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  Radar Bros. - Auditorium (Merge)
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A new record from landscape rockers Radar Bros.! Oh, Radar Brothers you make me want to go on a long road trip through the western United States with some good friends, a reliable thermos and some tasteful sunglasses. We won't talk too much, just soak in the sights. Placid lakes, winding mountain roads, coastal towns with miniature aquariums, long expanses of sun scorched earth, tumbleweeds, and dusty towns. Our car will break down but who cares. We're in no rush to get anywhere. We'll stop at every odd rest stop and offbeat tourist attraction. Hmm... maybe we should go in winter and see snow blanketed mountains... or maybe Autumn...
Yeah, the record is pretty much like that. Consistent as always Auditorium delivers more of your favorite slowcore – distant gaze-reflective jams. Who wants to go for a drive?
- Edmund LeStrange |
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 Chuck Ragan - Feast Or Famine (Side One Dummy)
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Okay so I just turned 30, bought a house and I have a kid...needless to say I've grown up (a little)! One of my favorite bands growing up was Hot Water Music. That band is gone but one of the singers, Chuck Ragan, has been putting out music non-stop over the past year year and a half! His new stuff is also more grown up! Its a meld of punk and country, roots, bluegrass... The punk part is mostly just edge and a good blue collar sensibility! Chuck tells great stories and the intrumentation is amazing! Move over Conor Oberst... If you're looking for our generations Dylan look no further than Chuck Ragan!!!
- Jay |
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 Chuck Ragan - Los Feliz (Side One Dummy)
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This is a live acoustic set from Chuck! These songs are so full of heart. Folky songs sung and played with the blue-collar sensibility that made Chuck's band a huge favorite for 12 years till they disbanded in '06. He tells stories like Bob Dylan. But his voice, though intensely weathered from drinking, smoking and touring, is incredibly beautiful and honest.
- Jay |
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 Ral Partha Vogelbacher - Shrill Falcons (Monotreme)
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This is a band not a person. This is a really good album. I have not heard the other releases but I'm sure going to now. I'm really having a hard time comparing this to anything, there are some cool guitar sounds on "Messy Artist" and "Aeroflot" that sound a little Swell Map-ish or maybe Wire (Pink Flag-ish) throw in a little Smog (not as deep vocals) and a lot of the truly good bands that came from the early 90's. Having said that what we have is a guitar heavy cd that leans on some song structure. At times comes dangerously close to being derivative of the above-mentioned bands but not quite. In the end we have a fresh sounding cd to help conquer boring sounding bands in '07.
- Bill |
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 Red Fang - Tour EP (Wantage)
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The guys in Red Fang have played in a crapload of bands including, but not limited to: Bad Wizard, Last of the Juanitas, Shiny Beast, Facedowninshit, Lachrymator, Regraped, Party Time, Trumans Water, and All Night. This is some serious heavy riffage that sometimes sits firmly in the lap of stoner metal and other times flirts with mid '90s AmRep bands. Melodic and pummeling all at once. This EP features 4 originals and a fantastic cover of a song by the obscure '70s combo, Dust, w/ the best monster fuzz-bass solo you'll hear this year.
- Doug |
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 Emitt Rhodes - Recordings 1969-1973 (Hip-o-Select)
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Hey pop music fans look no further! this cd is what you need! Yes the fine people at Hipo-Select have heard me! (well i DID send email requesting this to happen!) they finally put out all the Emitt Rhodes LPs. He is the long lost brother to pop music, although he gets some Paul Mccartney comparisons, he is in a world all is own. After hits he wrote with the 60's Merry-Go-Round including "Live", he made these 4 great pop records...and none did well! during all this he got sued by his label...after his 4th record, Farewell To Paradise , failed he got discouraged and stopped putting out records. After you listen to this incredible output you'll see what a great loss it is that he stopped. I hope he will forgive this cruel and indifferent world and make more...but in the meantime we have this... |
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 Richmond Fontaine - Thirteen Cities (Union)
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If you thought Reno was the end of the line, what with its cast-off sleaze, small-time losers and junior varsity hookers, man were you wrong. Where do you go from there? The desert, that's where. You go there to watch things never change and you wait around to die. Willy Vlautin and his compatriots have enlisted the help of Calexico/Giant Sand etc. and have established one last desperate outpost out where there is no shade and there are miles and miles of nothing happening. No saving graces, no matter where you look. I'm surprised there aren't any vultures circling this review as we speak. Buy it, you sad bastards. I did.
The motel life ain't no life.
- Cole |
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 Rob Sonic - Sabotage Gigante (Def Jux)
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Def Jux must be a serious place these days. Every release this past year by a Def Jux artist has been significantly darker than their previous effort. From EL-P to Aesop Rock and now Rob Sonic. Written and Produced by Rob Sonic Sabotage Gigante is markedly more trim than Telicatessen . "Mother Of All Bombs" is the closest in swagger to previous album Telicatessen but as close as it is in production the sense of play has been replaced by frustration with a broken system and a need to rail against the current state of our nation. The focus is survival, mental and physical. This record is hard with plenty of head bobbing fist-pumping action that reaches its fever pitch with "Smoke If You Got'um" featuring Aesop Rock. It is refreshing to see there are still some Hip-Hop artists and labels that remember the social function that Hip Hop once served.
- Edmund LeStrange |
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 Rock Plaza Central - Are We Not Horses (Yep Roc)
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Recommended if you like railroad crossings, creeks, and joyful noise. I am making a personal appeal to anyone who liked Lullaby for the Working Class (both of you) to buy this record. Now. Don't be that person that pretends they were always into Neutral Milk Hotel, get in on the ground floor of something shambling and magnificent
- Cole |
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 Andrew Rosas - 23rd and 2
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Where Has Andrew Rosas been hiding? The Austin-based musician recently self-released his fully realized debut and it's a breath of fresh air. Rosas' affinity for Big Star and Chris Bell is evident here. Shades of early Dwight Twilley and bands like 20/20 (Yellow Pills anyone?) and the Shoes can also be heard. Some quieter moments on the record conjure Sunflower era Beach Boys, and early post-Beatles George Harrison.
Fans of more recent power pop practitioners such as the New Pornographers, particularly the A.C. Newman penned material, and bands like the Apples in Stereo will also find much to like on this record.
- Andy |
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 The Rosebuds - Night Of The Furies (Merge Records)
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Uh oh, are The Rosebuds trying to pull the Of Montreal "Let's put some asses in the seats by making them shake their asses" trick. Is that a drum machine I hear along with propulsive bass lines? On a Rosebuds record? Well, maybe. But it works. You may question whether you somehow missed a transitional album, you didn't. The addition of programming and synths is admittedly a little jarring at first but when it's all said and done The Rosebuds have managed put out yet another solid album. If their last release, Birds Make Good Neighbors , was representative of the sunshine infused blissful moments of a new relationship then Night Of The Furies catapults the relationship forward into late night doubt and regret. While is it certainly a darker record the sun does there are breaks in the night sky with "Cemetery Lawn" and "Get Up Get Out". Check it out.
- Edmund LeStrange |
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 Christina Rosenvinge - Continental 62 (Smells Like Records)
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A criminally overlooked Danish/Spanish pop songwriter, usually too syrupy sweet Euro-pop for the art crowd and too weird for the pop scensters. Some years ago Rosenvinge abandoned her mainstream pop career (stadium filling teen pop sensation) for more substantial fare.
Excelling at themes of dislocation, alienation and failed dreams, Rosenvinge paints all these moods simultaneously in brood moody textures and distinct pop song structures. Accompanied by Tim Foljahn (2 Dollar Guitar) it’s easy to smell his esoteric mope all over these tracks when they are at their strongest. Sometimes she strays from her strong suits on this release, but it also contains some of her best material to date.
- Paul |
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 Shellac - Excellent Italian Greyhound (Touch & Go)
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Chicago's finest finally return! Appropriately Todd Trainer's drum is the first pristinely recorded sound you hear. From there these three proceed to build it and take it aprt and build it again right before your very ears. It is every bit as sharp and lacerating as you would hope with a sly nod on occasion. The long layoff is no cause for alarm, as it turns out. The best effort since At Action Park. There is also an excellent version of "steady as she goes" on the Chicago installment of the Burn to Chine DVD series that Bob Weston curated. Check it out.
- Cole |
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 Shocking Pinks - S/T (DFA)
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Blasting into your area with a wall of lo-fi pop bliss, this self-titled DFA debut is crafted to near perfection. Nick Harte's one man band approach to make your feet start moving and your heart start yearning allows the party-starters to come to terms with their emotions. Remember that girl you dated at the dorms, the one who made you that mix tape where Neutral Milk Hotel was lumped between My Bloody Valentine and LCD Soundsystem's "I'm Losing My Edge"? Well I guarantee you she owns this record and listens to it when she makes out with her new boyfriend as she forgets all about you.
- Ian Orth |
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 Skream - Skream! (tempa)
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As far as I am concerned Skream is the crowned king of Dubstep. I was introduced to Skream a little over a year ago with a track called, "midnight request line." The track quickly shot to the top of many Dj play lists and was infecting the world over to which it crossed so many genres that it was hard not to hear it where ever you went. His use of simple and effective melodies over the Dubstep formula has managed to give him the upper hand in really pushing boundaries. I really don't recommend listening to this on your crappy ipod headphones. There will be so much lost in the low-end department. I would also say that you should be careful with where you do play this, as it may damage your audio system due to dangerously low frequencies, just a warning. Album highlights are the previously mentioned "midnight request line", "Rutten" which has a retarded flute over it, and the amazing vocal track "check it" featuring warrior queen that really makes me want to buy about four sub woofers for my ipod. A good intro to the sound that is known as Dubstep.
- Fresh Prince |
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 Soft - Gone Faded (Lightyear)
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The music of Soft is like a time machine which makes express stops through the classic time in British music when Brit-Pop and Shoegazer bands were atop the pops, blaring from Radio One, and cluttering the pages of the Face (r.i.p.). The band has been riding high on blogs, in England, and in Japan (where they actually reached #10 on the pop charts there) for the past few years on the strength of their demo CD alone, but now with therelease of their debut Gone Faded, (produced by local Rory Phillips) Soft may honestly have the same impact on youth culture that albums like Is This It, by the Strokes (which they sound nothing like) and the self titled debut of the Stone Roses (who they do sound like) had upon their releases.
Each song is a mini masterpiece, where standard pop songs become masked in a wash of lush phased guitars and grooving drums and bass. The end sound is huge, warm, and inspiring. This is strutting music, this is walk down the street with your arms waving music, this is moped music, this is driving music, this is the next big thing music; and never has an American band gotten the British swagger of cool down this perfect.
- Ian Orth |
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 Omar Souleyman - Highway to Hassake: Folk & Pop Sounds of Syria (Sublime Frequencies)
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A legend in the cassette and bootleg CD markets of Syria, Omar Souleyman sees his first Western release from renowned International music ephermerist label Sublime Frequencies. A mish-mash of Syrian, Arabic and Iraqi traditional musical stylings roll out at breakneck speeds over frenetic keyboards and splatter shot rhythms. Finally, a cheap casio-tone dance party worth waving a Kalashnikov to.
Souleyman’s music embodies street level Syrian pop and folk music, a style often considered too inconsequential for Western recognition yet lies at the heart of Syrian street life. Moving back and forth through somber dirges and joyful exaltations, Souleyman infuses his music with secular and religious moods and images, egged on by the poet and long time collaborator Mahmoud Harbi.
- Paul |
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 Soundtrack - Valerie and Her Week of Wonders (B-Music)
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The soundtrack to Valerie is from a 1970 Czechoslovakian vampire film. I have never seen this film but it's definitely top on this year's things-to-do-list. There are Wickerman comparisons but Valerie is way more creepy...and beautiful. Unlike other soundtracks, I can listen to this from start to finish. the chanting, the bells, songs of the villagers and dark chamber music make this a must have for any collectors of the new avant-folk movement as well as goth kids.
- Bill |
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 Stars Of The Lid - And Their Refinement Of The Decline (Kranky)
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Once, a very many years ago, the guys in SOTL were walking to the Cannibal Club (now-defunct punk/indie venue/bar on 6 th St in Austin) to go see some great music. Well, they just happened to look over and in a nearby parking lot they saw some drunk people in a van. These people were very drunk and as they tried to exit the parking lot, they ran into another car. Adam and Brian decided that was an uncool thing to do so they got the license plate of the van and called the cops. They then proceeded to wait until the cops showed up and gave them all the information that they could. The other car happened to belong to me and I think that it was pretty cool for these guys to wait around and try to help me out without even knowing who I was. (Turns out we had some mutual friends and kinda knew each other anyway.) Oh and this is their new record. It's really good and probably sounds like nothing else in your collection. (unless you're really into this stuff in which case I don't need to suggest this to you) " Beautiful" and "wondrously baffling" are two phrases I would use to describe it.
- Corby |
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 Marnie Stern - In Advance Of The Broken Arm (Kill Rock Stars)
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Not knowing anything about Marnie Stern, and having only the album artwork to inform my opinion of her, I was expecting perhaps a pleasant collection of acoustic balladry, and not the mind-melting double-necked guitar rock contained within the album's 13 tracks.
Marnie Stern has right out of the gates found a sound all her own, with the closest comparisons probably being bands like Hella (Hella's Zach Hill lends his frenetic drumming on the record) or a slightly mellower Lightning Bolt, but with her high-pitched vocals giving her music a more ethereal and melodic feel. In fact, some of the earlier Deerhoof records could also be a good point of reference.
Marnie Stern is one of the best surprises of 2007, and this record simply rocks and is damn catchy to boot!
- Andy |
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 D.M. Stith - Heavy Ghost (Asthmatic Kitty Records)
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A stunning marriage of things old and new, beautiful and chaotic, ragged and polished. Stith incorporates melodies and harmonies from old musicals and Disney movies with his own strange arrangements and intimate recordings of his singular guitar strumming and piano work (sometimes reminiscent of Garson's infamous solo on Bowie's Aladdin Sane). Hints of Radiohead or Buckley will inevitably be heard but he steers you away from those comparisons with deftly composed lyrics and unique phrasing. Not just some neo-folkie who wishes he was born in the 50's, D.M. Stith is a modernist through and through. -Corby |
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 Sunn O))) - Oracle (EMI)
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Do you remember that scene in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where Indiana stumbles upon that underground cult who is sacrificing people to Kali (the Goddess of Death)? The whole "Nun-Nun Shi Baht," heart ripping out stuff? Well, listening to the new Sunn LP I feel like I just stumbled upon that ritual. Dark and moody atmospheric drone, in the traditional Sunn sense (if there is really anything traditional about Sunn), this record scared the hell out of me. The b-side was originally written for a live performance collaboration with the New York artist Banks Violette. Banks created a sculptural version of Sunn's stage set up (amp's, effects, etc) in cast and resin and stuffed it all in a small tight room where the song was being played. This was to give the viewer a sense of loss and absence. Side note: I can tell you from experience that listening to this on a capmetro (or any) bus at 6 in the morning will give you the same feeling.
Anyway, the record comes in a nice gate fold sleeve with nice pictures of the sculptures. While I think "Orakulum" (the b-side) is good, the real gem on here is the a-side, "Belurol Puszitit." Featuring Atsuo from Boris on Drums, Attila Csihar from Mayhem on vocals (also on b-side) and Joe Preston of Earth / The Melvins on Jackhammer (!!!!!!), it's Sunn at its best, and scariest. The songs are your traditional 16 to 18 minutes long each and will only be available for sale in LP format (unless you were lucky enough to get a tour only copy of the CD which came with a second CD featuring an additional 45 minute long track). If you're a fan of experimental or drone music, pick this up, you will not be disappointed.
- Adam |
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 Tarentel - Ghetto Beats on the Surface of the Sun (Temporary Residence)
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Man oh man is this sucker dense! No for serious I don't think my head can cram this masterpiece into itself. Noisy, clustered, pretty, long, and pretty long, are all perfect adjectives to describe this twisted spin through the Tarentel world.
Originally only released on a four vinyl series, Ghetto Beats on the Surface of the Sun is two and half hours of Tarentel showing off why they are the true spelunkers of sound. Crammed onto two CDs these 150 minutes of sound exploration may leave you feeling a bit overwhelmed, but you come out the smarter for it. Available in a numbered, limited edition quadruple gatefold jacket, Ghetto Beats on the Surface of the Sun is the sound of a band taking itself to the next level; a band that is not afraid to show off it's confidence in finding beauty in its unexpectedness.
- Ian Orth |
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 Titan - A Raining Sun of Light and Love For You and You and You (Tee Pee)
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Equal parts heavy psych, sludgy prog-rock and psychedelic freakout, the debut album from Titan almost lives up the the sticker on the front of the CD (which drops Ash Ra Tempel, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Hawkwind and Zombi, all in the same sentence). The album kicks off somewhat misleadingly with a minute of hippie, psych-folk w/ nasally vocals, but when the band kicks in, they never look back (and never trouble themselves with vocals again, either).
Fuzz guitar riffage, arpeggiated keyboard progressions, delay drenched noodling, spacey drones: they all combine to perfect effect. Never overindulgent and produced with a dirty aesthetic that keeps everything sound like it's just on the edge of falling into the black hole at the center of our galaxy. Add to all this liner note artwork featuring a giant mushroom and completely illegible '60s flyer-style text and it's hard not to know where these guys stand on the topic of the war on drugs.
- Doug |
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 Turzi - A (Kemado)
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So French duo Air started up this record label a handful of years back called Record Makers. The plan was/is to release only the choice cuts, the crème de la crème of French musical tastemakers. To date every release has been top notch, each carving itself deeper into the musical landscape that Air seems to be playing God over. Listening carefully to each Record Makers release you can hear what it is about said artist that beckoned the duo's attention and support. Case in point, A by Turzi.
Sounding like an organic take on Air's classic 10,000 Hz Legend, Turzi brings those driving kraut rock bass and drums to the heavy metal electronic gun show. Sounding lost somewhere between a drugged out Moriconne or John Carpenter soundtrack and a more garage rock styled Dungen, A evolves into a masterpiece of straight forward yet creative, intriguing, and well thought out rock n' roll. You could call it a journey if you felt so inclined, but that would sound too cliché for an album that is more deserving of a proper description.
Dungen was mentioned above, and for good reason. Dungen, as many people know, found United States love from the heavy push that the equally as solid NYC record label, Kemado threw behind the bands stateside debut. Well Kemado has proven itself unpredictable yet again by adding Turzi to its catalog and hopefully giving A the same amount of love and attention as it gives to the rest of its roster, ahem including local metal lords The Sword... duh. Kemado has been coming correct as of late escaping the blah blah bore of a young NYC label, and with it's releasing of A on these shores the team of Turzi and Kemado could prove a force to be reckoned with come time to make those 2007 top ten lists.
- Ian Orth |
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