Sister duo CocoRosie release a brand new vinyl single with two strong songs; the big news, however, is that it is a new release on dormant label Touch & Go.
For those who prefer a bit of melody with their metal, there’s Britain’s Forefather.
Very late review of Alabama Shakes’ debut album Boys & Girls
Stamey’s interestingly-titled “Collide-oOo-Scope” and Holsapple’s moving “She Won’t Drive in the Rain Anymore” end the album on a huge high note before going into the finale title track.
Chronology provides a compelling and worthwhile overview of Talking Heads’ career. Rather than trying to manufacture a narrative, the band’s history is told primarily through a series of musical nuggets – allowing the band to speak for itself.
Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds’s soundtrack to Sam Levinson’s film is a subtle, sublime collection of melancholy instrumentals.
With full-production and epic sound-quality, Consummatum Est is a solid statement of razor-sharp black metal with a death metal edge.
The Men deliver the best Matador subscription single so far. No surprise because they’re great.
There’s a way to pull off a sweatily awkward sense of the icky and inappropriate, and P/DO P/DRO are easily masters at elucidating the profane, from their live satanic invocations to their trashy and irreverent circuit-bending sound.
This nicely packaged gem of a 7” is a real mind voyage laden with some tasty concrete/actuelle treatments just this side of “too cool” for serious electroacoustic chin-strokers.
The Thrift knows how to write substantial tunes, and then attack them with the fervor of teenagers plugging into the amps for the first time.
Though closer to the Mississippi River of Eastern Ontario than that of the Southern Delta region, catl have that muddy water in their bodies and souls, and that’s what makes their newest album shine.
Philly’s sunny sweetheart Shorty Boy-Boy drops some grit into his pop machine with an auspicious single, a debut from the maverick party animal culture explosion that is BITBY.
Pomegranates bass-player prefaces the band’s forthcoming album with a six-song cassette of solo bass explorations.
Reminiscent, but not imitative, of Joe Jackson, Elvis Costello and their peers.
In a field perhaps over-filled with unauthorized biographies, Days of Our Lives is a refreshing and illuminating look into the arc of Queen’s stadium-sized career. Benefiting from full band involvement, the documentary makes for great drama. Above all, it’s filled with ambitious and extravagant rock and roll.
With this collection of tracks, Neorev proves to be a solid force in underground electronic music.
Recorded with producer/multi-instrumentalist Mattias Areskog, Hellberg keeps things simple, crooning over arrangements that are often little more than guitar and strings.
A new kind of drug album, one lacking the euphoric highs of Screamadelica, the terrifying/hilarious visions of Locust Abortion Technician, or anything like an identifiable “experience.”
Holter’s ideas are primarily latent, embedded in the slipperiness of her language, discoverable only from the pleasure the listener finds in their execution.
FOOD brings together veterans of 80s/90s indie rock.
Still, that’s half of the four song demo and it as well as the four newer songs sound MUCH better than said demo.
Toro y Moi’s third album is actually a collection of baby photos of the nascent electronica pop group, and though it’s a bit different in sound to their previous two albums, it’s still an enjoyable listen.
Working with producers Dave Fridmann and Steve Albini, the Jarman brothers crank the guitars and hooks, while still folding in enough texture to give the tracks depth.
Baltimore-based Dope Body’s Drag City debut is a fun, furious throwback to the sounds of the Northwest circa 1990.
Heroes has its missteps, but overall is one of Nelson’s strongest albums in recent years.
This is a band not content to simply plow the garage punk furrow – the writing is simply too skilled, melodic and ambitious for sitting comfortably in that much-beloved but limited niche.
The Man Who Sold Himself is challenging music, no question, but that challenge is worth meeting.
Straight out of a after-hours basement cabaret, Amour Obscur give us a glimpse into their upcoming Vic Thrill-produced full-length.
Gleeful lo-fi pop-punkers Rabbit Troupe are from New Jersey and are the breezy and fun summer high kick of 2012.
A repackaging of fIREHOSE’s major-label albums plus related B-sides and EPs proves that their surprising signing to Columbia was no fluke for either the band or the label.
Powell & The Exports have served up a fine brand of soulful, catchy rock that grows on you more with every listen.
Nest of Vipers refines the band’s timeless classic rock sound, giving it just enough polish to stand out from similar retro rock acts, but not enough to diminish the raw performances.
The mastermind behind SubtractiveLAD delivers his hinted-at solo debut album, and it’s a stunning departure from the ambient and neoclassical work of the past.
A 33% reduction (in time, not quality) of Beach House’s enduring classic Teen Dream? Let’s look back and see.
Too often we get stuck talking about the same few bands, but the self-evident secret about The Stevens is that they’re as good as anyone.
Norway’s Gazpacho continues to evolve into one of modern progressive rock’s most potent bands.
It had been a long five years, waiting for any release from Airiel, and this has not been a disappointment. Would a full-length be preferable? Yes, but in this case, quality trumps quantity.
Do you like weird, loose, open-ended, acid-psych hippy folk?
Second album from Tortoise member and experimental guitarist balance bombast and drone.
Pink Eye showcases the true eclecticism of Instagon, compiling fully improvised noise and music from 1998, 2007 and 2011.
Inspired by the stories of Canadian World War I vets, Elliott BROOD digs deep into its own emotional imagination on its third full-length.
Singer/songwriter Loudon Wainwright III is as accomplished an author as you could wish for on any subject, but he’s always at his best when he turns a sardonic eye towards his own life.
In a remarkable career that has embraced punk, post-punk, new wave, psychedelia, pop, rock, waltzes and more, the Stranglers are thriving in 2012, while many legendary peers such as the Clash, Ramones and Sex Pistols, are long gone.
She could sing the phone book and frankly I’d be OK with it, but thankfully the songs here are rich, melodically developed, rewarding and very soulful.
