record reviews

February 13, 2011 at 12:00a.m.

Jessica Lea Mayfield

Album: “Tell Me” (Polymer Sounds)

Grade: A

Oh, my. It’s been a long time since you’ve felt this way.

You’re in love. L-O-V-E. Your heart’s all pitter-pat, pitter-pat.

But after Jessica Lea Mayfield sets you up with opener “I’ll Be the One That You Want Some Day,” she is telling you “Our Hearts Are Wrong” on her enchanting and mesmerizing second album, “Tell Me.” And like the schmuck she’s dumping in one of the best songs you’ve heard in a long time, she’s breaking your heart.

Just utterly smashing it to pieces with nuance and vibe and attitude with that sad, resolute voice with producer Dan Auerbach’s menacing, razor-sharp guitar line leaning against the back wall cleaning its fingernails with a switchblade.

“Tell Me” is the portrait of a precocious girl growing into self-assured womanhood and a producer reaching the peak of his powers. It is a dark and moody album, full of delights throughout, and if it doesn’t make Mayfield a star, that too will be heartbreaking.

Just 21, Mayfield is writing at a higher level than most of her peers. She’s tough and wears it like a badge. On “Sometimes at Night,” she tells a lover it’s not her fault: “I did not ask to be born with these eyes/eyes that always speak for my mind.”

She can wish and yearn like any young woman, but she’s not going to take any crap because of it. Like on “Our Hearts Are Wrong” she tells you, “My self-esteem is heating up the room/you’re intimidating as all hell/but I ain’t scared of you,” and you know you’re done for.

— Chris Talbott, Associated Press

TRAIL OF DEAD

Album: “Tao of the Dead”

Grade: B+

Though the art rockers ... And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead have always been forward thinkers, their latest, “Tao of the Dead” (Richter Scale/Superball music), is a definite throwback to the early ’90s.

Remember those heady days after punk broke and Nirvana was king, and crazy, intense rock overwhelmed pop culture? This is a record made for those times, when Smashing Pumpkins were unwinding “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness” and Radiohead was cranking up “The Bends.”

If there’s any doubt about Trail of Dead’s ambitions, they offer “Tao of the Dead Part Two: Strange News From Another Planet,” a 16-minute-plus epic of guitar-driven atmospherics and one instrumental charge after another. It’s Genesis-styled prog-rock filtered through a punk perspective — complete with pretty lulls and angry chanting — for impressive results.

However, it’s Trail of Dead’s twisting of poppier influences into their broader story that is actually even more impressive. “Ebb Away” goes from Joy Division gloom into Foo Fighters’ straightforward rock in less than three minutes. The first single, “Summer of All Dead Souls,” bounces between pummeling drumming and Conrad Keely singing above Jason Reece’s grand guitar riffs for that rare combination of radio-friendly and utterly unique.

“Tao of The Dead” works well as both a return to Trail of Dead’s thrilling beginnings in mid-’90s Austin and a statement of where the once-again-indie rockers want to go in the future.

— Glenn Gamboa, Long Island Newsday

OVER THE RHINE

Album: “The Long Surrender”

Grade: B

Over the Rhine’s new album, “The Long Surrender” (Great Speckled Dog), is aggressively beautiful, like those ’60s protesters who confronted soldiers with flowers. Singer Karin Berquist and guitarist Linford Detweiler have teamed up with producer Joe Henry to build folk music that sounds stridently timeless and tells poignant stories that almost dare you not to cry. “Only God Can Save Us Now” is about life in a nursing home. “Undamped” finds Berquist and Lucinda Williams trading aching lines about the struggle to survive. Soon, it becomes useless to resist “The Long Surrender.”

— Glenn Gamboa, Long Island Newsday

Teddy Thompson

Album: “Bella” (Verve Forecast)

Grade: A

Judging from “Bella,” Teddy Thompson’s unlucky at love, even when he tries courting through his compositions.

“I know you’re hoping to move on, but now I’ve written you this song,” he sings on “Take Me Back Again.”

That approach should work, because “Bella” is irresistible. Thompson has written 11 pop jewels that sparkle thanks to fetching melodies, inventive arrangements and his versatile vocals.

Thompson sings mostly about the resilience and persistence required in the pursuit of love, and he chronicles a series of setbacks with wit while exploring a variety of musical settings. They include the baroque ballad “Home,” the Roy Orbison-style drama “Take Me Back Again,” a couple of catchy rockers and “Tell Me What You Want,” a twangy duet with Jenni Muldaur.

There are cameo contributions from the world’s greatest guitarist, Thompson’s dad, Richard, and much of the material benefits from cinematic string arrangements by producer David Kahne. Love’s not always pretty, but these songs are.

— Steven Wine, Associated Press

DESTROYER

Album: “Kaputt” (Merge)

Grade: C

Cutting-edge music can lose its edge and go slack and dull. Airy nostalgia acts such as M83 have been around for years. Ariel Pink is credited as the “godfather of chillwave” — but that will (or should) end once the world realizes that he taught indie how to soft-rock. “Kaputt” is the ninth solo album by Dan Bejar, a member of the band New Pornographers who uses the moniker Destroyer for his solo work. And it’s slack stuff.

The two minutes of dentist’s-office flute setting up “Suicide Demo for Kara Walker” are a new low, as is the soprano sax in “Kaputt.” “Kaputt’s” ugly referents are so self-aware (“Why’s everybody sing along when we built this city?” sings Bejar at one point) that the guitar solo in “Savage Night at the Opera” resembles longtime German synth-popsters Alphaville — probably intentionally. Oddly, the eyesore funk here renders some of the friendliest music under the Destroyer banner thus far. But Bejar’s best songs can be found on New Pornographers albums.

— Dan Weiss, Philadelphia Inquirer

CUT COPY

Album: “Zonoscope” (Modular)

Grade: B

Australia’s Cut Copy came into its own on 2008’s In Ghost Colours, which spawned dance-floor pleasers such as “Lights and Music” and “Hearts on Fire.” “Zonoscope” follows suit: It flows seamlessly like a club DJ set.

Like Hot Chip and Phoenix (or New Order and OMD before them), Cut Copy knows how to construct tracks that work as both visceral club pleasures and hook-ridden songs. At their best, on the bubbling “Take Me Over” or the blustery “This Is All We’ve Got,” they perfectly balance both impulses. When they indulge their artier side, for the LCD Soundsystem facsimile “Sun God,” or go for a straightforward house anthem, as on “Pharaohs & Pyramids,” they’re less personable. “Zonoscope” has songs to fill the dance floor, but it has some filler, too.

— Steve Klinge, Philadelphia Inquirer

JOE LOVANO/US FIVE

Album: “Bird Songs” (Blue Note)

Grade: B

Tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano chases the Bird on these 11 cuts. This is Charlie Parker cut and pasted for the digital age, via the leader’s unusual use of two drummers, Francisco Mela and Otis Brown III.

Sometimes a phrase gets repeated for emphasis, as on “Passport.” A staple such as “Moose the Mooche” gets a drunkenly slow treatment, while “Ko Ko,” a trio with Lovano and his two drummers, seems to come out of a smoke-filled room, with the tune and tempo fragmented.

The session with bassist Esperanza Spalding and pianist James Weidman is a brainy one. “Blues Collage,” a collection of three of Parker’s blues-based tunes, is oddly contrapuntal, like a Bach fugue. Tunes tend to recede into private spaces, although “Yardbird Suite” at least shows some tragic dimension.

— Karl Stark, Philadelphia Inquirer