Album Reviews

Plangent Processes is again at the center of a pair of new Grateful Dead reissues that were released by Rhino back in January: a) July 1977’s Top 30 hit LP Terrapin Station and July 1987’s Top 10 smash In the Dark — and now we’re finally getting around to reviewing them here together. Read Mark Smotroff’s review to see if either or both of these new LP editions of Terrapin Station and In the Dark — supervised and produced by noted Dead archivist David Lemieux, and mastered for vinyl by David Glasser — belong in your collection. . .

The Clientele’s Alasdair Maclean has been seduced by the precious 60’s west coast soft pop of Curt Boettcher, The Association, Brian Wilson, Boyce-Hart, Papa John Philips and even Arthur Lee, though like his fellow seductee Sean O’Hagan of High Llamas, he hails from the UK.

The new Geffen/UMe 1LP edition of Steely Dan’s seminal September 1977 album, Aja, sounds pretty darn good, all things considered, given that it bears a key difference from the other entries in this reissue series to date. Read Mark Smotroff’s review to see what that difference is, and if this new edition of Aja is right for you either way. . .

For those of you who know the pleasures of guitarist John Fahey’s Takoma recordings (Fahey was a rabid audiophile, BTW), or Robbie Basho’s, or even Sandy Bull’s extraordinary experiments in guitar-based world music fusion on Vanguard, James Blackshaw may already be on your radar screen, as may some of the other contemporary guitar experimenters who fly equally low beneath the mainstream musical radar screen, but until this LP, I’d not encountered the 24 year old Blackshaw who’s been recording and performing since 2003.

The gift of uniqueness can easily become the curse of familiarity, easy identification and in the worst case, self-parody.