A Music Review

5 Sep

Music review from Trying to be Different magazine:

Corporate Casual Racism by Tumbleweed Jebediah ft. jim.

In the 1890’s, ragtime hit its apex of popularity, moving from shadowy Red Light districts into mainstream success, echoing from wax cylinders and player pianos everywhere. On the eve of the Great War, however, the syncopated rhythms ceased to pulse on, and the genre devolved into obscurity, then nonexistence, with only a select few nursing homes offering live shows. Luckily, this trend was re-reouted in the late 1990’s in the haberdashery-by-day/pansexual-bazaar-by-nights of rural Utah, where curious youth found ragtime’s allure once again.

Revivalist ragtime’s messiah, nonagenarian Tumbleweed Jebediah, has emerged from the studio with his new cassette, Corporate Casual Racism. The album is chock full of Jebediah’s signature ragged timing, spotty musicianship, and inattention to detail, a rawness that has come to define his recent creations. The dancy, festive sound makes it clear: Tumbleweed Jebediah’s passion is running just as strong as his pacemaker.

The real eye-catcher on this record (besides the Sunday school unfriendly cover art) is the guest appearance by jim., punk’s genderless deity of mayhem. Though the collaboration may seem bizarre, the music proves this is a match made in heaven, as jim.’s animal, piercing vocals ride atop Jebediah’s arthritis-hankered ivory tickling. jim.’s creative spirit spices up the traditional ragtime flavors, offering chaotic synths and crunchy, sharp textures.

It is said this album represents ragtime’s role in the modern cultural conscience, and the theme is hammered home on tracks like “Ragtime’s Gone – Thanks, Obama”, which features a third-grader on the recorder, and “I Took a Dump on a Piano”, which includes a ten minute recording of Tumbleweed Jebediah’s bathroom break during the session.

Corporate Casual Racism will be on store shelves September 16th, and off them within the week.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

%d bloggers like this: