The new album from Lee Ranaldo and Raül Refree, Names of North End Women, sees the Sonic Youth musician blend forces with the man who's pitched as a "flamenco innovator" in the press materials. The resulting record, out now on Mute, offers up tunes that suggest debts owed to the past work of both artists. While this is an album that feels like an experimental music release, the selections here are largely accessible.
"Light Years Out" marries spoken word-bits over clanging and skittering electronics to great effect, while "Alice, Etc." sounds like The Velvet Underground a tiny bit. Ranaldo, obviously, would cite VU as an influence and there's some vibe here on each cut that's a bit like that of "The Gift". Lee, playing to his strengths, doesn't really sing as much as speak a lot of this material and it works. His pseudo-croon on "The Art of Losing" is affecting (even if the melodic hook sounds a whole lot like "Eyes Without a Face" by Billy Idol), and "New Brain Trajectory" is superb, a nice mix of sorta Yo La Tengo-kinda stuff with bits and pieces of the more experimental kind of music that Sonic Youth dabbled in decades ago. The presence of a member of Circuit des Yeux on Names of North End lends this all more out there bonafides, though, as I said, this is a largely accessible release.
Names of North End Women is out now via Mute.
[Photo: Marco Poulos]