Vol. 6 Issue 76 February 2012
Nothing says Valentine's Day more than a web page update! Not sure why my loved ones aren't happy when I give them a web page update every year for Valentine's Day, but this year is the best one yet! Twilight Sad, Lambchop or A Place To Bury Strangers not as good as a box of chocolates? A new record from the Dirty Three (first in 7 years!), is by far better than any blood diamond! Stop, stop the complaining. I'm sure by next year Hallmark will have me crank out a line of Valentine's Day cards. Happy Web Page Update Day!
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BRM: SuperB-log-owl?
Posted by Lyle On Feb 3, 2012
Yeah, I know Eli Manning lives in Hoboken. I also know that IF the ummm... Giants,... Read More
Current Releases
- Click to see:
- Merge
- Dead Oceans
- Thrill Jockey
- DFA
Merge
www.mergerecords.com
Lambchop
"Mr. M"
If Wilco is a gateway drug to alt-country, then Lambchop is what you are listening to right before your friends show up for an intervention. They have spent the last 20 years being weird and wonderful, recording albums built around Kurt Wagner’s voice and fingerplucked guitars. Though this is no exception in that regard, Mr. M (a record they've dedicated to Vic Chestnut...missing Mr. Chestnut as well boys) is richer than anything they’ve ever recorded. Rounding out their sound are harmonies, lush string arrangements, and some fantastically way-out sound choices that fill their many instrumental passages along the way. Check it out for yourself on “Gone Tomorrow.”
Dead Oceans
www.deadoceans.com
A Place to Bury Strangers
"Onwards to the Wall"
Produced, engineered, mixed and even mastered(!) by the band themselves, Onwards to the Wall is A Place to Bury Strangers’ first release for Dead Oceans. Combining “pop hooks and doomed-out vibes,” APTBS make some serious sunglasses-in-the-daytime rock and roll. Joy Division with guitar pedals? Jesus Lizard if they were a shoegaze band? Beats me. I picture these guys as the cool band playing at the scary nightclub where the bad girl takes the good boy in that movie that a couple hundred people are working on right now in Vancouver or in some coastal North Carolina town. This EP is loud and it’s fast and it rules. Listen to it at a loud volume. (But not too loud because, well, actually, it might blow your speakers.) Do your body a favor and check out “So Far Away.”
Thrill Jockey
www.thrilljockey.com
Dustin Wong
"Dreams Say, View, Create, Shadow Lead"
Guitars and pedals. Pedals and guitars. No one wants to be bored by technical jargon, but for Dustin Wong to create his second solo LP for Thrill Jockey, Dreams Say, View, Create, Shadow Leads, there had to be a complicated process that involves tuners, octave pedals, distortion pedals, loop pedals, envelope filters, more delay pedals, and a whole bunch of other stuff that you and I wouldn’t understand. But thankfully he went ahead and did it so we could have this hour of hyper, dreamy, instrumental, guitar virtuosity that somehow could appeal to fans of Cap’n Jazz and Philip Glass. DW used to play in both Ponytail and Ecstatic Sunshine, too, so that’s good news. Baltimore pride. This record rules! Check out "Ice Sheets On Feet Prints."
DFA
www.dfarecords.com
The 2 Bears
"Be Strong"
Some people say that music sets you free. The 2 Bears may agree. Joe Goddard (of—no big deal—Grammy Award-nominated Hot Chip) and Raf Rundell have been piling up EP after EP over the last couple of years, and the London duo’s first full-length is Be Strong (DFA). This record is very English, very dancey, and very pop. These songs are so positive! Need some touchstones? How ’bout Gorillaz, Beats International, Terry Hall, and Soul II Soul? Absolutely right, they got the vibe. Be Strong is twelve songs but, more accurately, it’s twelve hits. Do the math and check out “Work.” You can dance if you want to!
Mute
www.mute.com
Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves of Destiny
"Your Truly, Cellophane Nose"
2012 will most likely be Beth Jeans Houghton’s year. Though she has released a few singles here and there, her first long player, Yours Truly, Cellophane Nose (Mute), with her band Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny is a star-making album. Firstly, she is an impossibly talented folk-leaning singer-songwriter from England (it doesn’t get much better than fair voiced folkies from the UK). Secondly, she is impossibly adorable (check Google images, I’ll wait), a fact that was not missed by Anthony Keidis, who is currently dating her (Beth was one when Blood Sugar Sex Magic was released. ONE!) Thirdly, the band backing her is amazing. That sounds like a trifecta for success if you ask me (which you sort of did by reading this...) Check out “Dodecahedron,” and if you think the song starts out spectacularly, wait until the band comes in with her.
Fat Cat
www.fat-cat.co.uk/
The Twilight Sad
"No One Can Ever Know"
Are you sick of guitars yet? From misty Scotland (the Pacific Northwest of Europe) returns The Twilight Sad, with their third full-length No One Can Ever Know (FatCat). “Anti-produced” by the more dance-minded Andrew Weatherall, this stripped down LP is less Wall-of-Sound-y than their previous releases, and has newfound Industrial and Krautrock-y leanings. Buzz bands like Cabaret Voltaire, Can, Magazine, and even Depeche Mode and Nine Inch Nails are being thrown around as influences. Interesting. I never thought I’d live to see the day when I could and would dance to this band. These are exciting times. Still as “perennially unhappy” as on their earlier records, Twilight Sad are heading down a new path that is darker and scarier. How about checking out “Don’t Look at Me.”
Drag City
www.dragcity.com
Sophia Knapp
"Into The Waves"
I have never described someone’s sound by using the name Stevie Nicks and been complementary. But it’s gonna happen in this here blurb (wait for it....) Sophia Knapp has recorded a magical record for her solo debut. This is the first time she has stepped out from the canopy of her band Cliffie Swan. If you are familiar with that band then you know Ms. Knapp has a playful, toothsome voice that conjures up Stevie Nicks’ husky voice in the sexiest way possible. On Into The Waves (Drag City) she has created a new sonic language for her music, somehow combining the icy sheen of ‘80s downtown dance records with the warmth of ‘60s folkies into a combo that is immediately new without being jarring. Bill Callahan agrees, as he lends his smoggy vocals to a pair of duets on this album. But the real star of the whole show is Sophia’s voice and her songwriting skills, as is evidenced on stellar “Nothing To Lose.”
Dirty Three
"Toward the Low Sun"
Seven years. It’s been seven years since Dirty Three, Australia’s kings of post-rock, have recorded an album. For a band that was something of a constant soundtrack during indie’s ‘90s explosion, this is surprising. The world has really changed since their last release (how in the world did people watch 14 episodes of Frasier in a row without Netflix Instant? Talk about the dark ages...), but what hasn’t changed is the trio’s ability to tug at the heartstrings with simple instrumentation played in unique ways. Perhaps this is nowhere more apparent than with the longing and heartache of the violin melody in Toward The Low Sun (Drag City) standout “Rain Song” so check it out.