Tagged: onsecondlisten

With the help of collaborators like the virtuosic Yelawolf, and affectionate attention from various blogs, decidedly underground Alabama duo G-Side , comprised of emcees ST 2 Lettaz and Yung Clova, has been making a slow but steady rise up the ranks of Dixie rap since its debut, 2007's Sumthin 2 Hate . Sporting an airy, synth-happy style which sounds rooted in the Dungeon Family's bygone heyday, it's hard to not like this two-piece, especially if you've ever been a fan of Outkast, UGK, or 8Ball & MJG. Don't expect to hear any "Int'l Players Anthem"s or "B.O.B."s [...]

As the mournful trumpet signals the beginning of The Unthanks ' fourth record with the slow-burning ballad "Gan to the Kye", the sisters Unthanks invite us into a pastoral world of moors, roaming cattle, and love- broken, lost, and tragic. They have been exploring the more delicate aspects of the human condition for many years now, through previous compositions (as Rachel Unthank and the Winterset) Cruel Sister (2005), The Bairns (2007) and 20092s Here's the Tender Coming , which all share a graceful tenderness [...]

The state of pop music today feels more and more restrictive. Artists who garner huge success feel pressured to repeat the same work in hopes of repeated profit. These performers are cloned as well, leading to the presence of the same product with the same producers, but under a different name. That's a damn shame for many reasons, but the main one today is that it makes the path more difficult for an excellent musician like Oh Land . Her self-titled debut is a masterful combination of pop, dance, and experimental electronica that is both unfamiliar but centered enough [...]

The Western film genre was limping along at a listless and predictable pace at the end of the 1950s. The Golden Age of Hollywood was coming to a close, and audiences were tired of the studio-driven, mindless drivel that was churned out like a movie assembly line. Enter famed Italian director Sergio Leone and his own take on the genre. Suddenly, Westerns featured morally ambiguous characters, raw production values and plot lines that defied the usual straightforward convention. The "Spaghetti Western" was born and gave the industry the shot of whiskey it desperately needed. If "Spaghetti Western Rock" [...]

For someone I'd never heard of two weeks ago, Perfume Genius has a wealth of written material discussing the finer points of his debut album, Learning . In fact, the same points are repeated over and over again. Which, to be honest, is slightly discouraging, especially when I was expecting a haunting, intimate, devastating, and ultimately redemptive masterpiece I heard after my first listen. Those first impressions were correct, but also obvious. So, I will spare you the drawn-out, space-filling history or the paragraph-long explanations of why he is similar to and possibly better than [...]

California-born Alela Diane now resides in the folk heartlands of Portland, OR and is sometimes compared to (and has suffered by comparison to) Joanna Newsom. Newsom acted as a bit of a mentor to Diane when she took her first steps as a solo performer. She has toured the US and Europe largely solo but also with Tom Brosseau. Following two self-released albums early in her career, Alela Diane's exposure increased over the past two or three years and her February 2009 record, [...]

Most albums have long tracks, short tracks, filler, hit singles. How about a full-length album with just one track? Call it a single, or call it simply incredibly long, Mountains ' late 2009 release, Etching , is one 38 minute and 14 second mind trip of a song. Mountains is ambient music duo Brendon Anderegg and Koen Holtkamp. Their third album, Choral , was released in 2009 to generally positive reviews. As they prepared to hit the road in support of the release, they also hit the studio, recording music meant to mimic their live [...]

Think of the perfect summer. What would that entail? Warm weather, a beautiful locale, women, and cold drinks? Maybe a road trip with the love of your life? Well, when that summer is experienced, does it ever feel as if something is missing in between all of the memorable moments? Does it feel as if a general theme for the entire summer doesn't really exist? Look for the filler no longer: Hollands is here to satisfy the empty spaces. Described as the perfect summer [...]

It's been a while since Social Studies was last on the scene. Their self-released debut, This Is The World's Biggest Hammer , came out in 2006, and it's been pretty quiet since then. Until now, that is. With the release of The Hourglass EP in 2009, the indie rockers return with a mysterious yet playful record that will probably keep old fans, but may not draw in new ones. The Hourglass is a free digital download of only two songs. While that may seem like a lot, the songs are [...]

Andrew Cohen coined his stage name, Mayer Hawthorne , by blending his middle name with that of the street he grew up on. This pastiche approach also informs the 30-year-old's music, a mix of Motown and Philly soul with a side of lightweight hip-hop beats. On his debut release, A Strange Arrangement , Cohen – who also records straight ahead hip-hop under the Haircut moniker – sports a soulful falsetto and earnest, lovelorn lyrics. For a man who began recording classic soul music as a joke, his performance of it on his debut sounds completely sincere, [...]

Jazz and techno are very similar. This is strange to say, but both involve very specific elements in composition and improvisation. The only major difference is the audience. Jazz is heard by laid-back intellectuals who wear thick clothing and lounge in smoky rooms, while techno is listened to by ravers with glow-sticks and a tendency to take uppers in order to dance all night. But the music is too similar to draw comparisons by audiences, and Underworld seems to understand this. On their new album Athens , which they are billed as Underworld vs. The Misterons [...]

For those of you who have never heard High on Fire before, a little business is in order. Matt Pike and crew are considered stoner/doom metal, so the music is not for the faint of heart. If you enjoy the brutal stuff, however, this is one band that should not be missed. Their last record, 2007's Death is this Communion , blazed new trails in the metal world and even found itself a place amongst Decibel Magazine's Top 100 Metal Albums of the Decade . Snakes for the Divine is no different in quality [...]

About a third of the way through Stereo Night , one fact becomes apparent: The Twilight Hours are the anti-She & Him. This isn't to say they sound nothing alike. In fact, they both have that semi-acoustic '50s pop sound and write songs about love. What makes The Twilight Hours different is that they're much more about love that's been lost or remained unrequited, rather than love that's been found. It's Stereo Night's sense of sadness that is both its greatest strength and greatest weakness. The Twilight Hours are made up of Minneapolis duo John Munson and [...]

Okay, so were the Eighties really that great that bands continually want to take you back there? I had high hopes of Editors from their early days. The 2005 debut, The Back Room , was packed with strong tunes and storming riffs. Live, the band had a real presence and looked set to carve out a big name for itself in mainstream indie. Would they one day go on to reinvent prog rock, you dared to wonder! Second album syndrome was quickly banished when their follow up, An End Has A Start, introduced [...]

We've all seen moments in cinema where music adds that indescribable sensation, that unexplainable bliss where all you can do is sit helplessly as your body and soul are attached to the screen. It might come during a moment of sheer comedy - Geto Boys blasting as a fax machine is massacred in Office Space , or the entire reenactment of "Bohemian Rhapsody" by Wayne and Garth in Wayne's World . On the other end of the spectrum, a song can give a scene that somber overtone unachievable with acting alone. Richie's suicide attempt in The Royal [...]

If the Killers and Devendra Banhart had a baby, and then that baby wrote skillful acoustic pop music, the result might sound something like Hurricane Bells . The project of Steve Schiltz (singer and guitarist for New York band Longwave ), Hurricane Bells' first album is titled Tonight is the Ghost , and one gets the feeling that the writer felt the ghosts of long nights past about him as he composed. In keeping with the creepy theme, Schiltz's project has gained attention after a b-side entitled "Monsters" was selected for the soundtrack of the second installment [...]

Ten years is a long time to spend together as a band. It must feel a hundred times longer when you spend all that time working up to your first album. But that's exactly what Still Life Still did and their never-ending determination to succeed is heard all over their 2009 debut, Girls Come Too. The result is a record that is fiercely energetic, honest, and definitely worth a listen. Girls Come Too is a wonderful mess of shoegaze, indie rock that sounds traditional yet puts the band's personality on display. [...]

"See these fans can't resist the rush/they Wu-Tang for life," Method Man cries out in his first and certainly not last verse on the long-awaited Raekwon album. Only Built for Cuban Linx II. In a way, Meth speaks the truth. There are people who know the Wu-Tang Clan and then there are people who know the Wu-Tang Clan. The first group may have heard the classics such as Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) , Liquid Swords , Tical, Cuban Linx I, various Ol' Dirty Bastard tracks and have [...]

The main problem with Childish Prodigy is how misleading each song tends to be. With a somewhat unknown name, it's easy to predetermine the sound of the whole album based on one track alone. Yet, with Kurt Vile each song is its own genre, an entirely new experience, which makes Childish Prodigy a beautiful listen from start to finish. Distortion plays the lead role in both "Hunchback" and "Dead Alive", combining No Age style punk with a voice not yet introduced to the audience. As "Overnite Religion" fades in, we finally catch [...]

The evolution of a band is often a hit or miss venture. Either the band tries something new and it strikes just the perfect chord for its seasoned fans (e.g. Radiohead's Kid A ), or they lose hardcore fans but gain a more commercial audience (e.g. Modest Mouse's Good News for People Who Love Bad News ), or it completely blows up in their face and they lose mostly everything but real hardcore fans (Metallica's St. Anger ). As much as fans want [...]