tvfordogs, Roller
Hmm. Lots of comparisons to the Foo Fighters in this one-sheet — color me ready to be disappointed. Indie-rock bands love to compare themselves to the Foo Fighters…
Teenage Harlets, Up the Fixx
Some bands live to record, and some bands record to live. The Teenage Harlets (their misspelling, not mine) clearly fall in the latter category…
Sebadoh, III
Whenever an album is rereleased with a passel of bonus tracks, there’s a myth that suggests that it’s a classic worthy of being rediscovered by a new generation…
Die Hunns, You Rot Me
You Rot Me is the second release from Die Hunns, a pseudo-punk supergroup. The band has an impressive pedigree, with Duane Peters and Jamie Reidling from the U.S. Bombs, ex-Circle Jerk Zander Schloss…
Lucas Cates, Contradictory
From Madison, Wisconsin, Lucas Cates’ band brings together the sounds of folk, pop-rock, storytelling music — somewhat similar to the sound of Jack Johnson. Although the band is named after frontman Lucas Cates…
Various Artists, Saw III Soundtrack
Astute Space City Rock readers might know that I am a director of horror films. They might also reason that I must be a huge fan of the Saw series…
Sputnik Monroe, Wake the Sleeping Giant
Sputnik Monroe, the man, was a pro wrestler who used his popularity to integrate the city of Memphis. Sputnik Monroe, the band, on the other hand, has just released Wake the Sleeping Giant…
Something Fierce, Come For The Bastards
Aww, man. It always makes me a little nervous when I see somebody’s thanked this little e-zine in their album’s liner notes; it’s sweet, and I appreciate the sentiment, but when it happens…
The Sammies, The Sammies
You know how sometimes bands produce albums that meander down various paths, randomly picking at genres of music and making it work? It’s usually a refreshing change of pace, isn’t it?…
Robert Pollard, Normal Happiness
I’ve been reading the 33 1/3 book on Bee Thousand, which — your reviewer says, realizing his age — was a Guided By Voices album that was a revelation to everybody back in 1994, albeit a more gradual one for me…
Muller and Patton, Muller and Patton
Just when I’ve figured that the world’s pretty much had its fill of “two-name” pop duos — I mean, c’mon, Simon & Garfunkel were the high water mark, and from there it’s been downhill…
Bobby Conn, King for a Day
Bobby Conn’s latest record, King for a Day, satirizes movie stars, musicians and other celebrities amid so-bad-it’s-good commercial radio production…
Blinded Black, Under The Sunrise
Attention all you bored, 15-year-old suburbanites sporting dyed black hair and Hawthorne Heights T-shirts: here is the soundtrack to your sad, miserable lives…
Deftones, Saturday Night Wrist
I’ve been a huge Deftones fan ever since I saw them open up for the Bad Brains, way back before Adrenaline even came out. I also really dig the fact…
Dead Child, Dead Child
Okay, so this one’s a bit risky: a bunch of the biggest, most revered luminaries of the once-cerebral Louisville indie scene, the folks who brought us (well, partly) math-rock…
A New Dawn Fades, I See The Nightbirds
The debut CD from Virginia’s A New Dawn Fades, I See The Nightbirds, is a life preserver for the music fan that doesn’t need a singer and loves to dive headfirst into the music. Stylistically, ANDF is a tough one to describe…
Tommy and the Terrors, Unleash the Fury
Just by looking at the band name, the album title, and the producer (Matt Kelly of Dropkick Murphys fame), you know what you’re getting here. Raucous, old-school ’70s punk with elements of Oi! and hardcore. Lots of chanting and group vocals…
Speakerfire, Audio Alchemy
Speakerfire hails from Buffalo, and apparently the snowy winters have allowed the band ample time to hone their craft. Audio Alchemy is the perfect name for their album, as it’s an interesting amalgamation of all alt-rock leanings…
The Shins, Wincing the Night Away
When you get albums for review from labels, they generally come accompanied by a press release that is meant to color your perception of the album they have just sent you. The press is supposed to give you pointers on what you are to be thinking…
The Minstrels, Our Cruel Demise
I’m depressed, and the perfect soundtrack to my life right now is The Minstrels’ Our Cruel Demise. Okay, that’s a joke, guys, but if I were depressed, this would be what I would be listening to. That doesn’t mean that the album is bad, mind you…
The Dent, Farewell
The first time I heard the opening song from this Denton-based indie-pop band, I clenched my fists involuntarily. Something about the earnestness of the lyrics and the lead singer’s soft, pretty voice made me want to provoke him to violence…
Dead Moon, Echoes of the Past
Dead Moon plays garage punk rock from the ’80s. If you like The Pixies, Sonic Youth, or Adolescents, you’ll understand. Blink 182 fans or Fall Out Boy fans probably need not apply…
Your Black Star, Sound from the Ground
Your Black Star formed in 2001 in Louisville, Kentucky, home of well-known heroes Elliott, with whom the members of YBS toured extensively between 2000 and 2005 on the Louisville icons’ final hurrah. After Elliott dissolved, YBS decided to stay on the road…
Various Artists, Take Action!, Volume 6
I have to hand it to The Kids, sometimes. From the precious distance of Middle Age, I can remember back in the days of my youth, when music was ghettoized and genre-fied. You had metal, you had rock, you had hip-hop, you had pop, and you had all the bazillion sub-genres…
The Silvermen, Incendiary Luminary
First of all, let’s make it clear that we are talking about the rockabilly/western/surf rock band called The Silvermen. If you googled “The Silvermen” and came up with “NSW. Smooth bear seeks all ages locally or internationally,” you might be looking for Ken…
Many Birthdays, Days of Beat/Days of Hollow
The self-released EP Days of Beat/Days of Hollow, from Austinites Many Birthdays is a fusion of sounds and moods, with lyrics sung in both English and Japanese. The music ranges, at any given instant, from some kind of jaunty indie-pop to darker, beat-heavy prog-rock…
Lamexcuse, All Important Little Things
Lamexcuse hails from the depths of Graz, Austria, bringing with them a pretty banal indie-rock album. Their debut release, All Important Little Things, has made its way to the States and is being touted as “The Proclaimers playing Moody Blues covers…”
The Good Mornings, The Good Mornings
Rise and shine, kiddies. The Good Mornings are here to jump start your day with their self-titled debut album. Calliope bandmates Carmen Paradise and Jason Lantrip come together with their fellow Good Mornings counterparts to produce an album…
Four Star Alarm, Four Star Alarm
Four Star Alarm’s self-titled EP is competent, well-written guitar rock. The drumming’s strong, all the instruments are well-played, and the vocalist at least sounds like he’s heard Mike Patton and Brandon Boyd, especially on “Impenetrable”…
Black Ice, The Death of Willie Lynch
Black Ice starts his new album, The Death of Willie Lynch, with a prayer — as if he needs it. With lyrics that openly criticize the superficiality and ignorance of the “gangsta” mentality…
The American Black Lung, …And They Rode Their Weapons Into War
I usually reserve the term “brutal” for death metal, where the Cannibal Corpses of the world enlighten us with the finer intellectual details concerning disembowelment and necrotic fantasy. This is usually administered via a double-bass ninja and a twin-detuned guitar attack going…
The Seximals, No Glamour All Frenzy
“I got Sunday School bruises and my share of Cathedral scars,” Anthony Barilla sings on “Bound For Glory,” the lead track on No Glamour All Frenzy. With simple acoustic strumming and stripped-down drums, the band’s music lends itself…
The Rocket Summer, The Early Years EP
Ah, teen angst, deliverer of a thousand heartfelt youth anthems. Not knocking it, mind you — I spent many days in my youth obsessing over Superchunk’s Foolish, which is in my opinion one of the all-time classic breakup albums ever…
Blake Miller, Together with Cats
Although many liken his music to the early works of Sam Beam (a.k.a. Iron & Wine) or the eccentricity of Devendra Barnhart, 19-year-old Blake Miller is making impressive waves on his own terms. His recent debut album, Together with Cats…
LOW.Z, Salvo
I have the unenviable task of reviewing the most recent salvo (ahem) from one of Houston’s most well-ensconced and varied musicians, Rob Smith, aka LOW.Z, as an outsider. Smith is well-known to the Houston area music scene…
JMprint, Mperfect
Austin hip-hopper JMprint rapped on and produced his album, Mperfect, which is solidly in the alt-rap tradition. The samples run the range of styles, from hard-edged rock to jazzy funk to simple electronic noises, and his beats have potential…
Hello Defective, Kill Us Now
Duo Armitage and Kirby have created an original yet highly pop and psychedelic-influenced sound that could’ve been produced at Apple Records by Badfinger and Jane’s Addiction. Cool grooves and instrumentation, thick sound layers, unusual samples…
Frida Hyvönen, Until Death Comes
Frida Hyvönen’s debut album Until Death Comes came out in her native country of Sweden in 2005 to worldwide acclaim, winning the Stockholm Prize and breaking into the Swedish singles charts for a few weeks with her breakout single…
Gist, Diesel City
This is another one of those CDs that I spun during my road trip from Houston to New York last fall. Oddly enough, I popped this disc in right around the time we entered the Baltimore/Washington, D.C., area, which is where Gist hails from…
Dead Voices on Air, From Labrador to Madagascar
Gadamer states in Truth and Method that the experience of the work of art “always fundamentally surpasses any subjective horizon of interpretation, whether that of the artist or that of the participant.” If we hold this maxim as true…
