Veteran Avenue – Worlds of Man
Genre: Alternative Rock
Veteran Avenue mixes workmanlike rock n’ roll with visions of grandeur and towering achievements.
Music scenes are either started or they are inherited. Sure, the originators feel pressed to make changes to the sounds they’ve heard so often. They alter familiar formats and help start the mutation. But the task is a long one, and often, the people who start a scene don’t get to truly benefit from seeing it fully fleshed out.
What they end up creating, however, can resonate deeply with future audiences. They move in. They change the furniture. But they keep the spirit of the place alive. Modern rock n’ roll is a lot like that. For the most part, it echoes the righteous anger of the music developed decades ago.
Veteran Avenue’s “Worlds of Man” is a straight-ahead, energy-filled rock tune about nuclear fission. This may seem like an unlike topic, but it is a single release to coincide with the movie “Oppenheimer,” the ultimate modern tale of a man driven by ego and ambition. And so a modern rock song ends up sounding like an accompaniment to a Greek tragedy. Strange, but it honors the spirit of rock music.
Jay Van Raalte – Achtung
Genre: Garage Rock, Alternative Rock
Jay Van Raalte uses an economical approach to making rock music that emphasizes the music’s greatest qualities.
“How many notes is too much?” That’s a question that heavy-metal musicians almost never ask themselves. Instead, they fear that playing one note less will get them banned from a fraternity that includes people who view shredding as an Olympic sport and music as something that must be whipped into submission.
Just how many examples of this unnatural virtuosity do you hear even a decade after they were recorded? Few. And the ones you do hear are usually restricted to the heavy metal ghetto. Instead, songs built around only a few chords and minimal instrumental backing have been known to enjoy decades-long lives.
Jay Van Raalte’s “Achtung” is an exercise in restraint. The singer and songwriter clearly feel that the deepest emotions can’t properly be expressed over a clutter of sounds. This is not the kind of music that requires instruments fighting for real-estate or flashy displays from the central figure. It’s music that lets silence do the talking.
