Ty Segall, "Manipulator" (Drag City)
In another time and collective mental headspace Ty Segall might have been a pop star.
With his dreamy new album, "Manipulator," the Los Angeles psych rocker has perfected a sound — the bright, shiny 1960s garage rock variety — that once fired the imagination of a generation. Alas, these days the average 20-something music fan is focused on something quite different. Yet with sheer tenacity, an exhausting release schedule and a gift for fuzz-tone freakout, Segall has navigated his way from cult hero to wider acclaim with spots on the late night television circuit and in glossy fashion magazines.
Segall seizes the moment with "Manipulator," dispensing with the 27-year-old's usual fine layer of scuzz for a polished sound that's been burnished to a high gloss.
There's an infectious funk on the album's best tracks, and songs like "Feel," ''Tall Man Skinny Lady," ''The Crawler" and "The Connection Man" avoid mere revivalism with this updated groove, an overall guitar aggression and a very modern sense of paranoia.
The album positively shimmers and in a lot of ways serves as a career summation for Segall so far. Call it the end of Stage 1. As such, it begs the question: What's next?
Like all revivalists, Segall's a miner who's exhumed all the shiniest bits from this particular hole in the ground. The best rockers in this fractured era evolve beyond their niche, and it will be interesting to see which turn Segall takes now that he's arrived at this crossroads.
We're guessing there's no turning back.
r Fridad? a?? ?u? rth Carolina, then heads overseas for a punishing 33-date schedule that ends in Lisbon before coming back to the United States to open arena gigs for the Black Keys in December. The big mystery is how fans of the two-piece blues rockers will respond to Clark's act when the two join forces.
"Devo is one of my favorite bands, and there are things about her show that remind (me) of them in the best possible way," said Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney. "I am sure the crowds are going to be very into her show. I know when she played 'SNL' some people didn't get it. But when Devo played in 1978 I am sure there were plenty of people totally baffled as well."
The guitar is what connects the two acts, and Clark said she'll emphasize it. She can shred, too. "Anyone who has the slightest appreciation for the electric guitar should be able to get into her music," Carney said.
Clark, 31, grew up in the Dallas area and is now a New Yorker. She studied for three years at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and played in the choral group Polyphonic Spree and with Surfjan Stevens before striking out on her own.
She has an image, not totally accurate, of being very private. The modern-day habit of people living their lives in public through social media is the subject of her song "Digital Witness," and clearly that's not for her. She wants her public exposure to have cultural, not curiosity, value.
"I think that's been characterized as being private," she said, "when I'm really just a little picky."
While the arty, angular music on "St. Vincent," where Clark's guitar sails on a sea of synths, is reminiscent of the 1980s, many of Clark's musical heroes are rooted in jazz (John Coltrane) or 1990s rock: PJ Harvey, Sonic Youth, Nirvana.
That made it particularly meaningful when the surviving Nirvana members decided to invite some female vocalists, including Clark, to fill in for Cobain at the Rock Hall induction. Her only prior connection to the band was meeting Dave Grohl once at a party. Clark sang "Lithium."
"It was intimidating in terms of my own affection for Nirvana and wanting to honor the legacy as best I could," she said. "It's not often that someone says, 'Here, fill in for your hero.' I was struck by how it was really a joyful thing. It was still bittersweet. Everyone wishes that Kurt was still alive."
At one point during the performance, Grohl looks at her with a wide, admiring smile from behind the drums. Clark never knew; she hasn't watched it.
"It's too emotional," she said.