POP/ROCK: Ben Harper, "Give Till It's Gone" (Virgin)
His 10th studio album suggests a cathartic confessional. Pointedly a solo effort (previous Harper albums have largely co-billed backing bands the Innocent Criminals and Relentless7), it's also his last with longtime record label Virgin and comes after a very public split with his wife, actress Laura Dern.
As such, it's easy to discern the raw emotions in songs such as "Don't Give Up on Me Now" and "I Will Not Be Broken." The lens of anger and regret, however, provides Harper a musical focus he's never had. Previously, he has displayed a weakness for rootsy, bar-band dynamics, hippie-ish homilies and pleasant yet indistinct vocalizing. Here, however, rage cuts through any sentimentality, from the distorted primal screaming on "Do It for You, Do It for Us" to the passionate, ragged glory of his searing guitar solos.
Indeed, going to the edge has clearly pushed Harper into fresh sonic realms. "I Will Not Be Broken" grows to a surprising surge that evokes Mogwai and Explosions in the Sky, while "Get There From Here" (featuring Ringo Starr on drums) evolves into a shimmering Krautrock synthesizer jam. "Clearly Severely" even evokes Bloc Party's nervous post-punk, while "Rock N' Roll Is Free" exudes jangly Britpop swagger and the fuzzbox intensity of Bob Mould. If this represents the sound of pain and letting go -- well, then, Harper makes it hurt so good.
- MATT DIEHL, LOS ANGELES TIMES
Moby, "Destroyed" (Mute)
In his liner notes, Moby states that foreign cities, late at night when he struggled with insomnia, provided the perfect backdrop for the creation of "Destroyed." He also released with the album a sleek photography book of images of cities pulsing in their anonymity, like bad dreams out of a J.G. Ballard novel.
As a concept, these odes to isolation all fit together, but it doesn't make for particularly compelling entertainment. "Destroyed" is so uniform in mood -- sleepily alienated or sleepily wondrous -- that after a while, you long for something to rip through the transatlantic wallpaper. With 15 synth-heavy tracks, "Destroyed" often feels simply too long, and not varied enough in its posh detachment.
Removed from the album's pristine vault of air-conditioned chill, some of the tracks can be appreciated as singular objects of beauty. The delicately ghostly "Rockets," with Inyang Bassey filling in the Martina Topley Bird role of beautiful but doomed songbird, is probably the most evocative track here. But all the songs are encased behind such stylish glass that it's hard to feel much of anything while listening to "Destroyed," much less identification with the plight of the nomadic musician.
- MARGARET WAPPLER, LOS ANGELES TIMES
