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CD: Arlan Feiles, Razing a Nation (The Ballad of a New Lone Ranger)

Moving from the music of sweetness to the music of pain, we encounter Arlan Feiles, a folk troubador from New York City with a penchant for war stories. Sometimes you can really hear in people's music where they make their home, and the passionate intensity in Feiles's voice and melodies does indeed suggest the oppressiveness that sometimes makes city life tough to bear. The songs are about soldiers, sometimes literally, other times using battle imagery to express a lover's feelings, almost always looking at life as a battle to be fought. "I Fell" is a rare exception, a simple love song with only a tiny touch of melancholy.

Throughout the CD Feiles's quavery voice, half Adam Duritz and half Dave Matthews, stands front and center against the plain acoustic-guitar background. Other than a little harmonica, occasional piano (all played feelingly by Feiles) and a few backing vocals, that's all there is, but it's enough.

The CD is almost a concept album, an extended tableau of one man's stand for honor and love against opposing forces. My only complaint is that there's too much sameness of tone to merit a thirteen-song, 50-minute opus. Once you get seven or eight songs in, you've gotten the picture and the singing is starting to sound whiny. (But don't miss the Dylanesque "I Will Come For You" near the end.)

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EP: Central Services, self-titled

If you're in the mood for some jaunty rock with one leg in the late 60s and one in the present, you could do a lot worse than Central Services. Moving from deft power-pop to wavy acoustic grooves, the Seattle group has a knack for harmonies and hooks. Kevin Emerson, who is also the drummer for Math and Physics Club, has a controlled, airy tenor that isn't terribly strong but works nicely with the band's delicate arrangements. His sensibility as a songwriter has a subtle dark side, too, as evidenced by "Perfect Drug."

Their press materials reference Fountains of Wayne and Ben Folds, but they're neither as hard as the former nor as syrupy as the latter, and their sound harks back to the era of the Byrds and the Turtles as much as it nods to contemporary pop fauna. Though there's nothing quite as catchy here as "Stacy's Mom" or "Eleanor," it's a promising start for Emerson and his talented crew.

Article Author: Jon Sobel

Jon Sobel is Blogcritics' Culture and Theater Editor. In addition to reviewing NYC theater, he writes a semi-regular round-up of independent music releases. By day he is a writer and editor, and at night he's a working musician: lead singer, songwriter, …

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