It’s not always lonely in Lonelyville

 By Henry Lipput

Dusty Wright pulled a fast one on us.

Before he announced his latest album, he released three singles: two would become album tracks including “Stare into the Sun” which he described as “an homage to carefree days playing underneath the canopy of the sun” and a non-album track was a cover of Buffalo Springfield’s “Sit Down I Think I Love You.”

Of the album itself, Lonelyville (Pet Rock), Wright’s concept of isolation became the underlying narrative. There are of course examples of this in the title song in which following a routine takes the place of having a relationship (“I find peace in simple things/Repeating the same small things/My routine keeps me sharp/Melting away my pain … and loss”). The situation in “Making New Friends” is even more grim: “I’m playing with mud again/Watch me build my new friends.

But don't let the album’s title and the stated concept put you off because many songs on Lonelyville are about love in its many forms. It’s also a dramatic departure from Wright’s 2020 album Can Anyone Hear Me? which was full of protest songs about what we’re doing to the planet and each other.

One of my favorite songs on Lonelyville is “Unbearable Brightness” which asks the musical question: How bright does your love shine when it's not returned? (“But I don’t know what to say/I don’t know what to do/But I know you know/Just how you make me …  feel.”) It’s a situation many of us have been in and it’s a glorious feeling until we’re eventually shut down.

Despite these disappointments, the message of “To Find Love” is you have to share love to find love: “You have to love in spite of it all/You have to stand up after you fall/You have to give in to it all/You have to love to find love.”

Love can also be scary when it seems we’re in too deep too quickly. This is the situation in “Riptide of Love”: “Swimming to the surface/Trying to catch our breath/But I’m not certain/If we’re got our best/Caught in a riptide of love/Don’t know if we’re under or above.”

So how do you get out of Lonelyville? As four wise men once sang, all you need it love. Love is the exit ramp from Lonelyville and it's shouted loud and clear on the closing track, "Leaving Lonelyville," like a conductor calling for the final boarding of a train.

Trip to the stars

 By Henry Lipput

Here’s my question: Did SUPER 8 aka Trip aka Paul Ryan get an advance look at the pictures the Webb telescope had taken? It sure seems that way because his new album, Universal Journey (Bandcamp), is an out-of-this-world delight.

I’ve been enjoying and reviewing SUPER 8’s music since 2018, the year of his hat trick of three albums that are still a marvel of musical invention (start with the last one, HI/LO, and work your way backwards). He never fails to bring the tunes and arrangements and Universal Journey is no exception.

His new album is the first since 2020’s wonderful collaboration with Lisa Mychols which resulted in the Lisa Mychols and SUPER 8 album (Mychols provides guest vocals on many of Universal Journey’s songs). There have also been three singles in between these releases including “For My Friends” which has a lovely video made up of photos of his friends.

“California Road Trip,” a pop gem fronted by Mychols, opens with a terrific piano vamp lifted by Trip no doubt from a Goffin-King song and is just as good as “Timebomb” their first musical outing. The trip (pun intended) continues on the glorious “Rocky Road” with its lovely vocal from Mychols and, as always, a wonderful arrangement from Trip.

Trip takes over on the Dylan-esque “Cracks in The Pavement” bringing along his acoustic and his harmonica as well as some of The Bob’s wordplay: “I’ve got a friend who’s a poet/Drew me a picture of a boat/Friend who's a poet/Drew me a picture of a boat/But after reading through his poems/I wish he’d painted me a goat.” “On The Radio” is rocking little number with Trip in top-form musically and lyrically as he presents an ode about hearing new music (something we can all relate to).

The opening and closing tracks on Universal Journey (“Universe,” “Galactic 9,” “Feel,” and “The World Is Happening”) make up a soundtrack to a viewing of the incredible Webb telescope photos. “Galactic 9,” with vocals from Mychols, is the sexy sound of space travel with visions of a ship full of mile-high-and -a-half members.

“Feel,” which could be thought of as the album’s alternate title, is a woozy, psychedelic track and reflects the look of the cover painting: “We're floating through the sky on a flimsy wicker basket/The earth is just a ball suspended in the sky/Now here we find ourselves just learning how to fly.” There’s the repeated line “feel the air” and the song closes with “just keep me in your memory” as if the wonders of space travel might let you forget where you’re from and who you may be missing.

“The World Is Happening” wraps up the voyage. There’s a callback to the opening track with a repeated “The world is happening for you” and its used as part of a message of hope. If the stars shine in your eyes, it can make you stronger “when you feel the rhythm in your soul.” The song builds as it goes on and by the end with its chorus of backing vocals and a repeated refrain of the song’s title, you get an almost “Hey Jude” rush and wouldn’t mind if the song went on for a while longer.

The New Fools works in pairs

 By Henry Lipput 

The outstanding new album Vanille (Everlasting Records) from The New Fools is their third (although I’d argue that it’s their fourth because the terrific lockdown sessions collection released as Papillion in 2020 is, to my mind, a proper album). The CD version of Vanille comes with an eight-song disc with new songs while the second disc contains bits of radio interviews and song introductions for the four singles released between Papillion and Vanille and there’s also solo acoustic versions of four songs from Vanille performed by Tony Jenkins, the band’s lyricist and singer, for Stagger radio in Cambridge UK.

Why do I say The New Fools work in pairs? Well, for me six of the eight songs on Vanille are connected in a bizarre reverse mirror way: one song is a character study about a lonely, troubled person and the following song is hopeful and sometimes about love. It’s as if on the Revolver album track listing “Eleanor Rigby” was followed by “Here, There and Everywhere.”

The best example is “The Boy Needs a Miracle.” A man sits in his local café, “Every day is just like the last/He sits watching the world going past.” Like his favorite music, now repackaged and remastered, his life has lost its meaning, it “seems empty now.” The world is changing too fast, his favorite programs are no longer on the television, and in a nod to Anthony Newley’s 1960’s musical, he screams “Stop the world!” he wants to get off.

As you begin to listen to the next song, with the lyrics “When you’re alone/Your footsteps seem to echo down/This city street hollow/A sound so desolate/It cuts right to the bone” you might think it’s a continuation of the previous song. But the song takes a joyous turn and “I Found You” becomes an ode to a new-found love that is so out-of-the-blue it doesn’t seem real: “I put my finger to your lips/Brush them with my fingertips/Just to make sure you are real.”

The next pairing consists of “Samantha Sits” and “Better Days.” Samantha “sits and thinks about her life/Ponders on the things she’s never done/She’s never been anybody’s wife/Never been somebody’s mum.” She’s happy that she’s never had to tow the line or bite her tongue but the choices she’s made have resulted in a life of loneliness.

As a result, Samantha has never had to deal with the difficulties that the couple in “Better Days” are having. But is that a good thing? It can be hard work: “We’ve had some hard times, Baby, but we’ve seen enough/To feel secure when the going gets tough/And though we’re not smart girl, we know it’s not enough/To close our eyes and pray for better days.” And he promises: “I’d go the extra mile for the sight of your smile.”

“If Things Don’t Change” and “…A Campfire Song” may be more of a stretch but stay with me on this. The man in “If Things Don’t Change” is the polar opposite of the people in Vanille’s first song “New Fools.” “New Fools” is not the band’s theme song but a look at all the people who bite down hard on the lies and misinformation they get from the government and media. “If Things Don’t Change” is the picture of a man who makes up his own mind and can’t sleep or even get out of bed because of it: “I can’t fall into line and have someone/Whose language and culture is different than mine.”

But what’s the solution? Well, as a certain foursome once sang “All you need is love” and “…A Campfire Song” finds another way of saying it: “But when I wake up and the sun still shines/And there’s magic when your eyes meet mine.” And it’s both friends and lovers that make a community: “Let’s start ourselves a fire/Hold hands and laugh for a while/Don’t you know nothing can go wrong/Cos you got me and we’ve got this song.”