Written by: Dave Cantrell

As is never not the case an immodest host of recent releases has grown like some sort of multi-celled organism on my desk and rather than engage in an editorial eenie-meenie-miney-mo version of reviewer’s triage the notion occurred to bring back the Lightning Strikes column so as to avoid the pain of deciding. If memory isn’t failing me (big if) it was a fairly popular feature that was only put on ice because, rather obviously, it’s a bit of a heavier lift than taking up a single album but seeing as A) there is always a ‘pulling teeth’ aspect to this task anyway as any writer out there knows so what’s the difference, really, and B) I’m retired now so ostensibly – ostensibly, mind – pretty much every morning is my own these days and when you add that to the simple fact that there’s some reasonable fear that I’ll never see the surface of my desk again should action not be taken, well, here we are. So, please, have a read, see what you think and, above all, support the artists. It is, after all, why we’re all here (aside, of course, from discovering some fine, slightly off-the-radar music)

[feature photo Trish Tritz]

The Special Pillow – “The Special Pillow Meets the Space Monster” (Zofko Records)

Suitably, we kick off this LS resurrection with one of its more luminous alumni The Special Pillow, the Hoboken-based psych pop band that makes as good a case as any we’ve heard (or at least since their previous appearance) of, um, resurrecting the Nuggets brand for a new generation, specializing as they primarily do in a punchy-but-nuanced effervescence with a certain Jersey-bred edge that’s brought with a level of intelligence not easily found on either coast nor the heartland either, come to that.

Anchored as ever by the songwriting nous of lead singer/bassist Dan Cuddy – go back and ride a minute or two with Hypnolovewheel if there’s some backgrounding needed in that regard – and flushed out to the delirious max with returnees Katie Gentile handling the V’s (viola, violin, vox though every band member contributes the latter), Peter Stuart heading up the guitar department including 8-string bass in there somewhere, with drums and other percussive matters attended to by Eric Marc Cohen, it’s an ensemble whose sound easily – possibly even effortlessly or so it sounds – exceeds the sum of its parts and yet, dedicated to the psych pop apogee as they are, the band isn’t shy about enlisting others when the songs call for it which in this EP’s case has Debby Schwartz adding vocals “all over the place” as per the liner notes along with (former invitee) Cheryl Kingan and Steven Levi bringing brass straight out of N’Awlins and into the beating heart of the jaunty Jersey romp “Found and Foggy” that in its way centerpieces this release not least due, in our view, because it includes the line “a blurry photo you once found/a shoegaze site gone underground” (and lest you get the impression that that’s perhaps …Meets the Space Monster‘s best lyric, um, well, maybe yes maybe no but any collection of songs that begins, as this one does on the jumped-up “Three on a Sundial” with the couplet “the shadow crows/on top of every mortal//the shadow knows/the back way through the portal” might suggest we’re spoiled for choice on that matter and that suggestion wouldn’t be errant). In any case, parentheticals aside, and to put it simply, there isn’t any place on this 6-song outing you won’t care to linger which is to say the least.

Whether it’s the subtly peculiar and somewhat circular wonder of “A Certain Level of Uncertainty,” the yearning soar and woundedness of “Give Up the Ghost” (“how will you/give up the ghost/that’s given up on you?“), “That’s the Way It’s Got to Be,” built upon a Bo Diddley engine block, relentless, adroit, excellent, or the ghostly, slowed-down poignancy of “Nowhere to Go But Home” that closes this solid, well-faceted gem on a note of wistful albeit empathic resignation, it’s just the case that there’s, well, nowhere to go on this EP where you won’t find yourself awash in what we’re choosing to call a ‘pop humanity’ and that, we think you’ll concur, is kind of the whole point, isn’t it? Def check this one out. [pick up your copy here]

Nick Kizirnis – “Every Moment” (ATOM Records)

When your first reaction when fetching the post, finding then opening a tell-tale envelope from one of your fave publicists is ‘Oh boy! A new album from ______’ it’s both a moment of eager anticipation and its evil contrarian twin, trepidatious doubt, sitting in its usual musty corner muttering ‘What if it’s not as good, what if what if what if?’ Such buzzkill caution is, fortunately, almost never warranted and, in truth, when the artist in question is someone like Nick Kizirnis, that sniping what-if bastard’s voice barely registers. But, y’know, because we’re human and therefore, one, skeptical down to the bone, and, two, we actually have been burned in such “A new record by ___!!” circumstances enough times before across the long arc of our listening lives, we can’t be fully certain but, again, this is Nick Kizirnis we’re talking about, the same Nick Kizirnis that swooned us with his previous outing from 2020 The Distance and has, in fact, been plying his trade and gathering fans and adherents for decades prior to that, so such anticipation is reasonably justified and, no surprise, completely validated.

Released May 3rd on ATOM Records, Every Moment finds Kizirnis again teamed up with a crack array of musician friends – Tod Weidner guitars, Kate Wakefield cello and vox, Daisy Caplan bass and drummer Jim McPherson – that bring their abundance of licks and skills to supplement the no-slouch-himself core talent at the center of things here that again leads to an album of some wonderment and abiding satisfaction. Y’see, there’s something of the ‘seething just beneath the surface’ quality to the guy’s work that never fails to supply an incipient – and if we may say exquisite – tension to the songs he brings and that quality is certainly present on, um, every moment of this record. It’s a kind of ‘catharsis as a subtle engine’ approach to song-making that Mr. Kizirnis, at least on the evidence here, has pretty much mastered.

Nowhere is that ability more apparent than on the title track that opens the record , in which the pensive gets immediately gate-crashed by the churning and brash in the form of an electric, garagey geetar chord progression that on the one hand sets the tone for the tune the song’s built upon while on the other getting quickly subsumed by the strata of hooks and stellar arrangement that soon evolves and takes over the palette and there it is right there, craft at its craftiest, a phrase Kizirnis should seriously consider getting printed up as his calling card. In any case, from there, template set, the album simply proceeds to run from gem to gem.

There’s “Stars in Your Eyes,” a haunting clarion song of yearning that begins with the line (in harmony with Wakefield) “send for my love, cuz I’m not going to make it and there’s still so much for us to say//send for my heart, cuz I’m gonna break it, so there’s nothing else left in my way” before evolving into a juke-ready classic that doubles as a 5-minute songwriting lesson; the country rocked “Everything” that, besides its cameo appearance of Tobin Sprout on guitar, harbors the classic line “and sometimes I fail/but failing for you takes more work than you know” which this writer wishes he’d written; “The Dawn” that’s quiet then bursting, soothing then cathartic, and no wonder it occupies the centerpiece slot on the tracklist; the achingly wise and wistful “All My Life” that’s as loving a lost-love song as one could ask for, walking as it does that tightrope between reality and its foolish but ever-hopeful twin; the storming and vulnerable closing track “Through the Motions” that, though in no way a blues song – it is, in fact, a full-on rocker – contains a line (“now the only way to know your heart…is to let it go“) that any blues artist would gladly make a deal with the devil to claim and that is but a sampler of the wares on offer here so our advice to you? Buy the damn thing. They don’t make records like this any more except on the rare occasion they do and here we are. [grab Every Moment here]

Lynn Drury – “High Tide” (self-released)

Not to overstate the ‘burden of abundance’ issue touched on in the intro up above but the fact is that, once you’ve hung out your shingle (you know the one, “Record Reviews!! Step Right In!!) the candidates tend to flood in from all directions and while one may – nay, will – lament the built-in inadequacy of the time/energy ratio that, as it turns out, continues to hound you even after you’ve retired, in the end, all said and done, it’s nevertheless the case that, for a lifelong music obsessive, it’s actually an envious predicament to find oneself in, a statement made all that much truer when albums like Lynn Drury’s High Tide arrive unbidden but most welcome in your mailbox.

Recorded almost entirely live at Dockside Studios in New Orleans with a handful of local luminaries – drummer and Dr. John alumnus Doug Belote, René Coman providing bass as he has for Alex Chilton and many others and the legendary Papa Mali slinging his guitar licks here and there (most notably his slide on “Great Divide”) while also producing – Ms. Drury’s tenth, self-released April 5th, might well be her jumpin’est set yet which, to be honest, is no big surprise. While slightly south of that so-called radar, fact is she’s been bringing her brand of gently clarion, Crescent City-tinged singer-songwriter fare since the dawn of the century – debut “Crossing Frequencies” appearing in 2001 – and unless we’re missing our bet here, High Tide might well also be her best yet.

With its loping shuffle of a beat, opener “Blue,” masterfully clever of lyric, Drury’s unique voice with its somewhat delicate homespun trace of a rasp warmly pulling us in to its gentle yet compelling arrangement, we find – what else? – the beauty and ache of love and life settling in to their usual, if often elusive, detente. Were there a theme here, a note sounding the gist of this record entire it’s simply that, even as the ‘that’ were talking about makes a liar out of the word ‘simply’ every time. There’s complexity throughout High Tide but, like any finely-tuned record of this ilk, it’s drawn in subtleties and the assuredness that comes from having a (well-earned) confidence in one’s craft.

You can hear it in “Fade”‘s deep country soul, in the doleful twinge of the title track’s bewitching blend of pain and its better half resilience (and speaking of arrangements, what a lovely one), in “I Waited Too Long”‘s swirl of eternal regret and acceptance, in the punch and drive of “Great Divide,” in the rock’n’country roll of “Live My Life” with its “Get Back” beat that, at 5:09, is the album’s longest track yet goes by way too fast and we all know what that implies and though that, again, is but a mere sampling you surely get the idea (and, really, pick any handful here, it won’t change things).

What this all adds up to, in other words, is a delightful, more-than-the-sum-of-its-parts proposition that, track in track out, hits its (often moving and not infrequently quite, y’know, moving) target. While Lynn Drury may indeed be a bit off your radar – she was ours until this album arrived – it ain’t so hard nor certainly too late to readjust your settings and remedy that and we strongly suggest you give that some thought. [find High Tide here]