The Magnolia Electric Co. | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | March 3, 2003 [1] | |||
Recorded | July 1–3, 2002 | |||
Studio | Electrical Audio, Chicago, Illinois | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 45:09 | |||
Label | Secretly Canadian | |||
Producer | Steve Albini | |||
Songs: Ohia, or Magnolia Electric Co. chronology | ||||
|
Aggregate scores | |
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Source | Rating |
Metacritic | 85/100 [2] |
Review scores | |
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [3] |
The Boston Phoenix | [4] |
Consequence of Sound | [5] |
The Independent | [6] |
Mojo | [7] |
Now | [8] |
Pitchfork | 8.2/10 (2003) [9] 9.0/10 (2013) [10] |
PopMatters | 9/10 [11] |
Record Collector | [12] |
Uncut | [13] |
The Magnolia Electric Co. is the seventh and final album by Songs: Ohia. It was recorded by Steve Albini at Electrical Audio in Chicago and released by Secretly Canadian on March 4, 2003.
The title of the album and comments by Jason Molina have led to discussions whether it is not simultaneously, in fact, the debut album by Molina's new band, also named Magnolia Electric Co.
The artwork for the album does not contain the name Songs: Ohia anywhere, though the center label of the vinyl record does say "Songs: Ohia." On the other hand, the album was recorded with different musicians than the later members of Magnolia Electric Co., and the decision to take on the new name was not announced until the tour following the release in the spring of 2003. Molina later declared Didn't It Rain to be the final Songs: Ohia album. [14]
Magnolia digs into alt-country and "red-blood, full-throated" country rock, as well as seeing the band draw from both “orthodox” Americana and “otherworldly atmosphere”. [10] [15] It also works in roots rock, while the arrangements and songwriting echo 70s outlaw country. [5] [8]
All songs written by Jason Molina.
Bachelor No. 2 or, the Last Remains of the Dodo is the third album by the American singer-songwriter Aimee Mann, released on May 2, 2000. Some songs were previously released on the Magnolia soundtrack (1999), which Mann wrote in the same period.
Jason Andrew Molina was an American musician, singer and songwriter. Raised in northern Ohio, he came to prominence performing and recording as Songs: Ohia, both in solo projects and with a rotating cast of musicians in the late 1990s. Beginning in 2003, he garnered a further indie following for his releases with the band Magnolia Electric Co.
Secretly Canadian is an American independent record label based in Bloomington, Indiana, part of the Secretly Group. The Secretly Group includes record labels Dead Oceans and Jagjaguwar as well as a music publisher known as Secretly Publishing, representing artists, writers, film makers, producers, and comedians.
Emma Louise Niblett, better known by the stage name Scout Niblett, is an English singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist. Niblett debuted in 2001 with her first full-length studio album Sweet Heart Fever, and has gone on to release five more studio albums. In 2013, Niblett released her sixth studio album, It's Up to Emma, which she mixed and produced.
William J. Schaff Jr. is an American artist and musician based in Warren, Rhode Island and Oakland, California. He is known for artwork for the bands Okkervil River, Songs: Ohia, Godspeed You! Black Emperor, and The Mighty Mighty Bosstones.
What Comes After the Blues is the first full-length recording by what became the Magnolia Electric Co. touring line-up, and the second album released by Jason Molina under that name. It was recorded in November 2003 by Steve Albini at his Electrical Audio studio in Chicago.
Trials & Errors is a live album by Magnolia Electric Co., released on Secretly Canadian in 2005. It was recorded on April 16, 2003, at Club Ancienne Belgique in Brussels.
Fading Trails is the second studio album by Magnolia Electric Co., a project of indie musician Jason Molina. It is a compilation of tracks from four different recording sessions, including recordings at Electrical Audio in Chicago, engineered by Steve Albini, Sound of Music Studio in Richmond, Virginia, produced by David Lowery, and Sun Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, engineered by James Lott. All of Fading Trails' songs are featured on the boxset Sojourner.
Pyramid Electric Co. is the first full-length solo album by Jason Molina, released in 2004 on Secretly Canadian Records. It was recorded by Mike Mogis and received universal critical acclaim according to Metacritic. While critics found it hard going: "Pyramid is not Songs: Ohia but the musical equivalent of A Season in Hell, not something one can take in often, but which is beautiful for the fact that it was completed at all", they also commented on the sincerity of the delivery: "The delivery is too matter-of-fact, too genuine to evoke pity or sadness. It is lethargic, yet not dreary — it grabs you violently and lays you down so, so gently." An unusual feature of the album was that it was released as a vinyl LP only, but each copy also contains the CD version of the album in miniaturized artwork.
Didn't It Rain is the sixth regular album by American musician Songs: Ohia.
The Lioness is the fourth studio album by Songs: Ohia. It was released by Secretly Canadian on January 17, 2000. A reissue of the album, Love & Work: The Lioness Sessions, was released on November 23, 2018.
Ghost Tropic is the fifth regular studio album by Songs: Ohia. It was recorded by Mike Mogis at Dead Space Recording Studio in Lincoln, Nebraska. The album's name refers to two short instrumentals that are surrounded by six vocal tracks of at least five and up to twelve minutes length. The reviews noted the somber and dark mood permeating the album. According to Pitchfork, "Ghost Tropic (...) sounds as though it were recorded live in a haunted hut somewhere in an Ecuadorian rainforest. At night." AllMusic was less sanguine: "Everything moves as slowly as a three-legged dog, and anyone neither patient enough nor attuned to Molina's style of songcraft might very well be put to sleep."
Axxess & Ace is the third album by Songs: Ohia. It was recorded by Michael Krassner at Truckstop Studios in Chicago, Illinois, United States, and released by Secretly Canadian on March 15, 1999.
The Impossible Shapes are an independent rock band from Bloomington, Indiana. Since forming in 1998, the band has released eight albums in North America and Europe, sharing the stage with acts such as Wilco, Guided By Voices, Interpol, Danielson Famile, and Jens Lekman, among others, while garnering acclaim in publications such as Spin, Magnet, and Skyscraper magazines.
Sojourner is Magnolia Electric Co.'s 2007 box-set release, comprising: three full-length albums, one four-song EP, one documentary movie on DVD called The Road Becomes What You Leave; a celestial map and a medallion; all within a wooden box. The band's 2006 album, Fading Trails, was compiled from the four recording sessions included in their entirety on Sojourner.
Impala is the second album by Songs: Ohia. It was released in 1998 via Happy-Go-Lucky and Secretly Canadian.
Mi Sei Apparso Come Un Fantasma is a live album by Songs: Ohia. It was recorded at Barchessone Vecchio in Modena, Italy on September 27, 2000. The album received mixed reviews, with a Metacritic score of 60. While Pitchfork Media wrote that the album "...offers a better introduction to Songs: Ohia than the last couple of proper albums, which seemed like transitional or exploratory releases", The Wire's reviewer was underwhelmed, feeling that the disc "[s]till sounds like the work of someone desperate to gain the approval of the Drag City clique".
Josephine is the third and final studio album by Magnolia Electric Co. For the recording of the album, the band teamed up with frequent collaborator Steve Albini at his Electrical Audio Studios in Chicago. The record was conceived as a tribute to late Magnolia Electric Co. bassist Evan Farrell, and took two weeks to write and record. Josephine would also be the penultimate album released during frontman Jason Molina's lifetime – the last being a collaboration with Will Johnson – before his death in 2013.
On My Way to Absence is Damien Jurado's sixth full-length album. It was released in 2005 and was Jurado's second release on Secretly Canadian records. The album was produced by his frequent collaborator Eric Fisher. Jurado has referred to the album as "a tribute to jealousy".
Viking Moses is a band fronted by Brendon Massei, an American songwriter noted for being on tour since 1993. Founded in 2003 and currently based in Baltimore, the group features a rotating cast of musicians. Viking Moses has worked with the Alan McGee's Poptones record label as well as Portland-based Marriage Records.