The band moved more towards power pop and an almost Merseybeat influence on their second record, Time Bomb High School, and brought in a soul influence to the more straight-up rock of their third release, Too Much Guitar.We are grateful for your business and hope you are staying safe and healthy.
As good as Reigning Sounds 2004 album Too Much Guitar was, the title was both an accurate self-review and a preview of what was inside; the deep soul influences that made the groups first two albums so memorable were pushed to the side, and while the album rocked hard and strong, it seemed as if bandleader and songwriter Greg Cartwright was ignoring an integral part of his musical personality in favor of making his music better understood to the nuevo-garage crowd. After a three-year layoff and a rewarding detour backing up Shangri-Las vocalist Mary Weiss on her fine solo album Dangerous Game (with Cartwright producing and writing most of the material), Reigning Sound have returned to the studio with Love and Curses. The album finds the group getting most of their balance back, and while calling it a return to form suggests Too Much Guitar was more flawed than it really was, Love and Curses gives a clearer and more compelling picture of what Reigning Sound does best. Call Me, Only Want You More, and Is It True confirm that Cartwright and his partners rock roll is as tough as ever and bassist David Wayne Gay and drummer Lance Wille are a powerful and elemental rhythm section, but here they also make more room for the soulful edges of Cartwrights voice and Dave Amels keyboards. And when the band turns down the tempo and lets their RB influences step forward, Cartwright reaffirms that hes one of the most powerful and affecting blue-eyed soul men recording today, and the spirit and passion in Trash Talk, Something to Hold Onto, and Love Wont Leave You a Song is thrilling stuff that hardly anyone on the indie scene today can touch. Reigning Sound also dip their toes into the social relevance thing with the working class anthem Stick Up for Me and Banker and a Liar, a curious but fascinating finale which matches a slightly Dylan-esque lyric about the wealthy and corrupt backed with an accordion and a mandolin. Love and Curses features 14 songs driven by soul, strength and fierce belief, and with a voice as strong as Greg Cartwright fronting a band this tight and effective, Reigning Sound are just about unbeatable; theyre one of Americas great bands and theyre firing on all cylinders with Love and Curses. We are moving to WordPress and a new host, but we really need your help to save the site. We will publish a few essays daily while we develop the new site. Greg Cartwright channels pain, love, angst, and soul through his passionate, dynamic songs. Channeling pain, love, angst, and soul through Greg Cartwrights passionate, dynamic songs, Love and Curses stands alongside Time Bomb High School as their finest hour to date. Cartwright relocated to Asheville, North Carolina from his longtime base in Memphis, and the band followed. The current version of the quartet is probably its most proficient musical alignment. Drummer Lance Wille and new bassist David Wayne Gay are a deceptively strong backbone, and Dave Amels organ bleeds texture and verve throughout the album. Amels wonderful work is symbiotic, as critical to Cartwrights vision as Al Koopers flourishes were to the early Bob Dylan albums. The production is vinyl warm, vocals out front, a wall of sound behind that eschews studio trickery and overdubs for sonic truth. Like prior Reigning Sound albums, Cartwright offers a strong theme and excellent sequencing to make a powerful statement that flows with dynamic appeal. Despite the aroma of desperation, unrequited love, and loneliness in the lyrics, theres an infectious magnetism to a man who can bare his soul so completely in his music. Cartwright is a happily married man with a family, but hes able to dip into some dark places and channel the angst and pain of a tortured soul with amazing clarity. Reigning Sound Love And Curses Rar Files Movie Who IsHes willingly haunted, like the man in the horror movie who is warned not to go in the basement but clutches a lit match in shaky hands and starts the descent anyway. The album was recorded over time in two studios but has the immediacy of a group documenting a feverish all-nighter, and the balance of hard rock and desperate shuffles is flawless. This is the first Reigning Sound album in five years, although Cartwright has been busy working with the Detroit Cobras, Mary Weiss, and a briefly reunited Oblivians. Two of the songs on this new album first appeared on Weiss 2007 comeback album Dangerous Game, although her versions of Break It One More Time (titled Brake It here) and Dangerous Game are far more sedate than the cathartic, Red Bull versions on Love and Curses. Ditto Call Me and If I Cant Come Back, two raucous rockers where Cartwrights raw emotional vocals add new dimension to already strong material. Hes always been a great and underappreciated songwriter, but hes also grown into a skilled and passionate vocalist. Although its hard to pick a favorite among so many gems, perhaps the one-two punch of Debris and Stick Up For Me is the musical apex of the record. The discarded lover in Debris might be bitter at his fate as the other guy, but hes not going quietly. Cartwright is almost howling as he wonders, is there another lover there in your room does he even know about me, before declaring that he is irrevocably broken (this debris is all thats left of me). The lone cover tune on the album follows: a pile-driving version of Stick Up For Me where being blinded by sexual opportunity is a thin metaphor for the danger of being lulled into complacency while an uncaring government strips away your soul. Its another example of how Cartwright brilliantly unearths lost singles and garage rock gems and weaves them into his own cadre of songs like they share the same DNA. And before all the Decemberists fans get all bent out of shape about the cadence and instrumentation of Banker and a Liar, let me politely remind them that their heroes did not invent the sea shanty. Colin Meloy is no slouch, but he could never launch such a scathing social commentary within a bouncy, jaunty shuffle. Reigning Sound Love And Curses Rar Files Full Of ShitCartwright views the current sociopolitical environment with the same precision as his takes on the lovelorn and the desperate, since the common themes of deceit and powerlessness apply: And if their money dont fulfill you There are medicines that will do All the thinking for you so you can relax The poison kiss of easy living Full of shit and unforgiving To the poor who rest its burden on their backs Musically invigorating, lyrically exciting, and thematically prescient from start to finish, Love and Curses gets my vote as the best album of 2009.
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