Distortland, the ninth studio LP from Portland, Oregon quartet the Dandy Warhols, continues the band's post-Odditorium maturation, taming a bit of their edge. As singer Courtney Taylor-Taylor acknowledges on "The Grow Up Song," "I've got to admit, I'm too old for this shit." With less sleaze and more reflection, the Dandies retain their wit with a wink, but aren't as sneering as on prior releases. While their most popular hits tend to veer toward the infectious pop side of the spectrum, most of their albums contain a hefty amount of trippy dreamscapes. Distortland isn't as in-your-face as the more muscular tracks on This Machine, nor is it as shiny as Welcome to the Monkey House. Without any immediate hits like "We Used to Be Friends" or "Bohemian Like You," the band seems to have left behind that commercial urge on Distortland, instead focusing on vibes and sensations.
As live, late-1970s Sun Ra albums go, Somewhere Over the Rainbow is a cut above. It's similar to and contemporaneous with The Soul Vibrations of Man and Taking a Chance on Chances, two live sets also issued on Saturn in 1977 (and available in our digitally remastered download catalog). Somewhere Over the Rainbow (Saturn 7877) was also known as We Live to Be: the titles of track one on side A were often handwritten on labels and/or generic sleeves, a common practice in Saturn's DIY packaging process.
A bit more of a purist album than the usual collection of retro-swingers, All Aboard includes several jump blues (the best of which are "The Indigo Swing" and "Regular Joe") plus a good downtempo swinger, "(Today's the Day) I'm Glad I'm Not Dead," and an intriguing cover of Willie Dixon's "Violent Love" (previously done by bands ranging from Dr. Feelgood to Skankin' Pickle).
James Blunt is back with a sparkling new album Who We Used To Be on Atlantic Records, featuring the bright and breezy uptempo rocker “Beside You’.