Month: December 2013
Review: Lisa Papineau – Blood Noise
Often using the softer register of her varied instrument, songs like “Dream The Wild,” “Early Spring” and “Rainmaker” partially sound whispered and ghostly. … read more
Review: Korn – The Paradigm Shift
There are breakdowns and plenty of bass slapping going on, just not as much of front man Jonathan Davis’ screaming. For fans, this may be a nice bite of fresh Korn after the last dubstep collaborative album. Looking past “dubstep Korn,” this record fits right in with however many albums Korn’s recorded. … read more
Review: Jonathan Rado – Law and Order
The opening track “Seven Horses” starts off with an odd, fluid, warbling synth line and morphs into catchy ’60s pop. Because of the simplicity of the lyrics (“If you feel it all, clap your hands”) and the weird synth noise, I thought it was going to be pretty similar to the MGMT’s Oracular Spectacular, but by the second track it had completely changed … read more
Review: KILN – Meadow:watt
KILN’s exploration of the juxtaposition of the natural and the manmade is extended beyond the title and into the music of meadow:watt. KILN combine various guitar and bass lines with programmed beats and hefty amounts of post-production editing to create something wholly organic and wholly crafted. … read more
Review: Juan Wauters – N.A.P. North American Poetry
N.A.P North American Poetry is filled with beat poetry, combined with the radiant attraction of pop, dunked in folk. … read more
Review: King Krule – 6 Feet Beneath The Moon
His debut LP manages to blend light jazz with minimalistic trip hop, while the music itself remains folk at its core. This album feels like Marshall took the vibe of classic folk album Moondance by Van Morrison, then dragged it through the London underground, encountering a few alleyway beatings and a few bad breakups along the way. … read more
Review: Ills – Hideout From The Feeders
This album mixes aspects I’m fond of—catchy progressions matched on bass and guitar that give the rhythm a thickness I could move to—with aspects I could leave behind, like vocals that sometimes sound a little too much like Isaac Brock, for example. … read more
Review: Irish Moutarde – Raise ’Em All
A mix of alternating lead vocals—switching between nearly each band member—and representation of bagpipes, accordion and banjo, played to fast-paced punk rock, make for a really exciting sound. Like any Irish-style band, they include their drinking songs like the bittersweet “Farewell to Drunkenness” and the festive “Glasses to the Sky.” … read more
Review: Iron Chic – The Constant One
“Whoas” and subtle vocal harmonies adorn these major-key pop punk songs that elicit emotion in a heartening way, as if Iron Chic’s M.O. was to purge our negative thinking by way of sonic chemotherapy. … read more
Review: Jeffrey Novak – Lemon Kid
One assumes that the unintentionally yet appropriately titled opener, “Endless Repetition,” sounds like a first-stage demo on purpose, or that the title track is really dreadful, despite the briefly creative drumming that it starts with. … read more