October 2024 Music: Melanie MacLaren– Lucy Isabel – Abbie Thomas– Disappearing Act– Sicilian Music

 

 

 

 

October was a really great month for music, so much so I can’t get it all into one column. Let’s start with my Artist of the Month: Melanie MacLaren (above).

 

Melanie MacLaren might be the long-awaited Gen Z Folk Queen-To-Be. Her Bloodlust EP oozes “emergent talent.”  The eponymous title track has infectious melody hooks, bouncy internal rhymes, impeccable pacing, a voice that cuts through the instrumental mix, and something to say lyrically. Remember “Laika,” the little dog Russia sent to space to the sorrow and fury of millions around the world? Decades later, MacLaren adds her tears and outrage. Her finger-picked, gentle song brings the little pooch back to life in our hearts. “Get it Back” takes up the topic of things that slip away in different ways–moments glanced and lost from a speeding train window, death, grief …. The theme might be dark, but similar to “Laika,” there’s grace in memory. If you wonder if she can sound this good live, check out “Henry Hudson” (which isn’t on this EP). It’s about the man, the river, MacLaren’s family, changes in her New York neighborhood, and her innermost self. Who can’t relate to her linking refrain: Time, time, time/I’ll stay out of your way/If you stay out of mine. Kudos for having the guts to admit her shame of once judging of her grandfather’s trailer park: Thought I was too good for it, but I wasn’t. I am sincere when I say this song made me weep. MacLaren draws comparisons to Gillian Welch, but as much as I hate to saddle anyone with such a high-expectations comparison, how about Joni Mitchell in her wide-eyed youth? I don’t mean it in any copycat way, but, yeah, Melanie McLaren is that good. It would not be hyperbolic to call her voice ethereal. 

 

 

 

Lucy Isabel scores with All the Light. Note the spelling of her name. Although Jared Anderson, the producer of her new LP, has worked with Jason Isbell, Lucy just happens to have a similar-sounding surname. She’s a New Jersey gal now living in Nashville. She works well with bands, but All the Light highlights her inner folk persona. “A Better Life” is typical of the honest, vulnerable, and hopeful songs on the album. It opens with a lovely arpeggio that slides into to a sweet melody that frames a song about a choice: to let go or settle down. “Blind Ambition” speaks truth to dreams, namely the realization embedded in the old adage that the older we get, the less we know–because life and relationships are more complex than we ever imagined. “Miles From Home” shows off some of the album’s polished production; call it bluegrass-inflected folk in a pop wrapper. Nonetheless, a stripped down song like “A Hero’s Welcome” is even more affecting in communicating love’s promises and vicissitudes.

 

 

 

 

If you want to switch gears, try Abbie Thomas and The Crazy Hearts and Not Gonna Lie. Thomas is a combination of blue-eyed soul, retro country, and big-voice jazz. The title track showcases said big voice in a soulful plea to “hold on” when things seem “impossible.” But she takes no crap. On “Bitch Make the Coffee” she stands up for female workers expected to endure abuse to keep their jobs. Thick bass lines, electric guitar, and jazzy keys set an ominous mood. “Wild & Free” is a nostalgic no-apologies song about growing up and making ends meet, though by implication it could be any family, anywhere, anytime. It has a jazzy feel, though the key structure breaks a few rules. It and each song on the record puts Thomas upfront and lets her riff with the band. She is an indie artist. I suspect that won’t last much longer, but it’s open for discussion how a label will, well, label her.

 

 The Disappearing Act is a band-not-band of three longtime friends from Texas. Dallas-based Salim Nourallah is perhaps the best known, but Bob Blumenfeld is also a fine songwriter, and John Dufilho has a knack for bringing everything together. For lack of a better term, the three are a cross between folk and 60s bands in their quieter moments. Mainly you get the sound of synergy. Got that? Maybe it’s best to listen. “Why is Everyone So Damn Happy?” is an ironic and upbeat support of being glum: Why is everyone so damn up/Why won’t everybody just shut up…. but I know this will blow away. You might imagine some blood-curdling thrills in a song named “Gun Barrel City,” but it’s actually as languidly-paced as a Jim Jarmusch film and just as deeply sardonic. Put a happier melody to this and you’ve got a carefree rejoinder in “Santorini,” and if you’ve ever been there you know exactly what they mean. If you like their vibe, also try “People in the Movies” or “I Feel Like I’m Howard Hughes,” the first evocative of a retro creepy film score and the second that could be from an offbeat early ‘60s TV program.

 

 

 

One reviewer has called Rachel McIntrye Smith the “Loretta Lynn for the TikTok Generation.” Maybe, though her old-style country vibe seems more like a natural inclination than an attempt to channel. I guess her slight twang and a song like “Stoke the Coals” invites such a Lynn comparison. As we hear on “Hold the Ladder,” though she’s more of a songbird than a hard hitter. This also comes through in “Grow Up Slow,” which walks a fine line between saccharine imagery and seizing her own identity. Unlike a lot of Southern wannabes, Smith actually hails from Tennessee, which stamps her EP Honeysuckle Friend with homegrown authenticity.

 

 

Finally, something that falls into the categories of folk music for scholars and specialized taste, there is Italy-Sicily, two dozen tracks (save one) collected by ethnomusicologist Sergio Bonanzinga between 1984-2004. A few things for the curious. Sicily, the “ball” kicked by the boot of Italy, has long been a crossroads. Although distinctive styles emerged in the 16^th century, Sicilian music shows many influences: mainland Italian, Greek, Arab, Byzantine…. It also features a lot of polyphony which, in simple terms, means individual melodies woven together to harmonize. Here’s your link for the entire album, from drumming to dances to village songs. You might find it useful to use your slider to see what grabs you. If you’re moved to buy a track or so, go to the Website for the French label Ocora and type in Bonanzinga as your finding aid.

 

 

Rob Weir

 

 

 

American Fiction is a Serious Comedy

 

 

 

American Fiction (2023)

Directed by Cord Jefferson

Orion, 117 minutes, R (language, sexual references, drug use, some violence)

★★★★ ½

 

American Fiction made money, but its box office was softer than it should have been. It won numerous awards at film festivals and was nominated for five Oscars, winning one (director Cord Jefferson for best adapted screenplay). Label it a black comedy in the traditional sense–humor derived from serious matters–but it is also a “black” film that delves into how stereotypes persist in American culture. It’s also a book within a book within two films. See it to understand to unravel that!

 

It is based on Percival Everett’s 2001 novel Erasure.  In all likelihood Everett poured himself into protagonist Dr. Thelonious “Monk” Ellison (Jeffrey Wright). The Ellisons defy conventional views of black families. Monk is a novelist/literature professor in Los Angeles, his sister Lisa (Tracee Ellis Ross) is a Massachusetts physician, and younger brother Cliff (Sterling K. Brown) a plastic surgeon in Arizona. That’s three advanced degrees from an upper-middle-class black family whose aging mother Agnes (Leslie Uggams) still lives in the family home in Brookline, as well as a beachfront home in Scituate. If you’re keeping score this is lily-white Massachusetts; Brookline is just 0.12 percent black, Scituate 0.08 percent. The family must confront the fact that Agnes is suffering from Alzheimer’s. They plan to assemble at the beach to discuss future options.

 

The Ellisons are a rich-in-property-money-stretched and parallel the woes of some British gentry. The old properties need work, Lisa is divorced, Cliff has bills and is grappling with coming out as gay, and Monk’s books aren’t selling. That’s because Monk is grounded in classics and refuses to write anything that demeans African Americans. His agent Arthur (John Ortiz) delivers the bad news that his new novel has been rejected by major publishers. Imagine Monk’s shock when Sintara Golden (Issa Rae) scores bigtime with We Lives in Da’ Ghetto. His frustration-based response is to churn out My Pafology under the pseudonym Stagg R. Leigh. (Look up the legend of Stagolee if you don’t know it.) Monk’s intent is to be so trashy and outrageous that the public will see how African Americans are lampooned. Arthur reluctantly sends it out and to Monk’s horror, the big publishers love it and up the ante for an advance. The more outrageous Monk/Stagg gets–including changing the title to Fuck–the more the media salivates. Monk and Arthur must improvise why they can’t meet Stagg, but there’s even a movie producer (Adam Brody) ready to film it. Monk stands to make major coin but the price is his dignity.

 

Fuck sells so well that it’s up for a major book award. Poor Monk finds himself on a five-person committee–another member is Sintara–to sift between the ten contenders. He is relieved that Sintara hates the book, but their bonding is short-lived when he politely asks how her book is any different from the despicable Fuck. Nothing goes according to plan, including the ways in which Monk’s natural diffidence and introversion complicates an on/off new romance with Coraline (Erika Alexander), a lawyer renting a house in Scituate across the street from the Ellisons.

 

You name the trope and American Fiction toys with it: the cancel culture, whites crawling over each to “honor” black people and define their “authentic” experiences, the vulgarity of pop culture, occupations, flamboyant gayness, how a “black” film score should sound, the romantic comedy genre, dress, speech, and manners patterns….  All of this provides perfect comic setups, but is it too much of a good thing?

 

Jeffrey Wright is (as always) magnificent as Monk, a cold fish who’d like to swim in warm water but doesn’t know how. Alexander does a great job of treading the line between an independent woman and a coquette, Uggams convincingly blinks in and out of reality, and though she’s not on screen long, Ross is an acerbic delight. Although I worry it was too much, Brown is true to the adage that if you decide to go over the top, go way over.

 

Some audiences were disappointed by the film’s resolution and it’s an open question whether Jefferson (and Percival) inadvertently reify some of the negative stereotypes they hope to obliterate? I’m still mulling this, but I suggest that you go with any inconsistencies you find. American Fiction is often amusing, but it’s also a quiet think-about-it powerhouse.

 

Rob Weir