Junip - Fields

Paul's Choice:

Junip - Fields

Friend Review:

I KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THIS BAND OR ALBUM I JUST CHOSE. Since being in college, I’ve found that I’m very lost in the sense of music releases and stuff. So when in a jam I’ll just try to find one album that has come out recently and use that as my choice. The good thing about this is there’s some kind of excitement in listening to an album that you know nothing about and since you don’t really know what it’s about, it’s like going into uncharted waters, it might be the most amazing album ever and you don’t even know about it. I found some of my very favorite bands by randomly choosing to check them out (The Rural Alberta Advantage and Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, namely). Sadly, there’s also a counterpart to randomly choosing an album because it might just be something you hate. Place yourself in this situation, if you will: a market opens down the street from you, and you think, awesome, maybe they’ll have some berries and cherries I can eat. So you go down to the market and look around, and it turns out all they have is avocados. Ladies and gentlemen, Fields by Junip is a giant avocado.
I started listening to this album while working on calculus homework, and after three songs I was utterly bored. So bored that I had to write on Taylor’s Facebook telling him I was bored (if you’re not friends with us on Facebook, you should be! I’ll try to put up some links or something). There’s not much I can say to describe this music except that it’s dull. The instrumentation feels very repetitive. Usually if one instrument has a boring part it makes another instrument standout but it really sounds like a huge drone. What tops the cake for me though are the vocals. There’s simply no variation in them from song to song, it’s just really bland. I don’t feel like there is any individual song that stands out on this album, or really anything. It just feels like reading the same boring passage of a book over and over again. It’s boring. I think I’ve made my point.

Friend Rating:

4.8

Hipster Review:

Modern folk is kinda shaky ground for me. If a folk artist wants to get my attention, he or she has to shake the roots of the genre instead of doing the same, safe old thing, wading in the tepid pool of worn-out cliches. There's a handful that stick out (Devendra Banhart, Sufjan Stevens, Tallest Man On Earth, etc.), but overall it's a scene that I generally have little interest in.
So out of nowhere comes Junip, an indie-folk group that coats their acoustic compositions in electronic ambience in their debut(?) LP, Fields. Something on the album that really caught my attention- something that I didn't expect at all- was the beats. One can't accuse Junip's songs of lacking dynamics, as each of these eleven songs are arranged very differently from the last (there's even a bit of krautrock in "Rope & Summit"). It makes for an interesting experience for sure, and there's definitely a lot here that will pull listeners in for something truly unique. But the album does begin to drag near the end, with the compositions growing less inspired and more tossed off. But overall I found this album to be quite enjoyable, and I'm wondering where Junip are going to find themselves in the coming years. Fans of indie folk with definitely enjoy this, little doubt. It's far from excellent, but enjoyable nonetheless.

Hipster Rating:

7.5

Coming up next, Lisbon by The Walkmen!

The Books - The Way Out

Taylor's Choice:

The Books - The Way Out

Hipster Review:

The two-piece electronic/folk vocal-sampling group The Books are in a league of their own; they're one of those bands, like Animal Collective, that literally makes music that's unlike anything you've ever heard before. They've created and developed a unique and singular sound, altering slightly over the course of their career, and whether you like the music or not, their ingenuity cannot be denied. The Way Out is the band's fourth LP, and after three albums of using that same formula, the most important goal of this release is to distinguish itself from their previous work.
The music is a bit more pop-minded this time around, though you'd be hard-pressed to call this album accessible; the album's lead single, "A Cold Freezin' Night," with its unsettling vocal recordings of children making death threats to one another, is disquieting to say the least. The band is, in fact, being more experimental here by using their samples for creating actual tunes. "I Didn't Know That" samples various voices exclaiming just that, backed up by a spare funk groove, and "Beautiful People," the album's other single, is a perfect example of abstract artists putting a good pop song together. Each song has a different feel, which separates this record from the mostly static feel of the group's past albums. However, this is not the band's best album by any means, though it is a great, well-put together work. If you're looking to get into The Books, this is not the best starting point; look to their debut Thought For Food or their last release Lost & Safe. If you don't dig The Books' music, then this isn't for you. But those who enjoy the group's eccentric and unique brand of electronic sound collage will be plenty satisfied.

Hipster Rating:

8.4

Friend Review:

I typically try to stay away from Pitchfork, but occasionally I’ll read their reviews just to see how they feel about a specific in work. In this case, I checked out their review of The Books’ The Way Out and found this:

“Imagine if a blog had posted these clips of goofball hypnotherapist and meditation consultants, or found a tape of a boy and a girl swapping violent threats with each other: You'd chuckle and move on. But when the Books use these samples, they give them integrity.”

This is total crap. I don’t care if it’s me taking a dump or Jenna Fischer taking a dump, a dump is a dump. The Books made a piece of crap song. It's not saved by the fact that it was made by The Books. It's crap. But anyways, that’s the end of my Pitchfork rant.

My main gripe about this album is the use of samples. Yeah, samples can be cool at times (see The Heavy’s “How You Like Me Now” or M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes”) but when 98% of your music is samples, well that’s not very creative is it? A perfect example is their song “A Cold Freezin’ Night”. There’s basically two elements of this song, a loop of a drum machine beat thingy and two children threatening to kill each other. As far as drum machines go, **** drum machines, they suck. Especially using the same beat over and over and over again, boring. For the two children, well, why? It’s annoying, pointless, and stupid. The whole album sounds like the duo just found a bunch of samples and said, “Sure, this is weird let’s do it.” But other than the drum machine with whining children, there’s nothing on the album that’s completely unbearable. Yet, I still have no desire to listen to this again. There’s no feeling or soul to their music.

Friend Rating:

4.6

Coming up next, Crazy For You by Best Coast!

The Tallest Man On Earth - The Wild Hunt

Paul's Choice:

The Tallest Man On Earth - The Wild Hunt

Friend Review:

So, Folk is a genre I don’t know much about. The only reason I chose to review this album was because someone mentioned The Tallest Man On Earth on /mu/ as one of the nicest artists he or she’s ever met after a show. Curious, I checked out his Myspace and gave him a listened and enjoyed it. And typically, unless there is a specific album I’m looking forward to, that’s how I pick an album to review. But anyways, let’s get to the actual album…
Unfortunately, guitar is not my forte so I’m going to describe the instrumentation on this album in layman’s terms. Um, it’s AWESOME. Kristian Matsson is one of the most talented guitarists I’ve heard. Every song is filled with extremely complex, um, guitar-playing-skills and is really quite pleasing to the listener. I think the only song lacking amazing guitar playing is the closer, “Kids On the Run” and while it does drag on a bit (You have to do something amazing to impress me with just a piano and vocals), it’s a great way to close the album. So essentially, two sounds make up the album: Matsson’s guitar and Matsson’s voice. To be honest, if you can’t get past his voice, I wouldn’t really blame you. It’s very different from the norm and in a sense whiny. Personally, I like it. It reminds me of Jeff Mangum (hipster’s delight!) so if you dig Neutral Milk Hotel I don’t see why you wouldn’t like The Wild Hunt. Alright, now everyone hold on to your knickers because this is something I don’t think I’ve ever said before: THIS ALBUM IS TOO SHORT. Barely. If Matsson was able to produce just fifteen more minutes of good quality songs, I would be okay with it. However, I would rather have an album too short than three more boring songs so all in all, I am okay with this. At just under 35 minutes, I sat around a few extra minutes to listen to the top of the album again. If you’re not sure about this sort of music, I recommend you go to his his Myspace and listen to “King of Spain”, if you enjoy that you will absolutely love The Wild Hunt.

Friend Rating:

9.0

Hipster Review:

I'm just going to be blunt here: There are a plethora of singer-songwriter-folkie artists these days that all meld together. They do little to distinguish from one another (if at all), and they all copy from the same handbook with no real spark of inspiration. In my honest opinion, apart from their passion of playing music (which in some cases can be nothing more than airheaded pretension), there's no real reason for them to even be around. However, I'm not so cynical to truly believe that the art of good folk died with Dylan's glory days; there are a number (a small number, but nevertheless) of musicians that take the genre and make something inspired and truly wonderful (one artist you should check out for example is Spencer Garland... but I digress).
Swedish musician Kristian Matsson, under his moniker The Tallest Man On Earth, has apparently been making this kind of Folk music for some time now, and The Wild Hunt is my first exposure to him. And boy, does he know how to do it right; the lyrics are wonderfully crafted and delivered in a sensitive yet powerful Dylan-esque croon (I hate comparisons from other folk artists to Bob Dylan, but honestly sometimes it just can't be avoided), and the gentle, beautiful music is carefully arranged in such a unique way that Matsson makes the sound completely his own. And the album is at the perfect length; the 34 minutes that rush by allow the listener to appreciate the album without suffocating or boring them. Like I said before, there's only a few true Folk artists out there that are worth your time, and I'm happy to say that The Tallest Man On Earth is one of them.

Hipster Rating:

8.4

Coming up on Sunday, Brothers by The Black Keys!