My Week In Music: 15-19 July
Eminem and Kittie take us back to the early aughts, while Anna Coddington drops one of the best Kiwi albums of the year to date
Monday:
NEW: Kasabian - Happenings (2024)
I wrote back in February about how I'd lost track of Kasabian since they parted ways with original lead singer Tom Meighan amidst his guilty plea for domestic abuse. It turned out that the group had carried on as a four piece with guitarist Sergio Pizzorno taking over vocals.
And so I checked out their 2022 album The Alchemist's Euphoria and found myself unamused. I'm not sure why I'm avoiding saying what I think: it wasn't very good.
Their latest album Happenings, released a couple of weeks ago, and their second album with Pizzorno in charge, is a massive improvement on almost every level. The vocal is more interesting, while the musical style is a bit more frenetic, a bit more energetic. "Call" is an early highlight, threading the needle between dance and alternative. "Passengers" is another goodie, the kind of anthemc alt-rock the group are known for.
Its not a perfect album by any stretch; some of it is downright derivative of their earlier work, and of other (better) albums released earlier this year. But it was enjoyable enough to make feel a bit more positive about the future of Kasabian sans Meighan. I'll be keeping an eye on them again.
Tuesday:
NEW: Omar Apollo - God Said No (2024)
Indiana native Omar Apollo - Omar Apollonio Velasco to his friends - burst onto the scene a couple years ago with Grammy nominated debut Ivory; this new record is his much anticipated follow-up.
Apollo based the writing around the end of a love affair and the grind of supporting a hit album; ‘Used to talk about you and I / Used to see you every night / Won’t you please just let me go’ he sings on nu-soul inflected “Done With You”, an early highlight here. ‘How can we be dying / If we’re lying down beneath this tree / giving life to withered leaves’ he sings on slower, more pensive “Plane Trees”. It’s a dichotomy throughout, this oscillation between ‘I’m out’ and ‘what happened’ and it works for the most part.
A couple of well placed guests - including John Mayer and actor Pedro Pascal - and his ability in so many styles add flavour, but at the cost of some cohesion. But this is a good album, interesting and entertaining, and Apollo’s message is well voiced.
Tuesday:
NEW: Eminem - The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grace) (2024)
It’s hard to know how seriously to take this album from Eminem. On the one hand, a huge part of it is a return to the style of the Slim Shady persona, akin to the outrage baiting of his earliest work.
But all the quote-unquote attacks against everyone and everything - from Bruce Jenner and Christopher Reeve, to Gen Z and pronouns - are offset by skits in which Slim interacts with Marshall, the more reasonable of the two, leading to their riveting confrontation on “Guilty Conscience 2”.
Is there a place for complaining about being cancelled, talking about making feminists angry, in 2024, even if it is framed as a takedown of those complaints? Maybe the problem here is that it sounds like the same complaints being made by the ‘you can’t make comedy anymore’ choir.
And I think Em pulls it off in the end; by the time the album finishes, I’m back on Marshall’s side. And there are some great tracks on here - mostly in the form of throwbacks for longtime fans. “Head Honcho” is a late album highlight here.
This isn’t one of Eminem’s best - but it is an entertaining and engrossing behind-the-scenes album if you’re a fan of Em and familiar with his career trajectory.
Wednesday:
Moby - Play (1999)
Whatever happened to Moby? He seemed to release Play - which turns 25 this year - then maybe one more, then Eminem destroyed him with a single line (‘It’s over, nobody listens to techno’) after Moby called him misogynistic, homophobic and antisemitic at an awards ceremony.
Except that wasn’t it. Moby has quietly been plugging away in the background. He released his 22nd album earlier this year; Play was his fifth, and his biggest hit. And with respect to Eminem, I don’t think Moby actually is techno.
There are elements sure. But I’ve more often lumped him in with the Morcheebas and Massive Attacks. The letter M, huh.
Listening back to Play now, it feels like a point in time, like it could only exist in 1999. Songs like “Bodyrock” and “Run On” and “Natural Blues” are artefacts from an earlier time, fossils of a music industry in a shambles amid the rise of emo and nu metal and the disastrous Woodstock 99.
In fact, Moby played a let night set at Woodstock 99 and, in a remarkable piece of foreshadowing, left the site immediately after due to safety concerns. We can decide what we take with us into the future.
Perhaps Play was best left in 1999, then.
Wednesday:
NEW: Anna Coddington - Te Whakamiha (2024)
I’ve never really explored the solo output of Anna Coddington - the Kiwi songstress with four albums under her belt, who always seems to be involved in those big events with the Moas and Rungas despite lacking the fame, almost like she is a singer-songwriters’ singer-songwriter. I know she has a terrific voice. I know she is well regarded.
I don’t know if I was expecting this, her fifth solo album Te Whakamiha, a soul/funk album with bilingual lyrics, primarily Māori and occasionally English. The result is really rather brilliant. From the opening song, “Kātuarehe”, she exudes this funky vibe, almost akin to the likes of Prince, the beats catchy and daring you to sit still, the vocal melodies perfectly in sync with the music.
Te Reo takes centre stage frequently, familiar vocal patterns intermingling with the rhythms to create something uniquely enjoyable. Troy Kingi makes a guest appearance on highlight “Honey Back” (apparently alongside backing vocals from Anika Mia and Julia Deans).
Coddington channels 80s new wave on later highlight “Tōmina”. Closer “Mōhou Rā” - which I think translates to something like something fresh or new in the future, maybe Coddington literally pushing for this to become a new thing - sends us off with a pop-rock vibe, almost Naked And Famous-ish. It caps off a short but wonderful record. I loved this.
Thursday:
NEW: Kittie - Fire (2024)
The fascination with nostalgia and the resurgence of nu-metal - two things that are, I think, inextricably linked - has meant renewed interest in a number of bands from the turn of the century, one of whom is the all-girl nu-metal group Kittie, who are back with their first album since 2011 following appearances on the festival circuit in the USA, starting with appearances at When We Were Young in 2021.
I mention that Kittie are an all-girl group because, honestly, it was an oddity in nu-metal circa 2001 - a genre dominated by angry men singing about what makes them angry.
It’s less of an oddity in 2024; this album is the heavy companion to a number of records I’ve loved this year from female artists and female led bands. It is very nu-metal, though maybe a little more progressive - lots of chugging guitars and vocals switching from clean to growly, more akin to groove or thrash metal a la Pantera, but without the guitar solos.
The mid album pairing of “Vultures” and “We Are Shadows” are probably the highlights here. Not a bad album by any means. But it is weird hearing music I loved as an 18 to 20 year old come back in style.
Friday:
NEW: I Am A Monster - Maungawhau (2024)
I Am A Monster is the solo project of Auckland musician Sy Fong, a multi-instrumentalist who has put this album together from scratch using nothing but his nous as a composer, carefully layering tracks to create an ambient, heavy collection of tracks that suit his own personal style.
Sy is a one-time work colleague I ran into at a gig a few weeks ago, and I’ve got an interview with him coming to my SubStack early next week. (Link in bio; please like, share, subscribe, et al, etc.)
Named for his home turf of Mount Eden, Auckland, Maungawhau is just eight tracks, each somewhere between 5 and 7 minutes long, that are more like symphonies in miniature. Thrashy guitar stands as the backbone, with a wide variety of instruments layered on top to suit the mood - bass and drums, but also organs, strings, even what sounds like a xylophone to open the album.
Fong’s vocal generally sits back in the mix, meaning it takes effort to hear what he is singing, dissonant melodies rising from the depths of the instrumentation. “The Sound Of Water Sinking Deeper” is a highlight here, staccato riffage giving way to an old fashioned thrash riff.
“Walking In The Fog” is another highlight, clocking in at over seven minutes, but showing of Fong’s skill as a composer, the use of dynamic and dimension as it moves from acoustic ballad to its brutal ending.
I really enjoyed Maungawhau, a refreshing and unique album from the Kiwi scene. Recommended.
Friday:
NEW: Kate Nash - 9 Sad Symphonies (2024)
London singer-songwriter Kate Nash has been on the scene for a while now - her debut single “Foundations” hit big in 2007, leading to four albums and an acting career (including on Netflix hit GLOW). Nash has always seemed a decent sort. Heck, my buddy Nick has a voice recording of her singing his praises from his stint as a radio host, which at least proves she has a sense of humour.
(Sorry, Nick.)
9 Sad Symphonies has been a long time coming; the first single for it, highlight “Misery”, was released more than three years ago, and Nash also wrote an off-Broadway musical between then and now.
The resulting album could have been a mess, but it’s surprisingly cohesive and unsurprisingly twee - Nash has always had a bit of whimsy about her music, and the addition of ‘stage musical’ to her collection of writing skills has only upped that. Opener “Millions of Heartbeats” is ready made for a large scale stage performance.
Third track “Wasteman” is maybe my favourite track here, a little silly at times, combining a gorgeous string section with a break beat as Nash juxtaposes by singing ‘I’m not about it / I’m on my own shit’. It puts Nash in the same kind of tier as the Spektors’ and Bareilles’ and Folds’ of the world.
A thoroughly enjoyable album in all, and one I’ll be going back to.
Thanks for reading this week, whanau. Kate Nash brings us to a total of 200 albums listened and reviewed for 2024 so far. Thanks for your support!
Have a great weekend!
Cheers, Chris
That Kittie album is mean. Check out the new Julie Christmas album Ridiculous and Full of Blood, for something similar if more arty.