This collection of remixes is something that will be appreciated by fanatics of the Foreign Exchange. For those who don't fit that description, it would be hard to recommend that you add this to your must-listens. When artist releases an album full of new renditions of old tracks, it can be for a variety of reasons. In this case, +FE Music: The Reworks serves as a piece to showcase the friends and associates of the Foreign Exchange. While a good chunk of the remixes are reworked instrumentals by Nicolay, other contributions come from the likes of Vikter Duplaix , [...]
In commemoration of the 20th anniversary of Exile in Guyville , Sound Affects inaugurates a new Between the Grooves series that examines the indie rock landmark musically, as well as its author's own changing relationship with the album over the years. "Your record collection don't exist / You don't even know who Liz Phair is". This playful admonishing of a much younger lover is, in many ways, the most telling moment on Liz Phair's controversial eponymous 2003 album. The once reigning (blowjob) queen of the indie rock scene, Phair celebrated the 10th anniversary of her near-universally praised debut [...]
PopMatters premieres Suchness , the debut album by trans-Pacific duo We Are Loud Whispers. Trans-Pacific duo We Are Loud Whispers have a knack of making what doesn't seem possible possible. The brainchild of Sonya Westcott and Ayumu Haitani, the pair's debut effort Suchness was created over emails sent between their respective homes in Seattle and the Japanese island of Honshu, without the two principals ever coming together face-to-face again after briefly meeting in 2007 when Westcott's earlier gig Arthur & Yu toured Japan. And yet you wouldn't know...
There are at least four various artists tribute albums to Kris Kristofferson, all released in the last 11 years. Why him? Is it about the songwriter or the songs? The musicians or the listeners? The present or the past? The albums themselves might provide the answers. There are, at least, four various-artists tribute albums to Kris Kristofferson, all released in the last 11 years. Why him? His air of rebellion and hard-living appeals to musicians, including various sets of country artists who think of themselves as more progressive than the rest. He's a famous figure representing the [...]
PopMatters premieres Sun Moon , the latest from Bay Area indie-pop vets the Orange Peels. When it comes to going off in a new direction in terms of coming up with a different approach, how does a band go from being compared to such seemingly contradictory sources as the Byrds and Burt Bacharach to something far more contemporary, such as the New Pornographers? Well, the Orange Peels have done just that with their fifth and latest release, Sun Moon, which is out on Minty Fresh and Mystery Lawn Music...
With their culturally tied blend of eccentricity, intricacy, conceptuality, power, and catchiness, the Mars Volta left an indelible mark on the music industry with its six-album legacy. Of all the progressive rock groups that have come and/or gone over the last several decades, few -- if any -- have been as idiosyncratic and audacious as the Mars Volta. Formed out of the ashes of post-hardcore Texan outfit At the Drive-In (whose other three members went on to form indie rock band Sparta) by guitarist Omar Rodrguez-Lpez and vocalist Cedric Bixler-Zavala in 2001, the ensemble continuously broken boundaries, challenged expectations, [...]
On their much anticipated debut Silence Yourself Savages not only prove they are here, but that they are here to stay. There's some cognitive dissonance in Savages naming their much anticipated debut Silence Yourself, because there's absolutely nothing quiet or demure about the buzzed-about UK act and its unblinking neo-post-punk. Indeed, Savages got on the radar by backing up its own brand of next-wave don't-call-it-feminist rock with an attitude that's just as loud and brash as their music. Even if they don't fully identify with the feminist tag often attributed to them and apparently bristle at...
For Willie's 80th birthday, the Family brings it all back home. Willie Nelson's new label, Legacy, is billing the legend's new album, Let's Face the Music and Dance as timed to coincide with Willie's 80th birthday. True enough, but Willie would be putting out another album now no matter the occasion: He's been on a two-album-per-year pace for as long as anyone can remember. Such a pace is particularly amazing given the fact that no single artist in popular music history is more synonymous with the...
One of the most tragic and elegant records I've ever heard. Since its formation a decade ago, Italian outfit Nosound has gained a humbling reputation as one of the most emotionally and textually beautiful acts in the art/progressive rock spectrum. Founded and masterminded by guitarist/vocalist Giancarlo Erra, the project has already released plenty of work and received plenty of acclaim. On its newest LP, Afterthoughts, Erra and company continue to craft awe-inspiring gems filled with universal heartache and unique, bittersweet instrumentation. In fact, it feels like...
Full of sunny garage-pop gems from an original personality, King Tuff Was Dead is a reissue of King Tuff's impressive debut album. King Tuff aka Kyle Thomas makes feel good garage-pop songs that will have you singing along in just a couple listens. What separates him from contemporaries is his distinct voice and strange persona, both of which are inseparable from one another. He sounds like Marc Bolan after sucking helium out of a balloon (in a good way) and portrays himself as a strange loner, one who finds more satisfaction sitting at home, smoking marijuana and...
There's a kind of endemic patience in the fabric of these performances, a mood that doesn't depend on the speed of the song. A tourist in New York was walking down the street one morning, trusting with total innocence that he would climb the World Trade Center to see the view, when events occurred that made the activity impossible, not only then but forever afterwards. At home in Uganda he decided that unity had to become a priority, people unified and getting along, so he organized this coffee-growing collective, Mirembe Kawomera, or Delicious Peace, where people from a...
Woodkid's first full-length LP feels like the soundtrack to a high budget blockbuster. The problem is that it has trouble living up to this enormous scale. "Can we keep our Bering Strait / Or will we be blown off course / Are we instruments of fate? / Do we really have a choice?" Woodkid's ambitiously titled debut album, The Golden Age, is something that strives to sound enormous. The French musician has crafted grandiose instrumentals that aspire to return to a form of music that has since been lost upon a new era of sound. A former video director, [...]
A lack of consistency and an unfortunate fondness for Korn and Disturbed mars an occasionally promising debut. There is a strange sense of conflicted identity on Psychothermia's debut record Fall to the Rising Sun. The first five tracks combine modern metalcore and alternative metal with classic New Wave of British Heavy metal references quite successfully. The vocals are strong, the guitars are down-right Maiden-esc at times while always sounding distinctly modern and American, and the percussion is both heavy and complex. There are plenty of catchy hooks to go around on these...
See previews of this month's biggest pop entertainment. Every month brings us countless ways to be entertained, but how do we really know what the biggest releases and events are at the movies, on television, or in music? Well, this handy top ten list, complete with release dates, is here to let you know what's out there. There's something for everybody and a whole month of entertainment ahead.
The infrastructure will collapse from voltage spikes. Throw your keys in the bowl, kiss your husband good night, and give a listen to the 127th most acclaimed album of all time. Mendelsohn: After a couple of years wandering around in the digital hinterlands, Radiohead came back home to their guitars and put together a record with everything they had learned over their nearly 20-year-old career. If you are looking for the quintessence of Radiohead, look no further than In Rainbows. Everything the band ever was (and may ever be) was distilled into an odd, genre spanning collection of songs [...]
Get the scoop on the latest albums by Vampire Weekend, Savages, and Deerhunter, as well as an extensive list of May's new releases. You'd think that the record release schedule would have to slow down at some point, but the albums slated to come out in May only up the ante on the months before. This month is highlighted by new efforts from indie touchstones that come right on each other's heels, one week after the next, starting with Deerhunter's Monomania on May 7, followed up by Vampire Weekend's Modern Vampires of the City (May 14) and the...
Aladdin Sane may be the best example of one of Bowie's central themes: the artifice not as something to break through, not as an impediment on the way to the real, but the artifice as its own sort of realness. It's been 46 years since David Bowie put out his first record and we're still trying to figure him out. We're still trying because he's still dodging definition at every turn. Just look at the cover of his latest album, The Next Day, an album that itself emerged from a decade or radio silence and health scares and [...]
The Melvins' new collection of covers is less of a hit than a miss. The kings of sludge play at being jester! Would it be nauseating redundancy to state that the Melvins have influenced any band of subsequent origin that has opted to tune their instruments below the key of E and further beyond? Sure it would. Despite the deserved overstatement of that fact, it wouldn't be untruthful to say so. Kind of unwritten and slightly unsung, the Melvins' career has been one of the most prolific in subterranean rock. Over the span of more than two...
Each bar straddles rapid snares that pop and snap like firecrackers rippling on a waterbed mattress of liquid bass. Is this starting to sound like dirty talk? Then you're starting to get it. In less than a decade the producer known as Diplo has risen from seemingly nowhere to being the center of the party, making some of the strangest and most groundbreaking electronic dance music to ever shake a bass bin. Combining elements of trap, reggae, and dubstep with pop, Diplo has helped shape the evolving sound of the modern club. It's been four years since he and [...]
Love Has Come for You is a well-played, competently written effort, and while it may not rank as a masterpiece, it's far from embarrassing. More often than not (a lot more often than not), musical recordings by actors, comedians, or other such artists amount to little more than vanity projects. Remember Eddie Murphy's foray into pop, or Bruce Willis's R&B album? Yeah, no one else does either, and for good reason. Such ill-conceived releases are perhaps the most telling expression of the egomania that grips so many of our culture's artists and celebrities. Fortunately, Steve Martin's latest musical [...]
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Lana Del Rey is the “Queen of Disaster” on New ‘Born To Die’ Leak
