Dave Matthews Band
Stand Up
Few bands come with such a sterling reputation for emotive music as that of the Dave Matthews Band, so there are always high expectations of any of this award-winning and often-touring group’s new albums. Stand Up (Universal) — their 13th album — delivers, albeit not with the radio-geared sound that many fans might have expected.
Matthews’s warm, gritty voice swirls over a mellow, floating melody on Dreamgirl to open the album, and this breezy mood carries through to much of Stand Up, while dipping into a few earthy, organic genres along the way: Old Dirt Hill (Bring That Beat Back) is warm folk-rock; Stand Up (for It) has a jazzy energy with wild sax notes; Smooth Rider burns with a slow blues beat; Out of My Hands and Stolen Away on 55th and 3rd are slow and poignant; and Hello Again and especially Louisiana Bayou have an upbeat country-rock twang.
The production, by R&B man Mark Batson, is crisp and polished. American Baby starts with an enchanting two-minute intro, where what sounds like a bird’s wings flapping lends a haunting air to a piano, guitar and violin melody, before the song itself — also the first single, and maybe the most radio-oriented here, along with the war-themed Everybody Wake Up (Our Finest Hour Arrives) — kicks off.
“This album is about love, life, God, death and sex,” Matthews told Rolling Stone magazine, and while that might seem quite serious, Stand Up rather comes across as the product of a confident band with 12 years of experience getting together to jam and let the music flow where it will, even if some tracks don’t end up with much of a hook.
Stand Up might not quite be what every fan wished for — and it proves Matthews can’t conveniently be filed under rock — but it is a decent and enjoyable album.
ALSO ON THE SHELF
Collective Soul
From the Ground Up (Gallo)
Ed Roland tells in the CD sleeve how he was in the studio to demo some new songs he had written when it occurred to him that the stripped-down songs were what Collective Soul had always been about — so he called in the band “to help capture how our songs start in their infant form before the nurturing and hours of studio time mature them to what you’ve been accustomed to hearing”. So, this chilled-out EP has eight hits and rarities sounding raw, unplugged, unpolished — including the new track Youth (the eponymous new album is also out) and the hit December, which just sounds flat here. From the Ground Up could be mellow or monotonous — it just depends on how much one misses the bells and whistles. — Riaan Wolmarans
Craig David
The Story Goes (Warner Brothers)
Once a part of the exciting pirate radio system in the United Kingdom, where new styles are championed daily, Craig David’s music has progressively sweetened with each subsequent album. He has gradually swayed from the “urban” market formula into one-man boy-band territory, where tortured love songs are delivered in predictable harmonies and virtually stillborn drum programming. Although his singing ability remains undoubtable, I’m not sure how much effort went into the crafting the accompanying music. — Kwanele Sosibo
Freshlyground
Nomvula (Freeground Records)
It would perhaps be accurate to suggest that, over the past few years, the seven-piece Freshlyground have established themselves as every South African family’s favourite band. With help from excitable hacks and the adulation of impressionable female exchange students, the seven-piece Cape Town-based band have, since their 2003 debut, Jika Jika, become a trailblazing mainstay on the local music scene while steering clear of major record labels.
Listening to Nomvula, the group’s sophomore offering, it’s not hard to fathom the cross-generational appeal they evoke. Their music is squeaky clean and (for those who find this helpful for record shopping) often categorised under the wide umbrella term of “Afro-fusion” — not that that will tell you anything, of course. At the risk of sounding cynical, though, the most apt description that came to mind while grappling to articulate their sound was “the soundtrack to the euphoria of the new South Africa” — election-day music, if you will.
The album brims with an air of contentment and hope, an aesthetic best exemplified by tracks such as Doo Be Doo, Manyana and Mowbray Kaap. Even in melancholic moments (as on the title track), the group manage to keep their clinical composure. Perhaps the most overtly expressive thing about this collective is lead singer Zolani Mahola’s voice, which changes like the weather depending on subject matter. Utterly believable. — KS
Anthony Hamilton
Soulife (Rhino/Atlantic)
Soulife, Anthony Hamilton’s “lost” fourth album (if you count his unreleased 1995 project and 1996’s overlooked XTC) was actually recorded between 1999 and 2001 for the now defunct Soulife imprint, before the runaway success that was his So So Def debut, Coming from Where I’m from. As a result, you get more bang for your buck — pure, unbridled old-school soul crooning juxtaposed with stripped-down contemporary R&B stylings. In one collection, Hamilton manages not only to capture the essence of the soul tradition, but with his intrinsic countrified passion, also links it directly to the plantation lullabies that spawned it. With no obvious radio hits, this one is a slow burner whose beauty reveals itself with each subsequent listen. — KS
Polstar
Nostalgia (Bombshell)
Polstar borrow from the ranks of Buckfever Underground, with Stephen Timm, Gilad Hockman and Toast Coetzer involved in its performance and production, along with Jason Dyke and songwriter D Marcel Souchon. Seemingly a socially conscious album, with Russian political cover art and a voiceover addressing “despicable acts of terror” on the atmospheric opener Freedom and Democracy, Nostalgia is an appealing collection of laid-back folk-rock. The vocals bring to mind Billy Corgan at a 1960s hippy rally on tracks such as Bomb in My Heart and Maybe Baby, and Lotus Flower is pure loved-up trippiness.
Run through the Streets is a dramatic instrumental turn, and AOE could be the soundtrack to a meditation It’s all good, man, until That’s It, That’s All, with Coetzer’s stream-of-consciousness voiceover sounding simply like a bored newsreader rattling off a bland script. Thankfully, the über-ambient Canada follows to close the album and rescue the mood with its delicate orchestration. It’s an unusual and alluring album, and better than many of the usual folk-rock ramblings in this country. — RW
Various
Marimbas from Mother Africa (African Cream)
The marimba’s distinct tribal sound can easily conjure up Africa’s spirit, when matched with the right music. Here, played by Simba Rashe, Paul Kando and Jabu Sibumbe, it’s unfortunately used to perform already questionable Western songs such as Any Dream Will Do and Obladi Oblada, as well as local standards including Meadowlands and Pata Pata. It sounds like a sales gimmick, and only on a few tracks, such as the two traditional Zimbabwean folk songs included, do the marimbas really perform their magic. Oh, and the sleeve track listing is in the wrong order. — RW
Various
African Drum Masters (African Cream)
Its sister volume, Marimbas from Mother Africa, is disappointing, but African Drum Masters — with 12 tracks performed by a host of African and international drummers and percussionists brought together by singer and songwriter Wendy Oldfield — is a superb display of rhythm. Ranging from stark and abstract, like on opener Voices Apart by Pete Lockett’s Network of Sparks, and Elad Neeman’s Talking Drumto beats with a smattering of vocals (Ixoki by Thapelo Khomo and Mosoeu Ketlele, and the charming Zaza Mtyomani by Ricky Madagascar and Airto Moreira) and some traditional flavour (Zwara Kwenda by Suzan Hendricks and sangoma friends), this collection celebrates the versatility of drumming in fine fashion. — RW