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Here are the album reviews I wrote for the May issue of EL Magazine, which was distributed in Tokyo last week.

Sometimes I Sit and Think, and Sometimes I Just Sit
-Courtney Barnett (Milk!/Traffic)
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-Ron Sexsmith (Cooking Vinyl/Imperial)
Courtney Barnett, a young Australian singer-songwriter whose lack of guile has made her an indie darling among the cognoscenti, is the kind of lyricist who doesn’t sound as if she gets her own jokes. Her songs are all definitely about something, but her free-associative methodology reels in off-kilter references and non sequiturs that have a way of cracking you up even when you can’t quite locate the irony. She’s not as pointedly sarcastic as Loudon Wainwright III or John Prine, but she often ends up with the same results. Like Wainwright, she’s even written a swimming song, though the purpose seems to be to debunk the older musician’s notion that it’s a profound pastime. “I had goggles on,” she sings, “they were getting foggy/I much prefer swimming to jogging.” And she’s not a folkie. Though Barnett rarely works up a head of steam, she bangs her tunes out to jerry-built garage rock arangements that call attention to her non-melodic vocal style, which is delivered in an accent whose natural offhandedness gives the songs more relevance than she probably intends. She’s obviously not someone who means to tell you about herself, but she wants you to know where she’s from, geographically and emotionally. When she does sad, as on the haunting “Depreston” and the quirky “Boxing Day Blues,” you actually want to know more. For some reason, I doubt she even realizes she reveals as much as she does, even in her clever song titles, the best of which is “Nobody Really Cares If You Don’t Go to the Party.” I know exactly what she’s talking about. Usually I know what Ron Sexsmith is talking about, too, since he’s one of the most reliably transparent songwriters ever to wield a guitar, and this time the guitar is as often electric as not. His 14th LP is essentially more of the same, meaning it’s never content to pass the time. The melodies are sure, the rhymes natural, the themes comprehensible and compelling. What makes it a little better than usual is the attention to detail. For the first time in a number of years he’s assisted by a host of excellent studio hands, and the production, by Jim Scott, is attentive and on the nail, allowing Sexsmith to vary the tone and style widely from song to song without losing touch with his muse. There’s more buoyant pop in this collection, testifying to a resurgent interest in the creative process and maybe even in life itself. It’s much closer in mood and texture to his early albums, which were made when he was still a blessed discovery his label was willing to spend money on. It didn’t work out the way they hoped it would, but it worked out the way those of us who appreciate Sexsmith’s witty turn-of-phrase and self-deprecating demeanor wanted. He’s still around making great, meaningful music, which is more than you can say for Ryan Adams. Continue reading →