Short Reviews with meaningful links. Usually presented fairly.
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Aging American band She Wants Revenge release another album of Bauhaus, Joy Division, and Sisters of Mercy inspired nonsense replete with fake British accent and ridiculously simple lyrics. Sadly, video is still trying to kill the radio star on Valleyheart's Take The World, as SWR decide to distract the MTV generation with visual titillation with a montage of vixens flopping around on bedsheets and shedding their clothes. Duran Duran also released a track in late 2010 with a similar video of young ladies taking off their clothes and winking at the camera in hopes that people wouldn't actually listen to their own trite tracks. However, the single track that shines on She Wants Revenge's Valleyheart is Reasons where the boys take their sound someplace interesting and also lacks the singer's propensity to use a mock English accent.
1. Take the World
2. Kiss Me
3. Up In Flames
4. Must Be The One
5. Not Just A Girl
6. Reasons
7. Little Star
8. Suck It Up
9. Holiday Song
10. Maybe She’s Right
It was likely decided by Eddie Vedder to brand his new album Ukelele Songs as a warning to folks who haven't been watching Mr. Vedder's musical progression during the past decade and expecting a raucous Pearl Jam LP. Eddie's passion for music has led him toward more quiet and introspective work within his soundtrack work on Into the Wild and other film and charity projects. Sparse arrangements can be an ideal setting for the great songwriting of Stephin Merritt's Magnetic Fields and Hayden, but Vedder's Ukelele Songs becomes a bit tiresome over 16 tracks even though he has one of the most recognizable voices in rock n' roll. Then again, there's a financial certainty inherent in Mr. Vedder's ability to someday sell a million copies of a dozen voice mail messages to women across planet Earth for $9.99 US.
Upon first hearing that Gruff Rhys had released a new solo album called Hotel Shampoo, I found that his Super Furry Animals project was still in the kennel. Welshman Gruff Rhys assembles a sound of quiet psychedelia with exploding choruses, cascading keyboards, weeping violins, and other surprising instrumental flourishes throughout, which are characteristic of the experimentalism that Gruff brings to his solo work and also with SFA. There is even a duet with Sweden's Sarah Assbring of El Perro del Mar on Space Dust #2 that includes the beautifully nonsensical lyrics "When I saw you at the seminar, rainbows and fireworks flow. When I saw you at the seminar, active volcanoes aglow." Hotel Shampoo is not immediately affecting, until you've understood that this cat named Gruff is up to more than just collecting tiny packages of soaps and shampoos.
01 Shark Ridden Waters - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
02 Honey All Over - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
03 Sensations in the Dark - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
04 Vitamin K - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
05 Take a Sentence - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
06 Conservation Conversation - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
07 Sophie Softly - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
08 Christopher Columbus - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
09 Space Dust - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
10 At the Heart of Love - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
11 Patterns of Power - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
12 If We Were Words (We Would Rhyme) - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
13 Rubble Rubble - Gruff Rhys - (Album: Hotel Shampoo)
About ten Years ago, Will Holland began the first iteration of his musical experimentation simply as 'Quantic'. Quantic was usually filed under Electronica in record shops at the time. Through the years, Mr. Holland delivered a funk concept band Quantic Soul Orchestra, he remixed, guested as DJ in hip clubs across the planet, then retreated to the roots of afro-cuban sounds with His Combo Barbaro, and also began his other mutation with Flowering Inferno. This relatively unknown record, Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno's 'Death of a Revolution', is enough to melt your antiquated expectations of dub-reggae from one of the world's preeminent music junkies, Will Holland. Be at peace.
Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - Westbound Train
Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - Make Dub Not War
Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - Dub del Pacifico
Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - Juanita Bonita
Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - Alegria en Bella Vista
01. Death Of The Revolution - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
02. Mi Chocolatina - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
03. Make Dub Not war - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
04. Cuidad Del Swing - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
05. Westbound Train - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
06. Alegria En Bella Vista - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
07. Dub Del Pacifio - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
08. Cuidad Del Swing - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
09. Alegria En Bella Vista - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
10. Juanita Bonita - Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - (Album: Death of the Revolution)
In January of this year, an unassuming teenager from Cleveland assembled a band to record his songs, thereby creating the official self-titled Cloud Nothings full-length album. The LP is chock-full of unpretentious peach-fuzz energy, which also happens to come equipped with clever songwriting and hooks reminiscent of Good Shoes or Ride from 20 years ago. Cloud Nothings are really quite something.
FREE Download of Cloud Nothings - I Apologize
Click down arrow below Info at the right side of Soundcloud object Cloud Nothings - I Apologize by kgwightman
1. Understand At All
2. Not Important
3. Should Have
4. Forget You All The Time
5. Nothing’s Wrong
6. Heartbeat
7. Rock
8. You’re Not That Good At Anything
9. Been Through
10. On The Radio
11. All The Time
The recently released LP by 6th Borough Project is the work of Edinburgh, Scotland DJ/Producer Craig Smith and "One Night in the Borough" is a collection of his self-produced house music. It lacks the future-funk of Eddie C's latest 'Parts Unknown', but it does bear some resemblance to the more mellow variants within the Lazy Dog compilations of Ben Watt and Jay Hannan of one decade ago. This is certainly not a detriment to the project, as the tracks bring clarity to 6th Borough Project's understanding of house and deliver it without the cheese that is often indicative of this style of music.
FREE Download of 6th Borough Project - Closer
Click down arrow below Info at right side of Soundcloud object 6th Borough Project - Closer by arthgaff
Tracklist: The 6th Borough Project - One Night in the Borough
01. Intro
02. Let Yourself Go (Live Mix)
03. If the Feeling's Right
04. B.U.R.T. (The Journey)
05. Find A Way
06. Back to Me feat. Ricky Reid
07. Sometimes The Fool
08. Settle
09. How Can I Show You ?
10. Endless Night
11. Iznae
12. Deep C
13. Changin
14. BURT (Inside)
15. String-A-Lude
Cults' self-titled first release plays out like brightly lit scenes deleted from a David Lynch film, as the New Yorkers draw from early girl group Motown, Broadcast's haunting song construction, Blondie's vitality, and the clever simplicity of Magnetic Fields. This blend of historic styles that Cults uses as construction material also finds them distinguished as the first group signed and pressed by Lily Allen's new record label. This is future film noir or psychological thriller soundtrack material alongside The Raveonettes, The Kills, Tamaryn, and Timber Timbre.
Bellingham, Washington's Death Cab for Cutie have been skulking stages as long as their sonic cousins John Vanderslice, Pedro the Lion and Built to Spill. Death Cab's newest LP 'Codes and Keys' is masterwork. Thoughtful, introspective lyrics built upon their musical abstractions slip their hooks into you like The Postal Service and Silver Scooter on a vision quest in the Queen Charlotte Islands. Death Cab have an absolute understanding of the development and construction of an LP, as the crucial placement of tracks 2, 4 and 7 anchor the remaining songs in the timeless path of their rock n' roll time machine.
Track 2: Death Cab for Cutie - Codes & Keys
Track 4: Death Cab for Cutie - Doors Unlocked and Open
On Art Brut's newest creation 'Brilliant! Tragic!', the band and their vocalist are finally bridging the gap between what had previously been a strong stylistic asset for them. This was emblematic on their prior album 'It's a Bit Complicated' on the track I Will Survive where it sounds as though the band was playing with the calibre of Panic at the Disco! or Taking Back Sunday, but the smart-ass recording engineer replaced the pretty-boy vocals with his own British sing-talk late one night in the studio, presenting it to the producer as a much better version. However, on Brilliant! Tragic! the band and vocalist seem to be finding a middle ground to better match their strengths, but the band had more zing with less effort on their previous outings.
Munich's Pollyester finally collect enough acutely quirky electro-pop songs and jam it into an LP entitled Earthly Powers replete with accompanying moody night-shot videos. Concierge d'Amour, German Love Letters and Pikant are the highlight tracks. Think Cocteau Twins meets Broadcast meets Bunny Lake.
