“More Help For Your Nerves”
Roger Klug
MG9004-DF (Digital Download)
More Help For Your Nerves on CD Baby
More Help For Your Nerves on iTunes
Details
“The latest, greatest release from Roger Klug–ten years in the wilderness produces a genre-busting yet genre-defining effort. We are so speechless that we need to stop and finish this review later.”
Guest Musicians:
- Mike Tittel – Drums on “Tinnitus” and “Bi-Curious”
- Chris Arduser – Drums on “Dump Me Hard”
- Emily Randle – Violin Solo on “Bogeyman”
- Emily Randle and Eva Rosenberg – Strings on “Souls To Heaven”
Produced by Roger Klug
Recorded, Mixed, and Mastered at Mental Giant
Track Listing
- Tinnitus
- Dump Me Hard
- An Artist In The Field
- Girl After My Own Heart
- About Time
- For The Kids
- Witch From Hell
- The Day I Had My Brain Removed
- Hi-Hat
- A Girl Like That
- Bi-Curious
- When Dreams Dry Up
- My Life Is Sweet
- Souls To Heaven
- Bogeyman
- Man’s Man
- Your Diary
Accolades and Reviews
Audities: Best of 2009 (#2) No. 2 out of 185!
Powerpopaholic: Top 20 Albums of 2009 (#2)
Conqueror Of The Moon, 20 Delights of 2009 (#4)
The Un-Herd Music Blogspot: Best of the Best of 2009
“A late addition to my list of faves. Cincinnati’s Roger Klug plays pretty much all the instruments on this, and it’s a crazed mishmash of power, pop, and rock, at times sounding like early Joe Jackson fronting early XTC, except with a pile of guitar wig-outs piled on top. “When Dreams Dry Up” shows some of Klug’s range in a single song, but you really need to hear the whole thing to get the picture. In a word, amazing.”
Art Into Dust
“Back in the late nineties Cincinnati’s own Roger Klug got us to sit up and take notice with a pair of stunning albums of clever, inventive kick bottom power pop that showcased the man’s abundant creative talents and left us panting for more. Ten years later and the panting is over and half way through the opening witty ditty Tinnitus is clear that the man never really went away. The second track Dump Me Hard kicks in with all the classic Klug hallmarks we know and love. Classic pop melodies, swooping choruses, blazing playing and addictive hooks aplenty are at the heart of it and around this solid foundation dances the reasons that elevate him into the ranks of real genius. His lyrics are razor-sharp, smart-arsed and literate but never cold like some clever buggers tend to be. The playing, as ever nearly all done by the man himself, is wild and confidently adventurous, you never know where it’s going till it’s been there. Just as About Time settles into its perfectly pitched languid pop lament, it hammers down a brutal guitar riff before sliding into shit-hot country picking that give Barefoot Jerry a run for their money. Confounding expectations in a way that thrills and amuses in equal measures is a constant feature of this beautiful and rich album. Epic and sardonic, intimate and relaxed, Roger takes it all in his laid back stride. Whether it’s flicking off cascading riffs like only the likes of Jason Falkner usually attempts or pulling a melodic pop treat from his sleeves, the man is up for every challenge he sets himself with a down to earth mastery few can touch. And boy does he know how to rock. On top of all this wealth comes the other constant, the stunning guitar work that punches through and anoints throughout. Klug is without doubt one of the truly great lead guitar players in the world. If he could do nothing else he would be a legend in my books. Fortunately he does do everything else to the same breathtaking standard and More Help For Your Nerves shows that while he was away the talent remained as captivating as it ever was.”
Buhdge.com: Roger Klug has one hell of a nerve!
“Roger Klug has a heart alright, and here it is, splattered all over tunes about society’s misfits: a guy who pleads with his girlfriend to dump him hard so he knows that the hurt will stick; a guy who yearns for an eclectic relationship but can’t decide just how eclectic that is; a baby-hungry girl whose every activity revolves around meeting the father of her future children, at the risk of her own identity; a lovelorn guy who wishes a romance going on before his eyes will fail so he can swoop in and save the romantic day; a group of sad sacks who find that the keys to heaven may not always be within reach.
“More Help For Your Nerves turns out to be a snappy, pure pop, self-help manual that can inspire the minds of guys and gals like these to widen and accept all possibilities in life. Certainly, Klug is the epitome of the widescreen mind: his albums are practically road maps to creative bliss.
“The magic of More Help For Your Nerves is that anything is possible within its grooves, so it comes as no surprise when the (mostly) tender, have-hope-for-tomorrow, sage advice of “When Dreams Dry Up” is followed by the glorious, mega-multitracked Beach Boys a cappella creation, “My Life Is Sweet,” in which Klug can’t resist playing the John Lennon game of yin and yang in the midst of an otherwise, well, sweet confection. Klug, in fact, plays the yin and yangities of pop music like a sweet fiddle, taking on the eccentricities of life and marrying them to the pure pop he so obviously knows and loves.”
Cincinnati CityBeat: Roger Klug’s ‘Help’ Is on Its Way
CityBeat – The Year In Your Ear
“More Help for Your Nerves is the best of the songwriter’s career, with Klug back to his usual “voice” — timeless Power Pop that churns out songs so infectiously rich with hooks the CDC might think about investigating…
“Klug would fit in on a package tour with Ben Folds, The Move, The Shazam, Big Star, Fountains of Wayne and Joe Jackson (Look Sharp era), but More Help makes it clear that he’d not be the opening act on that tour.”
Big Hollywood: The Pop Underground Strikes Back
Top 10 Power Pop Albums of 2009 (#6) “And so it goes, one great song after another.”
“This disc is an embarrassment of riches clocking in at just under an hour with 17 tracks. None of them are throwaways. Klug’s mostly a one-man band with inspiration up to his ears and a voice that hints at hidden cabaret chops…The second song, “Dump Me Hard,” announces that this is an artist who’s got it going on in every department. Every song is a standout…”
Absolute Powerpop: CD of the Day, 6/11/09
Top 100 of 2009 (#18)
“Back for the first time in nearly a decade, Cincinnati’s Roger Klug has unleashed a 17-track power pop marvel. Klug bills himself a “pop scientist,” and that’s an apt description as he takes a mad scientist approach to this disc, experimenting here and there and trying a little bit of everything….perhaps the most ambitious power pop album of the year, and there’s so much here that it demands repeated listenings.”
Pop Underground – End Of Summer
28 Sep ’09 Roger Klug – More Help For Your Nerves – **** – One of the top releases so far this year. With an incredible energy and a bucketful of hooks, this album kicks off from the start and doesn’t stop kicking until the end. For the most part, it is great power pop, but he throws in some other musical styles, from showtunes to gypsy music and so on, which is cool. It’s so good!
Amazon.com
5 stars – “Brilliant hard classic pop”
This is the best of Roger Klug’s six albums. There’s not a single bad track on this album of complex, varied, melodic power pop. Fans of the harder side of Beatles pop (think Taxman, Paperback Writer) etc. will love this heavily 60s and, especially, 70s influenced CD that also yanks from everything from gypsy jazz to bluegrass.
The chords are layered and complex. The lyrics are intelligent and honest. The playing (almost every instrument is by Klug) is top notch, especially the guitar work. This is an album you can play over and over again without ever getting tired of it.
Not Lame Recordings
“It’s all there!! Amazing, smart, uber-crafty pop from this Cincinnati guitar wiz!”
“Roger Klug`s “More Help For Your Nerves” is not only one of the very, very best albums of 2009, it is one of the best albums of the last half of his decade for power pop fans…Yes, yes. I can not control myself: MASSIVELY Recommended.”