Knock Knock (album)

Last updated
Knock Knock
Knock Knock.jpg
Studio album by Smog
Released January 12, 1999 (1999-01-12)
Genre Folk rock, lo-fi
Length42:47
Label Drag City
Producer Jim O'Rourke
Smog chronology
Red Apple Falls
(1997) Red Apple Falls1997		Knock Knock
(1999)		 The Manta Rays of Time
(2000) The Manta Rays of Time2000
Singles from Knock Knock
  1. "Held"
    Released: 1999
  2. "Cold Blooded Old Times"
    Released: 1999
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svg [1]
Entertainment Weekly B+ [2]
NME 8/10 [3]
Pitchfork 9.7/10 [4]
Rolling Stone Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svgStar empty.svg [5]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svg [6]

Knock Knock is the seventh studio album by Bill Callahan, released under his Smog alias. It was originally released through Drag City in January 1999. In Europe, it was released through Domino Recording Company.

Bill Callahan (musician) American singer-songwriter and guitarist

Bill Callahan is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist who has also recorded and performed under the band name Smog. Callahan began working in the lo-fi genre of underground rock, with home-made tape-albums recorded on four track tape recorders. Later he began releasing albums with the label Drag City, to which he remains signed today.

Drag City (record label) independent record label in Chicago, Illinois, United States

Drag City is an American independent record label based in Chicago, Illinois. It was established with a Royal Trux single release in Chicago in 1990 in by Dan Koretzky and Dan Osborn. It specializes in indie rock, experimental rock, psychedelic rock, folk rock, and alternative country.

Domino Recording Company UK based record label founded in 1993

Domino Recording Company is a British independent record label based in London. There is also a wing of the label based in Brooklyn, New York that handles releases in the United States, as well as a German division called Domino Deutschland and a French division called Domino France. In addition, Stephen Pastel presides over the subsidiary label Geographic Music, which releases more 'unusual' music from Britain and outside of the Western world. In 2011, the company announced that it was beginning a book publishing division, The Domino Press.

Contents

Critical reception

Heather Phares of AllMusic gave the album 4.5 stars out of 5, calling it "Bill Callahan's subtlest collection of songs yet." [1] She added, "It's a moving album on many levels; not only do the songs have Smog's usual emotional intimacy, their subjects move away from difficult, claustrophobic situations toward maturity and acceptance." [1]

AllMusic Online music database

AllMusic is an online music database. It catalogs more than 3 million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musical artists and bands. It launched in 1991, predating the World Wide Web.

Michele Romero of Entertainment Weekly gave the album a grade of B+, saying, "The energy jolt serves him well, making the delicate broken spirit of his lyrics cathartic rather than depressing." [2] Meanwhile, Samir Khan of Pitchfork gave the album a 9.7 out of 10, saying, "Knock Knock will do little to expand his cult following, but judging by his haunting, twisted smoke, that suits him just fine." [4]

<i>Entertainment Weekly</i> American entertainment magazine published by Meredith Corporation

Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by Meredith Corporation, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books and popular culture.

<i>Pitchfork</i> (website) online music magazine

Pitchfork is an American online magazine launched in 1995 by Ryan Schreiber, based in Chicago, Illinois, and owned by Condé Nast. Being developed during Schreiber's tenure in a record store at the time, the magazine developed a reputation for its extensive focus on independent music, but has since expanded to a variety of coverage on both indie and popular music.

NME listed it as the 10th best album of 1999. [7] Steve Jelbert of The Independent named it the best pop album of 1999. [8]

<i>NME</i> British weekly music journalism magazine

New Musical Express (NME) is a British music journalism website and former magazine that has been published since 1952. It was the first British paper to include a singles chart, in the edition of 14 November 1952. In the 1970s it became the best-selling British music newspaper. During the period 1972 to 1976, it was particularly associated with gonzo journalism, then became closely associated with punk rock through the writings of Julie Burchill, Paul Morley and Tony Parsons. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s and 1990s, changing from newsprint in 1998.

<i>The Independent</i> British online daily newspaper

The Independent is a British online newspaper. Established in 1986 as a politically independent national morning newspaper published in London, it was controlled by Tony O'Reilly's Independent News & Media from 1997 until it was sold to Russian oligarch Alexander Lebedev in 2010. The last printed edition of The Independent was published on Saturday 26 March 2016, leaving only its digital editions.

Callahan has said the cover is a reference to "two zen tenets - that of life being like a flash of lightning or a wildcat's roar" (Smog interview in Ink Blot magazine).

Zen School of Mahayana Buddhism

Zen is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty as the Chan school (Chánzong) of Chinese Buddhism and later developed into various schools. Chán Buddhism was also influenced by Taoist philosophy, especially Neo-Daoist thought. From China, Chán spread south to Vietnam and became Vietnamese Thiền, northeast to Korea to become Seon Buddhism, and east to Japan, becoming Japanese Zen.

Responce

Musician Steve Adey covered River Guard on his 2017 LP "Do Me a Kindness".

Steve Adey Musician, singer-songwriter

Steve Adey is an English musician and singer-songwriter. His music is characterised by slow tempos, minimalist arrangements, underpinned by piano and a rich baritone vocal. To date, Adey has released three studio albums and various EPs and singles.

Track listing

All tracks written by Bill Callahan.

No.TitleLength
1."Let's Move to the Country"3:05
2."Held"4:02
3."River Guard"6:22
4."No Dancing"3:00
5."Teenage Spaceship"3:58
6."Cold Blooded Old Times"4:14
7."Sweet Treat"2:59
8."Hit the Ground Running"6:56
9."I Could Drive Forever"5:15
10."Left Only with Love"2:52

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References

  1. 1 2 3 Phares, Heather. "Knock Knock – Smog". AllMusic . Retrieved February 25, 2006.
  2. 1 2 Romero, Michele (February 5, 1999). "Knock Knock". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  3. ↑ Oldham, James (February 4, 1999). "Smog – Knock Knock". NME . Archived from the original on August 17, 2000. Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  4. 1 2 Khan, Samir. "Smog: Knock Knock". Pitchfork . Archived from the original on September 7, 2008. Retrieved August 25, 2006.
  5. ↑ Sheffield, Rob (February 4, 1999). "Smog: Knock Knock". Rolling Stone . Archived from the original on October 27, 2003. Retrieved August 15, 2007.
  6. ↑ Sheffield, Rob (2004). "Smog". In Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian. The New Rolling Stone Album Guide . Simon & Schuster. pp. 754–55. ISBN   0-7432-0169-8.
  7. ↑ "Albums And Tracks Of The Year: 1999". NME . October 10, 2016. Retrieved February 6, 2018.
  8. ↑ "The best pop albums of 1999". The Independent . December 17, 1999. Retrieved February 6, 2018.
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