Anybody ever listen to My Morning Jacket???

* (I'd biked from Wicker Park to Wrigleyville because of the parade- crowding, and biking all the way home and then basically right back again in all that heat didn't seem like a good idea.)

its called "Come Closer" btw.

Anyone have the live album, Okonokos? It turned up today on eMusic. I'm sure I'll download it, but any thoughts on the disc are appreciated.

I saw them live, BTW, at last year's Langerado festival. Amazing show.

Don't have that album, but this show from SXSW is fantastic.

http://atorecords.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Carl-Album-282x298.jpg

There was a time early last decade, before embarking on a fantastic stylistic lark that that has at times suggested a meld of Sigur Rós and the Allman Brothers, when My Morning Jacket was still a country band. A loosely defined one perhaps, leaning more toward reverb-soaked strangeness than tears-in-your-beer orthodoxy, but one still significantly informed by the example and standards of the genre. The band has since grown out of most of these traits, ranging out into far more inimitable territory, but at times there’s nothing wrong with yearning for simpler things.

Enter Carl Broemel, the band’s guitarist, whose earthy but sweet new album seems to exist just for this purpose. All Birds Say, his second foray into solo territory, is as attached to traditional country precepts as the band’s early work, meaning that its inflected by these principles without fully embracing them. This sense of distance, apparent on the breezy “In the Garden,” its straight-laced drum hobble seared by an ethereal slide guitar, often has magnificent effects.

Other songs, like the equally languid “Questions,” seem entirely divorced from country influence, but the soul of that influence still maintains a guiding hand over the album’s progress. Broemel’s songs with My Morning Jacket work by expanding the customary scope of country songs, transposing the familiar sounds gleaned from a Kentucky upbringing over broad, breathy passages. The ones here do almost the opposite, drawing out small, recognizable bits—a twang here, a shuffle here—and stretching them out. These songs never race and ramble; they stroll lazily across the lawn and plop down into a chair. It’s a reinterpretation of the genre that feels completely in line with its core principles.

Unfortunately, this kind of languidness takes a toll. All Birds Say is worn down by its sluggishness and suffers overall from a surfeit of ineffectual good humor. A key offender is “Different People,” a lame ballad that aims for wisdom via inclusiveness but ends up sounding like a drugged, defanged Randy Newman track. All this homey positivity is not out of step with the sunny atmosphere established by the music, but it smears a thick layer of schmaltziness over an otherwise sterling effort.

Written by: TishTash (Magic For Your Ears (so called site) on August 29, 2010.

1. All Birds Say
2. Life Leftover
3. In the Garden
4. Carried Away
5. Enough
6. Heaven Knows
7. Questions
8. Different People
9. Sunday Drivers
10. On the Case
11. Retired

This band really threw it all away. Everything through It Still Moves is pretty killer and then they fell of a cliff stylistically. Their live show went downhill too. Quite a strange progression from doing a split with Songs: Ohia where they compared favorably but were undoubtedly the under card to doing one of those "we play a different album every night of the week" things at Terminal 5 that's completely sold out as far as I know.

a meld of Sigur Rós and the Allman Brothers

is this a real thing? because it sounds horrible in ways i can't even describe.

man these fuckin guys.

i think At Dawn has snuck up and become my favorite record of the last decade.

i have not paid much attention since It still Moves, though. kind of sort of on purpose...

New album has some jams, some epics, some freakouts and "get the point," which is a gorgeous little folk song. The title track is a monster.

okonokos is still monstrous. is there a single song on it that doesn’t improve immensely on the studio version? it’s nearly impossible to go back to z after hearing the okonokos versions of the singles—it beats 4 u and what a wonderful man are kinda nothing songs in the studio, but they both kick all sorts of ass on this record.

It Still Moves was such a pivotal record for me back in college. I never could quite get into the subsequent releases as much, save for a few songs here and there. I should check out okonokos as it was released in the time frame from when I cared about them.

Yeah definitely check it out, it’s basically a best-of of their current career, except every song is a bit more muscular

New album out today.

sounding really nice, first track is an instant mmj classic

Sounds nice yes, but I keep missing the raw energy of earlier albums. It Still Moves still moves me more

yeah i don't begrudge them for mellowing out a bit, as long as there are still some moments where the earth shakes

These guys were pretty unstoppable through their first four albums, in my opinion. Then they got a little shaky on Evil Urges and Circuital, although both of those albums contain absolute stunners alongside some more questionable stuff. I have almost no memory of The Waterfall. Can't recall if I liked it or not - I guess I need to try it again. Listening to The Waterfall II right now and it's just kinda there so far. But I need to give it a more honest listen.

i was really really really into mmj when i was mostly listening to that mojo magazine stuff. i think it was partly a midwest thing, partly a hometown connection thing. i know they got a lot of shit because of their being jam-band-adjacent and indie-adjacent both, which doesn't sound like a winning combo on paper, but i don't know, i still liked them, just like i still like wilco. the heartland is dead, i hope never to go back, but i have good memories of listening to their music, they killed when i saw them live in '11.

they haven't grabbed me since then. says more about me than it says about them, i think. i got friends i like and respect who still stan them. what my morning jacket are doing has nothing to do with my life, has little to do with the world today as far as i can tell, but i'm glad they still exist and people still listen to them.

Okonokos fucking rips. Such a great live album, with a band at its absolute peak.

One of my favorite live bands, and the one I've seen the most. I've seen them on multiple nights in a row and they've played consecutive sets with no repeats.

The new album is kind of forgettable. Jim's lyrics are never all that, but he's kind of phoned this one in. Some of it is "moon-spoon-June" level.

I actually thought the new one was better than the last few, but I've long ago quit paying attention to his lyrics really. The first two songs were awful, but I thought the rest was decent and a few of the tracks reminded me of what I love about them, especially some of the longer burning songs.

I don't know, maybe the problem is that the lyrics are more comprehensible on this one than they have been on the last few.