Close to The Machine

Back in 2006 after I left DOMAIN, even if we ended up with the best album that band was able to do, I needed a change of pace, something a bit more back to where I came from, back to where my heart is. What I wanted to do was a real Classic Rock album. Straight PURPLE, RAINBOW, HEEP, MANFRED MANN… you name it. Quickly I got the boys together to do it, and we managed to record a few demos. Unfortunately, the band disbanded shortly after, and as my studio jobs became more and more interesting and important, I put that idea on hold. A couple years later in 2009 I finally came to the conclusion, not to go out looking for steady band members, but to try to get all my friends together to help me out making the album, I always wanted to make…

On their second album since their 2005 reunion, synth pop pioneers Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark rekindle the spirit of two new wave classics, the first being their own "slept on" masterpiece from 1983, Dazzle Ships, an album that pushed the boundaries sonically. From the blippy, robotic, and almost musique concrète opener "Please Remain Seated" to the geometric sleeve that credits DZ designer Peter Saville with Executive Art Design, English Electric carries on the pop-meets-avant-garde spirit of that fan favorite album. It gives up a love song like "Night Café" that's so glossed and polished that it could be used in a John Hughes film, and then it offers an edgy swerve like "Decimal," where answering machine messages, countdowns, and other disembodied voices provided some kind of silicon chorus that's equally majestic and precise…

Gold buried deep in the BIS back-catalog since 1980 (but readily available), this CD adds a couple of apt fillers from 1981 to the program of the original analog LP. Larsson’s Pastoral Suite is the best-known music here, and makes a fine overture in its most sprightly recorded chamber performance. The Romance has live intensity, helped by the sound, a classic piece of minimalist work by Bis proprietor, Robert von Bar: just a small Revox half-track reel-to-reel machine, and a couple of mikes above and in front of the conductor. T

A characteristically humongous (8-CD) box set from the wonderful obsessive-compulsives at Bear Family, documenting the Killer's '60s tenure at Smash Records. Lewis made consistently good music during this period, but the combination of his personal scandals and the British Invasion made him a pariah to radio programmers until mid-decade, when he returned to his country roots. Highlights of the set include the entirety of a Texas live show, with Lewis and his crack band rendering various early rock standards at dangerously high (i.e., proto punk) speed, some excellent duets with his (then) wife Linda Gail, and gorgeous renditions of standards like Willie Nelson's "Funny How Time Slips Away" and Merle Haggard's "Lonesome Fugitive." Lewis fans with deep pockets should grab this one immediately…