{"id":18795,"date":"2020-05-23T05:30:48","date_gmt":"2020-05-23T09:30:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=18795"},"modified":"2020-05-05T16:55:50","modified_gmt":"2020-05-05T20:55:50","slug":"album-review-gordon-anderson-moon-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2020\/05\/23\/album-review-gordon-anderson-moon-man\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Gordon Anderson — Moon Man"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It\u2019s sometimes said \u2013 and unfairly so \u2013 that people who are in the business side of the music business are essentially failed, frustrated musicians themselves. My own experience is different: some of my favorite musicians have a foot in both sides of the biz.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s safe to assume that most if not all of my friends and colleagues in the business \u2013 publicists, managers, label people and such \u2013 are musicians of some sort or another. I\u2019ll admit, though, that I had no idea that Gordon Anderson<\/a> is a songwriter. The head of Real Gone Music clearly has impeccable musical taste — just look at the material he\u2019s chosen to reissue this last decade or so \u2013 but it turns out that he\u2019s an appealing, insightful composer as well.<\/p>\n

His new album, Moon Man<\/i>, is full of what we must assume are story-songs drawn from his own life experiences. And those experineces are ones with which people of a certain age can most certainly relate: \u201cRecord Club\u201d tells of the joys of getting eight albums for a penny (or whatever it was). \u201cFunemployment\u201d is as potted tale of how he started a record label.<\/p>\n

\u201cPill Mill,\u201d on the other hand, probably isn\u2019t<\/em> a true story. Sung (like most all of Moon Man<\/i>) in the first person, it\u2019s the tale of someone who fell prey to pill addiction. The tune\u2019s languid tune has the scuzzed-out vibe of Exile<\/i>-era Rolling Stones, which is more than fitting.<\/p>\n

The Crazy Horse-ish, ragged-but-right feel of that tune is of a piece with Moon Man<\/i>\u2019s overall production aesthetic: the songs are well structured but carefully avoiding over-rehearsing and any sense of slickness. There are very little in the way of studio effects; the album sounds like a trio showed up to the studio knowing how it wanted its songs to sound, cut each one in a single take, and got out of there without breaking the bank.<\/p>\n

\u201cPalm Reader\u201d is reminiscent of Jonathan Richman, but with a more sophisticated lyrical approach. \u201cThe Fall of Song\u201d is as intriguing to read (the lyrics are all printed in the CD\u2019s booklet) as it is to hear. \u201cPinpricks\u201d has a melancholy feel not unlike The La\u2019s, and it showcases, Anderson\u2019s vocal range: He sure can hit those high notes. \u201cGlazed Antique\u201d is a catchy, rootsy rocker. The soaring \u201cShotgun Wedding\u201d and \u201cSiren Song\u201d both give the band \u2013 Anderson, Richard Briglia and Kathryn Korniloff \u2013 a chance to stretch out a la Neil Young and Crazy Horse (again).<\/p>\n

The album wraps up with a trio of shorter, more concise songs. The best is saved for last: the wryly humorous and endearing \u201cAlready Gone\u201d (not the Eagles song) is about a man whose family is away for the weekend. What does he do? Freed or responsibilities, he drinks, fires up a joint and watches violent movies and sports. But as the song careens toward it end, he admits that he\u2019s doing something else: planning a vacation with<\/i> that wife and kid.<\/p>\n

Even if you don\u2019t know Gordon personally, listen to Moon Man<\/i> and you\u2019ll likely smile and think to yourself, \u201cHey, I know that guy!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s sometimes said \u2013 and unfairly so \u2013 that people who are in the business side of the music business are essentially failed, frustrated musicians themselves. My own experience is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18796,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,39,49,62,65],"tags":[923],"class_list":["post-18795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cowpunk","category-indie","category-new-release","category-rawk","category-review","tag-gordon-anderson","cat-21-id","cat-39-id","cat-49-id","cat-62-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18795"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18797,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18795\/revisions\/18797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}