Co-authoring and performing with his friends and disciples in the Scottish pop scene, Collins knocks out gem after pop rock gem in a manner that would seem casual if you didn’t know his recent history.
Neorev embodies the epitome of what electronic dance music should be.
Busted At Oz is an essential time capsule of Chicago’s under-appreciated punk scene.
A couple of years ago, Yep Roc did the universe a service and rescued Jesus of Cool, the trailblazing solo debut of the irrepressible Nick Lowe, from oblivion. Now the label does the same for his 1979 follow-up, the equally delightful Labour of Lust.
Flight of the Solstice Queens is an album so refreshingly diverse, it’ll leave you scratching your head wondering if it’s the same person.
No matter Spector’s faults as a human being (and let’s face it – there are plenty), his work as a producer and songwriter has held up extremely well, even half a century on.
The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart’s sophomore album would be a perfect soundtrack to a John Hughes teen flick remake.
Mulatu Steps Ahead is an album of East African mystery, Latin influences and a mix of Afrobeat and highlife.
Napoleon Sodomite is a slab of truly heavy, immediately gratifying, un-fuckwithable riffs that taps the dark roots of unpretentious ‘banger ear-candy.
At times the sounds are beautiful, but there’s an underlying sinister element to it all.
A double-CD set, the record spotlights Jakszyk’s compositions on one disk and a set of covers on the other.
I want to flail ludicrously around the room in much the same way that The Fall make me wiggle all willy-nilly like I’m on an episode of Yo Gabba Gabba or something.
Tight and tuneful, Waving at the Astronauts is one of Pollard’s best efforts in a while.
Fueled By Zen is four songs of ’70s-influenced stoner rock, very heavy on the Black Sabbath.
Hi-kicking and ass-kicking, Philly’s Bandname is a kinetic ball of fun. Their new full length, Breakfast is a rad collection of sun-drenched punk chops for the uncynical.
Austin-based experimental guitar duo FiRES WERE SHOT releases only their third record in nearly 15 years, but the beauty found within makes it worth the wait.
Canadian composer Tim Hecker delivers an album of quiet drones and gentle meditative moments.
Armed with just his guitars, Wino lays himself and his vision out as nakedly as possible – no thundering rhythm section, no co-vocalist, just the man, his fingers, six strings and his exposed heart.
Surf Narcs is a sexy swirl of glam, new wave and roots punk, with that necessary bit of surf to keep us dressed in our bathing suits while a chorus line of drag queens dances around us.
The debut from Jace Lasek’s Besnard Lakes side project, The Soft Province, strips down the ethereal and some magic is lost. The straightforwardness of the songs will be refreshing to those who find the Besnard Lakes too sprawling.
DoTV’s debut album is a rollicking foray into the hard rock of forty years ago, when just about everything on the rock stations was “stoner” rock.
With buffed-up supporting vocals from the Jordanaires and deeper low-end bass than has previously been released, the Elvis is Back! Legacy Edition sparkles at every turn and better yet, it serves as reminder that Elvis Presley was much more than a country boy with animal magnetism and one of the best back-up bands of his time.
Working with touch guitarist/co-producer Trey Gunn, Zhelannaya takes a batch of elderly songs – some over 1000 years old – and lays them in atmospheric, almost ambient electronic beds that often twist worldbeat clichés and rock dynamics into new shapes.
It’s the instrumental tracks that stand out here, displaying what Otto Kinzel is truly capable of without the obstacle of bad singing to get in the way.
Smashface mixes an eclectic batch of influences into an infectious set of songs that will alternatively have you shaking your head and singing along.
“I really had a thing about the seriousness of folk music. I mean, with oldtimey – Dr. Smith’s Champion Hoss-hair Pullers, these old ‘20’s groups —they were all fuckin’ goofy-ass, weird nutty shit, you know? I thought the weird nutty shit was more, like, the point of it than the serious meaningful ‘People’s Rhetoric’ approach.”
Songs About Fucking Steve Albini is like a complete deconstruction of dance music to its extraneous elements, like the beats that propel the music have been removed, leaving only the strange sounds and effects that garnish the track as the main focus.
Cloud Nothings delivers on the promise of earlier work without abandoning the immediacy or charm that perked up attentive ears in the first place.
Like contemporaries The Brian Jonestown Massacre, the Witches see psych rock as contemporary art, rather than nostalgic exercise, and if Gregory is less enamored of shoegazing and the Paisley Underground than Anton Newcombe, he sees eye-to-eye on the idea that psych doesn’t have to be about peace, love and pretty flowers.
While making their third record, Texas based band Eisley experienced label shakeups, divorces, and breakups, and produced an album of beauty, loss, and redemption as a result.
The Southwestern atmospheres the band has been exploring have been shifted to a sound that evokes a wide, cloudy sky at dusk rather than the desert at night.
Hostile Cell’s music is pop-metal aimed at chart-topping, and as such, is as bland as they come.
Phantom Glue’s songs are low-end onslaughts of rage and aggression with a homeless lunatic shouting the vocals so loud and in your face that you can almost smell the booze and crack wafting from his breath.
Uncluttered, indelicate and immediately engaging, the 10 songs on the latest release by D&TW seem planted firmly in a My Bloody Valentine plot, yet their roots and branches extend widely and magnificently.
Not that prior records didn’t feature plenty of hooks, but on Kaputt Bejar’s really indulging himself in instantly appealing melodies and lyrics a shade less dense and enigmatic.
Drunkdriver’s eponymous final release is the soundtrack to being mugged by a guy who doesn’t need the money – rather he revels in the misery it causes.
While Stephen Ryan has long impressed me as one of the most promising Irish songwriters around, his new improved Windings now have the invention and punch to match him step for step.
Double Star is the sound of two old buddies expressing a different, equally valid side of their extraordinary talents.
Rather than being a mere side-project of three veterans of the Los Angeles underground noise scene, DDDD has its own sonic style that establishes the group as a separate entity.
These albums tend to be dismissed offhand by a lot of fans, but some diehards cite them as their favorites.
Totem Two would be the perfect soundtrack for a sex magic ceremony that ends in sacrifice and cannibalism.
This first piece of vinyl from fresh Nashville upstart DIY label Jeffery Drag is a really hot indication of the great things to come.
They play together like devils, and shake like “The American Ruse,” “The Human Being Lawnmower,” and “Sister Anne” are the bible, and they’re fire and brimstone preachers.
Introduction lays out in stark terms what we lost at knifepoint in an L.A. bathroom, October 21, 2003. The guy was so real he still hurts.
Phoenix five-some Lisa Savidge dig shoegaze/dreampop’s dense guitar majesty, offering intermittent, beautifully breathtaking, mountain-peak clusters of cascading cacophony—but those are mere passages.
Where most punk bands these days fall flat on their faces in cliches and poor musicianship, MCT happily drive over them in an out-of-control Mac truck heading downhill.
As with most concept albums, the tale is less important than the telling, and it’s far easier to simply enjoy the band’s dynamic arrangements and dramatic melodies than to follow the plot.
A mysterious vinyl-only release from a Texas electronic psych-rocking wizard that proves to be one of 2011’s more compelling releases.
The storyline gets lost in the singalong choruses and headlong rush of melody that has always been Hart’s forte, but that’s hardly a flaw here
