Category: Reviews

  • Gazelle Twin, otherwise known as Elizabeth Walling, is a British musician hailing from Brighton. Her debut album, The Entire City, is often described as “art rock,” but this E.P. is pure trip-hop. Well, 98% trip-hop. There’s a distinct electronica influence here, too. Elizabeth’s vocals on “Heartbeat” especially call to mind the brilliant Fever Ray, the…

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  • Las Vegas indie rock darlings Imagine Dragons have recently re:released their stunning 2012 debut, Night Visions, in a deluxe edition which now comes with five bonus tracks, known collectively as The Archive EP. The EP is available to be purchased alone on iTunes. “Round & Round” starts off with electric and acoustic guitars weaving in…

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  • This 5 song E.P. was released digitally last November. It was also released physically, though the CD is a limited edition collector’s item. (I actually just saw the CD on Amazon for less $$ than the download, so I’d recommend grabbing that.) The Amazon product description states, “While not a reflection of the direction of…

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  • Last year Blood Red Shoes, the duo consisting of Steven Ansell and Laura-Mary Carter, released one of the year’s very best albums in the form of In Time To Voices. Why they stopped promoting that and released a new 3 song E.P. is beyond me, but I’ll take all of the tunes from these two…

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  • Haim is a group formed by sisters Este, Danielle and Alana Haim with drummer Dash Hutton. They formed the group in 2006 in Los Angeles, California, but they didn’t actually start releasing music until 2012, taking time to perfect their very distinct sound. From the opening of “Better Off,” which features the girls harmonizing brilliantly…

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  • Gabrille Aplin is a British singer/songwriter hailing from Sutton Benger, Wiltshire who first rose to fame by posting acoustic covers of various songs on Youtube. Please Don’t Say You Love me is her fourth EP and her first for Parlophone Records. “Please don’t say you love me, ’cause I might not say it back,” Gabrielle…

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  • When Maria Taylor and Orenda Fink, otherwise known as Azure Ray, reunited in 2009 and set to work making their fourth album, Drawing Down the Moon, they used their very first album as a blueprint. “That approach facilitated Orenda (Fink) and I bringing our sound together stylistically and emotionally after working so many years apart,”…

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  • Forget Rod Stewart, *this* is how you do the American songbook. With 12 standards from the ’20’s through the ’60’s — each loosely representing a month of the year — Emmy marches through each of these precious classics with military-like precision and every bit of the wide-range of emotion she displays during each heart-breaking and…

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  • It seems like just yesterday I was buying Helloween’s brilliant Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part 1 on vinyl. But the fact of the matter is that two decades have past. Literally. And this, my friends, is Helloween’s 14th album. Boy does that make me feel old. It also makes me want to give a…

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  • MC Jin, a Chinese American rapper and songwriter, was born Jin Au-Yeung in Miami Florida. After spending years living in New York, he decided to move to Hong Kong, where he learned to speak Cantonese, though he eventually decided to move back to New York during the summer of 2012. From 2002 through 2005 Jin…

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  • Just a couple of years ago Sky was supposed to become an overnight sensation with her song “Obsession” appearing on everything from The Vampire Diaries soundtrack to one of those infamous NOW CDs. But the song’s failure to make much of an impression on anyone was likely a source of amusement for Sky, who was…

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  • Skunk Anansie was formed in 1994 and gained notoriety with their powerful rock hit “Selling Jesus”. I was hooked right away and bought it on cassette. Lead singer (Skin) has a captivating voice that can be both terrifying and beautiful over the scope of a few lines. The album challenged issues of sexism, religion and…

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  • Let me begin this review by stating that I was a huge fan of Christina’s last album, Bionic. I realize that most of the critics hated it and that it was a commercial flop, but I consider the majority of it to be forward-thinking, artsy pop. And that’s exactly what she was aiming for. She…

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  • If the red heart that reads YOU AND ME on the pink notebook album cover didn’t give it away, well, this is clearly a Valentine’s Day-themed release. Something that should not surprise Meiko’s longtime fans, who know the indie pop singer to be a hopeless romantic addicted to writing and singing love songs. The E.P.…

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  • Australian Julia Stone first captured our ears as the sister-half of the brother and sister duo Angus & Julia Stone. Together they’ve released critically acclaimed albums like Down The Way, Memories Of An Old Friend and Heart Full Of Wine. But they’ve never been mere critics’ darlings. On the contrary, the prolific duo has amassed…

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