The highlight of the disc is “Sublime,” which features Joseph Arthur. The song mirrors the finely layered arranging touches found on Arthur’s solo albums, with soaring guitars, a soulfully sung verse, and stacked vocals on a memorable chorus.

The two songs featuring the core band, “They Ride,” and “The Lure Would Prove too Much,” do not suffer from their lack of guest participation. The former is a sturdy hard rock workout with a suitably strenuous guitar solo. The latter is a melancholy, affecting ballad with a caterwauling coda. If Twilight Singers’s next full length lives up to the promise of this taster course, it will be strong fare indeed. – Christian Carey

If you haven’t already learned such a simple fact, A Stitch in Time is here to remind you again: don’t ever doubt Greg Dulli. Everything he touches is priceless, no exceptions. Even this, an EP composed of two covers and three collaborations, is every bit as necessary as the masterpiece that is Powder Burns. FUCK, someone buy me life insurance before my heart explodes.

Opening with a cover of Massive Attack’s recent newbie “Live With Me,” Dulli’s penchant for tackling surprising covers and turning them into his own classics once again yields superb results. Joined by Mark Lanegan, the song churns and wallows gloriously in its own depraved melancholy, brooding like an alcoholic beat poet: stylishly and romantically. Equally enthralling is “Sublime,” Dulli’s joint venture with Joseph Arthur, on which smooth sensuality is celebrated with thick bass, bedroom eyes wah-wah guitar licks, and intoxicating come-hithers. “Flashback” (a cover of Australian band Fat Freddy’s Drop; again joined by Lanegan) and “They Ride” (co-written by ex-The Afghan Whigs member Rick McCollom) both kick and punch like The Twilight Singers’ best rockers do, but of course Dulli closes out the disc with a last-call feeling, slow burning waltz worthy of lonely, drunken, 4am New Orleans nights (“The Lure Would Prove Too Much”). As the song dwindles down to its last few embers flickering in the distance, a collage of phone messages from friends (and maybe family) can be heard talking to Mr. Dulli. Some laugh, some reminisce, some profess love, all add another wonderfully sentimental dimension to the song. Leave it to the King of Tragic Romanticism to know exactly how to further accentuate an already-heart wrenching tune.

When Dulli sings “sunrise” repeatedly as the song fades out, you realize how such an earnestly dramatic and yearning move would be disastrous and vomit-inducing in lesser hands… but when it’s Greg Dulli we’re talking about, you really do envision the sun coming up over the urban sprawl, as you and your love struggle to stay awake on the top of a roof after a night of boozing, conversation, and bonding. It’s a movie-esque ending that not even the most cynical can dismiss as cliché, because – in this case – the feeling is real. You’ve been there and you can vouch for it, and A Stitch in Time’s closing perfectly recalls that sensation in your chest.

Greg Dulli’s Twilight Singers, not content with one well-received album this year, have returned with a five-track EP, Stitch in Time. While Dulli is an undeniable show-off, on this record, the limelight is very much shared with other musicians.

The EP kicks off with a cover of Massive Attack’s Live With Me, featuring Mark Lanegan (see Screaming Trees, Queens of the Stone Age, Mark Lanegan Band) on lead vocals. It’s Lanegan’s deep, dark baritone that turns this song into either a truly passionate, or deeply depressing masterpiece, depending on who you are and your outlook on life. Either way, this song could get anyone’s spine tingling as the subdued bluesy verses crash into a chorus which almost makes you believe that Dulli and Lanegan are feeling every word they are singing. As any Dulli fan knows, covers are his forte, and no genre is safe (the Justin Timberlake song at London Koko anybody?). This is one of the finest Dulli cover versions to date, and certainly deserves its place as the opening track.

Track 2, is a gentle, rhythmic little number called Sublime, featuring vocals from Joseph Arthur. Some nice guitar work and a more upbeat tempo make this a good contrast to track 1.

Flashback sees Mark Lanegan lend his vocals again to the EP, this time duetting with Dulli. This track is way more rocking live, as you will know if you were lucky enough to catch the recent tour.

Next is They Ride, possibly the best track here. Dulli reigns free with his gritty, slightly-sleazy voice, over a strong thumping bass line and guitars from Rick McCollom (Afghan Whigs). If you are wondering why there are so many female Greg Dulli fans, this song may give you some insight.

The Lure Would Prove Too Much closes the EP in a beautiful fashion, with its sway-inducing triple-time, and Dulli’s tender vocals effectively demonstrating his flexibility as a song-writer.

Stitch in Time proves that Dulli has still got it, enough so to release two records this year, and with Lanegan in tow, The Twilight Singers have developed into one hell of band. Not really indie, not quite rock, no rules apply- and the results are always impressive.

Sir Dulli, I salute thee.

The EP, “A Stitch in Time,” in stores Tuesday, is another stellar effort from Greg Dulli’s Twilight Singers, a place for Dulli to write and perform with some of his favored musicians that dates back to his days as an Afghan Whig. This five-song is also a tease for Dulli’s The Gutter Twins disc with former Screaming Trees singer Mark Lanegan next year. To say their collaboration on Massive Attack’s opening “Live With Me” elicits chills is to understate it.

As it was on Queens of the Stone Age’s most recent “Lullabies to Paralyze,” Lanegan’s beautifully broken voice is set to a dirge-like tempo and haunting riff that steals this song from the trip-hop pioneers – who included it on their recent best-of collection – and brings it into a bleary-eyed and hypnotic haze. When Dulli adds his vocal harmony, the song hits a high without shifting from its plodding momentum.

That Dulli should mine such a recent track should come as no surprise. A musicologist of sorts for alternative rockers, his Los Angeles bar is known for its jukebox. The Gutter Twins return two songs later with an even more obscure cover, “Flashback” from the New Zealand band Fat Freddy’s Drop. Here, the two play soulmen for a generation that grew up on Nirvana. With a pulsing bass line pushed up front, Dulli adds “yeah, yeahs” to Lanegan’s pleas, which, given the song’s title, could as easily be about any addiction as it is a lover. This Gutter Twins disc is going to rule!

Alternative songwriter Joseph Arthur takes the helm of “Sublime,” a track he co-wrote with Dulli. It’s laid-back, moody and only has the misfortune of existing between the two Lanegan collaborations.

Dulli’s own fractured, yet impassioned voice reclaims the last two cuts of the EP. “They Ride” was written with and features former Afghan Whig Rick McCollum and “The Lure Would Prove Too Much” is a haunting lullaby to bring listeners out of this uniformly excellent short set.

Dulli’s work with The Twilight Singers over the past few years has been numbingly awesome. That it hasn’t attracted more attention means only that the alt-rock generation has some explaining to do.

After their recent collaborative UK tour together, Mark Lanegan hooks up with The Twilight Singers for this haunting blues soaked EP. Including covers of Massive Attack’s ‘Live with Me’ and New Zealand’s Fat Freddy’s Drop song ‘Flashback’, this is another confirmation of former Afghan Whigs mainman Greg Dulli’s resurgence as simply a writer of beautiful music. It’s good to have both these survivors of the early ’90s grunge scene back.

El Prez

This is exactly why God invented the EP. Five songs, 23 minutes, a quick hit glimpse into the mind and id of lead Singer Greg Dulli. He’s always had good taste in both cover songs (consult various Afghan Whigs live bootlegs for evidence) and pals (his whole discography is filled with well-selected guests). Longtime on-and-off collaborator Mark Lanegan — he of the baritone even more whiskey-soaked than Dulli’s croon — takes lead vocals on the slow-burn bedroom rock cover of Massive Attack’s “Live With Me.” (One longs for the “Gutter Twins” collaboration album that these two rakes swear exists.) Lanegan also sings on the soundtracky “Flashback,” while Joseph Arthur contributes to the outstanding “Sublime.”

Whigs geeks will geek out over the amazing “They Ride,” co-written by Whigs guitarist Rick McCollum, one of the most egregiously underrated players of the ’90s. This feels like a glimpse into the albums the Whigs never made, into a world where the career finale “1965″ was a horn-soaked experiment in style rather than a dissolution. But in fairness, if the Singers keep knocking it out of the park like this, Dulli fans need never suffer.

— Joe Gross

Stitch opens with Mark Lanegan, ex-Screaming Trees vocal and frequent Dulli collaborator, applying his gruff baritone to the Massive Attack cover “Live with Me.” It’s a smoky slow-burner that only whets the appetite for the long-promised Gutter Twins project that pairs these same two who were among the bedrock of the 1990s Seattle scene.

Lanegan returns later for the nourish “Flashback,” but in between is “Sublime,” an update of Marvin Gaye’s “Sexual Healing” that might very well be the quintessential Dulli track. It’s all sultry swagger and has some backing vocals from new friend, Joseph Arthur. Drummer Bobby McIntyre, who calls Dulli “my poet,” finesses the tambourine, high-hat and snare to great effect.

The real star of this short-player, though, is “They Ride.” Co-written by one-time Dulli sidekick and Afghan Whigs guitarist Rick McCollom, the track transports the listener back to the early ‘90s of Gentlemen and Black Love, without sounding stale or worn. McIntyre punishes his kit and McCollom does his best Eddie Hazel.

For fans looking for a snack to tide them over until the Gutter Twins record or the next Twilight Singers LP, which ever comes first, A Stitch in Time is the perfect bridge between the once (Whigs) and future (Gutter Twins) King Dulli.

C.K.

Seemingly every generation of rock has its iron-man survivor who’s the exception to the “better to burn out than fade away” rule. The granddaddy of this motley crew is of course Keif, who can’t be slayed by mountains of drugs or plunges from palm trees. Neil Young probably did enough heroin to kill ten men but is somehow still around. Out of the ’90s, a decade that saw a sad list of musicians felled by substance abuse, the miraculous survivor has to be Greg Dulli, for whom sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll has often not been an empty cliche�.

Appropriate, then, that Dulli is teaming up with Mark Lanegan, another ’90s stay-over who may not share Dulli’s bad-boy past but has a voice gravelly and growly enough to make you believe he’s seen the dark sides of many days. The pair will release an album as the Gutter Twins next year. As a preview, Lanegan (quite the collaborator: see also Isobel Campbell, QOTSA) appears on two of the five songs on this Twilight Singers EP. One is “Live With Me,” an appropriately cinematic cover of a lesser-known Massive Attack song. The other is “Flashback,” which is more of a true duet will Dulli.

The other guest on Stitch is Joseph Arthur, apparently apprenticing with the two elder statesmen in the School of Hard-Knock Vocals. Arthur’s voice is just as smoky and husky on “Sublime” as Lanegan’s is elsewhere.

What does Dulli do in all of this? Not much of anything different than on past Twilight Singers offerings. Sweaty, impassioned blooze-rock abounds. Dulli’s soul-man schtick can be downright embarrassing at times, as when, on “Flashback,” he croons the high school diary-like lyrics, “There’s something mystic in the soul connection/ There’s something magic in your misty eyes.”

The short set ends nicely with “The Lure Would Prove too Much.” The song employs samples of melancholy answering-machine messages, reminiscent of “Verti-Marte,” the standout track from the band’s debut.

COLLUSION between Screaming Tree main man and utility guest vocalist Mark Lanegan and Afghan Whig Greg Dulli began three years ago, when the latter contributed backing vocals to a couple of tracks on the former’s Here Comes that Weird Chill EP.

Returning the favour, Lanegan has been touring with Dulli’s current outfit the Twilight Singers ever since the two shared a stage during a Hurricane Katrina benefit.

Here he wheels his voice into action on the lead tune of the Twilight Singer’s A Stitch in Time EP, a reworking of Massive Attack’s Live with Me, and is powerless to prevent its conversion into a U2-styled epic with a massive chorus. Still, not bad.

A collaboration between Dulli and the Keanu Reeves-backed Joseph Arthur and a pallid Richard Ashcroft imitation, Sublime is anything but. Far better is The Lure Would Prove too Much, which threads tender answerphone messages into an emotive reverie.

It’s perhaps a good thing that I have little knowledge of Mark Lanegan, The Screaming Trees, Joseph Arthur, Greg Dulli, Afghan Whigs or indeed The Twilight Singers all of whom, or rather members of all of whom, have played a part in the creation of this record. Such a weight of history would only confuse matters.

Instead I’m left with the far easier task of reviewing five songs. And even better they’re all pretty good.
A Stitch in Time is deep and dark and classic sounding. It’s rock music I suppose – it’s too brooding to classed as pop – but its not coated in waves of distortion. These are simple songs, with the right on production giving them an exceptional warmth and density. Sublime is perhaps the pick of the bunch although the start of Flashback, all twisting bass, splashes of wah-wah and electro-glitches run it pretty close as does the crackling phone message samples on the ending the lure would prove too much. Sublime combines drum-machine beats, an emotive vocal and a chorus that washes over you to make a very satisfying and very relaxing whole.

It’s a great EP all round, songs sung well and played well, the contributions by the guest vocalists never seeming superfluous or intruding on your enjoyment. The guitar work is excellent, the strings swoop and sway just as they should and the production is spot on. If you’re a fan of this kind of thing – aged, classic sounding rock songs (no, not ‘Classic Rock’) which sound as though they’ve been hanging around a while, brewing up their windswept atmosphere then this record is for you. Highly recommended.

8/10.