A Eric Ambel
Lakeside
Last Chance Records
Jack of all musical trades -- singer/songwriter/guitarist/producer -- Eric Ambel unleashes a wonderful mess of gritty roots rock on Lakeside, his first solo album in more than a decade.
Just listen to that twisted Neil Youngish guitar on "Hey, Mr. DJ"; then there's the twangy lope of "Let's Play With Fire," which could have been a John Fogerty hit; and "Here Come My Love" is a honky-tonk stomper. A take on the Motown staple "Money," inspired by a live Jerry Lee Lewis version, sounds as if it came straight from garage band heaven, while "Miss Ohio" turns into a volcanic guitar workout.
Though Ambel, who has played with Joan Jett, Steve Earle and others, is a well-known producer, he turned the knob-twisting duties over to Jimbo Mathus for Lakeside, and the results are appropriately loose and fun. Hopefully it won't be another 12 years before his next record.
Hot tracks: "Hey, Mr. DJ," "Money," "Here Come My Love"
-- SEAN CLANCY
ATen High
"Pipe Dream"/"Get It Together"
Greenway Records
There are no pipe dreams here, just a face-melting blast of thumping garage rawk from Fayetteville's Ten High.
OK. Actually, there is a song called "Pipe Dream." That's side A of this 45 rpm single, and it's a sneering put-down that has a drum bit reminiscent of Screaming Tree's "Nearly Lost You," fuzzed up guitars and a singalong chorus that calls out those who just pretend they know what they're talking about.
Side B's "Get It Together" is a rumbling, street-fighting hookup of a song with fierce, bratty vocals that wouldn't sound out of place on some really good punk rock mixtape, right between X-Ray Spex and the Cramps.
And vinylphiles rejoice! This excellent single is available in special colors at greenwayrecords.com.
-- SEAN CLANCY
B+Beach Slang
A Loud Bash of Teenage Feelings
Polyvinyl
Beach Slang is the kind of blindingly sincere punk band that believes rock 'n' roll has healing powers, that transcendence can be found in a certain song, the one that lets you know you're not alone, not everything is lost, or that makes you forget everything that's wrong and dumb in the first place.
This might be where we could turn cynical and scoff and say it all sounds like the well-planned narrative of some clever publicist, but put the record on and it's obvious that Beach Slang really means it.
On "Future Mixtape for the Art Kids," the very first track on A Loud Bash of Teenage Feelings, singer and true believer James Alex demands someone "play me something that might save my life" and then goes ahead and does it himself. "You might be cracked/but I won't let you break," he sings in a sort of shouted whisper, reminiscent of the Psychedelic Furs' Richard Butler, only with more energy, while the band tips its tattered hat to early Goo Goo Dolls, label mates Japandroids and, of course, The Replacements.
A Loud Bash ... picks up where last year's riotously infectious The Things We Do to Find People Who Feel Like Us left off, with Alex and the rest of Beach Slang powering through short, loud, punchy anthems about dead ends, wrecked lives, getting wasted and the constant search for something worth holding on to. It's positive but never preachy; a feisty yet vulnerable album full of hope and alive with possibility for all of those "broken kids no one needs."
Hot tracks: "Future Mixtape for the Art Kids," "Spin the Dial," "Young Hearts," "Atom Bomb"
-- SEAN CLANCY
AAgainst Me!
Shape Shift With Me
Total Treble
Against Me!'s Shape Shift With Me finds the veteran punk band reveling in singer Laura Jane Grace's newfound freedom with hard-hitting results.
Grace, who came out as a transgender woman in 2012, made a powerful statement about identity with the band's 2014 album Transgender Dysphoria Blues. With Shape Shift With Me, she is once again balancing the personal with the political, but with a bit more subtlety and humor.
On "Delicate, Petite & Other Things I'll Never Be," Grace demands, "I wanna know how you stay you" over a sleek, danceable bass groove that wouldn't have fit on previous Against Me! albums. They take gloom over the top on the Bauhaus-influenced "Dead Rats," ending with the chorus that goth kids will soon be chanting, "Shallow graves for all dead rats!/I like the dark clouds the best!"
That doesn't mean Against Me! has lost its political edge, as shown in the ferocious "ProVision L-3," a protest song about American surveillance named after an airport security scanner where Grace screams, "What can you see inside of me?" with thrashing rage.
Hot tracks: "Delicate, Petite & Other Things I'll Never Be," "ProVision L-3," "Dead Rats"
-- GLENN GAMBOA
Newsday (TNS)
Style on 09/27/2016