By Malcolm X Abram
Beacon Journal pop music writer
Punk’s not dead, it just smells funny.
Chicago punk band Rise Against will perform at Kent State.
The Chicago quartet Rise Against, performing tonight at Kent State’s M.A.C. Center, has been following in the Doc Marten-shaped footsteps of their forebears such as Bad Religion (whom lead singer/lyricist Tim McIlrath’s voice often resembles) since their 2001 full-length debut album The Unraveling. The band is also one of the aforementioned punk-pop groups whose records appear in the Billboard 200, with 2008’s Appeal To Reason and their current reason for touring, sixth album Endgame which was released last March, both debuting in the Top 5.
On Endgame, the band continues its musical “growth,” mixing classic punk rhythms with flashes of metal and hardcore, but McIlrath ensures there’s plenty of melodic hooks to go with his collection of lyrics about, as he said in a January album preview story in Spin Magazine, “the end of humankind as we know it.”
No songs about drinking, moshing (do people still do that?) or teenage ennui to be found; McIlrath only takes on big topics. He rails against war from the perspective of soldiers on Survivor Guilt, which samples the subversive classic film Catch-22, and he empathizes with bullied LGBT teens on Make It Stop (September’s Children), a song inspired by a spate of suicides of gay teens that took place in September 2010. The rumbling (and ironically titled) Help Is On the Way recalls the slow reaction of relief efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Longtime punk fans may find themselves playing “name-that-influence” while listening to the well-played and well-arranged but familiar-sounding tunes. But, hey, if some 19-year-old Warped Tour lover finds himself contemplating socio-economic inequity (the d-beat driven Disparity By Design) while jumping up and down, I call that a win for contemporary punk and society.
Brian McKnight at Civic
On Saturday night, the Akron Civic Theatre will play host to a soulful evening just for the grown and sexy folks.
Contemporary R&B/Quiet Storm crooner and multi-instrumentalist Brian McKnight will bring in the tour for his 2011 album Just Me, a double CD/download featuring one disc of 10 new songs recorded with McKnight’s sons, Brian Jr. and Nico. Disc two is a live recording of an acoustic concert, making it the perfect primer for this local appearance, which will be an acoustic show.
Despite selling more than 20 million albums, receiving 16 Grammy nominations and winning numerous awards including Billboard songwriter of the year, McKnight still doesn’t quite have the crossover name recognition of veterans such as Luther Vandross or R. Kelly (but does he really want the latter’s notoriety?).
But millions of contemporary R&B fans have been listening to the Buffalonian’s silky smooth tenor for two decades since his debut hit single One Last Cry. The R&B and pop charts have been littered with his love-related ballads and songs, including his biggest hit/crossover album and song, the triple-platinum-selling Back To One.
On Just Me, McKnight displays one aspect he has in common with Kelly: Both artists are excellent mimics, able to recreate the sound and feel of their influences in new songs that instantly remind you of old songs while still retaining their own flavor, and that’s not a slight. Just Me opens with Temptation, a sexy simmering tune that is essentially a rewrite of Marvin Gaye’s I Want You. The slippery synth bass line and fancy chord progression of Without You recalls early-1970s Stevie Wonder.
McKnight also applies his musical abilities — he plays nine instruments including keyboards, drums, flugelhorn(!) and guitar — to a rare rock-flavored tune, Husband 2.1, which has distorted rock riffs and strains of Michael Jackson’s Dirty Diana.
There are other different sounds to be found. One Mo’ Time is an old-school rhythm and blues torch song, while Gimme Yo Love sounds like a song Robin Thicke has been trying to write for years.
The 30-track live disc reveals McKnight the showman, as he charms and impresses an audience with his talents and a set list of hits, entertaining between-song banter and occasional tangents such as playing snatches of Gonna Fly Now (the theme from Rocky), classical and gospel music, and covers of some his heroes’ music including Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson and Nat King Cole.
Malcolm X Abram can be reached at 330-996-3758 or by email at mabram@thebeaconjournal.com. Read his blog at www.ohiomm.com/blogs/soundcheck. He’s also on Facebook where outside validation (i.e. being “liked”) will help ease the pain of the 49ers’ loss.
