Week of Atoms for Peace and Jonny Marr

     This week we are doing an all British blog with what could only be called British music royalty in the music world. We have Atoms for Peace-Amok. This is a super group from Thom Yorke, Nigel Godrich, and Flea of The Red Hot Chili Peppers. The second music legend is Johnny Marr of The Smiths, The Cribs, and Modest Mouse. Let's be honest, hes truly a guitar legend because of The Smiths. First Atoms for Peace.

     Atoms for peace is an experimental rock and electronic super group formed in Los Angeles, California in late 2009. The group was originally put together for the purpose of playing Thom Yorke's solo debut album, The Eraser. The group consists of Thom Yorke, the lead singer and lead songwriter of this tiny little band called Radiohead. He plays guitar, piano, created the beats, and sings lead vocals on the album. Flea of The Red Hot Chili Peppers plays bass on the album. Super Producer and music industry giant Nigel Godrich plays keyboards and synthesizers. Along with Joey Waronker and Mauro Refosco, who are drum legends and play percussion on the album. The band went on an eight city tour including a performance at Coachella Festival in 2010.  After performing at the Roseland Ballroom in 2010, they performed the song "Judge, Jury and Executioner" which was their first official collaborative song. It was revealed in an interview in 2011 that Thom and Flea were working on an album together. Amok was released on February 25th, 2013. The band announced a small headlining tour across Europe in July, and are expected to play more shows in August.

     I think I can't talk about Atoms for peace without giving a quick rundown of the landmark album The Eraser. The whole reason Atoms for Peace exists at all was to take that record on the road. First and most importantly the band was named off of one of the most important tracks on the album, the song "Atoms for Peace". Another thing to mention now, that I will reiterate later in the Amok review is that this is not a Radiohead album. The only member of Radiohead that made any considerable contribution to this album was Thom Yorke. The album has very little guitar at all on here,  Although it may sound like it does, I assure you it does not. Most of the album is made up of created electronic beats and synthetic drums laid down next to Thom's voice. The ability for Thom to hypnotize us with his beautiful and very unique vocals is what holds the whole album together. Even though this is a very dark album with a very mechanical feel to it we are not lost in it's techno robot feeling, because of Thom's wonderful vocal delivery. Which is very direct and intense at the same time. The whole time he is singing his beautifully crafted lyrics he draws you in and hypnotizes you, until before you know it you have reached the end of the album and the spell is broken. It's a thing of beauty.
                                          Here is the song "Atoms for Peace" off The Eraser

     Before we start into the real review remember this is not a Radiohead album, but another thing it's  not is a super group effort, at least not a traditional one. What a normal super group does is they all come together on their instruments, put all of their ideas together, and showcase a band full of ridiculous talent. Well that's not exactly what happens here, they are all insanely talented, but they are not all equally writing the songs together. Thom is the lead and main writer here and they are just doing what they did before when they backed him up on The Eraser. They add in their instruments and follow Thom's lead. Which leads us to a very natural progression from where The Eraser left off. This is still a very beat and techno driven album, pretty much what is was before with the addition of Fleas's pounding bass, guitar loops, and dense layers piled upon dense layers. Thom has really embraced his inner DJ as of late, and it shows. He writes some of the most complex beats he has ever written on this album. It's a very dark and mechanical album, its very hard to tell that this is more than Thom at some points. As he famously put it in an interview to Rollingstone, "Where you weren't quite sure where the humans starts and the machine ends".

     The opening track on the album is "Before Your Very Eyes..." it opens with a catchy guitar loop over very techno beat sounding drums, and of course Thom Yorke's very individualized vocals. The rest of the album follows the precedent set by this song. The beats hit hard and precisely, the bass lays down the every changing beat, the guitars fire hypnotizing line after line, the vocals soar, and it is thickly layered. "Default" one of the most interesting songs on the album, lays down a very polytheistic beat that, keeps you fascinated for the whole song. On "Ingenue" Fleas bass really lays down the law, the beat keeps the rhythm, but it's Thom's vocals that give the song life. "Dropped" is a very spastic weird beat that has some strange rhythms only Thom could dance to. "Useless" brings in similar beats, and bass lines, but shows us the most interesting and different singing on the album. "Stuck Together Pieces" feels like the most overall collaborative effort as a song. It's by far my favorite. Flea really adds to the overall feel of the song instead of just backing it up. "Judge, Jury and Executioner" sticks out as the standout from the rest of the album. It's the most Radiohead sounding song on the album because it doesn't rely entirely on the beats to drive the song. The final two songs "Reverse Running" and "Amok" keep up a similar formula to the early songs, fast percussive beat, over all changing bass, and simply guitar lines. The vocals remain the highest note on the album similarly to The Eraser. I would not say that this album is as good as The Eraser though. A solid and new sounding effort in a sea of the same old thing.
Recommended songs: Default, Dropped, Stuck Together Pieces, and Judge, Jury and Executioner.

4/5 Stars

                                                          Atoms for Peace- Ingenue

     John Martin Maher was born in 1963 in Ardwick, Manchester to Irish emigrants from Athy, County Kildare. He attended St Augustine's Catholic Grammar School in 1977. He had aspirations to be a professional football (or soccer for us in the US), player, he even had a trial with Manchester City F.C. He formed his first band The Paris Valentinos at the age of 13. In 1980 he enrolled in Wythenshawe College, serving as the student body president. After ending two previous bands White Dice and The Freak Party. He moved on to The Smiths, but we will get to that later. Following The Smiths relatively short 5 year run he moved on to becoming a member of The Pretenders. After a couple of years he formed The The which lasted till 1994, when he formed the band Electric which lasted most of the 90's. He has also done session work with tons of bands. In 2000 he formed Johnny Marr and the Healers with Zak Starkey, Ringo Starr's son. This band is still around. In 2001 he formed a super group called 7 Worlds Collide to play shows. The group included members of Pearl Jam, Radiohead, Split Enz and others. He wrote and performed with Modest Mouse on their last album cycle. The wrote and tour with The Cribs from 2008 to 2011. That leads us to now. Safe to say this guy is a guitar legend who has been in a ton of famous bands.

      OK, now we can talk about The Smiths. After all you can't really talk about Johnny Marr or Morrissey without talking about The Smiths. The Smiths were an an English rock band formed in Manchester in 1982. The Smiths included vocalist Morrissey, guitarist Johnny Marr, bassist Andy Rourke,  and drummer Mike Joyce. They have been called the most important rock band to emerge from England since the 80's. They released four studio albums, several compilations, and lots of singles. Even though they never received much commercial success in their home country while they were together. Since then they have been called one of the most important rock bands of all time. The name The Smiths was chosen because Morrissey thought it was an ordinary name, and he thought it was time the ordinary people showed their faces. They released their debut album The Smiths in 1984, in early 1985 the released Meat is Murder, a very political album. In 1986 they released their third album The Queen is Dead after extensive touring. Following this drug and alcohol problems, extensive touring, and record label problems had now started to plague the band. In 1987 they switched to EMI and put out their final album Strangeways, Here We Come. Then Johnny Marr temporarily left the band to work with other bands, because he was tired of Morrissey musical inflexibility. An article in NME was the final nail in the coffin, it stated that they had already broken up and Johnny thought Morrissey gave then the story. This caused Johnny Marr to quit permanently and put an end to The Smiths.
                                                      The Smiths-How soon is now?

    This is Marr's very first solo album even thought hes has written for  a ton of other bands this is his first by himself. Most of the record thrives on his amazing guitar work. He uses this record to revisit his past in all sorts of different ways. This is sort of like the discography album, where every style of music you have ever done in your career comes out on this one record. He said that this record is about his living in Britain his whole life, and how it has shaped him. Throughout the record you hear his different bands he played in come out, from The Smiths, Modest Mouse, The Cribs, and so many others. For never having been a lead singer before he has a very good voice that holds up the melody pretty well. My one real concern on the album is the lyrics, he has never really been a lyricist before and it shows. Without Morrissey and others backing him the lyrics leave some things to be desired. He put together a very stellar team to help him record this in the studio including Iwan Gronow Healers keyboardist James Doviak, and a bunch of others. The record is fairly long track wise for today's times coming in with 12 tracks. He dips into so many different styles of guitar playing on this album it's amazing an old dog has learned new tricks.

Johnny Marr-Upstarts

      The album's opener "The Right Thing Right" opens up with catchy guitar lick paying homage to new wave and a makes a crack about Face book pages and cyber tracking. The next one "I Want the Heartbeat" although opening up with catchy fast paced guitar licks falls short with the worst lyrics on the album. "European Me" channels The Smiths with a more Brit pop feel to it. "Upstarts" is a more garage rock song, while "Lockdown" is a highpoint on the album and uses a shoegaze guitar frame on it. The title track "The Messenger" is a very guitar heavy song with intricate lines around a very steady rhythm. "Generate! Generate!" and "Say Demesne" stay pretty close to form with strong guitar lines holding together some otherwise vocally weaker parts. "Sun & Moon" has a more brit pop feel to it while, "New Town Velocity" is a more new wave sounding song. The final song on the record is "World Starts Attack" feels like a page from his time in Modest Mouse with a very indie rock feel to it. Overall extreme talent and amazing guitar lines hold this album together. He plays guitar in tons of different styles proving that even at this age he's not done adding new styles to his song book. The only real problem with the record is his vocals, not necessarily the quality, hes a decent enough singer, but the lyrics. He is used to backing up other singers, not to taking the front center stage and backing him self up. He still has a lot to learn in that field. Overall though a very good start, for a first solo record.
Recommended Songs: The Crack Up, Lockdown, Upstarts, and The Messenger.

3.5/5 Stars

                                                       Johnny Marr- The Messenger