"My mama said don't talk to strangers" Easily the most successful thing to come out of Canada's now-defunct version of the Idol franchise, Hedley is a punk-pop band with a lot of radio appeal. I've written about them several times already. I'm a huge fan of lead singer Jacob Hoggard's voice. Their new album ups the electronic influence (think Boys Like Girls, Cobra Starship, etc) and though I haven't had time to listen to most of it, the first handful of tracks are quite good. Lead single Cha-Ching was incredibly catchy, and [...]
Hot on the heels of last year's awesome Find Me A Drink Home , the Lansing, Michigan trio Cheap Girls is back with another great full-length full of straightforward punkish power-pop, My Roaring 20's . There really aren't any huge changes to be found when comparing My Roaring 20's to their debut, but (again) it seems as if Cheap Girls know exactly what it is they do well and just stick with it. The production is (however) a bit better but still retains enough of the lo-fi charm that no one will accuse [...]
Contrast Podcast recently asked music bloggers like myself to submit our favorite 50 songs of the year for their annual "Festive 503 podcast. Our selections were then compiled into a shortlist and now we've been asked to recruit votes to narrow it down. For the curious, I've bolded the 10 songs I personally voted for. I really, really want "Nice Very Nice" by Kurt Vonnegut & Dave Soldier (from their album Ice-9 Ballads ) to make the final list. Not only because it's my favorite song of the year, from my favorite album of the year, [...]
Matter of Time mp3 The Leisure Society The Sleeper ..... ..... buy it Well, now this is getting interesting... Over at the Contrast Podcast , Tim's solicited everyone for their favorite 50 songs of 2009, remember? From all the responses he's compiled the top 155. I'm very impressed with the list! If you didn't submit your faves yet, you've still got a chance to get in the game at this point! Help us out, eh? (I"ve highlighted my top 10 in blue) Here's [...]
Wikipedia knows next to nothing of the Stockton-on-Tees noisenik quartet undulating the underground enough to crack Geordie pavements. Lead barker Kingsley Hall may well be the most articulate cult figurehead to shred the pages of NME with unequalled bravado and outspoken chivalry since Morrissey. Taking on the mainstream, one sycophant-smashing step at a time, The Chapman Family may well be the dark horses to back over the dingy, hurdled tracks of a recession-obsessed England. Brace yourselves- it's lenghty. But comedic genius shouldn't be abbreviated... Dots: The majority of those aware of the cataclysmic [...]
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book. Hos, Hookers, Call Girls & Rent Boys collects stories, poems, and essays by sex workers. Compiled by David Henry Sterry and RJ Martin, Jr., the book organizes this collection of refreshingly genuine and brutally honest writings by category (love, life, money, etc.). The New York Times wrote of the book: "From the unappealing title, you might think this is a truly trashy [...]
OMGZ! For whatever reason I really love this album. I mean, like, despite my better judgment I like this a whole fucking lot! First, the album is ridiculously titled Throw Up Your Hands For One Night Stands courtesy of Atlanta, Georgia's Freshman 15. They are one of those nu-pop-punk (or just call it pop-core) bands with overly-cheesy and cliched lyrics about loving and missing girls, broken hearts, and all those things. Yes, some (if not all) of the lyrics are cringe-worthy, but these guys seem sincere and I can certainly remember being in their shoes when [...]
Modern electronic-rock music, inaugurated in the early 1960s, is, and always has been, a joint enterprise of British military intelligence and Satanic cults. On the one side, the Satanists control the major rock groups through drugs, sex, threats of violence, and even murder. On the otherside, publicity, tours, and recordings are financed by record companies connected to British military intelligence circles. Both sides are intimately entwined with the biggest business in the world, the international drug trade. The so-called "rock stars" are pathetic puppets caught in a much larger scheme. From the moment they receive their first recording royalties, the [...]
Think About Life at Arlene's Grocery | "M for Montreal" Showcase at CMJ (10/21/09) Malajube at Arlene's Grocery | "M for Montreal" Showcase at CMJ (10/21/09) Photos : Jon Klemm M for Montreal 2009 Schedule ( Nov 19-21, 2009 ) Beast , Malajube and Think About Life were three of the bands I caught at the M for Montreal [...]
Three weeks ago I posted a list of my 50 favorite albums of the past decade. You can catch up with that here , here , here , here , and here , if you'd like. While drafting the list I found that I rediscovered plenty of albums that were and are still worthy of more attention, even though they ultimately weren't included on the finished product. It was extremely difficult to cut many of them, especially those made by lesser-known artists. So starting last week, continuing today, and for the next 2 Mondays I'll [...]
Many shy away from admitting they enjoy some Duran Duran; the fact they had thousands of teenage girls screaming for them for a few years somehow degrades their pop value (teenage girl fans are apparently credibility-suckers - another argument for another time). As a band, Simon LeBon and Co generally take the flak for the sins of the 80s: excess, commercialist greed, hyperbolic style, etc. I, myself, was a teenager in the 90s when I first heard Duran Duran, and while listening to songs like Planet Earth, Girls on Film, Hungry Like the Wolf, and The Reflex, I became a [...]
Hefner & Murry the Hump, The Point, Oxford, 15 April 2000 Beulah, Butterflies of Love & Pluto Monkey, The Point, Oxford, 21 April 2000 Encouraging thought the launch of ATP was, 2000 was the year of the schmindie credit crunch. Later in the year I was sent not one but two books giving retrospective accounts of Alan McGee's Creation Records. The Creation model--that one Oasis would fund investment in dozens of long-shot indie weirdos, one or two of which might become another [...]
Listening: 1. Jacaszek : If I only had one word to describe Poland's Jacaszek it would be otherworldly. 2. Dinowalrus : This Brooklyn group makes aggressive noise rock and recently got remixed by Mae Shi. Listen to: Nuke Duke 'Em (Mae Shi remix)( mp3 ) 3. Yellow Fever : Austin, TX band Yellow Fever play minimal art pop and are constructing their debut album for Vivian Girls' Wild World label imprint. Listen to: Hellfire ( mp3 ) Reading: 1. Norman Thomas [...]
Mariah Carey managed to validate her acting career by dressing down and taking a humble supporting part in depress-o-rama indie flick Precious , which opened last weekend. We can't believe the reigning champion of Pop Stars Pretending to Be Actresses has done on-screen work people can actually enjoy non-ironically. Brava, Mariah. Our little hoochie-dressed girl's all grown up. Mariah's earned our respect, but there are tons of other pop singers who, to paraphrase Mean Girls , keep trying to make this "acting" thing happen. It's not going to happen! After the [...]
Whoah, this was unexpected. We knew Portland experimental rock/folk/etc. trio Ghost to Falco had been touring a lot, but we didn't know there was a record coming out so soon. The band, currently in Europe, will release third full-length Exotic Believers as a vinyl-only release before the month is out. If you haven't checked out Ghost to Falco, you really should. Eric Crespo's group plays a lyrically conscious experimental folk-pop with nods to post-punk acts like Fugazi and Cursive. Just when one anticipates Crespo's next twist or turn, he injects a jazzy departure or wall of [...]
050. El Gran Silencio. "Chuntaro Style" Chuntaros Radio Poder I can't even imagine how many jukeboxes were torn to pieces by this explosive juicy shaker. Apparently, there isn't enough volume for it; its excess of everything is what makes it so attractive and undeniably, a crowd-pleaser. A celebration of its very own pedestrian vibe, so many market shops, tianguis, malls and weddings dancing to this very heavy voltage of chuntaro folklore. CR 049. Pedropiedra. "Inteligencia Dormida" [...]
After listening to Raditude , I am convinced Rivers Cuomo is the cop (the FBI agent, the NSA spy, etc.) so deep undercover he can no longer tell the difference between the person he is and the person he is pretending to be. The line between perception and reality is distorted, and the point at which it was crossed is a distant memory. Even though Make Believe was an exercise in banality and The Red Album was a weird-for-the-sake-of-being-we ird album with horrible results, we still got occasional lyrical assurances [...]
É sempre difícil lidar com expectativas e a produção do Planeta Terra parece ter entendido ao longo dos seus três anos de existência. Em 2007, o festival era a cara nova que deu certo apostando em infra-estrutura, pontualidade, preço baixo e num line-up sem headliner, mas com escolhas bem feitas como Rapture e Devo. A boa fama do primeiro ano e um line-up sensacional (Animal Collective, JAMC, Spoon, Kaiser Chiefs, Bloc Party, Foals, Breeders!) fizeram uma a segunda edição um evento divertido, mas que já não lidava tão bem com o tamanho do seu público (filas quilométricas e problemas no [...]
É sempre difícil lidar com expectativas e a produção do Planeta Terra parece ter entendido ao longo dos seus três anos de existência. Em 2007, o festival era a cara nova que deu certo apostando em infra-estrutura, pontualidade, preço baixo e num line-up sem headliner, mas com escolhas bem feitas como Rapture e Devo. A boa fama do primeiro ano e um line-up sensacional (Animal Collective, JAMC, Spoon, Kaiser Chiefs, Bloc Party, Foals, Breeders!) fizeram uma a segunda edição um evento divertido, mas que já não lidava tão bem com o tamanho do seu público (filas quilométricas e problemas no [...]
As yall know from the popular website calendar.blogspot.com, the year 2k9 only has 2 months left. The annual music cycle is 'officially over' and will be dormant until the first major indie album release in 2k10. This means 'we' as an altosphere need 2 do our best to reflect on the year that we just lived, and try 2 analyze which album/artist/mp3 we want to be the embodiment of 2k9. Each alt website has a responsibility to select a 'best' artist, which may not actually 'be the best', but instead will represent 'how they think 2k9 should [...]
Vampire Weekend - Cousins
Bobby B's Top 50 Albums Of The Decade (#25-21)
HOT CHIP TAKE another crack at IT and I’m IN
