The High Strung

On the one hand, Josh Malerman -- The High Strung's singer, guitarist, and songwriter -- sounds receptive to new ideas. When I asked whether the band will record an album of library songs -- the on-the-spot compositions generated with the help of the audience at the band's many gigs at public libraries -- he replied that generally the songs are performed once and then disappear.

But then: "We have probably 12 this year," he said. "If we recorded those 12, that's an album. I actually think that's a very good idea. Maybe we will. The more that I talk about this, I really think that we should just do that."

On the other hand, Malerman said he was perfectly happy for the trio to record with the same producer (Jim Diamond) well into old age. When the Detroit group's label suggested a new direction, Malerman said he was skeptical. He recalled that a representative told the band, "You've made three albums with this guy. Time to do something different." That was seconded by the High Strung's drummer and its bassist, but Malerman had to be sold: "I was ready to keep going like we were going until we were 80."

The High Strung will perform a Daytrotter show at Theo's Java Club on Friday, and the band's story suggests that Malerman indulges wacky ideas more than he rejects him. The group left its old tour bus in front of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2004, and it is probably best known, from a 2005 This American Life story, as the band that plays gigs at libraries -- full rock shows missing only booze and profanity.

Cross Canadian RagweedOn Cross Canadian Ragweed's 2007 album Mission California, the lead track is "Record Exec," and the prompt was the legendary Tony Brown, the co-founder of the band's label who played with Elvis Presley and produced records by everyone from Steve Earle to Reba McEntire.

Elvis Perkins in DearlandElvis Perkins is so full of articulated doubt in our interview that I ask him a blunt question: Does he like being a songwriter, musician, and bandleader? Because it seems like a miserable existence for him.

"Is that how it sounds?" he replied.

Superdrag

The first impression of Superdrag's Industry Giants is pure punk on "Slow to Anger," barely updated for the new millennium, and the second impression is My Bloody Valentine on "Live & Breathe," with its patient, droning guitar textures. The rest of the band's comeback album is confirmation that it defies pigeonholing.

But Superdrag -- which will be performing a Daytrotter show at RIBCO on Saturday, April 24 -- isn't impressive for merely being more than competent at different genres. What's striking is that it's nearly liquid; despite the stylistic shifts, the quartet is comfortable enough in the songs that the music all sounds of-a-piece. While Superdrag never transcends its influences, it is sometimes their equal, and that's no faint praise.

Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit

As part of the three-headed songwriting monster of the Drive-by Truckers, Jason Isbell was overshadowed by Patterson Hood's grim, vivid, and vernacular Southern tales sung with an inimitable, scorched voice that could become a haunting howl.

That says more about Hood than Isbell, though. Isbell wrote some the Truckers' prettiest music, but the band has never been much about pretty. Its three-guitar attack and working-class outrage meant that Isbell's songwriting and singing contributions to Decoration Day, The Dirty South, and A Blessing & a Curse got largely lost. And the truth is that his vocals are probably better suited to the Eagles than the Truckers.

When Isbell in 2007 split from the band (by all accounts amicably), it freed his songs from the Southern-rock context and gave them the space to be appreciated on their own. And following a 2007 solo debut mostly recorded with his Drive-by Truckers bandmates, the new Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit - released in February - represents a clean break.

I'm guessing the Quad Cities-based metal outfit won't approve of my labeling them "soft," but I intend it as a compliment. And I don't mean the quintet is a bunch of poseurs; they're still metal, but they're not made of titanium.

Because of its aesthetic constraints, metal often strips bands of credible emotional content, obscured by the muscle and attitude. And if one strays too far from the formula, it risks losing its bad-ass credibility.

In All Its Glory, on its self-titled debut, strikes a balance between sensitivity and a hard edge.

Photos by Chris Jones. Click on a photo for a larger version.

Ready the Destroyer

The first thing to notice about the music of Chicago's Ready the Destroyer is that singer Neill Miller's guitar has a lot to say. Some guitarists are technically proficient, but the really good ones are able to give their instruments a voice. Miller's sings.

The unsigned Chicago trio -- which will be playing at the River Music Experience's performance hall on Friday and Mixtapes on April 3 -- plays punk-ish music with a strong sense of melody on both guitar and bass, not unlike the Alkaline Trio and Interpol, and clearly influenced by Hüsker Dü. It's a lean, rigorous, muscular sound in which the guitar, bass, and voice are all fighting to be the lead instrument - a busy din but without discord.

Railroad EarthRailroad Earth mandolin player John Skehan notes that most recording studios are set up so that even when musicians are isolated from each other in separate rooms, they can see each other.

But when the New Jersey-based bluegrass/jam band convened in a three-century-old farmhouse owned by Todd Sheaffer, the band's singer and chief songwriter, the setup was different. As they tracked last year's Amen Corner mostly live, the sextet didn't have the benefit of body language and visual cues. Bass was in the kitchen. The drums were in the dining room. Multi-instrumentalist Andy Goessling was stuck in a bathroom.

"We had a little headphone system where everybody could control their own individual level and everybody else's level," Skehan said in a phone interview last week. "And we pretty much barely had eye contact. We just went into our individual little rooms and put our ears on, and that was the extent of the interaction. ... It does put you in a place where you're just listening."

Images by photographer Chris Jones from Sunday's Nickelback show at the i wireless Center. Click on any photo for a larger version.

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