Trax
07/05/2007
RYAN ADAMS, Easy Tiger (Lost Highway): Is it as good as the hype? No. Is it his most consistent work since 2004's “Heartbreaker”? Yes. There was more lyrical meat on “Heartbreaker'”s song bones, but for every “Two” here (a forgettable duet with Sheryl Crow) there's a sucker-punching “I Taught Myself How to Grow” or “Everybody Knows” (“How I'm going to hold on to you when I'm spinning out of control/ You and I together/ But only one of us in love”). Sonically speaking, with Adams' aching tenor offset by sweet harmonies, shimmering guitars and steel, it's like down-home ear candy. www.ryan-adams.com
MIKE FARRIS, Salvation in Lights (Columbia/ Sony): Can we get an amen? Former Screamin' Cheetah Wheelies frontman Farris delivers a gospel disc that sounds as solemn as Saturday night on Bourbon Street in pre-Katrina N'Awlins. Stylistically, Farris shuttles between the Big Easy and Memphis, ladling buckets of groove grease onto his boisterous renditions of traditionals such as “Sit Down Servant,” “Oh Mary, Don't You Weep” and Thomas A. Dorsey's “Precious Lord, Take My Hand.” Farris originals like the rollicking “Streets of Galilee” are of a piece with the stirring soul and gospel classics that inspired him, but the show-stoppers here are a deeply personal, soaring reading of Sam Cooke's “Change is Gonna Come” and especially “Can't No Grave Hold My Body Down,” a gospel standard transformed into a roof-raising, butt-shaking rocker. Hallelujah. www.mikefarrismusic.net .
DAN JANISCH, Medicine Man (Green Door): LA club-scene mainstay Janisch is nothing if not eclectic, a Carl Sandburg fan fond of chanting Tibetan monks whose music alternates between folky rockers, melodic fingerpicked weepers and intense, lyrically driven narratives that yield dramatic surprises. His newest disc reflects the curiosity and creativity if not the sonic quirks that make his best songs refreshing; from the title track's Dylan-esque clap-along spirit to the charming innocence of “Big Trip” and unexpected melancholy of “The Strongest Man (That Ever Lived)” and quietly transcendent “Nora Had a Bird.” With only nine tracks it's surprisingly brief for such a prolific songwriter, but what's here is solid. CD release party at the Echo Sunday. www.myspace.com/danjanisch
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