December 11, 2002

Whether butting heads with Carson Daly, telling Rolling Stone that Christina Aguilera looks "like a teenage boy that had a sex change," or demanding that an MTV Movie Awards audience "get the fuck up" when she performs, Kelly Osbourne has been living out every teenager's fantasy of crashing the music industry's high-pretension party – simply by being herself. Now she's sealing the deal as pop-rock's premier rabble-rouser by releasing a debut that'll send angst-addled adolescents into gleeful fits of fist-pumping, bed-jumping, and air-guitaring. With Nick Carter and Avril Lavigne getting ridiculously referred to as "rock," Shut Up is exactly what today's tired teen pop needs.

Quite simply, the album might be the most mindlessly fun record to hit shelves all year. Sure, anyone who heard Osbourne's excellent cover of Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach" on The Osbourne Family Album knows she isn't the best singer – though she's better than people assume. But it doesn't matter. After all, records with this much retro-punk passion demand anything but pitch-perfection, and Osbourne (who sounds wonderfully like one of those Brit brats in Shampoo) has enough 'tude to keep the disc enthralling from start to finish.

Still, whether you liked her "Papa Don't Preach" (included here as a bonus track) and the obnoxiously "bla-bla-bla"-ing first single is a good indication as to whether you'll appreciate Shut Up. Forewarned is forearmed, however: what with several sure-shot follow-up singles in the wings – the Go-Go's pogos "Coolhead" and "On Your Own" – chances are that the album's gonna be about as difficult to avoid as Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out of My Head." Which ain't to say it's the most original sound around, but Shut Up does exactly what it should: it gives Osbourne a career beyond her family's reality show and shakes up the teen scene. Now turn it the f&#k up! (Jimmy Draper)

Roots
Phrenology (MCA)

With Phrenology, the Roots absorb the latest urban music trends in an attempt to challenge their long-standing image as cool, jazz-inflected hip-hoppers. Disparate sounds appear throughout the group's fifth studio effort: broken beat and nu-jazz à la Jazzanova ("Break You Off"), punk hardcore circa early-'80s Bad Brains ("!!!!!"), and jazz rock reminiscent of Miles Davis's Jack Johnson ("Water"). There's also a glossiness to Phrenology, which includes guest appearances by performers such as Nelly Furtado, Musiq, and Jill Scott – distracting star turns that seem more self-congratulatory than synergistic.

So why is Phrenology the best Roots album since Do You Want More?!!!??!? The Philadelphia band have finally escaped the creative cul-de-sac that followed the release of that breakthrough classic, an album that provided a musical blueprint for the neosoul movement with its smooth, hard bop beats. On Phrenology the Roots are vivid and brash, funking hard on tracks such as "Rock You," where the beat hits like a heart thumping against your chest. Their new member, guitarist Ben Kenney, proves to be a key addition, and his scratch guitar licks transform songs such as "The Seed 2.0" into marvelously abrasive wig-outs. Stark without being minimalist, Phrenology sidesteps the murky overproduction and mushy bass-and-drum grooves that bogged down their 1999 effort, Things Fall Apart.

In the end, Phrenology's brilliance lies in the Roots' ability to appropriate preexisting musical styles without straying from their core identity as a "live" hip-hop band. Their leap into the rolling drum 'n' bass that closes "Break You Off" doesn't seem like a radical departure, but more like an interlude that makes perfect sense given the track's soft, whimsical quietude. It's the mark of a band who, having made a mark as mind-blowing innovators, are still capable of reinventing themselves. (Mosi Reeves)

Catherine Irwin
Cut Yourself a Switch (Thrill Jockey)

Catherine Irwin always seemed like the shy half of Freakwater, the alt-country outfit she founded during the 1980s with her pal Janet Bean. Now Irwin is stepping out on her own – Freakwater isn't gone, just taking a break – showcasing seven new songs and five well-chosen covers on her first solo album.

It seemed only a matter of time before Irwin made this move, as she's always been a powerful songwriter – not to mention the fact that she possesses a haunting voice that beautifully represented the core of Freakwater's fascination with old-time country. Switch, however, steps back from the somewhat electrified sound Freakwater explored on its most recent album, End Time, in favor of a stripped-down sound that allows Irwin to wallow even deeper in the murk of lost love, sadness, and death. The arrangements are sparse, mostly involving Irwin on acoustic guitar, backed by Freakwater bassist David Wayne Gay, although a handful of songs also feature fiddle, accordion, drums, and organ. Without Bean's high-pitched harmonies, Irwin's singing sounds all the more lonesome – her voice crackling, Conway Twitty style, during particularly forlorn moments. Cover songs, like the banjo-twisted version of Elvis Presley's "Power of My Love," do add some texture, but on the whole, a dark mood prevails – at the funeral in "Cry Our Little Eyes Out" and around a person, alone by the window, questioning love and conjuring revenge on "Hex."

At first, all this bleakness seems too much, even for veteran Freakwater fans. The mood never picks up; the album lacks momentum. But once you dig inside, you realize it's not an entirely gut-wrenching downer: A sly humor underlies "Dirty Little Snowman," for instance, and the Johnny Paycheck hit "The Only Hell My Momma Ever Raised" is almost peppy. And Irwin's mastery with lyrics gives each song – no matter how sad – an additional degree of emotional complexity. This is a stark beauty of an album that sinks in slowly and is well worth the effort. (Kurt Wolff)

Godspeed You! Black Emperor
Yanqui U.X.O. (Constellation)

Yanqui U.X.O. is an hour-long recording of violent musical exchanges between the nine members of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, a conflagration that's often as intense and humbling as watching fireworks burst into flames. The album begins with "15-00 (Part 1)" and a violin balancing against cascading distorted guitar flickering like light refracted through raindrops. This tranquil moment proves fleeting, however, as Godspeed launch into a tense, ominous buildup: the drums kick in, a fusillade of guitars crashes and careens out of control, and the playing grows louder and wilder. In contrast, the next track, "15-00 (Part 2)," is a beautiful symphony of single guitar notes being plucked, a temporary salve to the psychic wounds inflicted by the first song. While the two songs seem like polar opposites, both demonstrate how Godspeed's conflicting passions for restorative, healing music and complete sonic destruction add up to a tumultuous, devastating listening experience.

Though fans of Scottish rock band Mogwai will recognize the tension-release rhythmic tactics Godspeed employ on Yanqui U.X.O., the emotions this five-song tour de force triggers still manage to reach unexpected depths, as with the heartbreaking melody that closes "Motherfucker=Redeemer (Part 1)" and the righteous assault that is "Motherfucker=Redeemer (Part 2)." Yanqui U.X.O. sounds like a love-hate relationship, but such an analogy would do injustice to the explosive confrontations Godspeed create as well as the hopeful refrains that occasionally emerge from their cacophony.