Redray Frazier's Blood in the Water on CD

Do you remember back in the early to mid '80s, after Thriller had made that once in a lifetime splash on the charts, and suddenly there was a whole new breed of funk/r&b/pop that was edgy, quirky and dynamic? Remember that first album from Rockwell, and how good it actually was, and how everyone thought he'd knock the King of Pop off the top of the mountain? How about Terence Trent D'Arby, and how he was able to cast that darkness into the background of his songs and that made him sound like nobody else? Do you remember that's when The Purple One became huge and everyone was choosing sides between him and Mikey? Do you remember?

I don't. Back then, I was listening to the Minutemen and X and Husker Du and the Meat Puppets and I just didn't get it. I didn't hate that type of music, I respected it, but it just wasn't my thing. In my old age, I've changed. Where once I would have listened to a singer like Red Ray Frazier and said, "It's good, but not my deal," now I'm listening to his new EP, Blood in the Water, and I'm thinking "It's good, really good. I need this music in my life."

Maybe Janelle Monae was the flashpoint for me, but I'm truly welcoming any music that can take me back and help me to connect all the dots of my musical education. Frazier, who was born and raised in New York and started off singing gospel music "in his father's Baptist church," has deftly walked through the door opened by Frank Ocean, the Black Keys and perhaps even Sharon Jones, modern vanguards who have introduced old genres to a new audience. He navigates these six songs through a bright, sunny, '80s pair of shades with the ease of a seasoned vet who's already thinking about releasing a second box set. His soulful voice and his devotion to his very specialized and difficult genre sets him apart from his contemporaries who want to add too much 21st century to an '80s sound. Frazier is, perhaps, adding an '80s sound to classic Motown, and that's cool enough.

His amazing backing band doesn't hide in the shadows, either. They are able to capture those bizarre synthesizer programmings and laid back beats with a confidence that matches that of their front man. Jeff Baxter on keyboards? Matt Brown on guitars? How about folk-rocker Ezra Holbrook, a personal favorite, on drums? In other words, when will they be playing in Colorado? I'm there.

If there's a misstep on this album, it's the somewhat lo-fi approach to the production. It's not muffled and tinny in an attempt to recapture a classic R&B vibe, but it's sort of distorted and super sharp around the edges (although there is plenty of deep bass captured by our new Opera Seconda SE speakers). When the full-length debut album comes out from Redray, and it will be a great injustice if he doesn't follow this up immediately, I think he should make his songs sound as big and as dynamic and as sparkly as the best '80s pop albums. Have you listened to Thriller lately? It still sounds great more than thirty years later. I think Redray Frazier should go big, big as his vision.

(Frazier is selling this EP directly on his website, by the way. Check it out!)

Ezra Holbrook - Save Yourself

After hearing a few cuts from the latest overwrought and banal album from James Blunt, I sincerely wondered to myself if anyone could write a sweet, intelligent and romantic song in this day and age. Idiocracy aside, I just can't accept that intelligence is directly proportional to cynicism, and that a love song has to have a dark edge in order to be acceptable to your garden-variety hipster in the year 2011.

Ezra Holbrook, I believe, has the answer. Ezra was the original drummer for The Decemberists, and his new album Save Yourself combines a stunning trifecta of intelligent lyrics about love, varied and endlessly interesting instrumentation and great sound quality. Ezra's voice is surprisingly accomplished for someone who was previously just known as a drummer for a very good indie band. He mixes the slight breathiness of Sufjan Stevens with the honest, direct phrasing of Paul Simon, and the result is easy, sweet and smooth.

Best of all, he really has something to say about love that isn't maudlin, angular or overly unctuous. He's the master of the simple throwaway line that comes back to haunt you, like the simple yet poetic declaration in the song "Collide-oscope" that "Everything broken is beautiful too." (He comes back later in the same song to confirm that "You might feel broken but all of those pieces belong where they fall.") And for the record, I also sat up and took notice of the line "I would go to sleep unhappy if I could just wake up amazed" from "Do People Bloom?"; it reminded me of "You know I would die if I could come back new" from Wilco's astounding "Ashes of American Flags."

Ezra doesn't cheap out on his band, either. Like I said, it's varied, and I was constantly surprised by the sudden appearance of an accordion, a flute, a string arrangement or even a '70s-style electric piano. The gentle, jazz-tinged sax solo that ends "Another Light Off in the Distance" is definitely a welcome conceit. The sound quality is unusually warm and natural; on a couple of songs I could even hear when acoustic guitars were being strummed with the fingernails rather than picks.

Not every song is a home run--"God Help the Homeless Heart," for example, wears its heart a little too eagerly on its sleeve with its sentimental yet skittish string arrangement. But Save Yourself is a remarkably smart collection of love songs, and may be the perfect make-out record for the day you finally get that quirky, tattooed IT student who works at the local Starbucks to come over to your apartment.