Review: Kevin Tihista's Red Terror, Wake Up Captain

Chicago singer-songwriter Kevin Tihista (who records under the moniker Kevin Tihista's Red Terror) comfortably occupies the niche carved out by Elliott Smith and Epic Soundtracks -- quiet, stripped down indie-folk/pop tales of love and depression. Of course, both those artists seem to have met their demise at their own hands; let's hope Tihista fares better. For his third album, Wake Up Captain, Tihista moves beyond the largely acoustic guitar backing that dominated his first two albums, going for a more piano-based sound and fuller orchestration. Simple tunes expand into dense, Brian Wilson-esque soundscapes of harmonies and colorful instrumentation. A couple songs almost, dare I say it, rock (though most don't stray too far from the basic blueprint previously established). A few of these (most notably "Family Curse," one of 2004's more noteworthy songs) are stellar and quite catchy; much like the late great Epic Soundtracks, Tihista seems to be shooting, in places, for that melancholy early 70's piano pop sound championed by Todd Rundgren and Harry Nilsson. Unfortunately, as with his prior work, the disc drags in spots, and getting through the whole thing without skipping a track or three is no easy task. But for those quiet, instrospective mornings, Captain is surprisingly effective, and Tihista is an artist who'd be easily appreciated by those trying to fill Elliott's absence.

While we're at it, I recently picked up Tihista's 2005 collection of home demos and outtakes, Home Demons. Clever title. Alas, it's definitely for hardcore fans only, and even those (i.e. probably me & a couple others) will be largely disappointed. There are a couple fully-realized (and decent) tracks, as well as some unfinished snippets and rough-sounding home recordings. You get maybe 15 minutes of worthwhile music and a lot of filler. Even what should have been an amusing cover, Dave Mason's classic rock staple "We Just Disagree," is a bit of a letdown, though largely because it reminded me how annoying I find most classic rock staples. I'll probably take a few of these for my inevitable Tihista mix cdr, but casual listeners should stick with Wake Up Captain and his fine 2001 debut Don't Breathe A Word (which you can probably pick up used for a couple bucks). [NOTE: Home Demons doesn't appear to be widely distributed; I picked mine up from the fine folks at Parasol Records, a great spot for indie pop & rock.]

Review: Ben Folds, Songs For Silverman

A mere four years after his solo debut, Ben Folds follows up with the inferior, but still decent enough, Songs For Silverman. Granted, 1991's Rockin' The Suburbs was a tough act to follow. After a few fine (but invariably flawed) discs with his Ben Folds Five trio, Suburbs managed to weed out most of the intermittent lyrical smarminess and occasionally grating musical showmanship that dragged down bits of the BFF albums, featuring song after song of hook-filled, catchy rockers and ballads that dared to get emotional and insightful without falling into the tendency towards sappiness that plagues many piano-based artists. After that, Folds seemed to lie low, tossing out a quickie live disc and a few Internet-only EP's. Silverman cherry-picks some of the tunes from those EP's and adds in a bunch of new ones. The highlight, "Landed," already showed up on an EP, and it continues in the vein of prior work, sticking in your head like gum (though something about the chorus rings a bit too close to Carole King territory for me). A few other tunes similarly weld Folds' gifts for character-based storytelling (and the usual assortment of bitter break-up songs) and melodic richness. But unfortunately Silverman also revives the fatal flaw of the BFF's swan song, The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner: it's kinda dull. Many of the songs, while pretty enough, just don't go anywhere. This is particularly apparent on the latter half of the disc (back in the vinyl days, this would easily be one of those records where you rarely flip to side two). The nonstop musical variation and moving choruses that buoyed Suburbs are largely lacking. Maybe I noticed this more than I should have, having bought the disc at the same time I picked up the remastered Whatever And Ever Amen, Ben Folds Five's 1997 breakthrough cd, reissued with a slew of bonus tracks. Whatever And Ever highlights Ben's pluses and minuses -- a few unimaginably catchy and fantastic songs ("Brick," "Kate," "Ballad Of Who Could Care Less," etc.), weighted down by a tendency towards lyrical and musical excess that was annoying, but at least rarely dull. Silverman, at the end of the day, is the work of a truly mature artist who has shaved off the unnecessary cleverness that plagued his earlier works but in the process lost some of the edge that made him one of the more original voices in the indie rock scene. Final analysis: Buy the reissued/remastered Whatever And Ever; buy Suburbs; and only then grab a copy of Silverman if you need to cool down a bit.