Public Disgrace compiles three intense live recordings from a stellar lineup.
Evil Farm Children have made a beauty of a 7” that plays well with anything Norton. Throw in a rad black & white hand-drawn sleeve and this is exactly the kind of candy that rock and rollas like me love to get wired on.
Candian-based Tim Hecker concludes his year by releasing an album of stark, basic sketches of songs used as the basis for the album he released at the beginning of the year. Surprisingly essential.
Mostly gone is the flamboyance that is sure to piss off more than a few diehards. The raw, dangerous, funk element is missing. But with The Great Escape Artist, Jane’s Addiction proved that they can age gracefully and still be relevant.
Canadian-based The Darcys issue the first in a trilogy of vinyl-only releases; the novelty does not detract in any way from the quality.
On what is perhaps their first “official,” i.e., non-CDr or cassette, release, Viodre have assembled a collage of negativity that is at once disturbing, meditative and demanding, an unapologetic aural assault akin to those nightmares that just won’t let you wake up.
Oh, OK, I understand why this Athens, Georgia band has been piling on the accolades.
The Besnard Lakes impress yet again, this time with a gorgeous, dreamy 4-song 12” single.
Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s ninth album is full of unsettling beauty and unabashed emotion. It is not for the faint of heart.
This is one of those bittersweet moments where I get to chastise Jerry Only for another lackluster effort but, at the same time, I am panning a Misfits album.
When I started listening to this album, I couldn’t stop playing it. Weeks later, I STILL can’t stop playing it. It’s that good.
Austin’s Golden Bear has been quietly releasing sterling guitar pop records for several years now, with nary a ripple on the radar of the hipster faithful.
Enigmatic producer and musician Richard Swift offers up another confounding record.
A beguiling collection of pop music, for those darker moments of your life.
LA’s premiere noise supergroup pick up where Frustration Music left off, continuing the saga of lost, forlorn emotion channeled through electronics and distortion.
Holy impressive soft-rock super-group, Batman!
Swedish electronica duo Niki and the Dove tease the listener with a seven-song EP of utterly compelling, beguiling experimental pop music.
This is absolutely one of the most painful slabs of vinyl I’ve ever endured.
Awkward I is the moniker of a Djurre de Haan , a young songsmith from Amsterdam who’s mined a fresh new talent to emerge clutching a ream of engaging and mature tunes in his newest offering Everything On Wheels.
I think my ass bones are just healing from bailing flat out in the moshpit at Scarlet Beast ‘s last show. That’s because I’m getting old, tabarnac… but I’m still moshin’ at least!
This dangerous slab of flesh-covered vinyl is a visceral, punch-packed screamer of a tour through a morphing blend of dancepunk, noise-rock and a haze of shoegaze.
What a compelling thing this life is…
Perhaps the best thing about of these songs is how much they could pass for tracks on a Killed By Death comp.
Being mostly a comparison of the two versions of “Stephen.”
Once a side project for The Felice Brothers’ Simon Felice, this collection compiles selections from the band’s two European releases, highlighting the band’s overall talents and strengths.
The German Apparat’s entry in !K7’s DJ-Kicks series is a mellower affair than previous offerings, focusing more on sonic textures, atmospheres and patterns than floor-thumping house or techno music.
The In Heaven we have, not the one we dreamed, ends up more likely than Screamadelica to head for inner space, more eager to come down than to come together.
Sure, there’s nothing really new or original about these two songs, but that doesn’t mean they’re not any good.
In fact, one could argue that he just keeps getting better and better.
The appeal of Hollywood’s second Queen box is hearing the band’s familiar singles lifted from the homogenized presentation of greatest-hits packages. Taken together, these albums present a formidable band with rare songwriting and performing depth, and one which was both willing to take risks and able to get away with them.
Veteran Denton, Texas-based Sundress comes on strong with a six-song EP of atmospheric psychedelic rock influenced heavily by 90s era Britpop.
This is really the recording debut of a new incarnation of the band.
Streetwise New York songstress Lani Ford has lain her hard rock band Stark to rest and reemerged with a new sound, a new look and new songs that focus on her quiet side while retaining the intense personality that always shone through her music.
Former members of Shiv created a band that is simultaneously art rock and arena rock, two styles of music shouldn’t work well together, but somehow do.
It’s been so long since the uncompromising, indefatigable Mekons have released a record that many had suspected a quiet retirement.
The once-prolific Swedish popster Jens Lekman returns with his first record of new material since 2007, and it’s a keeper!
Fortunately, Kill Everyone was well worth the wait, showing the band evolving even further in their expanded four-piece lineup.
Hopefully, a television producer will hear this and use a song and Korb can make tens of thousands of dollars from it.
Alice Bag writes her memoirs of the early L.A. Punk scene and her involvement in the bands of the time.
Vincent’s Keep It That Way EP is another jewel from one of our country’s best songwriters and a must-have for fans of ballsy Canadian lit-rock.
With this combination book/CD, Instagon delivers a self-described “noise opera” about the seedy dark underbelly of urbanity.
The New Rochelles first album “It’s New” pays tribute to the Ramones
Though he doesn’t get the attention of his Oblivians bandmate Greg Cartwright, Jack Yarber, AKA Jack Oblivian, has a growing catalog of strong recordings as well, of which Rat City is the latest.
When the world’s greatest young band vends a hot, merch table-only live EP, wallets come out, and trifles like a playing order out of synch with the track listing matter not.
This noisy jangle pop hits like some demented lo-fi garage band attempting to break into the paisley underground.
After departing the best lineup of Deep Purple, guitar hero Ritchie Blackmore launched the heavy-hitting and mystical Rainbow with vocalist Ronnie James Dio. The band’s most potent lineup would create only one studio album, but is featured on this live set. The centerpiece is the self-contained hard rock opera “Stargazer,” which must have blown stoned minds in 1976.
The Blue Obscurities may contain work that the band considers ephemera, but it makes as strong a case for Trance To the Sun’s existence as any best-of ever could.
California modern psychedelic rock legends Brian Jonestown Massacre have compiled the band’s uber-rare vinyl sides, and this collection of rare gems wonderfully highlights the songwriting talent of Anton Newcombe.
