Fans who lost track of Juvenile after his 1998 breakout album 400 Degreez may have trouble believing that Juve the Great is a product of the same man and the same record label. Gone are the flashy Cash Money album covers of yore. Gone, too, is the creative monopoly normally afforded to producer Mannie Fresh. Even Juvenile’s voice has changed, sounding surprisingly polished for a man whose first hit consisted of grunting “ha” at the end of each line. In fact, the only constant is Juvenile’s uncanny flair for flowing over the agile bounce beats characteristic of Crescent City rap. The title track is the album’s hidden gem, a series of compelling verses with a tense, dramatic instrumental.
Juve the Great’s weakness isn’t the quality of the music—it’s that Juvenile doesn’t seem to be having as much fun as one would expect from the author of “Back That Azz Up.” Nevertheless, Juve the Great bodes well for the man who put the Magnolia Projects on the map—it may not be a classic, but it sure proves his ability to remain relevant.
—Thomas J. Clarke
The Microphones
Live in Japan, February 19th, 21st, and 22nd, 2003
(K Records)
Japan, as seen on the big screen, seems like as good a place as any to put the Microphones to rest, or at least their name. The anesthetized neon hotel rooms of Sofia Coppola’s Tokyo are the 21st century analogue to the lonesome Washingtonian shores from whence comes the music of Phil Elvrum, elfish folk matador behind the Microphones.
The ponderous nature of Mt. Eerie is absent on Live in Japan, a sober collection of new songs culled from the bare-bones shows Elvrum performed before retiring the Microphones’ moniker for good. All the ingredients of vintage Microphones are present: droopy guitars, moan-singing and months spent in isolation. But the magic of the spacious soundscapes that Elvrum dreams up so well in basement studios is missing, save standout tracks like the break-up tune “The Blow, Pt. 2” and “Universe Conclusion,” a bone-shaking campfire call-and-response that features an appearance by K Records founder Calvin Johnson.
Airy harmonies and quiet build-ups continue throughout the album in a slightly exhausting downhill amble that includes the regrettably-titled “I Have Been Told That My Skin Is Exceptionally Smooth,” as well as the gothic-esque “My Favorite Things” and “Silent Night.” But these songs are in every way inferior to the album’s opener and apex, “Great Ghosts,” a guitar lullaby about exile, return and surrender that should be the Microphone’s swan song. Typically, tentatively, Elvrum howls: “As you can see / having descended the hill / I still look like me / I still wallow like Phil, and forever will.” The luminous ghosts of the Microphones past are haunting Elvrum and us, but in this live setting they’re lost in translation.
—Alex L. Pasternack