"Tambourine Light"- Woods

Titling the A-side from an upcoming 7" single "Tambourine Light" couldn't have been a mistake by psych-folk rockers Woods. Before lead singer Jeremy Earl's voice can begin, his shimmering guitar riff engenders comparisons to The Byrds’ epochal cover of "Mr. Tambourine Man". It's not just Earl and his guitar tone; everyone in Woods manages to summon the spirit of the folk-rock originators. Kevin Morby's barely there, but anchoring bass doesn't fall far from the Chris Hillman tree. The way Aaron Neveu plays his lilting drummer pattern, Michael Clarke may as well be manning the kit. Even Woods' soft harmonizing exists on the same spectrum as the Roger McGuinn-led group In the "jingle-jangle morning" it’s clear who Woods are following.

There are digressions though. Earl's voice is best described as "quietly aching," whereas McGuinn's is routinely labelled "nasal" or "drawling." And while that's a miniscule difference, it's an important one. McGuinn sometimes sounded disappointed singing through those nostrils, but you got the sense he'd move past it. With Earl, it's harder to tell. Sure he's looking up "past the Sun," but at what and for how long? "Forever" is a word he let's go of as the band gels into a restful groove. That said it's an eternity where the bliss of it being "forever morning" can easily be misconstrued as "forever mourning." In that period of time he's pushed creeping shadows away and has felt all sorts of challenges come up "against him." Hearing Earl describe these struggles you realize if anyone's ready "for to fade," it's him.

 
"Tambourine Light" will be out July 8 on Captured Tracks and is backed by "Tomorrow's Only Yesterday".

What's New(s)?

Tame Impala cover Michael Jackson

Odds are if you have any idea who Tame Impala are, you wouldn't peg them to cover a Michael Jackson. The mind-traveling psych-rock they release is incredibly insular, a far-cry from the larger-than-life spectacle Jackson's work often created.

But you also probably wouldn't have seen the Australian group as the type to partner with a rapper, yet there they were last week undergirding Kendrick Lamar's firebreathing in "Backwards". While covering "Stranger in Moscow" is a headscratcher, like the Lamar work once you hear it, it makes all the sense in the world. Kevin Parker's voice floats over beds of rippling guitars and synthesizers, so high off the ground you couldn't possibly reach out to touch it. When he repeatedly asks "how does it feel?" it's a miracle he can feel anything at all with the walls he's constructed. On their Facebook page, they wrote "MJ 4eva", and hearing the way the group treats the source material you understand the timelessness of it.







DOOM remixes himself

"On the low-key," masked-rapper DOOM spits amidst a barrage of a liquid non sequiturs in his clattering remix of "Bookhead", 2012 collabo with Jneiro Jarel as JJ DOOM. But even when he's obscured by masks or hoodies, he can't help but drawing attention to himself. 

This non spotlight-seeking cut comes his recent partnership with Clarks, who he designed a Wallabee with. The steel clangs and twitters in the track are samples DOOM culled from time spent at the Clark's factory in Somerset, England. That sort-of blue-collar incorporation seems counter-intuitive for Mr. Metal-Face who's always sounded like the smartest dude in the room, even when he's talking nonsense. No matter what he's aiming for though, it's an effort well worth watching.

Clarks will be releasing the track tomorrow through their site and you can hear it now through FACT.



Drake/House of Cards Tumblr stays schemin

First the weird, wonderful world of "Drakeing Bad" and now this. Some enterprising Drake/House of Cards fan with more than enough time on there hands has overlaid brooding scenes from the Netflix show with quotables from the Toronto MC. The account, appropriately called "House of Drake" ends up working because like Drizzy Drake, Congressmen Frank Underwood can go from powerhungry paranoiac to tender romantic when the moment calls for it. Now if we could just get a Drake/True Detective account, my life would be complete.

"Worst Behavior"

Check back in tomorrow for more of the newest in new(s) and follow AllFreshSounds on Twitter for updates throughout the day.

"Backwards"- Kendrick Lamar & Tame Impala

"I feel relentless," "King" Kendrick Lamar snarls over a bed of lush strings and palpitating drum beats reconstructed from Tame Impala's 2012 psych tour-de-force "Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”. Leave it to Kendrick to best describe his pace since he dropped the game-changing good kid, m.A.A.d. city in 2012. He could've comfortably rested on his laurels, taken a year off to enjoy the immense spoils his major label debut afforded. Instead he soaked the entire rap game in gasoline and struck a match, then took the BET Cypher to a cataclysmic new level. It seemed as though the only "fun" he was having in 2013 was sliding in on the chintzy beat of Schoolboy Q's "Collard Greens" from Oxymoron. But even then he was promising to swipe girlfriends and doing bilingual double-time in his lightning verse.

That relentlessness is put into 20/20 focus late in Lamar's first verse when he lets everyone know, "this is what I live for." Rapping isn't what he's doing in between commercial spots or movie cameos. It's his lifeblood carrying him towards "immortality." And even if he reaches it, with his workmanlike nature he'll start the race over. He'll appear with Imagine Dragons just to prove traditional rap can't pin him in. He'll pop up on a Sci-Fi film soundtrack and turn what was once effusive into something much more ferocious. Now Tame Impala frontman Kevin Parker's tender coos aren't the focal point, they're a dire break from a verbal barrage. "I got my hopes up again, oh no... not again," Parker whispers from the bottom of a psilocybin canyon. That's all Kendrick Lamar does circa 2014 and he's yet to disappoint.

The Divergent soundtrack, which also features pairings between A$AP Rocky/Gesaffelstein and Chance the Rapper/Pia Mia is out March 11 and you can hear "Backwards" now through Pitchfork Advance.

Track Attack- "Crimson & Clover" (Tommy James and the Shondells)

Velvet Underground's "Heroin" is one of the most accurate depictions of drug use to appear in any medium. Not once in the song's sprawling, static-laden 7 minutes does it endorse or deny drug use. There isn't a hint of sensationalism dripping off of Lou Reed's panicked lyrics. He has no idea where he's going, so he turns to drugs. While the journey sounds incredible at first, it soon descends into shrieking violas and wailing guitars. It consciously takes time to present the listener with yin and yang; high and low.

Tommy James and the Shondells' "Crimson & Clover", written in 1968 performs the same duty for lovemaking. Though the two colors have little, if anything to do with getting intimate, you can hear sex in all of its permutations when Tommy James exhales his first "oh." No matter how much anyone pretends, first times are nerve wracking. Religious declarations and marriage pledges are understandable reasons why waiting happens, but the nervousness felt is as valid a reason for waiting. No one wants to be nervous. "I think I could love her", James delicately trembles, proving even in when you're fully entrenched in such an outward act, it’s easy to drift inward. That mental focus is unavoidable. You can't bury it under piles of clothes, drops of sweat, tender music, or expressive moans. 

The group does manage to brush past those initial stages of shaky hands into something more assured however. James and drummer Peter Lucia Jr. penned the tune as a reaction to the success "Mony Mony" afforded them; and a desire to move forward is what fuels "Crimson & Clover". At a certain point, any thoughts are thrown to the wayside. In the song, we hear the lizard brain take control as guitars shift into hiccupping strums and tambourines jangle. When James mentions “I’ve been waiting to show her" an instrumental shift acts as proof. Soon enough, even the "showing" stops as a tremolo-weighted James is left extolling the virtues of "Crimson and Clover". Jitteriness and ecstasy will co-habit "over and over" for as long as lovemaking exists.

If you have suggestions for songs you want to see featured in future editions of Track Attack, feel free to leave them in the comment section.