Friday, April 12 2013
Lord Weird Slough Feg: Twilight of the Idols / Down Among the Deadmen / Traveller
Slough Feg is one of the finest cult metal bands in existence. If you've not indulged before, this three-CD reissue from the band's earlier years is the perfect opportunity to experience some of the very best traditional metal ever made.
Papoose: The Nacirema Dream
It's hard to argue that it was worth the wait, but Papoose's debut album is finally upon us and it has a lot to offer.
The Sugargliders: A Nest With a View 1990-1994
Even if it were true that all music is readily available today, compilations like this would be as important, because context is important.
Broadway Calls: Comfort/ Distraction
An exemplary effort in pop-punk excellence that is free of both fat and filler; a true gem within a genre so often stuck in its past.
Thursday, April 11 2013
James Blake: Overgrown
The London wunderkind returns with an album that attempts to satisfy fans nostalgic for his early post-dubstep tinkerings and the new legion of listeners who know him as one of the decade's most promising singer-songwriters.
Dawes: Stories Don’t End
The third album in five years from the LA roots-rock favorites finds them continuing to channel Jackson Browne.
Josh Rouse: The Happiness Waltz
Rouse has settled in, it seems, and found a way to encapsulate all the dichotomies of life, making them work within the confines of a three-minute pop song.
Strange Talk: Cast Away
Eleven songs of bombastic synth pop joy that does not let concepts such as "subtlety" spoil the ride.
Jungle Rot: Terror Regime
Simplicity, thy name is Jungle Rot. The knuckle-dragging Wisconsin old-schoolers are back with another slab of back-to-basics death metal.
Keith Jarrett: Hymns/Spheres
A double-disc set that finds the jazz pianist jamming on a baroque organ in the 1970s (when else?).
Wednesday, April 10 2013
Kurt Vile: Wakin’ on a Pretty Daze
Disengagement is something Kurt Vile sentimentalises, but his newest record is brighter, more self-satisfying.
White Fence: Cyclops Reap
Tim Presley's melodies have tightened up on Cyclops Reap, and he also makes a point of breaking out of his private, home-recorded setting and into larger spaces and emotions.
James Hunter Six: Minute By Minute
Yes, the production is grand, the band tight, and the songs are clever; but Hunter’s voice is the main attraction here.
New Kids on the Block: 10
10 arrives five years after New Kids on the Block's 2008 comeback effort, The Block.
Nuru Kane: Exile
Rustic-grubby, like the rough finish left on a chair to make it look authentically hard-crafted and a little more expensive.
Tuesday, April 9 2013
Brad Paisley: Wheelhouse
If this resembles a big summertime blockbuster film, the concept behind it is to blow up outside your comfort zone while also thoroughly embodying it; change without changing too much.
Pick a Piper: Pick a Piper
Pick a Piper is not a bad statement for a debut full-length, one that sees the band exploring the intersection of electronica-based dance music with the more organic sounds of rock music.
