bright eyes

Bloggy Goodness: Sound Strike Benefit

With the list of musicians taking a stand against Arizona’s recently passed controversial immigration law SB 1070 by participating in The Sound Strike growing, two of the more vocal opponents

Read More

Bloggy Goodness: Prine Time

It’s going to be a good Spring if you’re a fan of the music of John Prine as you’ll be able to enjoy the legendary singer-songwriters music in two very

Read More

Video: Monsters Of Folk – Dear God

The future of the indie-rock super group Monsters Of Folk might be in doubt as the members are off working on their various other projects – M. Ward with She

Read More

Bloggy Goodness: Roger That

While we may never seen a full-on Pink Floyd reunion again, the band’s bassist – Roger Waters – hasn’t been shy about touring behind the group’s most well-known material. It’s

Read More

HT 25 Best Albums of 2009: Numbers 11-15

This year at Hidden Track, we concocted a little experiment for our year-end Best Albums of 2009 list. Instead of picking the old fashioned way – subjectively – we opted for something a little different: a collaborative, collective list that incorporates the opinions of everybody here at HT.

To begin, we devised an all-encompassing list of around 100 nominees and populated it in a Google spreadsheet – essentially anything that anybody who writes for Hidden Track liked at all, made the list. Then we invited our crew of writers to independently vote on the whole list (omitting anything unfamiliar) on a scale of 1 to 20 (20 = five stars). We ended up with 33 voters with varying degrees of familiarity with the nominees; some folks voted on just about everything, while some just a few. From there, we eliminated anything that did not receive at least three votes, calculated the average scores, and sorted it. We took the top 25 scores and presto: the Hidden Track 25 Best Albums of 2009. No bullshit, no big opinions; just the results.

Let’s check out numbers 15 through 11 and see what made the cut…

15) Elvis Perkins In DearlandElvis Perkins in Dearland

Key Tracks: Hey, Chains Chains Chains, Doomsday

Sounds Like: Part marching band, Part Dylan-esque folk-rock

elvis-perkins-in-dearland-cd-cover-album-art

Skinny: Perkins sophomore effort is more of a complete representation of what he and his band In Dearland sound like. The combo’s “antique music” can best be summed up as equal parts ramshackle folk and Sousa marching band, making it virtually impossible at times to keep you from from tapping your feet along to songs like Hey, I Heard Your Voice In The Dresden and Doomsday with Perkins’ vivid lyrics as the guide.

READ ON for the next four albums in our week long countdown…

Read More

HT 25 Best Albums of 2009: Numbers 21-25

This year at Hidden Track, we concocted a little experiment for our year-end Best Albums of 2009 list. Instead of picking the old fashioned way – subjectively – we opted for something a little different: a collaborative, collective list that incorporates the opinions of everybody here at HT.

To begin, we devised an all-encompassing list of around 100 nominees and populated it in a Google spreadsheet – essentially anything that anybody who writes for Hidden Track liked at all, made the list. Then we invited our crew of writers to independently vote on the whole list (omitting anything unfamiliar) on a scale of 1 to 20 (20 = five stars). We ended up with 33 voters with varying degrees of familiarity with the nominees; some folks voted on just about everything, while some just a few. From there, we eliminated anything that did not receive at least three votes, calculated the average scores, and sorted it. We took the top 25 scores and presto: the Hidden Track 25 Best Albums of 2009. No bullshit, no big opinions; just the results.

Let’s kick things off with numbers 25 through 21…

25) M. WardHold Time

Key Tracks: Stars Of Leo, Rave On, Never Had Nobody Like You

Sounds Like: An old antique photo

12681-hold-time

Skinny: In 2008 M. Ward seemed to take a backseat to doe-eyed actress Zooey Deschanel as the Him in vintage indie-pop act She & Him, but he was back in 2009 with his latest solo release, Hold Time. The album is full of everything we’ve come to expect from Matt over the years – modern indie-rock that is completely bathed in the patina of the last fifty-plus years of pop music. Combining his sepia-drenched vocals and open tuning guitar work with guest appearances from the aforementioned Deschanel, Lucinda Williams and Grandaddy’s Jason Lytle.

READ ON for the next four albums in our countdown…

Read More

The B List: Top Six Of The Last Six

As we continue our year end house cleaning around these parts, I thought I’d chime in once again with a list of my own. As has become the half yearly tradition around these parts, in lieu of a traditional top ten list we opt to do something a little different with our Top 6 of both halves of the year.

While my Top 6 Of The First 6 seemed to have some pretty obvious choices, the second half of the year’s list is mostly dominated by debut records – so let’s get on with it…

6. FanfarloReservoir

Fanfarlo-Reservoir

I’ve had Fanfarlo’s debut album for so long, that I almost forgot that it officially got released this September. Loaded with orchestral folk-rock that has become all the rage in recent years, the album features everything from saws and clarinets to cellos and ukuleles to melodicas and thermins that all combine with lead singers Simon Balthazar’s booming vocals to produce a cacophony of melodic noise that doesn’t fall far from the Neutral Milk Hotel/Arcade Fire tree.

READ ON for the rest of my Top 6 Of The Last 6…

Read More

Video: Monsters Of Folk – Say Please

On their recently wrapped world tour, indie-rock supergroup Monsters Of Folk treated fans to three-hour, 30+ song shows mixing material from their self-titled debut with selections from the members various

Read More

View posts by year

Recent Posts

New to Glide

Keep up-to-date with Glide

Twitter