MUSIC: MARCH

CDS WE LOVE...in which we cozy up to and share music that has struck our eardrums.
(The streams below will be available until early April, when a new batch will appear.)

Gil Scott-Heron: I'M NEW HERE

(XL, 2010)

Title notwithstanding, I’M NEW HERE, Gil Scott-Heron’s first studio album in sixteen years, shows the poet-in-exile’s revolutionary verve has given way to the hard-luck fatalism of the blues, a turn that is career-defining. The album, a mix of electronic beats, samples, spoken word, and wizened rhapsody, evokes the steely sophistication of Ghostface Killah or Tricky, artists who themselves owe much to Scott-Heron, the oft-termed “Godfather of Rap.”  “Me and the Devil” is an infernal chant to the ghetto-ravages of the soul. “New York Is Killing Me,” with its husky growls and rattling percussion, is a noir-circus straight from Tom Waits’s book. The title track is a sparsely layered folk ballad about a junkie starting over in the face of regret and complacency. “Turn around, turn around, turn around/you may come full circle,” he sings, which captures the significance of Heron’s latest—his ability to change his tune to the same powerful effect.

Hear This! "Me and the Devil" by Gil Scott-Heron

Carolina Chocolate Drops: GENUINE NEGRO JIG

(Nonesuch, 2010)

This genre-bending release from the Carolina Chocolate Drops offers far more than just novel, all-black old-time nostalgia. While on the surface, the album sounds like traditional porch-picking, the curious battery of covers and old standards constantly turns corners unseen. The blues cover “Your Baby Ain’t Sweet Like Mine,” replete with kitschy kazoo, transitions easily into the beat-boxed r&b revenge fantasy “Hit ’Em Up Style.” The traditional tune “Snowden’s Jig (Genuine Negro Jig)” enthralls with its otherworldly, Romani-throwdown feel. The musicianship and songwriting ability is unquestionable. Rhiannon Giddens’s vocals resound like the proverbial bell, while she plucks a banjo on many of the tracks. Justin Robinson’s original “Kissin’ And Cussin’” haunts like a murder ballad. And props to Dom Flemons for closing the album with the spooky Tom Waits lament “Trampled Rose,” another surprise that fits stealthily into the Chocolate Drops’ expansive arsenal.

Hear this! "Trampled Rose" by Carolina Chocolate Drops