The Early Bird: Top New Recorded Releases 7-22-22 – 7-28-22 Reviewed
Jack White, the blue haired slice of gorgonzola, came out of the solo gate in 2012 with one of his truly enjoyable albums Blunderbuss and then one piece of crap after another culminating earlier this year with a terrible weirdo eccentric piece of wank and a hugely awful live on stage performance (here)… and that would be that except he just released a second album, call it his wedding album, and Entering Heaven Alive is a pretty good singer songwriter Americana White, it is clearly a more commercial endeavor but for every “Help Me Along” there is the catchy “A Tip From You To Me” and the empathic “A Madman From Manhattan” (Grade: B).
Still with albums, on the heels of the sublime Starday collection is the Musicor George Jones collection Golden Hits, from 1964 to 1972, it isn’t as good though his singing is, in fact, better, and what price his take on “King Of The Road”? Plus the hits are hard and fast, starting with “She Still Thinks I Care”, truly it is time to re-release every single album from both periods… including the Melba Montgomery duets (Grade: A), Rico Nasty is an excellent rapper and she is better when left alone instead of working with producer Kenny Beats, Las Ruinas, the 17 track mixtape, is her best to date thanks to Kenny being missing in action (Grade: B+), Dawes are usually good for two songs out of every ten but on the excellent Misadventures Of Doomscroller they take the length to expand on genre twisting but jamband inspired songs with a consistency over seven tracks with songs wandering past nine minutes and no loss of tenseness (Grade: A-), with seventeen songs in less time than Dawes spent on seven, Flo Milli’s You Still Here, Ho? is a nonstop thrill with most fun rapper around (Grade: A-).
Over to singles, I reviewed Titus Andronicus’s cover of Cock Sparrer’s “We’re Coming Back” and their first original in three years “(I’m) Screwed” earlier today (here) (Grade: A-), after changing pronouns, Lil Uzi Vert (a beloved rapper for sure) is back with a terrific piece of wacky but commercial rap on “Space Cadet” (Grade: B+), nearly sixty years after its initial release, the demo version of “Heroin” confirms that nothing can catch up to Velvet Underground (Grade: A), the magical Nigerian Princess Yemi ALade returns with a simply gorgeous Afrobeats on “Begging”(Grade: A), the Ukrainian band in the US before anybody had even heard of Kyev with an in your face piece of brilliant agitprop (Grade: B+)
Misadventures Of Doomscroller – Dawes – A-
You Still Here, Ho – Flo Milli – A-
Focus Coin – Gogol Bordello – B+
Entering Heaven Alive – Jack White – B
Space Cadet – Lil Uzi Vert – B+
Heroin – May 1965 Demo – Lou Reed – A
Golden Hits (Original Musicor Records Recordings) – George Jones – A
Las Ruinas – Rico Nasty – B+
(I’m) Screwed – Titus Andronicus – A-
We’re Coming Back – Titus Andronicus – A-
Begging – Yemi Alade – B+
