Category: Reviews
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The duo known as no:carrier was formed in Germany in 1995 and has been active with its current line-up since 2001. These days, they operate through a great distance with producer/keyboardist/occasional vocalist Chris Wirsig living in San Francisco, California while main vocalist Cynthia Wechselberger continues to reside in her home country of Germany. But I…
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Cheerleader started off as a bedroom exercise, longtime buddies Joe Haller (vocals/guitar) and Chris Duran (guitar) making various demos with Garageband. But in 2013 the Connecticut natives got serious and relocated to Philadelphia where they completed the band’s line-up with Joshua Pannepacker (keyboards/guitar), Paul Impellizeri (bass) and Carl Bahner (drums). Today they’re opening for The…
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Is there such a thing as cold war chic? That’s how I keep hearing Client described, though I think it’s more of a reference to their album covers and videos than to their music. After all, Authority is their fifth album and it’s only the first to show the women’s faces on the cover. Previous…
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The last time I saw Butch Walker — sometime last year, at The Sinclair in Cambridge, Massachusetts — he did a bunch of new songs and talked about how they were going to be on a new EP he was releasing called Peachtree Battle. I really enjoyed all of the songs and was very much…
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Lana Del Rey’s red hot new single “West Coast” may, in fact, be at least partially about the West Coast, but it’s like the West Coast via Twin Peaks with its entirely haunting music and her super trippy vocals. Interestingly, the song, which was written by Lana and Rick Nowels, actually gets a bit slower…
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It seems like most rock fans gave up on Saliva when vocalist Josey Scott left the band. But I was actually kind of glad he left. While I’d loved the first couple of Saliva albums, nothing they’d done since had really grabbed me. Somehow a hair band element had crept into the band and replaced…
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The xx are known for some fairly dark music, but Jamie xx’s new solo tune, “Girl,” is a much brighter affair with its chugging bass and shiny synth. It begins very much in the electro-pop vein and quickly morphs into synth pop before it surrenders to a post house sound during what we assume is…
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UK producer Stumbleine — aka Peter Cooper — deservedly-earned a reputation as a skillful and even innovative electronic artist during the past few years with intoxicating releases such as his 2012 solo debut, Spiderwebbed, and 2013’s Things Don’t Sparkle Like They Used To. But there was one thing that prevented some listeners from becoming fully…
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Noblesse Oblige’s “Voices In My Head” is the final song on their stellar 2013 album Affair of the Heart and it’s an uber-moody, downtempo track that just might have you hearing voices in your own head. The Mylène Farmer meets Massive Attack tune has been one of our favorite Noblesse Oblige songs since we first…
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Rather than constantly expanding our April Rules playlist, we decided to simply start a volume 2, which is now long enough for posting. Once again, the tracks are simply listed in the order they currently appear in, but we may add a few more tracks here and there as the month goes on, and they…
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“Boom, clap, you make me feel good, come on to me, come on to me,” sings Charli Kiss Charlie Kiss during the magnificent chorus of her highly addictive new song “Boom Clap,” which just might be the best pop song we’ve heard so far this year. From the sonorous beats to the electro embellishments to…
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Little Racer is a band from Brooklyn, NY consisting of vocalist/guitarist Elliot Michaud, guitarist Wade Michael, bassist Ish Nazmi and drummer Dave Tedeschi. They formed and released their eponymous single, “Little Racer” in 2010 and somehow the single managed to cross the ocean to the BBC and London imprint Young and Lost Club, which wound…
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The first couple of times I listened to this new Foxy Shazam album, I thought it was terrible. No, I can be more accurate: I thought it was piss poor. My biggest complaint was that the vocals sounded as though they were recorded on a cheap, old blank cassette that sold for 99 cents back…
