Two for Thursday, 3/3/11

Hans Rotenberry & Brad Jones-Mountain Jack. I really fell down on the job here, as I missed this brilliant collaboration that came out last November. Especially as I've gone on record gushing over what a genius Jones is, and I'm a fan of Rotenberry's group The Shazam. Anyway, better late than never, and this is a rare case where the whole exceeds the sum of the parts when two talents get together. This isn't straight up power pop by any means, but a more rustic, laid-back affair that has an early 70s Small Faces/pastoral Kinks vibe. Lots of standout tracks, from the genial opener "Count on Me", the hands-down-best-track-on-the-disc "A Likely Lad", the sounds-like-a-Band-classic "Ain't Gonna Hunt Anyone" and the Stonesish "Greef" (get it? "grief" spelled like "Keef" Richards). There are a lot of things I'd do if I had a time machine, but one of them would be to go back and put this in the top 10 of my Best of 2010 list.

iTunes | eMusic

D.C. Cardwell-Some Hope. Melbourne's D.C. Cardwell is a singer-songwriter that should appeal to fans of Neil Finn and David Grahame, and he has the ability to excel on both the slower, acoustic numbers as well as the up-tempo pop gems. You'll only need to go a few tracks into Some Hope to realize this as the beautiful, gentle opener "I Am Still the Same" and the lovely, spare "Birthday Present" are followed by the catchy power pop of "Peace and Love". Aside from these three, there are plenty of instant classics to go around like the breezy "Way With Words", the harmonica and handclaps of "A Minute of Your Time", and the jangly "Tom is Everybody's Friend". 16 tracks in all here, so it's quality and quantity.

CD Baby | MySpace | iTunes | Listen/Buy at Bandcamp

CD of the Day, 5/17/07: The Sunday Drivers-Tiny Telephone

In my book, Brad Jones is pretty much God. Who is Brad Jones, you ask? Maybe the greatest pop/rock producer working these days. He produced my #1 disc of last year, Bob Evans' Suburban Songbook. He produced my #3 disc of 2005, Josh Rouse's Nashville. He also produced David Mead's Tangerine, and oh yeah, some disc called Kontiki by this band called Cotton Mather. Not to mention his work in the Nashville power pop mafia with Bill Lloyd and others. So when Brad Jones produces a new album, I take notice, and he's lent his considerable talents to Tiny Telephone, the new disc by the Spanish band The Sunday Drivers. And while not another Kontiki or Suburban Songbook, it's a great listen nonetheless.

The operative sound here is mid-tempo roots pop, somewhere in between Evans on Suburban Songbook and Josh Rouse. I also hear some Tom Petty as well as strong similarities to The Latebirds' Radio Insomnia (a Brad Jones album without Brad Jones if there ever was one). Things start off nicely with "Rainbows of Colours", which has a kind of dreamy feel to it (as might be expected from the title) and features a great minute or so instrumental outro that really makes the track. "She" is next, and if there ever was a more obvious lost Josh Rouse track out there, I'm not sure you'd be able to find it (melodically, it reminds me quite a bit of Rouse's best song ever, 1972's "Rise"). "Do It" is the first single off the album, and its driving guitar sound is where the Tom Petty comparisons come in. Other standouts include the languid "Paranoid", the poppy "Sing When You're Happy" (which doesn't wear out its welcome despite being 5:30 long), and the hand-clapping, foot-stomping "Day In Day Out". It hasn't been released in the USA yet (perhaps never, who knows?), but it's a not-terribly-expensive-for-an-import $18 at the Amazon link below.

MySpace | Amazon

And here's a video for "Do It":