Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Zachary Warnes – “What’s This Death”

Posted on February 20, 2020 by Jon Rooney

Singer / songwriter Amanda Winterhalter has made quite an impact on the Ball of Wax universe and PNW Americana music scene these past few years, going back to her 2016 debut LP Oleo that features a song called “I’m 100 Years Old” that’s flat-out amazing and you should click the link to listen to it right now. This past October Winterhalter and her band followed up Oleo with What’s This Death, the title track from which Zachary Warnes chose to cover. Winterhalter’s original recording starts as a sparse, country dirge with mostly voice and finger-picked electric guitar. After the first cycle the rest of the band comes booming in, creating an ominous, swamp Gothic atmosphere that wouldn’t be out of place in an episode of True Blood. It’s a polished, thoughtful arrangement that builds a simple, minor-pentatonic melodic idea (there’s really no B section or real shift) up to considerable weightiness.

Warnes takes “What’s This Death” out of the lush vampire boudoir and onto the front porch, reducing it all down to voice and acoustic guitar. Whereas Winterhalter’s version grew and growled, adding layers of instruments and textures, Warnes’s cover relies on the spookiness of simplicity, hoping to hypnotize you with deft guitar playing and soft-double tracked vocals. It’s a neat choice that’s really well executed.

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Sam Russell – “Everything Is Changing”

Posted on February 20, 2020 by Jon Rooney

Let’s not bury the lede; Sam Russell sings his cover of Zachary Warnes’s “Everything is Changing” in falsetto. Like full, guileless, going-for-it falsetto accompanied by nothing else than tastefully played electric guitar dialed up with a healthy dose of reverb. Sam’s cover is confessional, desperate, and laced with a kind of timeless R&B pleading that plants the song firmly into Sam’s well-curated Eddie and the Cruisers-esque universe. This is a meal made out of 2 simple but hard-to-nail-down ingredients. Enjoy:

Which brings us to the original from Zachary Warnes, which starts out with a more early 21st century indie band-based arrangement, like the shimmering power pop of Big Star or the Raspberries pulled through the slightly more brooding vibes of Mazarin or, more notably, the Shins. The vocals have a pinched, reedy quality for which I’m generally a sucker. The band, particularly the drums and bass, are tight and groovy, occasionally punctuated by clean, funk guitar chords and “oooh” background vocals that tie the whole song together. A Big Muffy acid rock guitar solo leads into one last chorus that repeats a few time before giving way to a Vanilla Fudge-esque outtro (maybe it’s a coda? anyone know?) that dials up the guitar wailing and circa 1971 spacey vocal effects, ending the song in a decidedly different place from where it started. It’s like Warnes showed up on a Vespa and tore out of town in a van with a dragon painted on the side. So Sam dove into this murky, yet enjoyable, bongwater to grab the essential pearls that form his pared-down version. This, my friends, is the magic of a Ball of Wax covers volume.

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Tomo Nakayama – “The Sugar Nile”

Posted on February 19, 2020 by Sam Russell

It’s quite an experience to hear one of your songs covered for the first time, and I can’t think of a better one to have than hearing Tomo Nakayama do “The Sugar Nile.” In fact, “cover” seems a woefully inappropriate term; I’m thinking maybe “resurrect” or “define” might be more apt verb.

For many of us indie artists with small fanbases, songs live and seem to die by quickly becoming obscure and mostly unlistened to on streaming services and bulk order boxes of CDs gathering dust in the storage space. If you stop playing it live too, then the reasons for writing said song in the first place also become obscured until the song itself almost seems to have never existed at all. It’s a true gift of this compilation and Tomo to have a song written by my younger self given back to me in such a way that the new version seems to be the realized and finished one and the old version just a demo.

From a musical standpoint, what Tomo does is reharmonize the melody with different placements of the song’s chords underneath at various times. In the original recording, the minor vi chord is slightly more prominent in the verse, whereas Tomo saves it to use once at the end for maximum impact. He then inversely uses the same chord as part of the main chorus progression, whereas the original recording saved it for end of chorus THERE for maximum impact. To my ear, this makes the verses more confident than melancholy and the choruses more anthem-like and pleading than surrendering.

I bring this up only to say that this reframing of the melody comes from a more seasoned and nuanced worldview than that which the original arrangement of the song came from, and I relate to this new presentation greatly more than the old one. I don’t want to get too much more pedantic about this because I wasn’t thinking this analytically when listening Tomo’s version for the first 20 times or so. I was just blown away.

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Medejin – “Roma”

Posted on February 18, 2020 by Brendon Helgason

Medejin’s cover of Tomo’s Nakayama’s “Roma” highlights, in its simplicity, how beautiful and strange the original composition is at its core. Medejin’s rendition feels especially haunting and hollow in the best way. Perhaps it’s because Jenn Taranto abandons her soft approach to downtempo shoegaze and the listener is just left with piano and voice, giving you the space to fully appreciate how strange some of the chord progressions are.

It’s a gorgeous cover. It’s strong and confident. I feel like I can hear Medejin taking this song personally and loving it. It’s a very comfortable vocal performance and the comfort resonates with me, making me want to dig deeper into both projects.

I’ve followed Tomo in some capacity for about 10 years. His orchestration with Grand Hallway is as solid as any chamber pop act ever and it is equally strong if not better in his solo work. I’ve always appreciated his predisposition for more off the beaten path elements on his music. I think that sets him apart from a lot of his peers and I think that’s what will set Medejin apart too.

I used the term downtempo shoegaze to describe Medejin’s sound, but really, that’s such an oversimplification. They draw comfortably from everything to trip-hop to folk. The ease with which they blend all these influences is something of note. They describe themselves as ethereal, which hits the nail in the head as this seems to be the common thread through all the different influences they balance. Looking forward to hearing more of this band.

Jenn will play a solo Medejin set as part of the Ball of Wax 59 show this Friday. Don’t miss it!

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Annie Ford – “World’s Fair”

Posted on February 18, 2020 by Levi Fuller

For our next Ball of Wax cover, Annie Ford beautifully deconstructs Medejin’s “World’s Fair.” The original – released as a single last summer, and featured recently on Ball of Wax 57 – is a driving deluge of layered guitars, vocals, and drums, awash in melody.

Being a string player, Annie chose to break down all those guitars and rebuild them as a string quartet. The simple, shuffling drum beat keeps the forward momentum but takes a back seat to the gorgeously intertwining cello, viola, and violins. Vocally, Annie stays true to Jenn Taranto’s original melody, but the overall feel is utterly its own thing. To my ears Annie Ford’s”World’s Fair” has a peacefulness to it, a calm remove from the core loss of the song, while the original communicates a sharper, more urgent grief.

Lucky us, we get to hear both versions this Friday night at Lo-Fi. Annie has mentioned she’ll be doing some live looping – a first for her, I believe – so we’re in for a unique treat.

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Julia Massey – “Ain’t No Place”

Posted on February 14, 2020 by Sam Russell

Annie Ford’s original recording of her song “Ain’t No Place” (which, it turns out, was written by drummer Matthew Manges) strikes that mythic sweet spot between the composed and the seemingly found; the song feels like it’s been around forever and you MUST have heard it a million times (like the way a Creedence song must have sounded when first released), while still bearing the personal stamp of its author.

By more or less not fucking with the actual song at all, Julia Massey’s cover version shows that modern pop/indie/electronica benefits greatly from incorporating certain traditional song structure. In this case, Julia’s version strikes a balance between the classic (using the folk musical language of the original song) and the modern (the production).

And whereas Annie sounds like she’s a little too deep in redneck territory (with the Bayou accompaniment seemingly a reference to where she feels she belongs instead of where she is), Julia’s version sounds like she’s at a bad art school party or a Manhattan sex dungeon, with (what sounds to me like) tubular bells in the arrangement reinforcing the horror-vibe undertone.

Arguably, Julia’s biggest departure from Annie’s original comes with how she sings the refrain. Whereas Annie sings her refrain as a declarative epiphany, Julia sings it with a seemingly self-aware smirk as if she should have known better than to hit this party up in the first place. And this, my friends, is one solid approach for covering a song: making it seem like a different person experiencing the same thoughts in a drastically varying setting.

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Moe Provencher & Carrie Biell: “A Bit of a Hard Time”

Posted on February 13, 2020 by Levi Fuller

I don’t believe in magic or fate or astrology or pretty much anything along those lines (except jinxes), but I do love the wonderful coincidences and synchronicities that projects like this often serve up. Another bit of magic that my hat manifested as I drew names out of it to decide who would cover whom was to assign Moe Provencher the task of covering Julia Massey. In addition to being an accomplished songwriter, musician, and audio engineer (she’s mastered the majority of volumes of Ball of Wax over the past few years), Moe is also a podcast host and producer. Her podcast Grief/Relief, now in its second year, has the Julia Massey song “A Bit of a Hard Time” as its theme. See? Magic! Naturally, I wasn’t too surprised to see that this was the song Moe had chosen to cover, but I was very pleased to see she’d chosen to make it a collaboration with local treasure Carrie Biell. (Carrie may not know or remember this, but she was one of the first people in Seattle I played music with, many years ago.)

Julia Massey and the Five Finger Discount’s original is a driving, joyful rock tune, with Julia’s bright voice and bubbling keyboards offsetting the titular “hard time,” so you focus on the “bit.” We’ll be fine, it leaves you thinking, despite the hard time.

Moe and Carrie leave the lyrics untouched, but they bring it all way down – the tempo, the vocal range and timbre, even the positivity. You feel the hard time a bit more with this one, as if the singers are singing to comfort themselves in the middle of it, rather than rallying a friend. But it’s not a sad, dreary bumout-fest, either. Moe has beautifully arranged and produced a lush, subtle musical landscape featuring hushed harmony vocals, melodic guitar, and keyboards that bubble in their own understated way. We are fortunate to have these two recordings in our lives: Depending on where you stand in relation to your own hard time at any given moment, you will want both Julia’s original and Moe and Carrie’s version in your playlist arsenal at all times.

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Nic Masangkay – “Like Moon River”

Posted on February 12, 2020 by Levi Fuller

I have not heard Moe Provencher’s original version of “Like Moon River.” You probably haven’t either. In fact, it may well be that only Moe and Nic Masangkay have had that pleasure. You see, Nic and Moe went the extra mile with this covers challenge, and got together so Moe could share some tunes with Nic and Nic could choose the song that most spoke to them – and then Moe recorded Nic! I could not have imagined this inspiring, collaborative outcome when I first selected this group of artists and then randomly picked their names out of a hat to decide who would cover whom, and I am just utterly delighted.

Since I have no reference points for “Like Moon River,” I do have the freedom of assessing it on its own merits, rather than as a cover – sort of like how we heard “Nothing Compares 2 U” as a Sinead song, and not a Prince cover, when it came out. And this is a beautiful, moving piece of music. The refrain “You’re like ‘Moon River’ from a golden throat” tells us this is a love song, but there is a strain of sadness that runs through the whole piece, tempered just a bit by a hopeful little synth melody. Thrumming synthesizers and sparse electronic beats provide a foundation for Nic’s voice, which does all the emotional heavy lifting. We hear – we feel – love, longing, heartache, and nostalgia, and when Nic goes high up in their range to sing “Moon . . . River,” it’s hard not to get chills.

Alas, Moe won’t be joining us at the Ball of Wax 59 show next Friday, so the original will remain a mystery, but you can hear Nic’s version live (as well as their version of “Forever,” which I was lucky enough to cover). Be there!

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Levi Fuller and the Library – “Forever” (Feat. Amanda Winterhalter)

Posted on February 11, 2020 by Lattney B. Jones

Here’s the challenge: you want to cover an electro-R&B song with confessionally soulful vocals and gentle synth touches. Where to begin? How will you interpret it in a way that retains the elegance of the original but has your own inimitable mark?

The original song in question is Nic Masangkay’s “Forever,” with the earthy-and-yet-not-of-this-earth voice of Falon Sierra. It’s timeless in a way that infuses ’80s sonic ethos with ’00s sensibilities; it’s the kind of song whose aural imprint is one with its message and structure. It’s also the kind of song that Levi Fuller and the Library love enough to want to honor with their own rendition.

Let’s talk arrangement and sound: This is a band that has worked together long enough to move through a structure intuitively. When I listen to their material, I imagine a nod or a wink or a tilt of the head from one of them becomes a clear indicator to the others to pull back, slow down, or charge ahead on the next section. Bass lines on “Forever” alternate between root notes and fretboard gymnastics, the latter echoing the synth lines of the original and adding a sinister bent. The guitars move from terrific plucked/muted harmonics to clanging swipes and suddenly into growling wall-of-sound menace. The drums are a wonderful complement to the original’s programmed percussion and compliment to the direction of the stringed instruments—particularly nice is the hi-hat work, sneaking in triplets that foreshadow vocal rhythms that pop up later (one of the coolest and perfectly-executed marks of Falon Sierra’s work).

Levi could have sung the whole thing himself and that alone would have been “sufficient,” for lack of a better phrase—a lot of covers use the gender-flip vocal as their sole contrast attribute, and Levi’s voice here is unadorned by FX or double-tracking, just as Sierra’s in parts of the original—but it wouldn’t have quite been the stunning cover that it is. Cue secret weapon: Amanda Winterhalter, one of my favorite New Country/Americana artists. Levi and Amanda duet the lyrics in a way that takes the song’s message from internal to external dialogue. Levi follows his own vocal style to manipulate his portions of the lyrical melody with slight drawls and subtle downward movements, while Amanda does the same with her own style while wisely choosing to closely mirror the original in places and proving that no certain genre of music owns any melody.

All in all, “Forever” is a gorgeous cover and really raises the question: When will we see a next-level collaboration between Levi Fuller and the Library and Nic Masangkay with vocals from Falon Sierra and Amanda Winterhalter?

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Ball of Wax 59 Songs: Frames in Motion – “Colossal”

Posted on February 10, 2020 by Lattney B. Jones

Do you remember the compilation put together by Elektra Records for their 40th anniversary back in 1990? It was called Rubáiyát and it had Elektra’s current roster covering songs by Elektra’s earlier artists. And it sucked. [I loved it. -ed.] Do you know why? Contractual obligation and money grabs, that’s why. And also The Cure’s bloodless rendition of “Hello, I Love You.”

For reasons diametrically opposite, the new volume of Ball of Wax—we’re at 59, now!—is everything that Rubáiyát wasn’t and could never be. The secret ingredient here is love, and I say that with tongue in neither cheek. These artist are doing what they’re doing out of love. Whether for Ball of Wax, for one another’s art, for the joy of interpretation, or for the sheer thrill of recording doesn’t matter. Listen to the eleven songs offered on this compilation and you will hear pleasure in every beat, tone, and nuance.

Let’s open, then, with Frames in Motion and their excellent take on Levi Fuller’s “Colossal.” Upon first hearing the album of the same name, “Colossal” was, for me, the perfect defining track: from its incessant pace, its upright bass chug, and its snare drive to Levi’s defiantly fragile solo vocals, the terrific guitar line, and the bring-your-friends-for-a-singalong chorus, the original version remains something to behold.

Frames in Motion (who captured my ears last summer with the perfect pop of “Behind the Face”) have chosen to move away entirely from the straight pace of the original and broken the song into miniature “movements.” With just a few changes in rhythm and backbeat, Frames in Motion alternate between gentle verses and energetic choruses, making “Colossal” entirely their own in bringing plenty of that instrumental playfulness that really drove their album, Euptablisses (be sure to stay tuned for a cover of ITS title track, too!).

The coolest trick here is that this cover could have been a chart-topper had it existed in the mid-’70s. I don’t know if it’s the subtle delayed reverb on the “we are” in the chorus, the elegantly understated electric piano, or the wonderful guitar-and-bass work (this seriously would have been an Al Stewart stomper!), but Frames in Motion does here what few if any bands in recent memory can pull off: they transport me to a time of innocence where nighttime drives were spent in the backseat of my parents’ Datsun, looking up at the stars and listening to AM radio. That’s actual magic and it’s a powerfully emotional way to kick off a compilation.

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