Sa Dingding
Alive
(Wrase Records)
Alive may not be the best pop album of the year, but it's got to be the coolest. Twenty-five-year-old Sa Dingding of China brings Sanskrit, Mandarin, Mongolian and Tibetan song into the age of electronica and sweaty dance floors. High-pitched vocals slice through synthesizers, bamboo flutes battle electric bass, Asian gongs and cymbals crash, and Chinese lutes sound as if Jimi Hendrix visited Beijing. Dingding uses controlled quavers, chants and voice modulation as counterpoint amidst the instrumental storm. Making Sanskrit prayer into pop is so audacious that reviewers have compared Dingding to Bjork, but her goal is to build global bridges, not push creative envelopes. She's also been dubbed a "psychedelic Bodhisattva."
—Rob Weir
Weezer
The Red Album
(DGC/Interscope)
I've always had a weak spot for punky/poppy California bands, and Weezer has always been somewhere between Green Day and The Offspring. Still, the hipper-than-thou Rivers Cuomo & Co. generally bat .500, tops, in coming up with good material. They keep the faith with deliciously chunky power chords (with help from producer Rick Rubin), and clock a couple of quality tunes, notably "Everybody Get Dangerous," which starts with a guitar rhythm that evokes the Beastie Boys' "Sabotage," and "Automatic," perhaps the coolest tune on the disc. But "Heart Songs" is an insufferable paean to '70s, '80s and '90s pop, and, sadly, paints the reputedly deep and mysterious Cuomo as shallow, uninspired and immature.
—Tom Sturm
The BellRays
Hard, Sweet and Sticky
(Anodyne)
An atomic fireball mash-up of AC/DC, Ike and Tina, and Mother's Finest—complete with all the initial heat, hard exterior, implicit silliness, sexual swagger and sweet center that suggests—is about what you get with the BellRays. Hard rock meets soul, blistering at both ends. Singer Lisa Kekaula can belt out some alarm-tripping screams. With songs about partying and loving, these aren't genius lyrics, but no one should look for deep poetry here. The BellRays are a bar band for everyone.
—John Adamian
Bill Dixon with the Exploding Star Orchestra
Bill Dixon with the Exploding Star Orchestra
(Thrill Jockey)
Composer/trumpeter Bill Dixon suffered a low profile for decades, but he's having an unexpected resurgence in his 80s. His latest sounds remarkably vital. Here Dixon collaborates with Exploding Star Orchestra. Leader Rob Mazurek contributes a po-mo pastiche that confidently segues between styles. Dixon's two major compositions offer fleeting echoes of Miles Davis' electric work and Anthony Braxton's big bands, but the overall ?lan is pure Dixon. Both pieces contain moments of roiling dissonance and aching lyricism, while maintaining momentum. This sly, slippery music offers an unconventional sort of drama, built on a series of sidelong glances.
—Jeff Jackson
