of obsessive post-breakup songs set to surging rock and roll guitars? As long as there's one more person out there in the world just about to have their heart broken and stomped to pieces on the floor, you're goddamned right it does. The old saying declares that life is pain. I wouldn't go that far myself, but for those passing moments when it feels that way, this album and all its ancestors and descendants are the soundtrack of life.
RATING: A-
AIDING & ABETTING, June 2003, Jon Worley
Ten years ago, Erik Schuman and Jean-Paul Vest were in a band back in Texas. A couple years ago they met once again--this time in New York--and decided to play some music once again. The duo is somewhat stuck in that whole midwestern roots punk thing. Think the first couple Uncle Tupelo albums or maybe some early Husker Du. Maybe. These guys make music that falls right into Still Feel Gone territory, though Vest's vocals are much more reminiscent of Walter Salas-Humara of the Silos. Mostly, though, these guys simply make fine roots-flavored rock. The sound is nicely chunky, though it isn't excessively loud or feedback-laden. The sort of stuff that's a bit loud for the porch, but just right for the back yard. A fine set of songs. There are a couple of covers, done with cool new settings (why else would you do a well-known song, anyway?). Just right for the onset of summer.
POPMATTERS, April 2003, Nikki Tranter
Blue Sandcastle's new album is their first full-length release. The band, consisting of New York musicians Jean-Paul Vest and Erik Schuman, have polished up their act significantly here, giving the rasp and bucked guitar of their ripping five-track debut, Paradise Misplaced, a rest in order to make way for skilled melodies and a far more relaxed vocal. The album, If You Only Knew... is a more than worthy follow-up to the EP, with 14 tracks of tightly woven roots-rock tunes. Vest and Schuman have taken their Replacements-esque style and given it more of a pop edge reminiscent of Husker Du, Matthew Sweet and early Toad the Wet Sprocket. A definite winner, these songs are beautifully written (especially "All for Nothing" and "Sooner") and similarly produced.
NEWSDAY, February 2003, Kevin Amorim
It took singer-guitarist-bassist Jean-Paul Vest and drummer Erik Schuman about a year, but they did it: They released a full-length album. The duo, known as Blue Sandcastle, had a fine roots-rockin' EP in 2001. Vest's distinctive voice and guitar jangle were at the heart of that scanty-but-skillful outing. Those five tracks are reprised here, including a jacked-up version of Willie Nelson's "Crazy." The new material, of course, is worthy, too. Especially evocative, "Closing Time at the Fair" offers: "Say goodbye to all the clowns and dancing bears...Now you're yelling at me in your underwear." It was worth the wait.
FRIGID EMBER, December 2002, Paul Cardone
This CD was given to me by a co-worker, whose wife works with one of the members of Blue Sandcastle. I had never heard of the band before, and I wasn't too optimistic but I'll listen to anything once. Or twice. Or three times? Never thought it would happen, but it did. Blue Sandcastle plays guitar-driven, chunky-at-times rock. People who are fans of the Replacements, Husker Du, and maybe even the Flaming Lips should give this disc a try. The band itself consists of only two members, Jean-Paul Vest on guitar/vocals/bass, and Erik Schuman on drums. Both give excellent musical performances, and together create a tight, blended sound that gives this album its power. "Starting Gun" is an excellent opener, with upbeat rock riffs right from the start. Blue Sandcastle also offers up two covers: Willie Nelson's "Crazy", and George Harrison's "Art Of Dying". Both covers are pulled off quite well, and should not offend fans of the original artists, as many covers tend to do. On the "words" end of things, everything fits right in. Vest's vocals are raspy but strong, and his insightful lyrics make "If You Only Knew..." an album that should get peoples attention. Hey, it got mine.
|