Goodnight to the Rock and Roll Era

Left of the Dial is going on hiatus for a few months on account of some spontaneous employment (I know, I'm just as surprised as you are).

In my absence, I advise you to check out the following sites for your music needs:

Picasso Blue (For your punk / indie needs.)

In The Wake of Poseidon (Like rock music? So does Paul.)

The Garbage Man and the Ambulance (Dudes, this is what the hipster gals are listening to. Ladies, this is what you should be listening to if you want to be hip.)

Also, check these ones out, too.

Nickmongo (Comics that occasionally feature jokes.)

Drunk and Stuck in Philadelphia... (A good read if you live in Philly and like alcohol.)

Well, that's it! You can still read my thoughts at Punknews.org and No Ripchord, on occasion. Thanks for reading this mess, everyone. I'll bring it back around again when I've got the time for it. In parting, I leave y'all with this:






One love,
Mr Dogg

Haiku Reviews #4

Artist: And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead
Album: The Century of Self

Epic and complex
Rocks throughout but holds no hits
Best work still in past

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal

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Artist: Yeah Yeah Yeahs
Album: It's Blitz!

Synth but not dance rock
Karen O still writes good songs
Everyone relax

Buy, Steal, Skip: Buy

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Artist: Dan Deacon
Album: Bromst

Still does same old tricks
Mature but fun, fills out sound
Deacon is the man

Buy, Steal, Skip: Buy

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Artist: Wavves
Album: Wavvves

Fuzz punk songs are good
Total four good tracks, no more
Don't believe the hype

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal

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Artist: The Black Lips
Album: 200 Million Thousand

60s garage punk
It's been done, but still sounds good
VU fans should like

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal

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Artist: Mi Ami
Album: Watersports

I like the idea
Flashes of good guitar work
Not a fun listen

Buy, Steal, Skip: Skip

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Artist: Say Hi
Album: Ohhs & Ahhs

Weakest record yet
Too much indulgence, Say Hi
Get Ferocious Mopes

Buy, Steal, Skip: Skip

Get It Now!: Oxford Collapse - Young Love Delivers

Oxford Collapse came to my attention from the most unlikely of places: the MTV corporation. The charmingly homemade video for "Young Love Delivers" flashed across my screen and burned itself into my mind. As I watched the band eat cheese burgers in a Delorian (no joke, this video was fucking system), I couldn't help but fall in love with the band's reckless and friendly brand of indie-rock. I strongly urge you to pick up Bits, the band's 2008 release on Sub Pop records. In a more perfect world, this is what the underground would sound like.

Oxford Collapse - Young Love Delivers

Buy Bits Here

Get It Now!: Superdrag - Slow to Anger

While I know a shitload about 90s power-pop, my knowledge of that spunky also-ran Superdrag is minimal. What I do know is that "Slow to Anger," the opening track off Industry Giants, their fifth album and first in as many years, is a three-minute blast of strong, feelgood rock. With its simple song structure and classic-rock melodies, the track is not only a great "in-the-car-warm-weather" song, but also a template for fledgling rock bands; this is how to make a simple idea sound great. If only the entire album was this good...

Superdrag - Slow to Anger

Get Industry Giants here

Nerds and Hip Hop, Together at Last (In A Good Way, Not The MC Lars Way)

Artist: Team Teamwork
Album: Ocarina of Rhyme

Comments: While Danger Mouse didn't invent the mash-up on his copy write-violating 2004 record The Grey Album, he certainly propelled the art form into the public eye like never before. In the wake of his success, the music world has seen a slew of like-minded projects, from the good (Girl Talk's last two albums) to the not so good (LushLife's WestSounds, which brought the Beach Boys and Kanye West together with disastrous results). The relatively unknown Team Teamwork (whose Myspace page has less than 10k views at the moment) is the latest group to try their hand at mashing with their Ocarina of Rhyme mix tape.

Dorks and gamers will probably have a pretty good idea of what's going on already, but for the uninitiated, OoR is a play on The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time, one of the best selling and most popular video games of all time. Team Teamwork's record takes selections from the game's score and pairs them with some of hip-hop's best lyricists (and Slim Thug).

To recap: music from video games + rappers = Ocarina of Rhyme.

Considering how ridiculous this looks on paper, the album's success to failure rate is surprising. True, the first few bars of the opening track, a mash of Clipse's "Virginia" with the "Lost Woods Theme," is a bit hard to swallow. Even someone with no Zelda familiarity will have a tough time rectifying the pairing of lighthearted flute with Clipse's ice-cold verses about laying suckers down. However, the song is a winning one, and the juxtaposition in styles will eventually sway even the most stalwart of naysayers.

Indeed, most of the album is legitimately good, pushing itself way past novelty and into the realm of legitimate work. Team Teamwork do little to the original songs, occasionally adding heavier percussion or outside instruments, but never ruining the original spirit of the songs or their concept. There are some truly brilliant pairings to be found on OoR. The mix of the "Hyrule Field Theme" does wonders for Pimp C, making the rapper sound much more triumphant and commanding than his own tracks can, and MF Doom's "Vomit" sounds right at home over the "Lon Lon Horse Race Theme," a pairing that makes almost entirely too much sense (I mean, odds are good that Doom would have wound up doing something like this on his own, anyway). The real album highlight is Aesop Rock's "No Jumper Cables" mixed with a drummed-up version of the "Goron Village Theme;" the minimal tribal beat gives weight to Rock's intricate wordplay and affords the track a level of punch that is shockingly missing from most mainstream rap productions.

Like any mash-up collection, the album is not without its misses. Common's "I Used to Love H.E.R" sounds just a little bit too playful mixed up with the "Hyrule Market Theme," and the combination of "Still D.R.E" and the "Getting Treasure" theme is an outright car wreck. While Team Teamwork is to be admired for trying to create a track from such a small and quick fanfare, the song is stretched way too far and collapses before even getting out of the first verse. But to be fair, it's a lot harder to make Mike Jones and Slim Thug sound elegant (which is exactly what happens when they are paired with the "Fairy Fountain Theme") than it is to make Dr. Dre sound any better.

Ultimately, mash-ups like Ocarina of Rhyme (and even The Grey Album) are only as good as the novelty of collaboration will allow. Once the combos become commonplace, the album usually falls to the wayside. The best that can be hoped for is a handful of legitimate tracks and a way to get your name out there. To that end, Team Teamwork's hip-hop nerd wet dream is a success. Not bad for a day's work.

Key Tracks: No Jumper Cables + Goron Village, Still Tippin' + Fairy Fountain

Download the album here from free.

Do We Really Need Another Band That Sounds Like Guster? No? Cool.

Artist: Fiction Family
Album: Fiction Family

Comments: Fiction Family, the collaboration between Switchfoot lead singer Jon Foreman and Nickle Creek guitarist Sean Watkins, is a classic example of a band that can do one thing (and only one thing) well. The group's self-titled debut album is awash with soft-spoken, gently strummed acoustic ballads that aim to couple nicely with Foreman's earnest prose and sincere delivery. Their familiar brand of emoting can be charming on individual tracks, but stretched out over the course of an album their one trick loses steam quickly.

Fiction Family is pleasant to a fault. The album utilizes a formula that hinges on Watkin's new-folk instrumentation and Foreman's coffee house croon with the aim of delivering both lyrical and musical charm. While this formula works in small bits (“Betrayal,” “When She's Near”), the album quickly blends into cliché on both fronts, reducing the record to little more than a pile of overused chords and horse-whipped sentiments about love.

Nickel Creek die-hards will no doubt hear Watkin's touch all over the album in the form of sitars, pianos, and violins melded into his folk arrangements, and while there are some nice structures to be found, lyrics like “You spend your life inside a box looking through stained glass / And dream about a better day and hope it finds you fast” quickly obliterate any musical goodwill.

The record is such a slave to its familiar routine that any slight break from the mold (like the catchy, loopy “Out of Order”) stands as a titanic success in the face of such willful, agreeable mediocrity.

For a certain group of people, the people who watch Garden State once a month, who can't forget the first time they ever heard Guster, whose play lists are riddled with acoustic singer-songwriters wailing about emotional gambits with the opposite sex, Fiction Family's self titled debut will likely be the album of the year. For the rest of the world, however, Fiction Family is nothing more than a bland collection of pleasant soft-pop, good for high school mix tapes, background music, open mic nights, and little else.

Key Tracks: Out of Order, Betrayal

Buy, Steal, Skip: Skip

Someone Call Zack Braff! Scrambles Will Change Your Life!

Artist: Bomb The Music Industry!
Album: Scrambles

Comments: It doesn't matter how many times Fight Club comes on, nothing can prepare you for failure. Sure, heartbreak, lonesomeness and isolation are powerful, but there is no feeling quite like the exotic mix of apathy, self-loathing, bitter anger, and frustration that comes with hitting bottom. Finding oneself unable to live up to personal expectations, let alone the expectations of society at large, is a truly crippling thing. As an unemployed guy in his mid 20s living on the poverty line in a country falling apart from the inside out, I can understand the smoldering frustration and anger that threatens to boil over at any time. Forget high school, being on the brink of adulthood is fucking terrifying.

It's at times like this when punk rock is more important than ever. Regardless of how you wish to classify it, (as a movement, a genre, a lifestyle, etc), odds are good that we all got into it for the same reason: at some point it spoke not just to us, but for us. It gave us sense of belonging and kinship that was otherwise unavailable, not to mention a mouthpiece for the feelings we were too feeble to describe. Punk put the words in our mouths and spat them out as a defiant scream. It gave us strength when we felt weakest.

Well what was true at 16 is still true in your mid-20s. The world still makes no sense, and we still occasionally need someone to speak for us, to give our internal struggle a voice, something to sympathize, something that understands. No one comprehends this like Jeff Rosenstock, the ringleader of punk's finest musical circus Bomb the Music Industry!. Scrambles, the collective's latest album, is a testament to confusion and impotence on the doorstep of legitimacy and how we can find hope even in the face of such titanic self-doubt.

After four albums of kitchen-sink punk rock, Roesnstock's skills as an arranger and composer are fully honed and razor-sharp. Never content with simple sequences, Rosenstock has found a balance between his epic aspirations and conventional song structure, resulting in songs that throw everything together without ever sounding jumbled or unorganized. Where on previous albums songs were occasionally too excitable to be reigned in, Scrambles is a well-structured serving of fist-pumpin', boot-stompin' punk rock that manages to sound controlled without sounding limiting. Tracks like "25!" and "Sort of Like Being Pumped" are bursting with life and excitement, piling on layers of sound without ever getting too messy to enjoy. Even more scaled back tracks like "Saddr Weirdr" and "Wednesday Night Drinkball" spare themselves no indulgence without ever actually sounding indulgent.

In his book Nothing Feels Good, Andy Greenwald points out that Blake Schwarzenbach was idolized for his ability to write songs that were intensely personal yet able to appeal to a mass audience at the same time. Rosenstock also has this ability to speak for us all, to let his personal stories stand as parables and metaphors for our own lives. Scrambles finds him on the verge of becoming one of punk's most vital song writes, a low-fi Jarvis Cocker singing for the man-boys who are old enough to drink but still living in the gutter, unable to pull a life together.

The album features songs about party-going dance clubbers and their drugs of choice, losing friends when moving out of town and (of course) a track about the foolishness and hypocrisy that runs rampant within the punk scene. While these songs are certainly good, it is the ones about Rosenstock's life as a man-child living in the city that are the most impactful, the most essential to the album's emotional core. On "25!" Rosenstock breaks down burden of the late-bloomer with simple and elegant prose, cramming a lifetime of frustration and panic into a two and half minute piano stomp ("We got our ideals but no way to achieve them / We swallow our pride over piles of problems / We're reaching for answers like nobody's got 'em").

Of course, you don't have to be at a life crossroads to feel confused about what to do, and if the album was nothing more than a laundry-list of complaints and whining, it wouldn't be nearly as good. At the end of it all, however, Scrambles is an album about overcoming. Sometimes things fall apart. There are times when the rigors of life will beat down even the most optimistic of individuals. Scrambles is a life vest at those times. It is an album about spinning wheels, about hovering between adulthood and adolescence, and ultimately, about how even something as small as seeing the sunset from the back of a train can give you enough strength to carry yourself home.

Key Tracks: Stuff That I Like, It Shits!!!, 25!, Saddr, Weirdr, Young Mind Fresh Body, Sort of Like Being Pumped, (Shut) Up the Punx!!!

Buy, Steal, Skip: Buy it now. In fact, you can download it for free at the band's website, but you really should donate some money (which you can also do from the website).

Adult Nights Too Similar to Every Other Night

Artist: Wild Light
Album: Adult Nights

Comments: My first experience with Wild Light was not a good one.

See, I saw them open up for Tapes n Tapes a week ago, and they made me sick. While the band has been getting some pretty good press all over the place, all I saw was four guys in tight pants making stupid faces and playing what could charitably be called "synth pop" and more accurately called "generic dance-rock bullshit." I left the bar with one of their matchbooks (yeah, this band has got fucking match books, for chrissakes), fully prepared to rip their album Adult Nights to shreds.

To be fair, Adult Nights is not nearly as bad as the band's live show lead me to believe. First of all, their songs are much more synth pop and much less dance bullshit on the album, and it's always better to make synth pop than dance bullshit. In fact, some of these tracks, like the one-two album opening punch of "California on my Mind" and "New Hampshire" are pretty nice little pop songs. With strong vocals and catchy hooks that get stuck in the head the way good pop songs should, Adult Nights is a hit as long as you stop listening after the first two songs.

After those songs, however, the album quickly runs out of charm. Every song after the first two is either a retread of those first two or a reminded of other, better bands. At any given moment listening to Adult Nights, one will be reminded of Death Cab For Cutie, The Shout Out Louds, The Legends, Belle & Sebastian, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, even the Arcade Fire (of which one of the members of Wild Light is a former member). It's one thing to listen to an album and think "Hm, this reminds me of something else" and another to listen to an album and think "Hm, I wish I was listening to one of these other, better bands right now. I think I'll put that on!"

Still, Adult Nights is not at all the train wreck I hoped it would be. It's a perfectly fine album if you can't wait for the next Train album, or if you're a high school girl, or if you just really, really like average keyboard pop. Harmless and toothless, I'm sure this album will appeal to someone, but with some many better bands doing the same thing at a higher level, I'm just not sure who. The only way to really look favorably on Wild Light is as a springboard to better bands, which is a noble enough purpose, I guess.

Key Tracks: California on my Mind, New Hampshire

Buy, Steal, Skip: Skip

Get It Now #2: Constantines - On To You

(Get It Now! is a new segment at LOTD, and, as the title suggests, it is an instant recommendation of what sounds good in the moment. Act fast before the mood changes!)

The Constantines are a hard band to pin down. Their complex guitar layering avoidance of traditional song structure and gruff vocal delivery make them consistently interesting, if not always instantly successful with first time listeners. However, when these Canadian post-rockers put their mind to it, they can make one fine song. While they've never delivered a knockout album from start to finish, tracks like "On To You," "Young Lions," and "Shine A Light" off their watershed 2003 release Shine A Light proves that when Constantines get it right, it's time to sit up and listen.

Constantines - On To You
Buy Shine A Light Here

Indie Rock's Mustached Meatloaf Strikes Chords, But Not Without the Occasional Strikeout

Artist: Franz Nicolay
Album: Major General


Comments: I'll always have a soft spot for over-the-top balladeers like Meatloaf and Billy Joel. Say what you want about their theatrical tendencies and their ham-handedness, but when one makes their entire musical career about the trails and tribulations of love, mankind's most overblown emotion, there has to be a sense of presentation and grandness. It is this mentality, the idea of magnifying emotions through music, that drives Franz Nicolay's Major General, the first solo record from the mustached troubadour responsible for ivory tickling with The Hold Stead and World Inferno/Friendship Society.

The existence of this album doesn't make much sense, until one pulls back and realizes that Nicoaly, with his operatic voice and flair for the dramatic (I mean, have you SEEN this man?), is one of the few members of their band with enough character to support a solo album. And if there is one thing Major General has, it is character. In spades.

Nicolay must have been working on variations of these songs for years. The music jumps around in style so much that Major General is more a collection of ideas than an actual album. Some of the ideas are quite good, too. Take for example the album opener "Jeff Penalty," a punk smasher about Nicolay's time at a Dead Kennedys reunion show. The song builds toward a big multi-vocal breakdown that doesn't work as well as one would hope, but is still worth repeat listens. In the same vein is the excellent "Confessions of an Ineffective Casanova," in which Nicolay regales us with tales of his botched romances. Both songs might be a little bit too "Hold Steady" for some, but those people are just being dicks (on "Quiet Where I Lie," however, that argument is much more apt).

Of course, an album of just punk anthems would never stand for someone as quirky as Nicolay. The rest of Major General is all over the place, jumping from Joel-like character sketches ("Dead Sailors" and "Hey Dad!") to an honest to God smooth lounge track ("Do We Not Live in Dreams?") and every classic rock touchstone in between. All this jumping from style to style insures that the listener is never bored at the cost of robbing the album of any sort of cohesive flow or connection. And while Nicolay has a distinct voice, it does tend to waver at times, reveling why he's been a backup singer in most of his bands.

Major General is a pretty decent collection of songs from a man who obviously has more ideas than his two bands will allow him to release, but probably too many ideas to ever button down and release a steady unified work. Still, if you've got a soft spot for the dramatic blowhards who know more about the human heart and aren't afraid to sing about it, there's a lot to like in Franz Nicolay.

Key Tracks: Jeff Penalty, Do We Not Live In Dreams?, Confessions of an Inefective Casanova, I'm Done Singing

Get It Now! #1: Wintersleep

(Get It Now! is a new segment at LOTD, and as the title suggests it is an instant recommendation of what sounds good in the moment. Act fast before the mood changes!)


Artist: Wintersleep
Album: Welcome to the Night SKy

Comments: Snow Patrol, The Fray, Keane, Travis, Belle & Sebastien, and early Death Cab For Cutie. Wintersleep could be mentioned in the same breath with any of these bands, as well as any band that makes mid-sized emotional pop music. The comparison wouldn't be wrong, especially considering how pleasantly unremarkable Welcome to the Night Sky is on first listen. Those who recognize the strength of the band and go back for repeat listens, however, will find a wealth of better-than-average pop songs that hit much harder than their soft-rocking brethren. Tracks like "Weighty Ghost" and "Laser Beams" have much better composition and structure than anything Snow Patrol has done, while mammoth album closer "Miasmal Smoke & The Yellow Bellied Freaks" is a post-rock turned soft titan, a beautiful and epic closer to an album that is as yielding and adventurous as the season that named them. Philadelphia is covered in snow. There is no better time to get into Wintersleep.

Fight Seasonal Affective Disorder With The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

Artist: The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
Album: The Pains of Being Pure at Heart

Comments:Despite the massive snow storm that will surely have destroyed us all come Monday morning, there is no doubt that Spring is well on its way. Soon enough teens will be falling in love, plants will rise to greet the new found warmth of our mother sun, and the music world will see a slew of sunny, poppy releases that will aim to match the bright and frivolous joy of the season. The Pains of Being Pure At Heart self-titled release is the first of many albums in this subgroup, and it might be the best one as well.

The band has seemingly been universally compared to My Bloody Valentine, and while touchstones like R.E.M, The Cure, The Cars and Polaris (best known as the house band for Nickelodeon's hipster training program The Adventures of Pete & Pete), there is something undeniably 80s going on throughout the record. It's not hard to imagine a parallel universe where TPOBPAH would sit snugly next to other sweet, fuzzed out love songs on some John Hughes movie soundtrack.

Breaking down an album like this on a song by song basis is pointless, as almost every track sounds identical to the one before it. The only honest to God standout on the record is the drum-less opening track "Contender," a song that sets the charming tone of the record but is still strong enough to operate on its own. However, while saying an album is similar throughout is often a bad thing, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart sidesteps this criticism by working fantastically as a whole record. Clocking in at 10 songs in just over 30 minutes, the album is the perfect length: not so long that it overstays its welcome but not so short that the listener feels gypped.

These punky, new-wavey, synthy, mildly fuzzy songs might not become the new anthems for teen love, they certainly make for nice music to listen to while walking on a spring day.

Key Tracks: Contender, This Love is Fucking Right, Hey Paul (Not that it really matters, it's all gravy - Ed.)

Despite Serious Star Power, N.A.S.A Can't Quite Touch the Sun

Artist: N.A.S.A
Album: Spirit of Apollo

Comments: If fantasy sports, all-star teams, super groups, and My Life in the Bush of Ghosts have proven anything, it is that America loves the idea of collaborations. The idea of the biggest and brightest coming together to make something is always enticing, especially in the world of music.

Given this inclination for collaboration, N.A.S.A's Spirit of Apollo is a music dork's wet dream. Founded by L.A producers Squeak E. Clean and DJ Zegon, N.A.S.A (which stands for North America / South America) is a vessel for uniting people of different genres and cultures together under the universal idea that making music is cool. As if this hippy, free-love ideal wasn't enough on its own, Spirit of Apollo contains some of the biggest and best names in both hip hop and indie rock. Including artists like Kanye West, Karen O, Chuck D, David Byrne, RZA, Santagold, Ghostface Killah and Tom Waits (Tom Waits!), on paper this album is the best idea of all time, ever.

The album even lives up to this insanely high standard on occasion. Listening to Ol' Dirty rap from beyond the grave while Karen O sings the most adorable hook of 2009 on "Strange Enough" is both compelling and tragic. "Spacious Thoughts," which pairs Kool Keith and Tom Waits, is another genius track that can only come from two innovative artists combining forces for a 4 and a 1/2 minute march of awesome (Tom Waits really can't do any wrong, it seems). "The Mayor," which pairs Ghostface's drunken-master prose with the endless confidence and smooth delivery of the The Cool Kids, is far and away the strongest track on the album and a definete candidate for "Song of the Year."

Sadly, Spirit of Apollo can't live up this unreasonable expectation forever. The sad truth is that the majority of the tracks are little more than novelty. It's interesting on the first listen to see who is paired with whom (kind of like prom), but by the second and third spins, the album's flaws being to stand out. Too many tracks are samey and poorly produced, too many songs suffer from their ham-handedness, too many tracks collapse under the weight of their stars, and too many songs are forgettable. "Money" features a rare uninspired verse from Chuck D and a nonexistent contribution from Seu Jorge (he of The Life Aquatic fame), and "Gifted" featuring Kanye West, Santagold and Lyyke Li is an absolute mess from start to finish.

While Spirit of Apollo does yield some truly good tracks, most of the songs are only as good as long as one's fascination with the collaboration's last. Still, no album could ever match up to the collaborations in the heads of listeners all over the country and N.A.S.A's heart is definitely in the right place, so maybe the album deserves a break. While it's worth checking out, it'll never replace the fun of mixing and matching bands in your own head.

Key Tracks: The Mayor, Strange Enough, Spacious Thoughts

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal

OK, So Maybe This Is a Picture of a Dude, but Still, Freaky.

Artist: Antony and the Johnsons
Album: The Crying Light

Comments: Music as art is sometimes cumbersome to listen to. Luckily, one of the years first truly awesome musical releases blends the line of artistic expression and beautifully crafted songs into a listening experience of a lifetime. Antony and the Johnsons latest album, The Crying Light, takes it's inspiration and amplifies the beauty into some incredibly sublime music. Antony Hegarty's muse is not another musical act, but a 102 year old Japanese Bhuto dancer, Kazuo Ohno (who graces the cover of the album.) Hegarty was so moved by the lyrical dance of this frail but incredibly passionate dancer , that the album exudes an air of gentle beauty that seems at any moment could break. The album is simple, but it dazzles from start to finish. The music floats above the air and Hagerty's voice takes front and center stage and shoots the music to the limits of the sky.

The album opens with "Her Eyes Are Underneath the Ground" which starts immediately with a trembling Hegarty delivering the lyrics at such a beautiful, melancholy timber that it's almost impossible to not be moved by the song's first few seconds. The arrangements are simple and not overpowering, but add another element of beauty to an already gorgeous melody. Hegarty's voice is reminiscent of Nina Simone and Tim Buckley giving it a very ethereal feel. It adds so much to the songs. "Epilepsy is Dancing" takes a physical condition that is restrictive and makes it into a beautiful art form. Strange, yet it is a beautiful image to say that a physical ailment could actually be a wondrous piece of art. The ideas of death, physical restriction and art are definitely a theme on this album.

Running just a little over a half hour, the album seems like a sweeping epic even though it's over quickly. All the praise goes to the centerpiece of Antony Hegarty's voice. The most up-tempo and musically flowering song, "Kiss My Name", is really the only time that the music stands up to the power of the vocal performance. It's a fast waltz of sorts with very snappy drums and elegant flute and string arrangements that flutter about your ear drums. Other than that, it's all Hegarty's beautiful bravado. Luckily it's not just baseless vocal show boating. The lyrical content is poetic and poignant. During the title track, Hegarty delivers one of the most romantic lines I have ever heard in: "I was born to adore you/As a baby in the blind/I was born to represent you/To carry your head into the sun/To carve your face into the back of the sun." Something about this line screams dedication and sheer love for someone and Hegarty's delivery here shows that passion and amplifies it by 100. "One Dove" also has this element of poetic beauty that gains value with its master's voice. It trembles along as Hegarty begs for "mercy" from the tracks guiding force. It's genuine.

One thing for sure is that Antony is more important then the Johnsons here, but this is not to say that the music isn't fit for the style and mood of the album. It's subtle and quiet and somber and is the perfect balance to his voice. It's like Meg White of the White Stripes. It's not that shes a bad drummer (Come on dude, she totally is - Ed.), but the bravado and flashy eccentricity of Jack White's guitar and vocals needs something simple but a good backbone. The Crying Light is a triumphant record. It's some of the most beautifully poetic music you will ever hear and it does not get tired or old. The unique voice of Antony Hegarty is filled with utter desperation and melancholy, but instead of it being overbearing or cumbersome, it's somber and gentle and inviting. Rather than alienate the listener with something so artistic, The Crying Light invites you to share with the emotions and the grandiose-yet-simple structures of the songs is what makes this record excellent. It will make you weep at times and it will fill you with a romanticism that music rarely does.

- By Paul Tsikitas




Rating: 9 out of 10

Key Tracks: Epilepsy is Dancing, One Dove, Kiss My Name, The Crying Light

Buy, Skip, Steal: Buy

Clean this Goddamn House! (Pictures and Links Comming this Afternoon)

OK, so I am obviously really far behind on my reviews. In the interest of getting back to business, here are some really, really short reviews of albums that have come out this year, in alphabetical order as they appear on my itunes (journalism!).

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Get Guilty by AC Newman

I never listened to The Slow Wonder, but I imagine it sounds quite a bit like this. Fans of The New Pornographers, especially their last album Challengers will find a lot to like here. Newman specializes in the kind of pop music that is smart and catchy, but not always constraining itself to 4/4 time or set patterns like verse / chorus / verse, which can sometimes get a little grating. Its not hard to see Newman making this kind of good, not great album every four years for the rest of his life.

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Noble Beast by Andrew Bird

I saw Andrew Bird in concert once, and it was far and away my best experience with him. Watching him build loop layers and harmonize with himself is captivating. Sadly, that performance didn't transform into an appreciation for his album work. I get why people like his soundtrack-ready chamber pop, it's pretty and soft and nice to listen to, but too much of it runs together for me. A friend of my mine compared him to Sufjan Stevens, which is accurate if you take away Steven's prose and replaced them with a lounge voice and a killer set of whistlin' lips. More of the same from Bird, so if you were on board before, you'll be on board now.

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The Last Pale Light in the West by Ben Nichols

By all accounts, Cormack McCarthy is taking the demise of the American frontier harder than everyone, but Ben Nichols of Lucero is a close second. Inspired by one of McCarthy's novels (I'm too lazy to look up which one), Pale Light is one of the better offerings of the year. Nichols strums an acoustic guitar, sings in his lonesome raspy way, and makes an album of somewhat tragic, somewhat good country-alt-folk-punk songs. I'm a little confused as to why this is a solo EP and not a Lucero album since they sound fucking identical, but whatever, it's a good listen. Put in on when you are sad and it'll make you want to go to Montana.

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Ray Guns Are Not Just The Future by The Bird and The Bee

Boy girl electro-dance-pop. This is what happens when you listen to too much Jenny Lewis. If you like this, you just aren't trying anymore. Music for idiots.

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Liferz by Blood on the Wall

I suspect this is a pretty cool album, but really I haven't taken enough time with it. Whenever one of their songs comes up on my shuffle, I usually skip it. When I don't I am treated with some low budget indie punk that never leaves a bad taste in my mouth, but never really hits me hard enough to come back to it. I guess the jury's still out, but in the back of my mind I don't really see myself ever listening to this album more than once. Sorry, Blood on the Wall.

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Working on a Dream by Bruce Springsteen

In two songs, Springsteen obliterated all the good will he had built up with me with The Rising and Magic. Those two songs are "Outlaw Pete" and "Queen of the Supermarket," the latter being one of the worst Springsteen songs ever and the former being one of the worst rock songs ever, probably in the top 20. Turns out Springsteen is one of those songwriters who can't operate without something to push again (like the Bush administration). I see two more albums like this, followed by some long hiatus and one final old man album that Rolling Stone praises as the finest piece of music of all time, ever.

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Gutter Tactics by Dalek

The reminds me of one of my favorite albums ever, El-P's I'll Sleep When You're Dead, and as such gets much love from my ipod. Not really a rap record, seeing as the vocals are fuzzed out and pushed way back in the mix, Gutter Tactics is a producer's record all about immersion and oblivion. The opening track, featuring an exert from that crazed priest that gave Obama trouble last year, sets an urgent and Dystopian tone that is appealing as fuck to me. "We Lost Sight" is one of the only tracks not about how fucked we all are, and it's about how fucked rap is. Not a feel good record, but definitely an early highlight.

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Already Free by The Derek Trucks Band

Dave Mathews Band type horse shit. If you like Mathews, The John Butler Trio, or any other of those "chill" frat bands, this shit will appeal to you. Also, please get better taste in music.

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Tonight by Franz Ferdinand

Another early highlight, Tonight is the disco album than answers the question "What would happen if the guys from Franz Ferdinand spent the last three years fucking groupies instead of writing an album?" Thank god these guys are so good with hooky pop music. With it's drums and bass much more pronounced and obvious and their guitars scaled back for a more synthesized sound, this is about as well made a party record as you'll find this year I suspect.

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Major General by Franz Nicolay

I'm actually going to flesh this out tomorrow. In the mean time, check this dude out.

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Glasvegas by Glasvegas

More hyper-pop from the Scots. If you liked Frightened Rabbit or The Shout Out Louds, you'll probably like this. Is it wrong of me to lump all these Scottish bands together into one cloud? No, since they all make pretty pop music in varying degrees of coolness. Glasvegas is the weakest of the three, I wouldn't recommend it unless you REALLY like Scot-pop or unless you REALLY love the idea of mixing Coldplay with The Killers.

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The Mountain by The Heartless Bastards

It's hard for me to recommend this given my deep distaste for The Black Keys, especially since both these bands make blues revival rock, but fuck it, The Mountain is a pretty cool record. The lead singer has a really neat voice, the guitars sound cool, the bottom end is as heavy as it should be, and you can listen to the whole goddamn thing without changing a track and have a pretty good time of things. The Mountain is a great sitting around record.

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For(n)ever by Hoobastank

Hoobastank is still making records?!

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S/t EP by Iwrestledabearonce

You ever hear one of those hardcore bands that all play at the exact same time as loud and as sloppy as they can while someone grunts and screams along with it and you can never really tell exactly what is going on and you suspect that it's all very technical and professional musicianship but who the fuck cares because how can anyone tell in this tangled swamp of assault noise? That is what this sounds like, expect different than the rest of the bands. I mean, don't get me wrong, if that sentence above made any sense to you, you've got a pretty good idea of what to expect, but something about Iwrestledabearonce stands out to me, makes me think they might be a little better than the rest of the noisemakers. I don't know, get this if you like Dillinger Escape Plan and punching yourself in the face.

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Fantasy Black Channel by Late of the Pier
Fantasy Black Channel is definitely hipster dance music ala Does it Offend You, Yeah?, but a little more interesting. LOTP seem a lot more occupied with trying new arrangements and changing directions mid song then they actually are with making people dance. Kind of a fun listen, but nothing to get too occupied with.

Ludacris - Theater of the Mind
Mi Ami - Watersports
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart - S/t

I'll flesh these out. I love me some Luda, and Mi Ami is too weird not to be discussed. As far as Pains goes, I'll get to them.

Well, that's about all I feel comfortable covering right now. Hopefully, regular broadcasts will resume by next week.

Okay, Let's All Calm Down About This New Animal Collective CD

Artist: Animal Collective
Album: Merriweather Post Pavillion

Comments: It's never as easy to review a groundbreaking band as it is to review an average band. The latter can be given context, where the former can only be judged by its own merits with no benchmarks or guidelines to follow. Because of this, I understand the recent critical clamoring recieved by Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion, even if I do not agree with it.

Judged against the rest of the independent music world, MPP is a triumph. The four goofs in Animal Collective continue their streak of creating starkly original music so dynamic and dense that it defies genre. People like me struggle to wrangle them in with vague and weak labels like "expansionist" and "psychedelic," but these uninspired platitudes fail to capture the scope of what AC are creating. They are an indispencible band that must be listened to to be understood, and that alone is worth praise.

However, when judged within the scope of their past releases, when measured up to themselves, MPP is a lacking record. Countless others have referred to this as AC's "pop" album, a designation I will not dispute. There are certainly elements of pop on this record, soundscapes and movements that follow the simple patterns and hooky harmonies that are the essence of pop music. However, these moments seem to come scattered throughout a mostly uninspired swamp of repetitious noise clouds and meaningless sonic meanderings. Songs take too long to develop with too little to sustain them, turning flashes of song into bright spots in a dense cloud of sound. Where last year's Strawberry Jam was a record of forward motion, MPP is a collection of wandering, building toward nothing and taking its time to get there.

Which is not to suggest that MMP is un-listenable, just less inspired than previous outings. "My Girls" is a pleasant enough track until it folds in on its own lack of development. "Summertime Clothes" and "Daily Routine" both have admirable sections within them, but both fall apart before anything more than cursory interest can set in. The album's closing track "Brother Sport" is the only one with any backbone, and even at its best moments its little more than a reminder of a much better collection of songs, those found on Strawberry Jam.

Let me not understate the importance of Animal Collective. In a time when even indie rock, a source of eternal originality, seems to be collapsing in on itself, AC is one of the few bands putting out unmatched and non-repeatable music. However, even the great bands have to answer to their past works, and Merriweather Post Pavilion cannot match up the band's previous heights. It might be more interesting and original than 75% of 2009's potential albums, but its not even half of what it should be.




Rating: 6.5 out of 10

Key Tracks: My Girls, Brother Sport, Summertime Clothes

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal

Parts and Labor Recieves a :(

Artist: Parts and Labor
Album: Receivers

Comments: I tried really hard to love Receivers, the latest from Parts and Labor. I read all the blogs hyping them as a band to watch in '09. I listened to the album for weeks, hoping for something to spark and grab me. I spent hours looking for angles to expand into stories. After weeks of trying, I just have to realize what's been in the back of my head this whole time: Receivers is not great, its just OK.

It's a damn shame I can't drum up more to say about it. Parts and Labor have an interesting sound. They make indie rock heavy on keyboards and synthesized sounds with as little guitar as possible. Their sound combines the ascetic of Wolf Parade with the collective mentality of Akron/Family and the European hilly feel of Big Country, one of the least appreciated bands of all time. Basically, this band makes assessable fuzzy noise rock and that shit is right in my wheelhouse.

And yet, nothing sticks. Sure, the seven minute fuzz out of "Satellites" makes for a compelling listen, and the mountain stomp of "Wedding In a Waste Land" is top notch thumpin' music reminiscent of a hipster version of The Who. Sure, the smaller scaled tracks like "Nowheres High" and "Little Ones" are charming numbers that use the band's noisy buzz to create a warm listening experience. But for some reason, it isn't enough.

Maybe the songs take too long to get to the payoff (cough, "Satellites" cough), languish too long in their own noisy self indulgence without ever making it worth it to the listener, noise for noise sake. Maybe its the sometimes jarring voice of the lead singers, almost painful on "Mount Misery." Maybe there's just too much flash and not enough substance.

I still like Parts and Labor, and I like Receivers. I'll get their next album as soon as its out. I do hope they become an "it" band in '09, and I wish them nothing but the best. But I can't pretend to love Receivers any more. Too much of it just leaves me wanting.




Rating: 6 out of 10

Key Tracks: Satellites, Wedding in a Waste Land

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal

(Listen to Big Country, goddamnit!)

Scotts Out Coldply Coldplay

Artist: Frightened Rabbit
Album: Midnight Organ Fight

Comments: Even before the turn of the new year, I was late to the Frightened Rabbit party. I first heard them shortly after college while staying with a friend, their Scottish voices and large-minded soft rock coming from his little brother's speakers. I offhandedly asked what it was, feigned interest and forgot all about them. A few weeks later, that same friend came to me talking about their songwriting and how "just fucking cool" their music was. Because I am wretched, I ignored him, too.

It wasn't until the waning moments of 08 that I finally got on board and got Midnight Organ Fight, a decision that I regret only for my tardiness. Frightened Rabbit's second album is a combination of Coldplay and Shout Out Louds, merging stadium readiness with smart pop construction for an album rich with well written anthems melodramatic matters of the heart. This album is one Garden State away from ruining teenage love lives across the nation.

The first three tracks on the album are so good that for the first week of having the album, they are all I listen to. "I Feel Better" is the most rocking of the three but the least substantial despite its excellent delivery of rather uninspired lyrics ("I feel better / and better / and worse and then better). "The Modern Leper" and "Good Arms vs Bad Arms" are the real killers though, the kind of mix tape fodder that serves as the soundtrack to high school pining when love is still new and indestructible in its powers. The kind of songs that will be popping up in AIM profiles and Myspace pages and episodes of Grey's Anatomy and anywhere that emotion is mined for years to come. The former is a self deprecating love song that paints the portrait of a man in decay and the woman who loves him regardless and is both charming and a little embarrassing.

The real magic, however, is the titanic crush of "Good Arms vs Bad Arms," a song about what happens in the aftermath of a relationship devoid of a clean break. Brushed drums and simple background harmonies hang above a repeated guitar line for four minutes, building up to an almost tragic decrescendo. All this would be for nothing if not for the fantastic lyrics that capture the frustration, anger, and melancholy of being the one left behind, the foolish and crazy things it makes you want to do. ("I'm armed with the past/ and the will / and a brick / and I don't want you back / but I want to kill him") It's a near perfect five minutes that is so daunting that it makes the listener almost beg for the album to be over.

Of course, there are ten tracks to go from there. Most all of them are fantastic, and I could paw through songs trying to find more examples of the moving lyric writing, but half the fun of Midnight Organ Fight is finding them and given them their own meaning. It's that kind of album, a cathartic guide to modern love. I'll highlight "The Twist" and “Keep Yourself Warm” as other personal favorites, tracks that denounce the shark lifestyle and looks down at the notion of jumping from person to person for warmth and meaning, but favorites shift depending on mood.

This is by no means a perfect album. The 13 songs on the album are more or less repeats of the first three, causing the album to blend into a giant mess of dramatic soft-pop when taken in one sitting and none of the songs ever match the skull-crushing heartbreak of “Good Arms vs Bad Arms” (although”Keep Yourself Warm” comes close). However, when taken on a song-to-song basis, it's hard to recall a more well written, well performed collection of love songs than the ones found on Midnight Organ Fight. Get on board now, before Frightened Rabbit becomes a household name and Zach Braff is exploiting their magic for his self-absorbed vanity projects.



Rating: 8 out of 10

Key Tracks: Good Arms vs Bad Arms, The Modern Leper, The Twist, Keep Yourself Warm

Buy, Steal, Skip: Buy

Hair Jordan Shoots, Scores

Artist: Black Ladies
Album: Hair Jordan EP
Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/blackladiesband

Comments: Of all the rock duos to grace my stereo over the last several years, none had as much punch and staying power as the heartbroken robots in Death From Above 1979. You're A Woman, I'm a Machine was not only of the best albums of 2004, but still remains the strongest duo album of all time. Now, in their awesome wake, the Black Ladies have stepped up in an attempt to fill that particular void.

Musically, the bands don't have much in common, yet the comparison is hard to avoid as both groups consist of only drums and bass. However, the tracks on the Black Ladies Hair Jordan EP are not so much about relationships and lust as they are about destroying the world. See, the Black Ladies have more in common with attack bands like Lightning Bolt and Hella, groups that are not about message or meaning, only destruction. While the EP never reaches the same chaotic heights as the other two bands, the songs are far and away more user friendly.

The EP opens with "Hair Jordan," a wordless three minute blast of sixteenth notes and punishing drums, both airtight and locked into each other. This trend of relentless sound is carried into the EPs other two tracks, "Ace of Fades" and " Skullcaps," with only the occasional change in tempo and the fuzzed out vocals that briefly show up on the last track to make a difference.

Hair Jordan is the kind of EP that is best heard and not described. I am not a good enough writer to convey the power and brutal fun of this music. At about eight minutes long, the EP never wears out its welcome, although I could see an entire album of this getting a little old without some more accompaniment besides the drum and bass fuzz. Regardless, Hair Jordan will fill a rocking duo hole in your heart and make you believe in the power of two.



Rating: 7.5 out of 10

Key Tracks: Hair Jordan, Ace of Fades

Buy, Steal, Skip: Buy

Parks Kind of Cool, Like Vanilla Ice Cream

Artist: Cale Parks
Album: Sparklace

Comments: Sparklace is the worst kind of album to review because I have no strong feelings towards it either way. It is a startlingly above average album, by no means good and definitely not band. It is the vanilla of electronic music: it will sometimes make you want to dance and sometimes you will not even notice that its on, but it will never challenge or elate you.

Tracks on the album go one of two ways, atmospheric drone and weird, Brian Eno-esque dance music. I find the sequencing of the album odd, Parks chooses to put most of the more active tracks ("Two Haunt Me" and "Some Sew, Some Find" especially) in the back half of the CD while the first few minutes are thick with more subtle and ambient fare ("Train Lady" and "Every Week Ends") The album begins and ends with electronic interludes that are not much more than audio experiments. The eight tracks in between are strangely charming and almost instantly forgettable. This is the sort of album I would only put on while I was doing something else.

Initially, I felt guilty about my assessment of Sparklace. When I saw Parks open for Ted Leo a few weeks back, he preformed admirably in the face of a largely ambivalent crowd. In the 30 seconds I spent talking to him, he seemed like a nervous, likable guy who just wanted to make low impact dance music, and I found that charming. After some brief research, however, I realize Parks doesn't need my support. Besides his solo stuff, the dude is active in Aloha and White Williams, two bands with more than enough indie love. The last thing they need is more blog buzz.

While I cannot recommend Sparklace to anyone, I also would never chastise someone for picking it up. There are some neat sounds to be found (the wind chimes on "Age of Reform" are hella peaceful) and the whole thing is largely enjoyable. It just lacks any and all staying power.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Key Tracks: Every Week Ends, Two Haunt Me, Some Sew, Some Find

Buy, Steal, Skip: Steal, I guess.