Music Reviews
Or, The Whale

Or, The Whale

Light Poles and Pines

Seany

It’s nice to know someone still makes country music like they used to. Or, the Whale mixes soaring harmony, social responsibility and steel guitar and sounds like a lonesome lover up in the cab of an 18 wheeler. It’s not complicated music, at least not when you listen to it the first time. A simple acoustic guitar, drum and pedal steel supports a melodic harmony on “Call and Response” as they sing about bravely rebuilding a city on sinking ground, already 20 feet below sea level. That’s the sort of gloriously irresponsible action that propels so many country songs and so many musical ballads. The record continues on in this vein with odd instruments popping up to punctuate the melody – there’s a saw lurking in cut two, and a harmonium, a glockenspiel, and even an omnichord, whatever that might be. Or, the Whale fuses all the traditional forms of the rural working class, producing a sound that is both new and exciting, and old and reassuring.

Or, the Whale: http://www.orthewhale.com


Recently on Ink 19...

Archive Archaeology

Archive Archaeology

Archive Archaeology

Bob Pomeroy gets into four Radio Rarities from producer Zev Feldman for Record Store Day with great jazz recordings from Wes Montgomery, Les McCann, Cal Tjader, and Ahmad Jamal.

Archive Archaeology: Phil Alvin

Archive Archaeology: Phil Alvin

Archive Archaeology

Bob Pomeroy digs into Un “Sung Stories” (1986, Liberation Hall), Blasters’ frontman Phil Alvin’s American Roots collaboration with Sun Ra and his Arkestra, the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, and New Orleans saxman Lee Allen.

A Darker Shade of Noir

A Darker Shade of Noir

Print Reviews

Roi J. Tamkin reviews A Darker Shade of Noir, fifteen new stories from women writers completely familiar with the horrors of owning a body in a patriarchal society, edited by Joyce Carol Oates.

Garage Sale Vinyl: The Time

Garage Sale Vinyl: The Time

Garage Sale Vinyl

Feeling funky this week, Christopher Long gets his groove on while discovering a well-cared-for used vinyl copy of one of his all-time R&B faves: Ice Cream Castle, the classic 1984 LP from The Time, for just a couple of bucks.

Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir

Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir

Interviews

During AFI Fest 2023, Lily and Generoso interviewed director Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir, whose impressive debut feature, City of Wind, carefully examines the juxtaposition between the identity of place and tradition against the powers of modernity in contemporary Mongolia.

Garage Sale Vinyl: Bonnie Raitt

Garage Sale Vinyl: Bonnie Raitt

Garage Sale Vinyl

Ever-focused on finding (affordable) vinyl treasures, Christopher Long returns this week with his latest gem — a reasonably well-cared-for LP copy of The Glow, the 1979 studio classic from Bonnie Raitt.

%d bloggers like this: