May 2013
2 posts
4 tags
“I argued that we matter because we are unique, that we can be special creatures...”
– The Inevitable Question by Marcelo Gleiser
April 2013
2 posts
1 tag
“Kindness” covers all of my political beliefs. No need to spell them out. I...”
– Roger Ebert
February 2013
2 posts
In which I deftly cloak my Valentine's Day hijinks...
Erin: remember
Erin: I have to run a few errands after work
Josh: yes
Josh: I need to run one as well
Erin: oh
Erin: for meeeee??????
Josh: nope, just for me
Josh: I'm gonna go buy some Nutella and eat it all before I get home
Josh: that's my errand
Erin: that's the meanest thing you've ever said
3 tags
“In short, during those few steps, walking as a woman, Beyoncé declared ownership...”
– David Henson
January 2013
1 post
3 tags
December 2012
35 posts
2 tags
Trash Talk: 119
Trash Talk has the youth, vigor and aggression of hardcore punk under their thumb. Rather than recycling the same songs and sounds that similar bands in the recent past have already overused, they take the gritty screams and buzzy guitars to new sonic heights.
Beyond that, 119 has the band breaking out of the hardcore mold in other ways; Blossom & Burn has guest verses by Tyler the...
2 tags
Swans: The Seer
Swans serve as a sort of vocals-allowed alternative to Godspeed You! Black Emperor. All the anarchy, chaos and noise, but with the addition of Michael Gira’s dark-as-hell voice laid over the top.
Coming in at a whopping 1 hour and 59 minutes, The Seer is clearly the culmination of decades of work by the band to reach new highs and lows. It’s a pinnacle for the group, not only in...
2 tags
Liars: WIXIW
Liars has been an intriguing sort of noise since Drum’s Not Dead was released to critical acclaim in 2006. They have had a way of subversively spinning their own sound into new territories for each album. What used to be guitar-heavy chaos has since shifted to a dark take on electronic music, which is where we find the band on WIXIW.
Angus Andrew’s voice may be the only constant...
2 tags
Hot Chip: In Our Heads
I’ll admit that this is the first time Hot Chip has been anything but neutral sound to my ears. It’s hard to say whether they’ve changed or I have, but my money’s on the latter.
In Our Heads has impeccable melody and light, bouncy electronic rhythms. Like new wave without the darkness, or disco without the coke. It’s an extremely nuanced form of dance music that...
2 tags
Alt-J: An Awesome Wave
Opaque lyrics and an overwhelming feeling that the only constant is change. That’s Alt-J for you. An Awesome Wave won the group the 2012 Mercury Prize and, despite very little media attention stateside, they have a quickly growing fanbase.
Taking influences from electronic, alternative and world music (and, perhaps, some alien species), An Awesome Wave shows off an infinitely deep well...
“Hallucinations, whether revelatory or banal, are not of supernatural origin;...”
– Oliver Sacks: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/12/seeing-god-in-the-third-millenium/266134/
2 tags
Aesop Rock: Skelethon
If independent, stream-of-consciousness hip-hop is your thing, Aesop Rock is your man. His flow is impeccable, his wordplay is second to none. It’s the kind of music where you find yourself rewinding and replaying verses to dig out the meaning, which is always one or two levels deeper than expected. It’s like a rapper/philosopher bait and switch.
Skelethon has Aesop at his most...
2 tags
Bonus best-of! The Polyphonic Spree: Holidaydream:...
Because it’s Christmas and it’s the Polyphonic Spree. Come on, now.
Standout tracks: “Happy Xmas (War is Over),” “Let It Snow”
Listen on Spotify and Rdio. Buy on Amazon.
2 tags
Hammock: Departure Songs
In many ways, Hammock’s music has presented itself as an unintentional instrumental soundtrack to the lives of many who have heard the music or not. Their last LP, Chasing After Shadows, had a dark, watery theme both musically and in its artwork, and was coincidentally released within days of their Nashville hometown being flooded.
Departure Songs sees the band becoming more cinematic...
2 tags
Band of Skulls: Sweet Sour
Not much needs to be said here. Sweet Sour taps into the American rock and roll tradition, at least as much as a trio of Brits can. There’s a long history of the English adopting American rhythm and blues and often doing it better than we do.
Band of Skulls honed their craft on this, their sophomore LP. Clearly they’ve had their heads down, focusing on self-improvement on an...
2 tags
The Weeknd: Trilogy
Another submission for the PBR&B file. Trilogy is exactly what it says on the tin: a long-awaited physical release of the three free, digital albums The Weeknd released in 2011. When combined they make for a post-modern R&B album of epic proportions.
While House of Balloons was the first and best release of the three, there are plenty of gems to be found throughout. Abel Tesfaye turns...
2 tags
Titus Andronicus: Local Business
Patrick Stickles may be the most intelligent, well-read and curious character contributing to the current punk rock scene. His past work with his rotating cast of bandmates in Titus Andronicus includes countless references to Shakespeare (naturally), Seinfeld, Camus and ancient mythology and a concept album about the American Civil War.
So, Local Business was destined to be a noise punk...
2 tags
Sweet Valley: Stay Calm & Eternal Champ
As if Nathan Williams didn’t have it good enough with the popularity of his buzzy California noise project Wavves, he decided to change gears entirely and form Sweet Valley with his brother Kynan.
Stay Calm is laid back and ADD-inducing all at once. It feels sort of like a mashup album, but one in which all the samples come from sources you’ve never heard of. All their sample...
2 tags
Beach House: Bloom
Beach House has a sound, and they have it down pat. Victoria Legrand’s deep, warm, commanding voice combined with slithery, reverb-laden guitars and infinitely-building crescendos are all signatures to a style that hasn’t shifted throughout the band’s entire career.
Not to say this album is a repeat, but rather that the duo has gotten extremely good at taking something...
2 tags
Bruce Springsteen: Wrecking Ball
It’s hard to find first-generation rock stars that are, one, still performing and releasing new material and, two, who are doing so without seeming entirely washed up. Exhibit 1: Bob Dylan’s recent work. Exhibit 2: almost every other artist from the 70s or before that isn’t Bruce Springsteen.
Wrecking Ball is not only a return to Bruce’s long tradition of fist-pump...
1 tag
“Getting older is very depressing. As far as everything being worthless is...”
– Patrick Stickles of Titus Andronicus
2 tags
Death Grips: The Money Store & No Love Deep Web
Death Grips’s entrance to the experimental hip-hop scene was so sudden that it at once seemed like a conspiracy-heavy troll and a complete game-changer for the genre. Their inclination to self-release material without label approval and put genitalia on album art is one way they let us know they don’t give a fuck. The music itself is equally, if not more, punk rock in maintaining...
5 tags
“In a Christian culture whose doctors of theology, board members and published...”
– Stuff Christian Culture Likes
3 tags
Antony and the Johnsons: Cut the World
It’s rare that a live album ends up being one of the most impressive releases in a given year; we focus so much on new material that we overlook the potential that reworkings of songs from the past might contain. Antony Hegarty, though, is one of few whose live energy is so particularly mesmerizing that taking him from the studio to the stage is never without its transcendent moments.
...
2 tags
Dum Dum Girls: End of Daze
End of Daze — as is much of the work of the Dum Dum Girls — is a stereo flashback to both the 80s and the 60s. Their sound is characterized by that combination of My Bloody Valentine/Jesus and Mary Chain staticy loudnes combined with a Spector-esque wall of noise and the distinct sound of 60s, girl-fronted surf pop.
The EP is a collection of outtakes from the recording of Only In...
2 tags
Grizzly Bear: Shields
Shields, at once, sounds both old and new. Grizzly Bear have a unique talent at making something brand new sound old, and not with fancy production tricks or aggressive preference for vintage techniques and gear. It’s as though they’ve found some alternate reality from the not-too-distant past and brought it into our own. It’s a talent that bridges a gap between innovation and...
2 tags
Burial: Kindred EP
Any time Burial releases something, it’s pretty much a no-brainer that it’ll end up in the winner’s circle. He puts out singles and EPs that easily pass the 30+ minute mark that many full lengths don’t. His shifting, electronic epics expose an infinitely deep soul, equal parts fearful, introverted and passionate.
His signature vinyl crackle and rickety, rim-hit heavy...
3 tags
Tim Hecker & Daniel Lopatin: Instrumental Tourist
Hecker and Lopatin are each, in their own right, masters of their respective musical games. Hecker’s history as a sculptor of lush, ambient sounds and static and as an encourager of those who drop pianos off of buildings has earned him respect among the experimental ambient community enough that elements of his sound, knowingly or not, inspired some of Brian Eno’s arrangements for...
2 tags
Simian Mobile Disco: A Form of Change
As A Form of Change’s opening title track warms up, it’s already pretty clear that this isn’t going to be your standard house music release. Slow, “Treefingers”-esque, stone-cold ambient tones gather over the course of the first almost-three minutes before a beat ever kicks in. Eventually it becomes something danceable, but the first impression sets a tone in which...
2 tags
The Very Best: MTMTMK
Many people think of Africa as a wasteland of poverty, starvation and political corruption. Those more familiar with the continent, though, know of a culture of deep, powerful, relational joy that binds its people together. They are also the keepers of much of the world’s musical heritage, so it should come as no surprise that Esau Mwamwaya and company would record the most joyful,...
2 tags
Godspeed You! Black Emperor: Allelujah! Don't...
When Godspeed You! Black Emperor released Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven back in 2000, it put a serious wind in the sails of the instrumental, post-rock movement. They managed to speak of a brave new world of political conspiracy, anarchy, frustration and joy without singing a single word. Allelujah! Don’t Bend! Ascend! may be the closest thing we’ll get at...
2 tags
Purity Ring: Shrines
Somewhere between indie pop and bass music is where Purity Ring have made their nest. All tracks would stand almost-sturdy on their own as half-step electronic tunes, but then Megan James’s clear, sweet voice floats up over the synthesized swells and trappy beats. That’s what ties the whole thing together as a cohesive package.
There’s not much in the way of variety between...
2 tags
Perfume Genius: Put Your Back N 2 It
Mike Hadreas, the person behind Perfume Genius, is working through a history of pain, and you can hear it in his voice. It quivers, and is stripped of anything but the most honest inflection. He can make a piano and guitar cry, and if you pay attention to his words, you might shed a tear yourself.
Put Your Back N 2 It offers the most candid of portraits of a lifetime spent battling addiction,...
2 tags
Flying Lotus: Until the Quiet Comes
Steven Ellison has jazz in his blood. That’s no joke. Dude’s great aunt is Alice Coltrane. AKA wife of John Fucking Coltrane. So, as a musician, even if his work sits firmly in the crosshairs of hip-hop and experimental electronic, it was inevitable that he’d eventually find his way back to jazz. Not to say his past several releases haven’t shown the signs, but Until the...
2 tags
Holy Other: Held
It’d be a complete mislabeling to call Held dubstep (especially the way most Americans are treating the word lately), or to push it under the umbrella of “bass music,” but that may be the closest comparison, word-wise. I suppose that’s how truly innovative artists are destined to be described.
Holy Other loves a half-step beat, a pitched-up R&B vocal sample and a...
2 tags
Frank Ocean: Channel Orange
I am 100% guilty of falling for this whole PBR&B thing. I only just heard about it today, but it is completely accurate. And Frank Ocean is a perfect example of hipster R&B. Whether he meant it as such doesn’t matter; the Williamsburg crowd have latched on, and they can’t wait for Channel Orange to get released on orange vinyl, as is rumored.
Never mind the hype though....
2 tags
Japandroids: Celebration Rock
Late-era pop punk and nth-generation emo finally circled back around to thank their classic rock, fist-pumping, Bruuuuuuce-chanting parents for their heritage. Japandroids takes a set of drums and a guitar and gives it all the energy of the E Street Band on Celebration Rock, and that’s no small order.
Where Springsteen, Petty, Costello and friends focused on storytelling and nostalgia,...
2 tags
mewithoutYou: Ten Stories
Every established band has to try their hand at a concept album at some point in their career. Well, maybe not, but it seems to be one of those Things Bands Do after they’ve been around for a while. mewithoutYou’s Ten Stories is one such attempt (fittingly: ten stories about the animals escaping a traveling circus when their train crashes) and, while it may not be the most...
2 tags
Joshua James: From the Top of Willamette Mountain
Since his debut, Joshua James has presented himself as something of a broken man. Whether the stories he tells are true to his own experience or a channeling of the struggles and sufferings of others, manufactured or real, it matters little. Someone’s truth is being expressed, and it’s a shame so few are listening up.
For his third album, the production is his most dynamic, as are...
2 tags
Black Moth Super Rainbow: Cobra Juicy
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Garbage Pail Kids. Pop Rocks. Smurfs. Stir it all together, add a spoonful of psychedelia (sans drugs, mind you) and a pinch of experimental hip-hop. Reduce and serve, preferably with a rubber Cobra Juicy mask.
Tobacco, Black Moth Super Rainbow’s creative center, continues to produce music that manufactures authentic nostalgia for children of the 80s and...
2 tags
“Twitter is a steady stream of mostly joy and makes my life better. Facebook is...”
– Matt Haughey
November 2012
5 posts
2 tags
1 tag
1 tag
“Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth...”
– Sigmund Freud
1 tag
October 2012
5 posts
1 tag
3 tags
“So much of the condition of being human involves not knowing. The more...”
– Leah Hager Cohen
2 tags
