New CD releases

I'm late, I'm late for a very important date - the start of my vacation. But before I exit, I just had to plug some new musical releases of note.

U.K. EXPORT: There must be another group called the Enemy, forcing the British band of the same name to call themselves Enemy UK. Hope you caught 'em at the Download Festival on Saturday. I'm really into their thick accents and pumping rock sounds on "We'll Live and Die in These Towns" (Warner Bros., A-).

It burns and clashes like the mightiest of Britain's on- the-dole protest rock poets of yore, without overtly copying their licks. Even the one cover track - David Bowie's "Five Years" - sounds fresh.

OPERA CONVERT: Philadelphia-based singer songwriter Dan May has taken a roundabout path to his current vocation as a country-tinged singer-songwriter. Before vocal chord surgery stopped him in his tracks, May was an opera singer working with companies across the U.S. and Canada.

Knowing this before listening, I expected a stilted take on contemporary country music. But May's set "The Long Road Home" (www.dan

maycd.com, B+) is substantial work, with haunting, heartfelt tunes and resonant vocals in the tradition of deep pocket singers like Gordon Lightfoot and Randy Travis. Harking to his mixed heritage, May's doing a record release show on Aug. 14 at the Academy of Vocal Arts on Spruce Street.

MORE PHILLY STUFF: I find it all a bit cheesy. But if you really loved Tears for Fears, you could get close to the similarly sweet and sappy, voice and keyboard dominated sounds of Cloning Einstein on their self-titled album, now getting a major label re-release (Universal, C+). Try the "Fugees-influenced" (so they say) cover of "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."

The local Jamie Records label has put together an ear-opening two-disc collection of tracks spotlighting the long-forgotten (except by the Geator) sweet-soul-pop sounds of Barbara Lynn, "The Jamie Singles Collection 1962-1965" (B). Her first record, "You'll Lose a Good Thing," was the singer's biggest hit, but there was a lot of good stuff (produced by the legendary Huey Meaux) that followed, like the cha-cha-styled "Promises" and a neat version of Elvis' "Don't Be Cruel."

West Chester-based Appleseed Recordings' latest serving is an amazing concert date by the David Bromberg Quartet, "Live New York City 1982" (A-). Bromberg, now a Wilmington resident and violin maker/restorer by day, introduced the first fiddle he ever made at this performance. And showed such variety he proved a folk festival unto himself, leading a jumping little string band in the marathon-length "Don't Let Your Deal Go Down" (which transforms into a bunch of old-timey rags and hoedowns), the twangy "When I Was a Cowboy" and down-low, darkly comic "Creeper's Blues." Sonic quality ain't all that, but the performances are killer.

DEVOLUTION: The Faint come off like a 21st-century answer to Devo on "Fasciination"(Blank Way, B+), a bleeping, blunking, synthesizer- and vocals-scored sci-fi rock concept album about the future. Yeah, "The Geeks Are Right." We'll soon be having sex with robots and moving in different dimensions in "Forever Growing Centipedes" and learning to fly out of cannons (or whatever) with "Fulcrum and Lever." Fun stuff.

Also lightly twisted but in a more humane, family foibles way is the solo spin-off project of Animal Liberation Orchestra keyboardist/singer Zach Gill, "Zach Gill's Stuff" (Brushfire, B). He comes off like a new-gen Randy Newman on the reggae-light title track, the old-timey piano- and banjo-scored "Back in the Day" and the supercute and catchy "Bettina."

JAZZ AND JAMS: Fronted by the amazing, multilingual Sabina Sciubba, global dance pop originals Brazilian Girls celebrate the many ethnic flavors of their adopted home on "New York City" (Verve Forecast, A-). Betcha you can't sit still listening to it!

On the aptly named "Earfood" (Groovin' High/Decca, B+), the Roy Hargrove Quintet harkens back to the glories of Blue Note Records' jazz finger-snappers and ballads of the '60s. Substantial yet easy going down, the band is tighter than a drum, with never a note out of place.

If you like good-rockin' blues, give a listen to the Jackie Payne/Steve Edmonson Band, showing how years of sweat can turn guys into an "Overnight Sensation" (Delta Groove, B).

Phish fans will enjoy getting fried with the double-disc concert DVD "Walnut Creek" (JEMP Record, B), a 1997 show where nature provided its own light show and downpour of notes.

Practically a band reunion, several former Phish buddies are jamming tastefully alongside bassist/singer Mike Gordon on "The Green Sparrow" (Rounder, B+).

OH, YOU GIRLS: Amy Ray is mad as hell and ain't gonna take it anymore on "Didn't It Feel Kinder" (Daemon Records, B+), rocking harder and dropping the F-bomb like she'd never do in the Indigo Girls. *