Album Reviews

[rating=6.0] Filled with sun-drenched melodies, dreamy aesthetics and a whole lot of echoing sounds and fantastical flourishes, it is obvious to anyone listening to the sophomore release from Imaginary Cities that singer Marti Sarbit and songwriter Rusty Matyas had an absolute ball making this record. It doesn’t necessarily fall into any particular genre, as elements […]

[rating=8.0] Yellowbirds’ sophomore album marks Sam Cohen’s first foray into a full band collaboration since the dissolution of Apollo Sunshine in 2009. Yellowbirds’ 2011 debut, The Color, was essentially a solo album, written and conceived simply because Cohen’s overactive mind couldn’t stop writing songs. Not surprisingly, the release felt small and intimate. After traveling with […]

[rating=8.0] It’s been quite some time since Chris Flemmons fired up his Denton, TX collective The Baptist Generals. Ten long years, in fact, have passed since the critically acclaimed No Silver/No Gold  buzzed the music world with its’ ambient and kaleidoscopic whirling dirges and sound-scapes.  In this day and age of blogs and self-uploading of […]

Folk singers like Marling are often called “storytellers” to the point that it has become a cliché, but if her previous releases were collections of short stories, Once I Was an Eagle is Marling’s debut novel.

[rating=7.0 ] Eisley has had a few years to purge their demons and have come out on the other side stronger. 2011’s comparatively angry and jaded The Valley was preceded by their split with Warner Bros. Records and various band members’ personal problems, which provided fodder for that record. You had to wonder if the […]

[rating=9.0] With The National’s last release High Violet, mid-life dread was floating everywhere; it was the perfect “hip white people’s problems” disk.  The band apparently scrapped thousands of hours of music to get the right sonic tone and texture and in that department there are few (if any) indie bands that can rival them (Spoon […]

Listening to Promises from The Boxer Rebellion is like gorging yourself on chocolate for a bit before you start to get tired of it and suddenly remember that you can add some things to the chocolate to make it even better.

Coming from their hometown of New Orleans, Dumpstaphunk have steadily expanded their sound to achieve global funk success.  Dirty Word is the latest from the band and shows off the professional funkateers in winning fashion. 

Shooter fearlessly confronts the duality of man’s nature. Can Saturday night and Sunday morning learn to live side by side? Directly quoting one of his father’s songs, he asks, “Don’t y’all think this ‘outlaw’ bit done got outta hand?” As a lens through which to view and contemplate the finer points of man’s perplexing nature, The Other Life is not just Shooter’s birthright but a surprisingly fertile platform for hard-won philosophical insights.

At its core Modern Vampires of the City still has the clever hooks and effortless melodies that made the band blogosphere darlings in 2008, but underneath the gloss there's a less easy, more fatalistic worldview

There's a certain kind of heft to Wakin on a Pretty Daze that wasn't present on a Kurt Vile LP before. And not just with regards to the length of several of the songs that appear on this eleven-track collection bookended by the nine-and-a-half minute "Wakin on a Pretty Day" and the mesmerizing ten-plus minute comedown "Goldtone". What is more prevalent perhaps is the sense of ease by which the songs seem to just roll out of your headphones as Vile and his current primary Violators–multi-instrumentalists Jesse Trbovich and Rob Laakso–submerge the street cool of late-80s Lou Reed into that hazy psych-rock thing he's been doing since since his bedroom dubbing days, albeit less volatile from the sounds of such key tracks as "Was All Talk" and "Shame Chamber".

Signed since 2011 to the Kings of Leon helmed imprint, Serpents & Snakes, The Features have returned with their latest LP, an eleven track self-titled walk through their kaleidoscopic soundscape, offering both steady favorites and some new, interesting wrinkles.

The recent revelation from Sonic Youth bassist and ex-wife Kim Gordon in the May issue of Elle that Moore had a little side action going on during the recent years of their marriage might come as a surprise to some. But in listening to songs like the Roky Erickson homage "Empires of Time", "Frank O'Hara Hit"–which refers to the Dune Buggy death of the acclaimed mid-60s poet–and the relentlessly scrub-core closing cut "Communist Eyes", there's something fueling Thurston's thirst for throwback chaos.

After six years, Griffin returns with a masterclass in folk she’s dubbed American Kid, a record which explores life and death in a way that shows considerable candor and heartfelt honesty.

As the Grateful Dead organization entered its transition from an independent business entity to its full-fledged collaboration with Rhino Records in the middle of the last decade, the titles in the ‘Dick’s Pick’s’ archive series became available only sporadically. Beginning in 2011, however, Real Gone Music began the regular reissue of the titles. Dick’s Picks #24, recorded March 1974 at the venerable Cow Palace, is testament to a high level of inspiration in the band’s playing, no doubt elevated even further as it takes place on the group's home turf in San Francisco. Even more notably, this concert represents the first use of the hallowed ‘Wall of Sound’ in its entirety.

MS MR’s full-length debut Secondhand Rapture (out now on Columbia Records) features a rich, consistent and at times addicting sound that reveals the band’s tremendous potential across twelve tracks.

To pin the R&B label on Land of CanAan would miss what Marques Toliver’s first album captures: a junction of soul and classical sensibility, where a violinist with a killer vocal shakes up both genres.

In interviews regarding her new album Love and Forgiveness, Courtney Jaye has been quoted as saying “I’ve always wanted to find a way to not be afraid of pop.  I’m done apologizing for writing big songs.”  Jaye (with a helping hand from producer Mike Wrucke) has certainly done that here as fans of 70’s folk-pop will instantly enjoy their surroundings.

The Waterboys' An Appointment with Mr. Yeats actually predates the concept of the Billy Bragg/Wilco Mermaid Avenue project as well as New Multitudes' more recent homage to Woody Guthrie. Nurtured by bandleader Mike Scott over a period of two decades, the album's exalting music, roiling ("The Hosting of the Shee") and reflective ("Song of Wandering Aengus), has its inspiration in the verse of the genius Irish poet William Butler Yeats.

2013 may not be finding Kenny Roby as wealthy or as famous as his old pal, Adams, but it has found him back on his feet as a musician. These quiet years away from the musical grind have allowed him to painstakingly craft an album borne out of his vision and outlook, and the results sound pretty sweet. It’s a triumph for the spirit of the artist, and hopefully a sign of more good things to come.