Back in 1998, Rawkus Records released Black Star, featuring the iconic debut of Mos Def and Talib Kweli as the hip-hop duo Black Star. One year later, Mos Def released his critically acclaimed solo album, Black on Both Sides, solidifying himself as a socially aware and truly gifted MC. Things then took a sharp turn south. His second album, The New Danger, missed the creativity and freshness of Black on Both Sides, while his third album, True Magic, seemingly lacked any real effort and can barely be considered an album. Ten years down the road, and Mos Def has yet to live up to the potential he displayed on that debut solo album. If Mos Def wants to avoid the has-been label, things need to change with The Ecstatic, Mos Def's newest record.

Thankfully, The Ecstatic is a return to what made Mos Def great: the ability to weave in metaphors with the lyrical agility that most MCs lack. As obvious as it sounds, lyrics make or break for hip-hop, and it appears that Mos Def has rediscovered his ability to craft a great verse. Gone are the self-seeking lyrics and lazy poetry of the last two albums; instead we're treated to a barrage of lyrical gems. In "Quiet Dog Bite Hard," Mos Def calls out the whole wack-MC sound by claiming, "They flow so petty, unsteady, it's boring / These dudes ain't throwin, they yawnin' / They need to get off it / So 'wack rap' is all you can call it / Therefore move it on to Def for stimulus." The subject matter is back to what Mos does best, as well, relating his life through brilliant observational lyrics. "Life in Marvelous" describes Bed-Stuy Brooklyn in 1982 as a place where, "The windows on the ave look like sad eyes / They fix their sharp gaze on you when you pass by / and if you dare to stand, you can see 'em cry."

It's not just his lyrics that are better, though -- it's not that he hasn't tried to incorporate new sounds and styles in previous albums, it was just so unsuccessful. The Ecstatic has found the right balance between hip-hop beats and the other, with beats ranging from the aggressive and brass-heavy "Twilite Speedball," by the Neptunes, to the classic hip-hop sound and looped R&B samples in "History," by the late J Dilla. Mos Def even does a little experimentation in "Casa Bey," a song that's one part funk and one part music for a 1970s game show. While conceptually bizarre, it all works well with Mos Def's lyrical style.

Listen to The Ecstatic, and you can't help but wonder what happened to Mos Def. It's as if Mos knew that his last two albums were terrible and now speaks and rhymes with the passion of someone who has something to prove, someone with a chip on his shoulder. This is the Mos Def we'd hoped for and expected after Black on Both Sides. With rumors of a new Black Star album in the pipelines, it's good to know that Mos Def still has it.

[Mos Def is playing 8/19/09 at House of Blues, along with Jay Electronica.] (Daniel Yuan // 08/19/09)

"Retro" has become a bad word in the musical world. First we had the '70s stoner bands, the neo-thrash bands, and the revival of glam. So what's a band like Nebula supposed to do, when they were retro before retro was a cool, and subsequently uncool, thing to be?

Their newest release, Heavy Psych, attempts to get one foot outside of their psychedelic/stoner box while keeping a Birkenstock-wearing one safely still in. While it does retain many of the standards and trademarks of said genre, what accompanies the psych are some slivers of -- gasp! -- pop.

This is not to say that they are trying to become something akin to Shinedown (oh, the horror...). What they have done, instead, is taken off the fuzzed-out edges and allowed some of the songs to breathe.

Listen to "The Dagger" or "The Other Side," and the guitars and vocals sound a lot cleaner, and the organ gives it a nice feel. Now, long-time fans shouldn't fret too much, as the back half of the album will make them feel like Spicoli and friends climbing out of their van in Fast Times and Ridgemont High. "Dude that's my skull!"

"Dream Submarine" and "Little Yellow Pill" should make the hashers happy just on name alone. Musically, the guitars distortion gets cranked, vocals get fuzzed up, and structure gives way to feel.

Heavy Psych is not two halves of a whole, as the album flows easily even with the new influences. While some may argue that the "heavy" of Heavy Psych is lacking, what's present is a band that's learned that knobs go two ways for a reason.

[Nebula is playing 8/31/09 at Walter's on Washington, along with The Entrance Band, Trian Woodburns, & Ghost Town Electric.] (Scott Whitt // 08/28/09)

It's hard to resist the temptation to compare Floridians (er, Floridian, at this point) One Small Step For Landmines and the significantly better-known Dashboard Confessional. Beyond the geographic kinship, both are shifting band/solo acts focused around punk-rock-bred guys playing hearts-on-sleeves, sweet, jangly, emo-boy acoustic pop songs, both are utter romantics who deal with love won, lost, and celebrated in myriad ways, and both have appealing, guy-next-door voices that can go from gentle melody to desperate howl at the flick of a switch.

Listen blind to most of the tracks on the free-download EP If You Could Get Over Me (get it here), and odds are that you'll think you're listening to the latest from Chris Carraba and company. In spite of all that, though, singer/guitarist Kevin Allen manages to distinguish himself over the course of this handful of songs, and while the Dashboard Confessional feel does stick, it doesn't hurt things any. If the songs sound like Carraba's, they sound like they're among his best.

And while Carraba seems to move further towards lush orchestration and full-band stuff with each album, this album's actually a stripped-down version of One Small Step For Landmines, with the band stepping aside to let Allen take the reins all on his own with just his voice, guitar, and these unassumingly beautiful songs. He starts with the warm, up-close "If You Could Get Over Me," with its wonderfully sweet, nimble guitars and lyrics like a cheerier, more okay-with-the-world Elliott Smith, and dives headlong into restrained heartbreak, wishing goodbye to a love who can't reconcile his big-stage dreams with their loathing of the band life.

"Aluminum Can Strings" is more languid and endearing, mellow but world-weary, all about dealing with the trials of a long-distance relationship, while "I Woke Up" is jangly and yearning, with Allen playing the bad guy at the end of something -- when he declares, "nobody will ever treat you worse / 'cause I was first," he doesn't even really sound that sorry about it. He knows it's spin, just a justification, but he also knows that that's how a love crumbles.

The crowning moment here comes halfway through the EP, with "New York, On Purpose," a pitch-perfect snapshot of a night spent on tour in NYC that becomes one of those nights you'll remember for the rest of your life not because it was spectacular in some way but just because everything felt absolutely perfect. Allen's voice here is smiling and serene, beaming as he reels back and lets the memory play, and it's beautiful and elegaic and thoughtful, making you feel the cool city breeze across the rooftops and yearn for the blissful freedom of getting lost in a city that's not your own. (Jeremy Hart // 08/07/09)

There's something fascinating to me about the ties between music and place -- how a certain sound, song, or voice can immediately evoke somewhere you've been, something you've seen, and immediately pull you inexorably back to the exact moment when you first experienced it. I'd be willing to bet everyone's got those moments; hell, movie soundtracks are essentially built around the very premise. I know I've got my own, like the way I can't help but think of roaming the woods of summer camp when I hear the first Enya album, or the Irish countryside when I hear The Pogues' version of "Waltzing Matilda," or a dusty train station outside Tangier when I hear Destiny's Child's "Survivor" (no, seriously).

All of which goes somewhat to explain, I think, why I'm getting into Oppressed by the Line's Kiku EP so much. OBTL music-maker Jonathan Thompson, ex-Of Normandy, ex-The Wash, and sometimes ex-Houston, came up with the songs on the EP while visiting Japan back in 2006, so the whole thing plays like an auditory postcard/journal of the trip, music as travelogue. And as travelogues of this sort go, it's a remarkably alluring one, marrying a lush/ethereal dreampop haze to restrained-yet-beautiful beats and synths and bringing to mind folks like Ulrich Schnauss (particularly on opener "Mountain Mist") and M83.

The aforementioned opener, for example, starts off with nice, gamelan-sounding percussion, then shifts upwards into a beat-driven cloud of melody, while "Sunset from the 16th Floor" is shimmering and ephemeral, gorgeous and gone far, far too soon -- although that's appropriate, given the inspiration/title of the track itself. It's electronic, yet warm and stunningly bright, with crystalline keys drifting over the top and an almost Tangerine Dream-esque harmony (and yes, that's a compliment).

"One Thousand Red Stars," for its part, is M83 all the way, complete with those thick, all-encompassing synth sounds; I find myself loving the calm, implacable single drum thumping along in the background. Then there's "Shinkansen," part of which Thompson apparently literally recorded on a bullet train across Japan; the train sounds eventually get swallowed by the solid-sounding Underworld lines Thompson slowly layers on, transforming the track into a speedy, sleek piece of robot-pop that moves along with the clean, efficient precision of (okay, never having been to Japan, I'm guessing, here) its namesake trains.

My personal favorite, though, has to be "Paper Cranes" -- I can't help but dig the steadily-building beats and vocals that sound like they're being broadcast from inside the airlock of a space station somewhere high above the planet (complete with the cool little electronic beep that precedes Thompson's vocal lines). Once the guitars switch on, covering the whole thing with a woolly blanket of fuzzed-out melodic noise reverently swiped from Kevin Shields, I'm fully sold. Majestic and awesome, with all the open-mouthed wonderment you should feel at discovering a new place for yourself. (Jeremy Hart // 08/07/09)

Let me start off by saying that I've never seen this much variety in a single record; I have to compliment Mr. Schutz for his combination of jazz, blues, lullaby-type songs, and Spanish flair. I think Gemini has the potential to be a good record, but without any sort of general theme at all, it's just more up-and-coming singer/songwriter stuff that honestly becomes sort of, well, already done, so to speak. I will say, though, that there's a range of influences here, ranging from Paul McCartney to Bob Dylan -- this isn't the hip new exciting record it wants to be, but while being groovy at times, it's really for the older crowd. (Justin Bradley // 08/07/09)

In the overflowing racks of DVDs at your local record store, the subject of stoner rock has long been neglected. The void has now been filled, however, with the release of Such Hawks Such Hounds. The film is the culmination of three years work by John Srebalus, a first-time director who seeks to expose one hard rock's many subgenres. While any documentary on stoner rock is very welcome, Srebalus has unfortunately delivered a very disjointed and confusing result.

Such Hawks Such Hounds starts off with a timeline beginning with Sabbath, plus a nice piece on Pentagram; the American band is one of those underground influences that get sadly overlooked. Then the timeline becomes almost inconsequential, as there's a piece on Earthless, a band who was not born when Pentagram was formed. This is nothing against that band, by the way, as their live piece is outstanding, not to mention bassist Mario Rubalcaba's explanation of the "cosmic nod."

The film continues in the same vein, with a look back and then a piece on a modern band. While that may be acceptable, what isn't is some of the bands included. There is Fatso Jetson, a blues band complete with a harmonica-playing frontman. The fact that they refer to themselves as a blues band should have been Clue Number One for the director. When guitarist Mario Lalli says, "a clean tremolo can sound so evil that it makes Black Sabbath sound like Peggy Lee," however, that should've been the proverbial final straw. They seem to be included because they were signed to SST Records.

Srebalus seems to play up the alt-rock and punk influence more than it really should be. Case in point is the inclusion of über-producer Jack Endino and Mudhoney's Mark Arm. Their inclusion wouldn't have been so bad, but it comes at the expense of Wino, generally regarded as the grandfather of stoner rock -- although after watching this film, you wouldn't get that impression. It's sickening that the director was able to land him and then to not fully expand on his influence. Instead, he chooses to spend more time of Arik Roper and others on "the art of stoner rock." Maddening.

That said, there are several good parts to Such Hawks. For one, the classic Sleep album, Jerusalem, is justly given its due. The 58-minute, one-song album is covered in detail, from the long and tiring recording to its mishandling by the record label, London Records. The label was so confused on what to do, partly because the band had broken up by the time it was released. The groups that rose from Sleep's ashes, OM and High on Fire, are both featured extensively.

One of the more interesting things Srebalus does is to touch on the pot influence of stoner rock. What's curious is how many bands apparently didn't like the tag, because they thought it gave them an unfair stigma. Also mentioned is how all the bands know they will never "make it" and the sacrifices that they make to keep playing.

Subjects aside, the film is not well-produced. It feels disjointed for the most part, and the timeline graphic used never seems to matter. There are many points brought up -- like how important Man's Ruin Records was -- that are never followed up on or further explained. My biggest complaint, though, is that Srebalus never does a complete job of explaining what "stoner rock" is. There are some cursory attempts at the beginning of the film, but they're never developed. I've read Wino's explanation, that stoner rock is the type of music that makes you feel like you are stoned, and to me that's the perfect genre definition. Of course, if Wino was given more time, we might have heard that in the film, but no such luck. (Scott Whitt // 08/21/09)

Reviewing Vetiver's latest release, Tight Knit, has been a most pleasant experience. Self-classified as "Thrash/Black Metal/Christian Rap"on their MySpace page -- proof positive the band does have a sense of humor -- the band tends to get tagged as "Freak Folk" or "crippled pigeon music" by reviewers, although most bands within this genre apparently prefer something more along the lines of "Naturalism" or "Naturalismo," as proposed by Vetiver singer/songwriter Andy Cabic's musical counterpart Devendra Banhart. To a new listener, it might be described as easy-listening folk-style music with soft and subtle arrangements and vocals.

There's an element of humility running throughout, which may be traced back to Andy's seemingly tranquil demeanor. There's a really nice French interview with Cabic at http://www.hi-nu.com/event/vetiver.php (it's in English, with French subtitles), if you're interested knowing more about his life, work, his very first guitar, and the one he tours with -- not to mention get a glimpse of his angelic-looking face.

In the album's first song, "Rolling Sea," he sweetly sings, "Wouldn't you like to be out on the rolling sea / What if your friends were there laughing at all your jokes and shit / Wouldn't that be good? You know it would." Light, intricate acoustic guitar and arrangements get you thinking, "hell, yeah, that'd be good -- and just exactly where are my friends!?" Further on he sings, "Nothing escapes the rolling sea / not the past or you or me." I can feel the hair against my face as the cool ocean breeze passes me gently...oops, that's only my bedroom fan; but seriously, it's fun to dream along with Andy.

"More of This" is a timely upbeat melody, much needed amidst the collection of other rather gentler works, and somehow manages to get me boppin' along, lifts my spirits, and also happens to be my favorite song on the album. This is one of the few songs that I can literally listen to over and over and over again without any qualms about it -- meanwhile possibly annoying any well-meaning vehicle passenger of mine. More likely, I'll teach them to enjoy such good musical stylings themselves.

"On the Other Side" is a quant narrative of Andy's aversion to the unnecessary business of being busy in the modern world, not to mention a valuable moral tale. At first listen, though, a proverbial red flag goes up in my mind's eye. "Wait just a minute here, Andy," I think to myself -- how do you keep so calm at all times? Are you really being true here? Are you not guilty of flipping off the occasional commuter, loudly blowing off steam in a public place, or just all-around freaking out every now and again? Are you so well-behaved that I should take lessons in composure from you? Now, having listened to the song repeatedly, I've come to believe that he is being honest and most likely has a very, very calm disposition.

"Sister" is a song where Cabic pleads for his sister to come back home, partly because, "Mom and dad are mad at me..." I can't help but become attached to this song, as it could very well have been my little brother crying out to me during my recent travels to Colorado, hurriedly leaving Houston, my family, and my friends far behind me.

Tight Knit is guaranteed to lower your blood pressure immediately, or your money back. I highly recommend purchasing this album to drive long distances across the countryside or just chill out on the seashore. When the album comes to an end, I can promise you that you won't mind replaying it time and again.

And when it comes to album covers, the old adage isn't always true. I believe that often times you can judge an album by its cover, and so is the case with this diamond. Quality musical creativity is usually reflected in quality artwork. The dark blue, black, and white cardboard bi-fold is well-designed, with starry nighttime constellations and a dense black forest of painted trees all against a background of what appears to be an old school record.

I find the lyrics and music here to be quite heartfelt, well thought-out, honest, and intelligent -- qualities oftentimes hard to come by in this age of incessant musical fodder and empty musical calories. Tight Knit proves itself a lyrical memory book worthy of keeping within arms' reach.

The band is currently starting out on their European tour, joined by Beach House, which will make for a fantastic sight to see and hear if you feel like taking a little 9-hour flight. (SCR Staff // 08/21/09)

Psychedelic music often gets a bad rap for its close kinship to '60s hippie culture. Despite modern psychedelic rock's distance from its groovier brethren, its dedication to mind-altering substances often does the music more harm than good. Early psychedelic music was the result of a time, mostly, while much of today's psych rock relies too heavily on the style rather than the substance.

The Warlocks are as guilty of this as any band, as was evidenced by the band's last album, Heavy Deavy Skull Lover. The Bay Area stoners redeem themselves with their latest release, however. The Mirror Explodes still reflects the band's dark, brooding sound, but longtime fans will appreciate frontman Bobby Hecksher's ability to create new material that doesn't sound completely rehashed.

While nothing on The Mirror Explodes has the instant addictiveness of anything on Phoenix or Surgery, "Standing Between The Lovers Of Hell" and the wonderfully drone-y "There Is A Formula To Your Despair" are among the album's best. Each song is classic Warlocks material, full of fuzzy feedback and low-key melodies, but the latter is the closest thing to a ballad Hecksher has written -- it never builds to an explosive peak the way the band's songs typically do -- while the other capitalizes on the group's strongest points: drawn-out intros, soft-spoken vocals, and catchy (for The Warlocks, anyway) choruses. "Frequency Meltdown," the album's token instrumental jam, is a shoo-in for being great live, which is how the band's music is best experienced.

[The Warlocks are playing 8/22/09 at Walter's on Washington, along with The Morning After Girls & The Vandelles.] (David A. Cobb // 08/21/09)

I usually come across four types of bands: the bands that impress you with their musical technicality; the bands you feel sorry for, knowing that this is their passion but that it's probably time for them to hang it up; the bands that get you fired up and make you want to put your fist through something; and the bands that make you want to dance. WE ARE HEX, a foursome out of Indianapolis, makes you want to dance.

Jilly Weiss, Brandon Beaver, Trevor Wathen, and Matt Hagan have thrown convention out the window with their debut full-length album, Gloom Bloom, which is an auditory assault of organic pop psychedelic-disco-noise experimentation. From the plush atmosphere of opening track "Sea Hound," which sounds like a trippy audio warp of transmuted accordions, plucked mandolins, and moaning synths, the album builds into a lush pool of sound that leaves you unprepared for the more indie "I N D P L S." The album then takes a decidedly retro feel with "Bottom of My Belly," and so on and so on, with each song taking the listener in a new direction.

What's most remarkable about the album is the live spontaneity of the recordings, due to the fact that most of the songs were done in a few takes, recorded in their living room. The retro synths the band employs and Jilly Weiss's distinct voice have brought comparisons to bands like Joy Division, Peaches, the Cure, New Order, and even Erase Errata, but with their airy doubled vocals, stripped-down three-piece drum kit, loopy guitars, and crunchy bass, they remind me more of their experimental contemporaries TV On The Radio, with a much more retro feel and, of course, female lead vocals.

If you've been looking for a gem of an underground band to call your own, get into WE ARE HEX now so you can say you were into them before they went mainstream. (Dremaceo Giles // 08/07/09)

Topless at the ARCO Arena is the first album from Wonderlick since their eponymous release in 2002. With two former members of Too Much Joy in the band, it's tempting to skip breezily over the pretty surface of this album and chalk it up as another tongue-in-cheek record full of the acerbic wit that was TMJ's stock-in-trade. Certainly the album is replete with ironic humor and sarcasm, and the smorgasbord of genre-bending post-modern pop hooks is fun to listen to, but don't let Wonderlick's smooth taste fool you into missing a rewarding experience.

Although seven years in the making, as the band had time and money to record (mostly through donations from fans), Topless at the ARCO Arena still hangs together as a concept album loosely centered around the problematic intersection of art and commercialism and reaching from there into an impressive array of subjects. The band masterfully juxtaposes accessible and never-repetitive music with intelligent lyrics and subject matter that deal with life's many contradictory impulses. Their songs address issues like the freedom of falling in love and the fear of actually letting it happen, the hunger for what is real and meaningful and the allure of the quick fix - of what makes us feel good now, the desire for personal independence and the need to be needed, the hope for a transcendent experience and the bitter disappointment of a life that often falls short of what we dream of for ourselves. What's truly marvelous about this album is that in spite of, or perhaps because of, its life and death subject matter, the obvious pleasure the band has in making music shines through. They provide a finished pop polish that makes a sweet coating over a sometimes bitter pill, and they manage to do so without ever becoming hopelessly cynical or falling prey to pat answers.

Like the band's name itself, Wonderlick offers up a tasty blend of the sacred and the profane. "This Song Is a Commercial" quips about itself, "It's vaguely defined in order to appeal / to the maximum number of fans / Has parts designed to make you feel / That someone finally understands," and then follows up with, "Your rage and your fear and your sadness and your dreams / Your dependence on certain lotions and creams / Your most beautiful hopes and most terrible pain / The urge you have to jump at oncoming trains." Wow. Are they sincere, or is that the part designed to seduce me into believing someone finally understands? Just when I think the joke is on me, the next verse in the song comes: "Your reluctance to sing along now / And the reasons you'll do it anyhow / Gimme a kiss, gimme something new now / Gimme something real no one can see through now." While skewering human foibles, Wonderlick never becomes so arrogant as to not include themselves in the joke.

"You First" is a song about falling in love, but love as only Wonderlick can describe it. It starts out with a sinister, throbbing bassline and morphs into a stirring anthem that's uplifting without being forced or serving up the commercial schlock we are cautioned about. And the lyrics follow a similar trajectory. Singing about his wife, we learn, "The day she said, 'I love you' / I had the worst reply / I should have said it back / But all I said was, 'Why?'" The sad inadequacy of that moment is palpable, and then comes the chorus and a moment of redemption that's gone almost as quickly as it came: "We are scared but we are willing / Unprepared and unrehearsed / Could be lame or could be thrilling / You go first." Again, Wonderlick artfully describes our conflicted natures: our greatest virtue, the transformative capacity to love, so often undermined by self-centered fear.

"Fuck Yeah!" pulls off the neat trick of being simultaneously about suicide and self-love, and there's a great cover of The Clash's "Janie Jones" that takes a 2:05 song and stretches it into a downtempo shuffle that lasts almost four minutes. "Devil Horns" first comes across as a snarky slam on Def Leppard and their mindless fans paying far too much for tickets and t-shirts, complete with a mocking sing-song melody. The gospel influences at the end of the song are the final biting punch line to the joke. But Wonderlick is never so simple -- in the midst of ridiculing concert-goers in search of some kind of transcendent experience, the lyrics affirm what those of us who love music know, that such experiences are possible. Suddenly the rousing gospel sounds at the end of the song no longer sound derisive but instead inspirational.

So it goes with the rest of the record, each song serving up a compelling blend of hope and despair, redemption and humiliation. And in the mix is the message. The album is about the spaces in between, those moments of grace when, even if we fall short of our very best, we are spared the pain of our own demons and find solace -- if only for a moment. (Jowell Lydon // 08/07/09)