Morning Spy is a poppy quartet from San Francisco, and on the band’s new record, The Silver Age, the songs encompass a range of feels, from rocking and energetic to calm and mellow — although even the energy of the loud ones is pretty contained…
For a band that dubs itself “The Fury,” there’s not much these guys seem upset about on their five-song EP, Infinite Jest. Maybe they’re broken up a bit about a lost love (“I’m tired of wasting words that keep me locked inside / I want to say how much your love has pushed me away”)…
Let me start here with a little history of one of my personal musical obsessions. I can remember that after I finally heard Massive Attack’s Mezzanine, I searched for what felt like years…
How in the heck do you take The Streets’ Mike Skinner these days? He started out on Original Pirate Material (and even somewhat on 2004’s A Grand Don’t Come For Free concept album) as a raggedy, rough-around-the-edges, streetwise, lager lout/rapper…
Funny that I review this right after reviewing the Head Wound City EP. Some Girls also features Justin Pearson of that “band” (although only on bass here), along with current and former members of Give Up The Ghost, Unbroken, and The Plot To Blow Up The Eiffel Tower…
The first release from this Houston quartet reveals a startlingly well-developed sound. This bold, forceful, thought-provoking EP recalls a whole lineage of loud indie rock, from Mission of Burma and Dinosaur Jr. to Fugazi…
For nearly a decade, the music industry’s armchair quarterbacks waited for “the next Nirvana” — the band that would remind big record labels and radio listeners (again) what decent music sounded like (and that it could be sold to teenagers). When it came, bands that hit the (much smaller, due to hip-hop) rock jackpot…
Funny name, but Novillero’s newest release Aim Right for the Holes in Their Lives, is nothing but serious. These guys mean what they say and they aren’t holding anything back…
Seven songs in nine minutes. That alone should give you, Constant Reader, an idea of what lies in store for you here. Just in case that’s not enough of a warning/invitation for you, you should know that Head Wound City features members of the Locust, Blood Brothers, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs…
Yeeaaah. THIS is what “screamo” really is and should be. You won’t find a Funeral Diner CD at your local Hot Topic, that’s for sure. But (or maybe because of that), this is the most incendiary, most cathartic, most real example of this subgenre I’ve heard since…
I’ve mentioned a couple of times in these pages that it seems like Victory is moving away from the hardcore types of music that established the label, in favor of more accessible, poppier fare. I guess The Forecast further proves that point. In all actuality, though, I think Victory is just broadening its roster…
I’m relatively ignorant of Rilo Kiley, Elected frontman Blake Sennett’s “day job” band. Hard to believe, I know, given the amount of RK-love currently floating around out there, but I think I’ve actually heard more of Sennett’s The Elected than I have the other band…
The sixties are alive and well in Aster’s world. The band incorporates understated vocals and infectious harmonies with low-key indie rock, complete with organ, harmonica, and a stripped-down drumkit. “Lift Provider” and “Counter Culture” are the best examples…
Forever the sullen girl, Fiona also seems to have become one with a certain humor. Her newest release, Extraordinary Machine, inspires contradictory imagery: that of a beatnik with a peppy, even somewhat chipper, backing track…
Memphis’ Lucero blends a solid dedication to Southern rock (sans racism) with early country and punk-tinged garage rock (thanks in no small part to producer Jim Dickinson, best known for his work with The Replacements, Big Star, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Bob Dylan…)
I’ve run out of ways to describe what bands sound like. And if you think about it, telling you that one band sounds like another is really a worthless observation. So for the purposes of this review, let’s just say that if you put Lola Ray on a bill with…
No Straight Lines by Private Eleanor is the Baltimore alt-pop band’s third album, and its seems to do well at fitting into what I call the Garden State aesthetic. No, I’m not talking about the fact that Baltimore is near New Jersey — I’m talking about music that could have fit on the soundtrack…
Parker Street Cinema is a three-piece instrumental ensemble from San Francisco; pretty straightforward, but instead of using a guitar, like a standard three-piece, the third person instead rocks out on keyboard. Keyboard player Brian Glover really does rock out, too…
Okay, so I feel like I’m trespassing. Historically, “The Jonah Matranga Guy” here at SCR has always been Mel House — he’s the one who’s reviewed nearly every single thing Matranga’s done up to this point, from Far onward through The Volunteers, and these days…
Did anyone catch that miniseries on Showtime called Masters of Horror? If the answer’s “no,” well, it was a showcase of thirteen one-hour original horror films, each directed by a different classic director (John Carpenter, Dario Argento, John Landis, etc.)…
Y’know, I know that Washington rockers The Makers left any pretense of “punk” behind back in ’98, but since I haven’t had all that much exposure to the post-Hunger version of the band, it’s taken me a long time to adjust somewhat to their swerve into full-on glam rock…
This is heady, trippy stuff from a band that I know absolutely nothing about. But sometimes not knowing anything about a group is better than getting a CD in the mail from an artist that you really love…
Damn. I did it again. I went to a show last night specifically to see Boston rockers Damone, rushing my little girl to bed, throwing on a T-shirt I didn’t mind getting smoky, and blazing like a lunatic down the freeway to the club, all so I could get to the show before 8PM…
Rarely does a band I’ve never really listened to blow me away the first time I see them live. Usually, I have to build up some sort of familiarity with their catalog to really “get into the groove” (so to speak). Criteria, however, had me running to the merch table…
For the true fan of the half-man, half-chicken god of shred known as Buckethead, any new release is cause for celebration. Luckily, he’s been pretty prolific over the years, putting out an astounding body of work while staying as far away…
Holopaw is a low-key post-Elliot Smith sextet. The two singers take turns — one sings as if unsure of himself, with a quaver in his voice, and the other sings more assuredly, though not necessarily more loudly. On Quit +/- or Fight, most of their songs…
The Pacific Northwest is best known for two things: beautiful scenery and rain. Reverb Records, however, is doing its best to put the area on the map for another reason. The Portland label is at the forefront of the American shoegazer movement, and Eugene, OR, act…
What is there to be said about Gas Huffer? Lemonade for Vampires is just immature punk rock coming from a group of guys who have been around for ages. On this latest attempt to create old school-sounding punk rock, though, Gas Huffer has sadly failed…
I had high hopes for this, based on what I’ve heard in the past from John Dufilho’s full-time band, the Deathray Davies, but despite the decent songwriting, his solo debut, I Remain, as Always, a Rabble Rouser from the Mountains, is a bit of a letdown…
As anybody who’s read this little e-zine for a little while probably knows, I’ve been a fan of H-town singer-songwriter Arthur Yoria for a few years now. And upon receiving his latest two releases, a pair of EPs entitled Suerte Mijo and Something Must Be Wrong, I’m reminded why…
One of the most refreshing releases of the year, this Chicago-area band mixes poppy hooks with anthemic, classic rock riffs and a seventies sense of rock ‘n’ roll cool. There’s no garage-y throwbacks here, though. Instead, the band works through radio-friendly alt-rock…
I was intrigued by Snake’s Got A Leg when I saw “includes members of Wolf Parade” in the tagline for this album. Sunset Rubdown is essentially Spencer Krug, the lead singer and keyboardist from said band, one of a number of recent Canuck bands emerging on the hype scene…
How to do yourself no favors: send out a press kit where every article mentions Modest Mouse or Arcade Fire or both, and then mention both several additional times in the base text. Setting yourself up for comparisons to those bands is a recipe for disappointment…
I’ve been a fair-weather Supergrass fan, I’m afraid. I loved ’em when they first emerged, kicking and spitting, out of that shiny-clean era of Blur-obsessed Britpop, saw them play an amazing show here in Houston to a shamefully small crowd of local hipsters…
Minimal singer/songwriter music from Mr. Stevens’s own noggin. It’s a difficult task to create a solo work that retains its individual identity without becoming self-absorbed or so personal that no one else can relate to it, but by remaining simple, plain, and true…
If the reference point for Rogue Wave’s sunny one-man show Out of the Shadow was the Shins, then for the paradoxically dense and weightless near-psychedelia of Descended Like Vultures, it’s the Flaming Lips’ Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots…
The job of the critic, I think, shouldn’t be to say whether or not the critic likes the record so much as to communicate whether or not you would like the record. So let’s say you’re not me. Let’s say you like high-concept stuff like the Decemberists dressing up as pirates but really wish that they would have done it with a Western-style theme…
By far The (International) Noise Conspiracy’s cleanest record, and after relentless touring in support of their breakthrough album, A New Morning, Changing Weather, the Swedish band exchanges the stripped-down, raucous sounds of the past for more radio-friendly fare…
I’ve got a soft spot for Seattle noisemakers the Blood Brothers, it’s true. Unlike a lot of their fellow travelers in the noise-rock arena, they always seemed to hang onto to some semblance of a groove, and vocalist Johnny Whitney always staggered relatively close…
I’ve always been kind of conflicted on The Appleseed Cast, the long-lived “main band” of Hundred Hands vocalist/whateveralist Aaron Pillar (his former Hundred Hands/Cast cohorts, Christopher Crisci and Ed Rose, have apparently dropped out, leaving everything to Pillar…
