Search - Mark Helm :: Everything's Ok

My favorite record so far this year

jo jo | san fran | 07/12/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I picked this up because Mark's label, Not Lame Recordings, always puts out great power pop records. But this just hit me over the head and dragged me home by my hair. Amazing record. Somehow, he manages to use dead-on elements from the Beatles (a piccolo trumpet a la Penny Lane, Mellotron from Strawberry Fields), the Beach Boys (Pet Sounds-era percussion and vocal harmonies), Neil Young (grungy guitars and country acoustic gems), Alex Chilton (a lot of this reminded me of Big Star 3rd), and others (Nick Drake comes to mind) but NEVER sounds like he's ripping anybody off. The lyrical content of the songs AND the fragile honesty of the vocal performances are so original you never feel like he's being derivative. Something like, say how james Joyce was able to allude to all the great literature he loved but always sounded only like, well, James Joyce. This is high praise, but in a time when possibly lesser talents than Mr. Helm (Robert Pollard, Eliot Smith and Built to Spill come to mind) are lauded to the heavens....well, this guy deserves it. Buy this record. You'll come to cherish it. LOVE and MERCY....."

Not Just Another Eliot Smith

jo jo | 04/02/2001

(4 out of 5 stars)

"very cool record. I'm not giving it 5 stars cause some of it seems a little lo-fi.....but this is a really, really good artist in the vein of Eliot Smith but a lot less angry and a lot more personal. This is the sort of material that would really benefit from the backing of a big label, some solid promotion and more time in a top-notch recording studio. Not that it doesn't sounf good--it does. many tracks are quite good, fidelity-wise. Just a few sound like they were recorded on the ol' 4 track in the basement. In an era where that's considered cool, there's probably nothing wrong with that. Many of the lo-fi artists aren't as strong at songwriting as Helm and I'm sincerely hope he gets his due.I checked out his website and he seems photogenic enough for some mainstream success, so we'll see. In the meantime, i strongly recommend adding this to your collection if you're a big fan of neil young meets alex chilton on a beach boys/beatles bender."