Customer Reviews

Rain on the City

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I don't think Freedy can make another CD that I love as much as Blue Days Black Nights, but this CD is pretty close. It's very melodic, with great harmonies, and kind of a throwback to the 60s and 70s when there was more craftsmanship and musicianship in pop/folk music as a whole.

If you listen to the preview for "The Devil Raises His Own" or "What you Cannot See You Cannot Fight", you should be sold. They aren't typical of the mood of all the other tunes, but no songs of Freedy's are typical in any way and those two are standouts for me. Every tune on here is so loaded with melody and feeling that you really need to listen to it for a while to digest it all.

Now Freedy just needs to get out and tour the country so people can hear him live to knock their socks off.

You know, Freedy is good.

Right from the getgo his sound just grabs hold of you. Yes, Freedy does have his own sound. He'd stick out anywhere. He's like Grant-Lee Phillips in that you'd know themj anywhere, like Morrissey. Infectious as herpes, pop rock songs done well with some acoustic mood lyrical stuff thrown in. There is your review. Freedy is a national icon and he is always in your town playing for cheap to fewer people than he should, but that's okay.

Freedy is a songsmith. He keeps you interested, absorbed, oh he gives you the "sugar", but has great lyrics also. Pick it up, it's a great release.

Freedy Johnston opens his new album, his first new material since 2001's Right Between the Promises, with a ukulele strum and a lyric that searches optimistically for answers. The quality of his voice against the stripped-down arrangement highlights the arresting, bell-like clarity of his tone, and the lyric playfully strides between a literal ode to a found coin and a metaphorical hand outstretched to a lost girl. Producer Richard McLaurin leavens the ukulele's chipper tone with more quizzical and unsure dashes of lap steel and Hammond B3. The arrangement's subtlety is a perfect balance to the lyrics' provocative queries. The same vocal quality cuts through the electric arrangement of "Venus is Her Name" as Johnston hits and holds piercing country-tinged notes.

Johnston has returned to the character and scene studies that attracted fans to his earliest works. "Rain on the City" animates rain as a character and evokes the painterly way that Paul Simon projected human emotion on observed imagery, and the tearful goodbye of "Central Station" couches its discomfort in keen observations of worn station details substituting for eye contact. The album isn't all texture and mood, however, as Johnston writes lyrics of romantic strife and McLaurin happily indulges the songwriter's need to rock. The power-chords and strings of "Don't Fall in Love with a Lonely Girl" may remind you of power-pop artists like Adam Schmitt or the Smithereens, and Johnston sings with open-throated abandon on "Livin' Too Close to the Rio Grande" as the band bashes and twangs.

Stretching out, the baion beat of "The Other Side of Love" signals the sort of heartbreak common to early `60s productions by Leiber & Stoller and Phil Spector, but here it's dressed in rootsier instrumentation; "The Kind of Love We're In" floats along on a gentle bossa nova rhythm. The closing "What You Cannot See, You Cannot Fight" suggests a father's entreaty to a son deeply troubled by his mother's passing, but Johnston's lyrics are sufficiently open-ended to leave room for personal interpretation. The album's catchy melodies ease you aboard, and the rich threads of loss, loneliness and meandering hope invite you to make these songs you own. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Freedy Johnston delivers the smartest, most listenable AAA (Adult Acoustic Alternative) music out there. Johnston is a gifted songwriter, constructing meticulously-crafted songs, and his silky voice remains charmed. With 12 albums over the 20 years, Johnston's new release, Rain on the City, is his 1st in eight years and is yet another superb effort. The album is classic Freedy, offering energized rock songs as well as soothing acoustic folk tunes. Production is smooth, and themes addressed are common ones - romance gone right...and wrong, loss of a loved one, haunted characters, etc.

GENRES: Rock, Mellow Rock.

BUY IF YOU LIKE: The Jayhawks, Steve Earle, Matthew Sweet.

MUST HEAR TRACKS: "Don't Fall In Love With A Lonely Girl," "Venus Is Her Name," "The Other Side of Love," "The Kind of Love We're In."

This guy is such a great songwriter; his lack of widespread acclaim is as disappointing to his admirers as I'm sure it is to him.

The New York Times once described a Freedy Johnston album as "incandescent," meaning a: white, glowing, or luminous with intense heat b: strikingly bright, radiant, or clear c: marked by brilliance especially of expression.

That word will suffice to describe this latest album. "Don't Fall in Love With a Lonely Girl" is particularly brilliant. Great lyrics put to an even better rockin' melody. Like pretty much every Freedy album there are songs like "Venus is Her Name" and "It's Gonna Come Back to You" that have great hooks and catch your interest immediately. Patient listeners, however, are rewarded with discovering the beauties in some of the less immediately accessible songs. Central Station, for instance, creates in immedaite mood and image in your mind with nine simple words:

Early morning, central station
Tears in coffee, words unspoken

Great stuff from one of the very best writers working today.

Simply marvelous, atmospheric stuff. Strong set from a guy who shoulda been a huge star.

What's not to love about this diverse collection of music sent from Freedy's heart to yours?? More than ever, smiles,tears,joy and sorrow reach out and touch the listener. It's playing non-stop at my house.

While Freedy will never be remembered as an innovator, he does have his own special way of putting familiar song components together. And then there's his unique and cuddley voice; I could listen to him sing the phone book. As usual the album has a nice mix of styles and moods, with nice instrumentations and arrangements. I thought the overall production was a little too thumpy, but that's a minor complaint. My major complaint is with our music-listening society,which never made a big star out of Freedy. I hope this album serves to introduce a younger generation of fans to one of our most underrated singer/songwriters.

Vendor was incredibly fast in sending me the CD, and it doesn't disappoint. Poignant lyrics, lots of variety in instrumentation.