Music

SHINING THROUGH THE NOISE

The latest offering by Shiner revives alt-rock

When I hear a CD like Shiner's Starless I want to tell all my friends about it, buy a copy for everyone I know and just blast it loud and often from my little car. This is a band that has made a record able to rise above all the journalistic melodrama. No cutesy chic hyphenated lingo on this one: Shiner simply rocks uncontrollably. The four boys from Kansas City, Missouri, will play live at the 15th Street Tavern on May 2.

Starless is not the first Shiner record, but it is the first with a new line-up and innovative rock sensibilities. It will be interesting to see how the album, and past tunes from 1997's Lula Divinia and 1995's Splay, will sound live since the studio production of Starless is an extraordinary auditory feast for ears awaiting the next great independent rock band.

Original members Allen Epley (guitar/ vocals) and Paul Malinowski (bass) added Jason Gerken (drums) and most recently Josh Newton (guitar) to form a band whose sound is thicker and tighter than most rock bands and more melodic, rhythmically complex and hypnotic than the traditional millennium punk band. After the success of Lula Divinia on Hitit! Records, Starless was picked up by Fort Collins label Owned and Operated Recordings. This west leg of the tour will wrap up promotion for Starless material and open the door for future tours supporting the next record, The Egg, set to drop this fall.

Shiner's music breathes and pulsates with a liquid, sort of syrup quality to it that gives new definition to the typical guitar-based rock band. Starless does many things that are admirable and conjures up all sorts of great adjectives that can try to describe it: dark but brilliant, gritty but smooth, dense but airy. Still not sure? Bassist Paul Malinowski tries to clear things up a bit. "It's hard to pinpoint it, but we always try to expand on what we do. Calling us punk may be a stretch. We just like to rock hard, that's all, and keep making great songs. We try not to pigeonhole ourselves."

Shiner did not always sound like they do today. In fact, before the release of Starless, the band considered changing its name because the sound and concepts had so moved far away from their Lula Divinia days. They had skillfully earned their notch on the indie rock belt attracting fans familiar with Hum and Jawbox. Last year, Shiner took a giant step forward on Starless, bringing along bulldozing guitars, great riffs, skillful songwriting and intelligently balanced sonic variety. Said Malinowski, "The songs on Starless are more concise, a little more laid out on the table. Lula was a bit more experimental, I guess, but I like Starless better. The textures are better and I think the songs are better."

Several things strike the listener from the get-go. The album opens with "Spinning," a song that's "radio-friendly" but more original than a lot of major label stuff. Allen Epley's voice is a nice surprise because it's deep rather than rock-shrill. The guitars crunch away in tight, rhythmic riffs. Malinowski's bass, instead of just lending a hand in the harmony, is more obvious and lays down some serious texture. The close vocal harmonies seem to be a consistent characteristic on the album, but are never overdone. What caught my ear and still makes me smile in "Spinning" is the breakdown during the chorus. Gerken pounds the shit out of his drums-- tastefully mind you-- with a couple of fills that simply blew me away. The guitars compete with Epley's voice until the song suddenly ends with a gasp.

Other moments of note are "Kevin Is Gone," illustrating how different two songs can be while maintaining a strong sense of sonic identity. "Unglued" feels like a well-intended nod to the progressive rock of the late '70s. The gentle guitar strumming of the opening verses leads to a power finish of moaning harmonies and mythological, cryptic lyrics: "His feathers melt away / The sun was out today / His feathers melt away / we've all seen better days."

The Egg will be released on DeSoto Records in September. Touring will start at the end of the summer, and Denver will again be on the bill. Said Malinowski of how The Egg fits into Shiner's progress, "The band is growing. I think this next record is our best yet. We're just trying to do our own thing, and I think we're doing a good job of it."

--Judy B.

For more information, visit www.shiner.net

BEAT DIET

RABBIT AT REZODANC

Once upon a time, there was a performance artist named Bunny who lived with his grandmother in Tampa, Florida. When he realized one day that electronic music was in desperate need of a multimedia aesthetic, he constructed a bodysuit from glowstring and introduced himself to a production duo known as Confucius and the Monk. And so Rabbit in the Moon was born. And it was good.

On April 14, Bunny and Confucius of world-famous Hallucination recording artists Rabbit in the Moon descended on Rezodanc, Denver's newest after hours addition, for the beginning of the Lifestyle Odyssey. High-profile remixes of artists ranging from Tori Amos to Goldie to Orbital have put Rabbit on the radio in recent years, but it was Bunny's often luminescent wardrobe that first put Rabbit on the map and in the memory of the masses.

Due to the fairly intimate nature of this particular venue (approximately 300 capacity), the fire twirling that accompanied last year's Moby warm-up at Red Rocks was obviously absent but their signature deep tribal psychedelic beats were more than adequately amplified by Rezodanc resident Supersonic Organism Wave Audio. Green lasers parted Bunny's blonde dreadlocks as he PC DJ's his first live MP3 set in Colorado from behind a stack of white noisy televisions. Confucius followed the Rabbit with vinyl to kick off the grand opening wallflower transplant surgery style.

What does the owner, Brian Robinson, have in store for the future of Rezodanc? An alleycat's erotic ball afterparty on April 28, a Larimer Square fashion show benefit on May 12, and a summer full of other surprises. Let the Lifestyle Odyssey continue.

--orange peel moses

Rezodanc is located at 1442 Larimer Square behind Blue 67. For more information and/or directions, you can visit them in cyberspace at www.rezodanc.com

CD Review

THE SHAKES: TWO FACES, A ROCK NOVEL

Like many great bands before them, Denver's The Shakes uses external concepts for their music. For this second album, Two Faces: A Rock Novel, it's easy to guess what style of format serves as the model. The 20-song CD has a plot, characters, storyline and setting, but aims to tell the story through musical dialog instead of the old fashioned cover-to-cover way. A hefty set of liner notes takes the listener through this tale of humanity and society, angst and wisdom.

I like this CD for a few specific reasons: It reminds me of The Who. I love The Who. Whether Tommy inspired the idea for this millennium rock novel, who knows, but the players definitely paid attention to their predecessors. And, The Shakes have their act together. There is an underlying sense of professionalism, inspiration, and experience behind The Shakes' music. Honestly, the idea of listening to a record that has a separate and unifying "plot" and agenda didn't exactly appeal to me, but Two Faces holds up and offers some interesting insights into the band.

The Denver trio is guitarist Jeff Harrison, drummer Dale DeCesare, and bassist Mike Dockery, with Harrison and DeCesare sharing vocals. The CD's story centers on a young guy having to reconcile his expectations for success and happiness with the different crappy scenarios that constitute "real life." We've all been there.

Thankfully, the band opted for a solution that is easy to swallow as the young man resolves to be constantly curious, "understanding a few more pieces of the puzzle." As "Over Me" completes this song cycle, our young hero muses:
"Two in me, and two I'll always find /
One in my heart, and one inside my mind /
One is free, the other one defined /
I am a child who would be king /
Two voices sing /
Over me."

Most of the songs stand on their own, and the band could easily satisfy a live audience. Especially welcome is the acoustic guitar in conjunction with the plugged-in stuff. Part I opens with "Somewhere in the Grey," a great pop rock song followed the little ditty "To Sleep." The fourth track "Let the Fight Begin," is classic rock at its finest. Part II continues in a similar manner using consistent style and solid songwriting, bringing the plot to a close. An extensive website offers MP3 files and more info on this ambitious project at www. theshakes. net. B+ --Judy B.

CD Review

ANI DIFRANCO: REVELLING/RECKONING

If you are not familiar with Ani DiFranco, buy this record. If you have known her since her folk, coffeehouse, shaved-head, political, angst-grrl days, buy this record. DiFranco's new release is the epitome of how an artist can go from neophyte to pro without a single murmur of "sell-out."

The double 29-track CD has two faces. Revelling begins with a thick and funky number with Maceo Parker and dips into DiFranco's penchant for rocking and rolling on a twelve-string and backup band. Her vocals are no less tame or controlled than any other record, but some of the lyrics are. From the girl who once penned, "Fuck you and your untouchable face," now comes the beautifully bewildering, "Some crazy fucker carved a sculpture out of butter / and propped it up in the middle of the Bonanza Breakfast Bar."

Social commentary is one of DiFranco's greatest talents. Her words can flow so smoothly she should probably be known as a poet who can sing instead of a self-proclaimed folksinger. On Revelling's "Heartbreak Even," the listener can't help listen more closely to a song that states, "I feel you make love to me slightly / everytime you let a little laugh slip too soon / and the moment passes over us so lightly / it feels like sand blowing over a dune."

The most striking and welcome difference in R and R from previous recordings seems to be the root inspiration for the music. Anyone familiar with past releases will recognize the unique lyrics and subject matter, but DiFranco seems to be pulling from jazz and R&B much more heavily than from her New York City alt-rock folk-punk tastes. It is a change that works well. With the addition of trumpet (played by Denver's own Shane Endsley), flute, saxophone, and Fender Rhodes, there is more groove and a new sense of freedom for future innovations. The more I listen, the more I like.

Not to lose touch with her state-of-humanity address for her listeners, DiFranco adds Reckoning's "Subdivision." I could reprint the whole song and we could all nod, "Yass, yass. Go Ani, go," but you should really check it out for yourself. Today. A+ --Judy B.

CD Review

ORB: CYDONIA

You could fill a history book with Dr. Alex Paterson's contributions to techno music, beginning with his basic invention of ambient house in the mid-'80s to the influence of Orb on such giants as KMFDM, Moby, Beck, etc. The question has always been, what next?

His previous album, Orblivion, proved that meandering space treks could be made radio-friendly, and Dr. Alex expands in that direction with Cydonia-- four tracks even include original vocal lines with lyrics penned by Paterson. Fans of obscure sampling need not worry, though; Cydonia still includes plenty of Paterson's patented looping spoken samples, and even a few sly references to squeaks and buzzes he's used in the past on such gems as Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld and U. F. Orb.

It's the self-referencing that has many Orb fans up in arms. You know you're an Orb geek when you can identify one muted sample of a squeak used off a track from an album nearly ten years old. You also know it means Paterson is either running out of ideas, or wrapping something up. The latter idea is particularly scary. Cydonia almost goes out of its way to avoid breaking ground-- even the live vocals are a bit weak and slurry, especially since the idea of female voice-over on chill out music has been explored and perfected by Portishead and Björk many times over. "Once More," the opening single, and "Centuries" are both good songs, but one doesn't buy Orb for mere songs. There's supposed to be a flow here. What happened to the god of continuity?

Still, for fans thirsty after a three-year wait, it's good just to hear these noises again. "Promis" and "Hamlet of Kings" contain some killer riffs, and the sonic whale-like booms of "Terminus" wash up nicely at the end of the album. What's lacking are any brilliant transitions, such as the skip from the creepy "S.A.L.T." into "Toxygen" on Orblivion (a juxtaposition that may go down in history as Paterson's last great idea). With a greatest hits album already out, and Cydonia's "Terminus" wrapping up a whimper instead of a bang, it might be that Paterson is leaving the question of "what next?" to other artists for the first time in his storied career.

As the project scales down and tightens up, the layers become more digestible. I once had fun challenging my roommate to listen to every noise on U. F. Orb at once (inevitably sending him off into this weird trance). Now, I just have fun closing my eyes and going where the music takes me: city, country, space. B--- Chris J. Magyar