When Life Hands You Lemons, Listen to Music
Foggy Otis goes "deluxe," Glenn Morrow Cries For Help, CR & The White Lights recall 'My Old Self,' and The Black Drumset fill out a New Music Friday
FOGGY OTIS - When Life Hands You Lemons, Play the Ukulele (Deluxe) (Verdict Music)
John Raido has already used up his lifetime allotment of second chances. Nearly 20 years ago, the longtime Jersey scene fixture flatlined during emergency heart surgery, with doctors swiping arteries from his arm in the process, effectively ending his ability to play guitar. Most people would call that a lousy trade-off. Raido picked up a ukulele instead and started over. That’s where Foggy Otis comes from: equal parts survival instinct and stubborn creative refusal to shut up and go away.
Originally self-released last year as a modest 10-song set, When Life Hands You Lemons… now gets the deluxe treatment via Verdict Music, with eight additional tracks and a remaster by Rob Fraboni using something called “RealFeel.” Normally, anything with a trademarked name like that screams snake oil, but in this case, it actually works. The record sounds fuller, warmer - less like something assembled on a laptop and more like something that accidentally wandered in from a pre-algorithm universe where humans still made eye contact.
Foggy Otis operates in a loose, rootsy Americana lane with a polite tip of the hat to the Great American Songbook, but without the museum-glass stiffness that usually comes with that territory. The ukulele - still a punchline in lesser hands - gets pushed into unexpected shapes here, standing in for banjo, bass, even a pseudo-mellotron (“uke-tron,” because, why not?) Backed by Tom Gioia on drums and adding some low-key keys and percussion himself, Otis keeps things simple without sounding simplistic.
Lyrically, he leans into the kind of plainspoken wisdom that usually gets dismissed until you realize it’s harder to pull off than it sounds. “Never been too good with words,” he claims on “For the Rest of My Life,” which is either false modesty or the most convincing lie on the record. These are songs written by someone who’s stared down the exit sign and decided to stick around a while longer. There’s a second-marriage perspective baked in here that trades cynicism for something far more dangerous: sincerity.
“I Got You” swings with a ragged music-hall bounce, “Everything’s OK” drifts in like a lullaby you didn’t know you needed, and “The Chance I Take” practically begs for Levon Helm to rise up and claim it. Even “Bad News Coming” manages to sound weirdly upbeat, which is either emotional resilience or willful denial. But it works.
The closer, “Thanks for Taking the Ride,” is where the record stops smiling and looks you straight in the eye. Built around a tribute to DJ Ron Bennington - who publicly disclosed a stage 4 cancer diagnosis. It’s not subtle, and it’s not supposed to be. It lands exactly where it should: somewhere between a lump in your throat and a reminder that you’re still here.
Foggy Otis isn’t reinventing anything. He’s just making a strong case for why some things don’t need reinventing in the first place.
GLENN MORROW’S CRY FOR HELP - Our Final Album, Vol. 1 (Bar/None)
Glenn Morrow spent four decades running Bar/None Records, which means he’s heard just about every permutation of indie rock that can fit on a 12-inch slab of vinyl. So naturally, upon “retiring” (read: handing the keys to someone else), he decides what the world really needs is another Glenn Morrow record. And not just any record—a final one. Volume 1. Sure, Glenn.
If you’re expecting some kind of late-career reinvention, don’t. Morrow’s not about to drop a synth-pop album or start mumbling over trap beats. Instead, Our Final Album Vol. 1 is exactly what you’d expect from a guy who helped define a certain strain of tasteful, literate indie rock - “the Hoboken sound,” for want of a better term - and never saw a reason to stop: a grab bag of power pop, classic rock, and mildly bluesy dad-rock riffs, delivered with the calm assurance of someone who knows nobody’s going to fire him.
To his credit, he doesn’t overplay his hand. This isn’t one of those “look, I can still shred” vanity projects. The songs mostly sit back, crack a beer, and let the vibe do the work. “Autumn Leaves” (no, not that one) floats by on a gentle shrug of an arrangement, pondering mortality in a way that feels less like existential dread and more like flipping through old gig flyers in a shoebox.
Then there’s “Beatle Bones,” which is about as subtle as the title suggests. Imagine the Rolling Stones and the Beatles tossed in a blender and poured out at a Hoboken bar circa 1978. It’s not breaking new ground, but it’s got enough charm to keep you from checking your phone.
Morrow keeps spinning the genre wheel: “Boom Boom” goes lounge-y without quite committing to shtick, reminiscent of some late-period Alex Chilton. “In Love With Love” aims for cinematic romance and mostly lands somewhere between sincere and slightly overbaked. And then there’s “Sweater Weather,” which delivers the obligatory jangle like it’s checking a box on an indie-rock bingo card. “Songs about sweaters” used to mean Yo La Tengo and Weezer; now, add this one.
Another track that actually cuts through the airy pleasantness is “Stop Your Crying,” which dials down the smirk and, for a few minutes, sounds like it means it. It builds slowly, lands a real emotional note, and stands in sharp contrast to the album’s otherwise casual demeanor.
Closer “Begin Again” is the inevitable “turning the page” moment - because what’s a semi-retirement album without a little light autobiography? It’s reflective, sure, but also feels like Morrow acknowledging that he’s not done, no matter what the album title claims. “Final” is doing a lot of ironic heavy lifting here.
Let’s not pretend this album’s a cry for help. It’s more like a contented sigh from a guy who’s already won the game and decided to keep playing anyway.
Read my Constant Listener interview with Glenn Morrow here…
CR & THE WHITE LIGHTS - My Old Self (Magic Door Record Label)
Chris Gennone has already made his case with a couple of standout singles from this album, so no need to belabor it: the guy can write, sing, and play. But his real stroke of genius might be the band he’s built around him, an outfit that takes a little Jersey City grime and buffs it into something that could pass for Nashville polish. Special mention to Liam Bornovski, whose pedal steel practically steals the album out from under everyone else.
The sound lands somewhere in that Neil Young Comes a Time / Gram Parsons orbit - country without the cosplay - with just enough city smirk to keep it from going full honky-tonk. A song about the Plaza Hotel isn’t exactly standard issue, and a line like “major airlines / so unkind” feels more Newark Airport than open prairie.
Gennone leans into the ache, his voice cracking in all the right places while the band locks in those high-lonesome harmonies. If you’re waiting for a barroom rave-up, don’t hold your breath - this record would rather nurse a drink than spill one. In an era where too much country is tailgates and testosterone, Gennone is content to watch the sun go down and catalog the damage.
The closer, “Dose of Darkness,” might actually be the better title for the whole affair, unless the point is that he’s already crawled out from under it. Either way, it’s probably not getting him to the Opry anytime soon, but for anyone who prefers their country a little bruised and self-aware, My Old Self is just the ticket.
THE BLACK DRUMSET - Friends in Dark Places (Self-released)
Give me anything with a strand of Velvet Underground DNA and I’m there. The Black Drumset, the solo endeavor of Austin’s Brian Willey, not only channels Velvets drone but also dips into psychedelic rock, Indian raga, krautrock, and shoegaze, truly an international smorgasbord of sounds. Yet Friends in Dark Places, Willey’s third album as The Black Drumset, never sounds messy or tossed together. Quite the contrary, every one of these seven tracks boasts a pristine focus.
Like so much music we’re hearing this year, the album had its roots in the pandemic and was polished afterwards. I couldn’t tell you what any of it means; Willey says, “The lyrics are about gathering your friends around yourself in order to move through difficult times, especially when those difficulties come wave after wave.” Better, consider this a guided tour through Willey’s brain, one that sees kaleidoscopic colors and rainbow bridges and probably a unicorn or two. The song titles - “Beauty, Hope and Peace of Mind,” “The Ice Melted, We Had To Swim,” or “Moment, moment, moment, moment” provide a clue, perhaps. Better not to overthink it. Just let these songs wash over you and cleanse your mind. It’s better than a trip to the masseuse, and you don’t have to smell the patchouli.