Tag: review
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Armed with just the guitar and the sound of Chris Chu’s voice, POP ETC deliver an inspired cover of Tom Petty’s classic “I Won’t Back Down.” Their rendition is true to the original but there’s a different vibe about it just the same with Chu delivering more of a pop vocal and singing the chorus…
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If the tremendously talented Banks made grandiose dance pop songs, they would sound an awful lot like the music of Charlotte OC, who has a similar flair for haunting melodies and insightful lyrics. “If my house was burning / Would you run or stay?” she asks during the lead track “If My House Was Burning,”…
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Janine and The Mixtape, otherwise known as Janine Foster, started off playing open mic nights in her native Auckland when she was just 14 years old. It wasn’t long before she’d concocted her own unique blend of pop, soul and R&B. She released Dark Mind on her own label, Little Mixtapes Records, back in 2013,…
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To my ears, R5 are like a cross between The Maine and Hysteria-era Def Leppard. And that’s a good thing. Def Leppard’s blend of pop and rock was the greatest thing since sliced bread at the time and “Let’s Not Be Alone Tonight” calls to mind “Pour Some Sugar On Me” with its danceable drum…
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“King Kunta” is one of the highlights from Kendrick Lamar’s new album, To Pimp A Butterfly. My favorite part is when he disses rappers who use ghostwriters.
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The Maine are five albums in now and they’re still living up to the title of their first: Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop. And while each of their albums has a different vibe, they still sound like The Maine we heard on their debut. How many bands today can you say that about, five albums and…
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“Carmen” is French artist Stromae’s latest single from his excellent album Racine carrée. It is a “tribute” to Twitter and our consumption of tweets. (He even has a crazy blue Twitter bird following him around throughout the video.)
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Wale’s new album, The Album About Nothing, is released today, “The White Shoes” its first single. And it’s quite the song. Not only does Wale deliver his primo rap, which never fails to flow beautifully, he actually sings on this one. And it turns out he can sing. Better than Kanye West, in fact. Not…
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I’m not a huge fan of instrumental music. I can listen to it now and again but after a while it gets on my nerves. For me, the voice is the greatest of all instruments. That’s why I can listen to music in foreign languages that I don’t know — I can still appreciate a…
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One of the many things I love about Florence is her ability to sound both melancholic and hopeful at the same time. With most artists, they just fall into a gray area if they attempt to capture both ends of the happiness/depression scale at the same time. But Florence doesn’t fall into that grey area.…
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One of the things that made the blogosphere fall in love with Tinashe was undoubtedly that she released her music for free in the form of the album-length mixtapes Black Water, In Case We Die and Reverie. Of course, her talent is what made these mixtapes stick. So many people wouldn’t have been downloading them…
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Natalie Prass is a singer/songwriter based out of Nashville who used to sing backing vocals for Jenny Lewis. Her album has already received heaps of praise from TIME, Pitchfork, Q and The Guardian, and that’s actually how I came to discover it. I read a few positive reviews and then I had to check it…
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“I no longer need to hide,” sings Yael Naim on “Dream In My Head,” the lead single from her fantastic new album, Older, which is released today. Her music is the sort of artsy pop you’re either really good at or you fall flat on your face.