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In their first go-round in the early 1980s, Mission of Burma were equal parts innovation and perspiration. Their muscular post-punk was groundbreaking, but it also had a workman-like quality. Maybe that's what made them unique-- Roger Miller, Clint Conley, and Peter Prescott always had their noses to the grindstone even when they were being visionary. Full review |
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Given their vast and varied catalog, it's sometimes easier to imagine R.E.M. as a discography than to picture them as a flesh-and-blood band. Ironically, it may be R.E.M.'s insistence upon operating as a fully democratic entity that has allowed them to shapeshift so completely and convincingly. Full story |
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Summary: Intelligent enough for the conscious, poppy enough for the club, and ideal for a 45-minute workout.
It's really no secret: some of the most creative beats right now are coming out of Michigan's motor-city, influencing the entire midwest and hip-hop as a whole into the next decade. Full review
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At some point in early 2008, before the first reconciliation curry was scoffed and the concept of a new Blur gig ticket seemed as likely as Calvin Harris eating a Solero without Tweeting about it, Graham Coxon sat in his Camden home, dug his fingers into his armrests and felt a monsoon of jealousy crash over him. Full review |
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It’s tempting to start a review of Sub Pop’s lush, loving new Vaselines retrospective with some comments on Kurt Cobain’s role in their popularity—ruminations on his early embrace of Earth and the Butthole Surfers and the Pixies and his overwhelmingly astute critical perspective on his own band—but it’d be better and fairer to start with “Son of a Gun,” just like the retrospective does, just like the band did. Full review |
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Even as the first angular, punky releases from the Noisettes' 2007 debut, "What Time Is It Mr. Wolf?", were earning the London trio underground approval and a place in the same feisty female fronted indie bracket as The Gossip, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and New Young Pony Club, there were hints that such quick categorisation wasn't playing well with them. Full Review |
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A couple years ago some friends and I drove to watch The Books in concert. Opening for the duo was a "group" called Death Vessel, which I hadn't heard of at the time. When Death Vessel came out on the stage, though, it was just a single androgynous human who sang in a voice that made it somewhat difficult to ascertain which sex they were. Full review |
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You have, in the context of a man in a fantastic band, to feel kind of sorry for Jaguar Love drummer J Clark. Without resorting to an unlikely statistical mission to confirm such speculation, we’d wager at least 83.8 per cent of interested listening parties are here because of one band. And it ain’t – ass kicking and loved as they were – Clark’s former pursuit, Pretty Girls Make Graves. Sorry. Full review |
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There's a five-year gap between the unleashing of G-Unit's debut album — 2003's Beg for Mercy — and the more casual dropping of the follow-up, T.O.S., as in Terminate on Sight. Even so, 50 Cent's crew remains the thing that anchors his hip-hop career, connecting him to the streets through mixtapes, guest appearances, and venomous beefs with other rappers, including two of its own. Full review |
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Upon its release two years ago, Joan As Police Woman’s debut album Real Life reaped great acclaim from certain quarters. The first ‘solo’ project of Joan Wasser (as much as they are in fact a trio, Parker Kindred recently stepping in on drums), it saw her step out from the shadows of contemporaries such as Antony Hegarty and Rufus Wainwright (both of whom she’s sung back-up for) with a startling collection of songs; from the luminescent splendour of ‘The Ride’ through to the devastating emotional impact of closer ‘We Don’t Own It’ (about and dedicated to friend Elliott Smith) it yielded countless replays, quietly converting a number who may have been put off by the fearsome, misguided ‘coffee table’ tag, through its enduring quality. Full review |
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Because she's kept herself so busy in the interim (releasing three albums that included a collection of standards, a pop album exclusive to Japan, and an anthology of acoustic reinterpretations of some of the best songs in her catalogue; acting in various television, film and theater productions; and founding the True Colors concert tour with the B-52s and Joan Jett & the Blackhearts to raise awareness about discrimination issues within the GLBT community), it's easy to miss the fact that Bring Ya to the Brink is Cyndi Lauper's first album of original material for U.S. audiences since her underrated, trip-hop-inflected 1997 set Sisters of Avalon. Full review |
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A record that's under the constant threat of being swallowed whole by the context of its creation, Robert Forster's The Evangelist manages to function as an amalgam of a Forster solo record, a follow-up to his former band the Go-Betweens's Oceans Apart, and a tribute to Grant McLennan, his collaborator in the Go-Betweens for some 35 years. In May 2006, while on tour in support of the band's widely acclaimed last album, McLennan died suddenly, suffering a massive heart attack while napping before a party. Full review |
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“Oh man, it’s dropping out from heaven and it’s bringing the word, the wicked fucking sound that you never have heard,” reckons The Brian Jonestown Massacre’s ringleader, swaggering through the front door of album number 13 with a long list of antagonising song titles and a fat bag of tattva under his arm. Bold words, but who is anyone to argue with the musing of Anton “You fucking broke my sitar, motherfucker!” Newcombe?“So grab your silver bullets and sharpen your stakes, and lock your fucking doors, for Jesus sakes.” Righto boss. Full review |
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It has been said that travel expands your mind, excites your senses, and feeds your soul, but most spend their exotic vacations vainly chasing after fellow traveling ass or blitzed out of their heads. Listening to The Ruby Suns, it is obvious that head Sun Ryan McPhun has spent his away time wisely, soaking up the local and national sounds of far-flung places instead of getting high in his hostel. His band’s latest album, Sea Lion, is a curious hodgepodge of Polynesian and African rhythms, Pacific Rim and Maori influence, Mexi-minstrel finger-picking, and California psychedelia. Full review |
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Following its pair of bizarrely excellent albums for tiny indie imprint Ace Fu, Man Man has signed to Anti- Records, and it feels like some sort of alien-to-mothership homecoming. After all, aside from the Philadelphia quintet being granted a larger platform from which to spew its raucous circus chants, Man Man is now labelmate to fellow shit-stirrers Nick Cave and Tom Waits. Full review |
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Is there such a thing as closure? Crime writer James Ellroy’s mother was murdered when he was 10 years old, and Ellroy has spent his entire career writing his way out of it with no expectation of emotional settlement. It’s made him who he is. Chances are Mark Kozelek—formerly of Red House Painters, currently of Sun Kil Moon—will also write his way through memory and fate until the end of his days. Full review |
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There are three distinct timelines for Accelerate, R.E.M.’s 14th full-length studio album: that of the band’s devoted fanbase, that of the band itself, and that of the music-buying (or downloading, as it were) populace at large. Full review |
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Decadent, sullen and minimal, the Kills have always been a band seemingly out-of-sorts with the industry they’ve chosen. Their ragged garage blues and photobooth posing suggest an art installation or some conceptual burst of freedom in an underground movie, not the austere album/tour order of the music business. Full review |
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The conceit of this record-- mixing aggressive rock with dub reggae-- isn't new. Bad Brains were the first notable practitioners, inserting clean-toned dub between bouts of hardcore punk. Blind Idiot God were like if Bad Brains were white, instrumental, and played avant-garde metal. Fugazi's rhythm section had heavy dub influences. Full review |
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Tift Merritt’s last album, Tambourine, brought with it a mixture of blessings and curses. On the positive side, it was a young artist’s dream come true. Only two albums into her career, Merritt was working with the A-list of roots-rock: Gary Louris of the Jayhawks, Mike Campbell and Benmont Tench of the Heartbreakers, the respected producer George Drakoulias… Full story |
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69 Love Songs, The Magnetic Fields' three-volume concept album released in 1999, is the rare musical experiment gone so horribly right that it nearly completely disintegrates anything else released by the artist, before or after. Even the annoying genre interludes like "Experimental Music Love" or "Punk Love" had such a winning sense of purpose they were hard to hate. And the real tunes, well, they were the stunners that a tour de force of love songs damn well better promise. Full review |
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Every cloud, so they say, has a silver lining. About 18 months ago, Kate Nash was a teenager from Harrow, moping round her house after being rejected by Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. She fell down a flight of stairs, broke her foot and was confined to bed for a number of weeks. To cheer herself up, she started to write some songs while bedridden. Fast forward to summer 2007, and Nash has had a number 2 hit with her first 'official' single and her album has been brought forward by five weeks due to overwhelming public demand. Now that's serendipity. Full story |
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One thing I love about Lupe Fiasco is how he resides in this hermetic parallel universe where he can get away with experimental shit that major labels haven't indulged since Aphex Twin had Sire money: unknown producers, ludicrous Magic: The Gathering–meets–Back to the Future album art, and, um, inter-record concept threads with multiple protagonists engaging in a battle between good, evil, and the streets. Paging Coheed & Cambria . . . something Fiasco might actually do one day. Full review |
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Life can be only what you make it, when you’re feeling down, you should never fake it/
Say what’s on your mind and you’ll find in time, that all the negative energy, it will all decease
Mary J. Blige has built a career off of channeling her inner demons to create some of contemporary soul music’s finest recordings, leading to her amass a huge fan base that’s used her music as the soundtrack to their own lives. Over the years, Blige has been quite candid about her struggles with love (of self and others), addiction, depression, and overall happiness. Full review
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Beanie Sigel's clothing line, State Property, features hidden pockets and gun holsters, his lyrics often glorify all the worst elements of street culture (homophobia, misogyny, the "stop-snitchin'" code of ethics), and his last album, The B. Coming, was recorded on the eve of a 10-month prison term. But whatever Sigel lacks in morality or imagination, he more than makes up for it with surefire verbal mastery, and The Solution is another hard-boiled testament of ghetto truth-telling. Full review |
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Having never heard of White Williams until this here album, one can only suspect a fondness for Brian Eno without certainty, save for the proof in the pudding. Williams’ Smoke is forever in debt to various aspects of Eno’s early art pop recordings or, at the least, the innovations of Eno’s brand of skewed pop. After all, the queer synth-pop of album opener “Headlines” could just as easily be clipped from any number of British LPs circa 1980. Full review |
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For the committed, reggae is honed on the tropical sufferah's redemption: sweat, riddim, and a virile roots-rebel stance. So where to place a gregarious hip-swiveler like Shaggy and Intoxication, his latest set of dance-floor fodder? A well-mannered brown chap rhyming about erotic antics is no hero to those who prefer artists served up as avenging myths. Full review |
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Reviewing Bruce Springsteen’s work is both easy and daunting. What else can be said and what needs to be said, or should be? Even when he’s off his stride, which is infrequent, he’s good, which has to do with the easy part. And, to many, he’s God (not simply a god), which is the daunting part. (Disparage him in NJ at peril of your life.) He is among a handful of the most influential, significant and successful rock musicians of the last 30 odd years, since he erupted on the scene in 1975 with dual covers on Time and Newsweek announcing rock and roll’s savior. Full review |
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Over the course of a career that’s spanned 15 years and some change, Seal has crafted an image as an ethereal balladeer. His rough-hewn soulful croon has contrasted nicely with his music over the years. A music which has mostly comprised tasteful mid-tempo pop and beautifully orchestrated moodier cuts that hint at new age and dream-pop textures. After four increasingly lush Trevor Horn-produced albums, you’ve gotta figure that it was time for Seal to try something a little different. Full review |
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Angels And Airwaves frontman Tom DeLonge has a lot in common with R&B egomaniac R. Kelly: No one can discuss Kelly lately without debating whether he takes himself seriously, and ever since DeLonge released his band's overly ambitious debut, 2006's We Don't Need To Whisper, many have wondered the same about him. Yet even those who initially scoffed at the former Blink-182 leader couldn't deny that, like Kelly, the guy can occasionally write one hell of a song. Full review |
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Former Sam Cooke-soundalike Hooks adds some different shades to his sound on this new CD, his fifth, and a return to the label where he began his career. Though Hooks has retained the same producers (the same team as his other four albums, the great John and Sally Tiven) and pretty much the same core group of backing musicians (also the Tivens) he has changed his style from the smooth balladry and soft soul of Cooke to a harder edge shouting style typified by Wilson Pickett and Howard Tate. Full review |
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It's a curiosity that, just as the Led Zeppelin revival is reaching fever pitch, Robert Plant is sneaking out this album of reverential duets with Alison Krauss. What it does, though, is show the singer's softer, sensitive side - something not all that apparent when atop thunderous Jimmy Page guitar riffs. In his recent solo career Plant has tended to keep an open book, as last album Mighty Rearranger testified, with its variety of loosely world music-influenced songs. Full review |
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The wider (read: more muscular) Paula Abdul's thighs got (as per In Living Color's "The Promise of a Thin Me" satire of her Spellbound-era girth), the more I liked her music. When former Fly Girl Jennifer Lopez's first long-player, On the 6, showed up on store shelves in 1999, my first thought was, "What happened to all that booty she gained to fill out Selena's costumes? Does On the 6 refer to the number of inches between the inner walls of her legs? Full review |
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Annie Lennox is often at her very best as a songwriter when she is feeling at her very worst. Songs like the troubled-soul ballad "Cold" or the deceptively sunny "Walking on Broken Glass" from her 1992 solo debut, "Diva," have proved her mastery of transforming personal ache into beautiful music that never crosses the line into tragic, tortured-artist territory. She may sometimes be sad, but she's still singing and, when applicable, making it snappy. Full review |
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With her tatted-up arms, crazy-color hair (just when this fashion shifted from punk rock to hip-hop is unclear), and acrylic-tips toughness, no one would ever confuse Keyshia Cole with a dewy ingénue. But while Cole (whose '05 sleeper The Way It Is earned her the "New Mary" tag—something that must thrill the highly functional "old" Mary) has that hood-honey thing on lock, her husky yet openly optimistic voice betrays the softness beneath. Full review |
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Back when I first started really getting into music I used to find out about artists by reading the liner notes on other artists’ albums. For example, I found out about Chuck Berry and Muddy Waters by reading the backs of my brother’s Rolling Stones albums. I’d see the writers of the songs’ names - C. Berry, McKinley Morganfield, etc. - and then try to figure out who they were and if they had any albums of their own. I’d think to myself that if the Stones thought their songs were good, they’d probably have some other worthwhile songs as well. Full review |
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When Kanye West comes up in conversation, the word “restraint” doesn’t usually get thrown around much. West has always come off as exuberant and overexcitable, a twitchy little guy perpetually uncertain of his status. Even when he steps outside of himself and catches a fleeting bout of righteousness, there’s something embarrassing about it: witness his “George Bush doesn’t care about black people!” outburst, next to a horrified Mike Meyers, on national television. Full review |
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David P. Madsori wears many hats. He was one of the founding members of the groundbreaking Clouddead, he was the art director for the Anticon label for five plus years, and he's been an audio-advisor for a good chunk of albums on that label (including work by Sole, Jel, Sage Francis, Why? and others). Full review |
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Collaborators either challenge each other to build new strengths, or merely staple together the (hopefully complementary) sounds they're already making. New Orleans funk band Galactic evens out the differences on From The Corner To The Block, working with a stellar group of guest rappers. Full review |
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On seminal early albums with Black Star and Reflection Eternal, Talib Kweli rapped as if each line might be his last, and he'd stopped to stockpile words in case he never had another chance to use them. The results were exhilarating and exhausting. Kweli's recorded output has grown much spottier since, but last year's nifty collaboration with Madlib, the Liberation EP, found Kweli in a nice, relaxed groove that continues with his stellar new Eardrum. Full story |
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At one of my casual labour jobs this summer (for I be a po’ student and all that) in a major sporting ground that will go unnamed, the workers sat in the little room to the side of the bar, at the back of the restaurant we were at, were taking an impromptu break. The workforce in this small part of the ground was comprised of two Englishmen (including me), four Poles and five South Africans. While the Poles nattered to each other in their native language, drenched in its harsh, staccato intonation, the South Africans explained how the business that employed them was, appropriately, named after a Roman slave. Full review |
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The Oklahoma native, Leon Russell, now 65 years old, could easily sit back and observe today’s musical scene without having to throw himself into the fray (if that is the way to describe the release of his 33rd solo record, Angel in Disguise, on Leon Russell Records). But the fray ain’t what it used to be: music has by no means passed him by—his kind of swamp-romp-country-blues-gospel is timeless, and he works that particular musical vein as well as any. Full review |
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Once upon a time, the Robbers On High Street were a 4-piece studio/5 piece-touring band. During that time, a few years back, I had the pleasure of meeting and interviewing lead singer and songwriter Ben Trokan, a young man who struck me to be a delightful fellow with a great sense of humor. Trokan and his mates have been weathering the test of time as a band, and their new album Grand Animals finds them stripped down to a trio of players well versed in the book of Kinks style sensibilities. Full review |
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Barring another Electric Circus-type detour down the psychedelic-rap off-ramp, it’s nearly impossible to conceive of Common, at this stage in a rock-solid rap career, coming out with a bad record. What is there not to like about this guy? His smooth-to-the-point-of-absurdity flow is all but perfected, his gift for smacking around various social ills without sounding didactic is a given, his spirituality is one of the strongest arrows in his quiver, his selection of producers and beats—even not counting the Kanye card—results in an organic unity that’s damn near the Guru/Premier variety. Full review |
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Ever the shape-shifter, Prince Rogers Nelson makes his most outrageous move yet. Lots of fans grumble about the lengths to which the artist formerly known as the Artist will go to ensure listenability. No doubt about it: distributing an album with The Mail is a masterstroke. A shame, then, we're not discussing another Parade or, hell, The Gold Experience, but lately Prince puts his talent into recording albums and his genius into marketing them. In 2004, for example, he included Musicology with the price of a concert ticket and forced the RIAA to like it. Full review |
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It's been fascinating to watch T.I. come into his own, especially since his is the kind of career that doesn't happen often these days. Rappers rarely slow-boil anymore, building and nursing a craft over several albums and unfolding their complex personalities in the process. (T.I.'s buddy Lil Wayne is another notable exception.) T.I. has had one hell of an album arc since his low-key introduction of a debut, I'm Serious, in 2001. Full eview |
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As soul legend Rufus Thomas states during his MC stint at the beginning on this live document from 1972, when you speak about the blues Johnnie Taylor is a man who knows them from the letter A to the letter Z. And despite his attempts to shake off his early image as a blues shouter as he re-made his image into that of a deep soul singer, Taylor knew deep down in his heart that all great R&B had elements of the blues in it. Full review |
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Arguably the best female jazz singer of all time, Fitzgerald didn't earn the title "The First Lady of Song" for nothing. Not only was the sound of her voice one of the most beautiful and joyful sounds ever heard, but she had all of the gifts that made singers great: perfect tone, great phrasing, excellent diction, wide range, and the ability to make it all sound easy. Full review |
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When seeking out great music for listening (and writing about), like any critic worth his salt (or worth assaulting) I try my hardest to find cooler than cool artists and albums upon which to feast my ears and pontificate about on this website. What then better to review, to hip you crazy cats to, to do the music do, then the new reissue from the music crew at Collector's Choice on The Iceman himself, Jerry Butler? Coolsville, baby! Full review |
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