Alan Sparhawk, "Get Still" (Sub Pop)
“Get Still” is the first Alan Sparhawk music since his wife and Low bandmate Mimi Parker succumbed to cancer in November 2022, and it comes freighted with anticipation, apprehension, and appreciation. Their partnership in love and creativity was so integral that it seemed as if Sparhawk might decide to call it a career and pivot to... anything else besides music. But, no. The Duluth, Minnesota vocalist/guitarist has returned sooner than expected with White Roses, My God (out September 27), the first album under his own name since 2006's little-heard Solo Guitar.
The most obvious change in Sparhawk's sonic vocabulary on this record are the vocals. With Low, he initially sang in a hushed, plaintive manner that seemed like a byproduct of time spent in church (Sparhawk's a Mormon). Over time, Sparhawk's singing developed a more boisterous manner while still maintaining poise. The last two glitchy, electronics-laden Low LPs—Double Negative and Hey What—may have featured some effects on his and Parker's vocals, but they were subtle.
On White Roses, though, it's as if Sparhawk needed to camouflage his natural voice with Auto-Tune in order to more authentically bare his soul and cope with the tragedy of losing his beloved Mimi. Sometimes the effect comes off like Alvin and the Chipmunks. One expected deep gravitas from Sparhawk here, but instead he's occasionally doling out levity, whether intentional or not.
His love of distortion extends well beyond this album. "Ever since I was a child, I remember the little noises in my head that would coincide with different thoughts for me, and they were always distorted sounds,” he told me in an interview in 2019. Distortion has always been a reflection of human existence, a kind of bashing against reality. It's the sound of tension, of two things rubbing against each other uncomfortably."
Let it be known that rock is not on the agenda on White Roses, as "I Made This Beat" proves. Its warped disco with Al's voice synthesized into heliumized cuteness is ripe for a Daft Punk remix. "Can U Hear" rides in on ominous low-end throb and clipped trap beats, with Sparhawk's voice pitched up to hysterical (in both senses of the word) levels. The downcast synth anti-pop of "Brother" finds Alan's pipes warped to an inconsolable, soulful brood and then wildly stretched into a rich tapestry of voices. A rust-toned guitar breaks through the soft, skittering beats (definitely not from a human drummer), the only time that traditional rock signifier appears on White Roses.
New single "Get Still" is a mutedly grandiose synth opus with disciplined, tumbling beats and otherworldly vocal melisma. The semi-danceable results sound like Tobacco or even Boards of Canada teetering on the edge of melancholy. The lyrics wax oblique about (possibly?) lifting oneself out of a profound, uh, low point: "Do you want a big thrill?/Do you wanna get real?/Do you wanna sit still?/I’m a wanna make a deal/Eighty acres of trill/Everybody on strip pill/‘Body on drip kick/And it’s so much wicked."
It may alienate some Low fans (especially those who love their first half dozen albums), but "Get Still"—and White Roses, in general—represents a bold change in direction for an artist more than 30 years deep into his career. (The titular flower symbolizes new beginnings, after all.) The man also deserves respect for carrying on in the face of shattering heartbreak.
Alan Sparhawk performs January 17, 2025 at the Crocodile.
206 Ribshack Orchestra, "Is Ribs Pork?" (We Coast Records)
Seattle funk ensemble 206 Ribshack Orchestra cut six tracks with producer Mell Dettmer in 2004, but they're only now seeing release 20 years later. Not sure of the story behind that delay, but most of these songs have burst out of hibernation ready to make you sweat.
206 Ribshack Orchestra are led by Turner brothers Thaddeus (guitar) and Gerald (bass), both of whom perform in Digable Planets' live band. Keyboardist Mark Cardenas played with Morris Day and the Time on their 1984 LP Ice Cream Castle and appeared in Prince's 1984 film Purple Rain. Guest violinist Eyvind Kang won The Stranger's Genius award in 2013 and baritone saxophonist Skerik has played in dozens of notable bands, including Critters Buggin and Les Claypool's current unit. So, you know, they have chops.
As the group name and track titles imply, this is something of a concept album about tasty, unhealthy food. Take "Flapjack Love," for instance. A seemingly sincere ballad devoted to the decadent culinary pleasures of pancakes, the song comes off like a forerunner of Reggie Watts's hilarious, over-the-top parodies of love/sex ballads. To call this slow-burning, horn-laden paean to starchy breakfast food "syrupy" would be too easy, so I'm going to do it.
"Sauce on My Bone" offers lubricious funk in the vein of Dirty Mind-era Prince and late-'70s P-Funk, and contains lyrics that are an extended food/sex innuendo. It's all too appropriate that the tumescent groove is enhanced by what sounds like ass-slaps. Thaddeus's Ed Van Halen-like guitar solo showboating is pure gravy on top of this sinfully savory dish. On "Ribshack Disco," Kang surprisingly provides strings for a breezy, slick disco banger that would make Barry White smile in approval. The elastic, party-starting funk (with bonus rapping) of "3 Day Old Chicken" evokes Fatback Band and, vocally, Kid Creole and the Coconuts' "Stool Pigeon."
The mini-album peaks on "Is Ribs Pork?" It's strange, as a vegan, to like a song that salivates over pig meat, but that's a testament to 206 Ribshack Orchestra's exceptional skill as funkateers. The track's a bounty of beefy revelry, with a rudely thrusting bass line, uproarious horns by Skerik, Jon Ryser, and CD Littlefield, and robust vocals by Ernest Pumphrey Jr. I can imagine DJs segueing from a '70s Kool & the Gang joint into "Is Ribs Pork?"
206 Ribshack Orchestra's album-release party happens August 31 at Sea Monster Lounge.
