Recorded and filmed live in Tokyo, Deerhoof’s Fever 121614 is a multimedia offering (video & audio) that, in 40 minutes, compacts 10+ years of music into a tightly tailored, 12 track live set. It’s the perfect intro into Deerhoof’s expansive and eccentric discography for a new listener, and a brilliant reminder to old fans why this band is so, so important.
Life is Alright, Everybody Dies is a complex beast, and one that requires numerous listens to fully engage. Kal Marks are making a brand of catharsis rock that seems content being deeply isolated from a wider audience -- it’d be a stretch to say that Shane wants everyone to understand what he’s created. This benefits Kal Marks though, as they’re one of the bands that make their name finding a middle ground between relatability and extraordinary talent.
Wronger, released late last year, is the band's second full-length and, like its predecessor, it is full of the gravelly noise rock that its members are known for making throughout their careers. Comparisons to those earlier projects, along with bands like Atlanta's Whores or Athens, GA's Jucifer will surely abound, but what sets PIGS apart from their brethren is how much more they are.
While this collaborative effort between post-metal shoegazers Jesu and confessional crooner Sun Kil Moon doesn’t quite creep its way toward words like masterpiece or classic, it is an impressively rich and engaging musical experiment – a coalescence of disparate sensibilities that form something new, if not entirely unique.
The third full-length output from Aaron Maine as Porches, his first for Domino Records, is among other things, a noted departure from Slow Dance in the Cosmos. On Pool, Maine, and by extension the band, trade warm rock for a far colder sound – mostly eschewing live drums and guitars and instead working primarily with a varied palate of bass tones and synthesizers.
The newest record from The Spirit of the Beehive entitled You are Arrived (but You’ve Been Cheated) is a fever dream that sets the listener in a dark bedroom writhing in sweat-soaked blankets. This release isn’t so much of a departure from their previous self titled LP as it is a descent deeper into the swirling dream world that the band has created.
In a 2013 interview via The Drone, Ty Segall explains his obsession with garage rock at an early age. “The only flaw of garage rock,” he mentions, “is the repetition.” Over the course of his insistent stream of studio albums, Segall has proven that he’s serious about that claim. With Emotional Mugger, he takes Bowie’s credence in shape shifting and, on first listen, gives us his strangest album to date.
Washer finds a happy medium between the pop sensibilities you may find in the late ‘90s—early 2000’s punk scene and the fuzzy, slightly-math-rock influenced work of their EIS peers. Most songs on the record are singalong friendly, while some contain a part or two that induces finger-counting, or an ending seemingly unrelated to the rest of the track
Radcliffe’s first record under his own name is a constantly buzzing machine even in its quietest moments; a jarring found sound or rogue synth melody is lurking in the shadows continuously, giving each song a depth that is uniquely Radcliffe’s. This record is at times reminiscent of early albums by The Microphones in their eerie and dense but still sweet sounding progressions, as well as their dual ability to turn uneasiness into complex beauty.
Spray Paint isn’t catchy, or hooky. They don’t write earworms. Their guitars are more likely to sound metallic and percussive than anything like a guitar. When the guitar is recognizable as such, it is likely playing the same chord continuously. What their music is: infectious and hypnotizing, driving.
Those who wear their feelings on their sleeves aren’t to be trusted. Emotions are for the weak. Sprained Ankle by Julien Baker is a slap in the face to that line of thinking. It shares a lineage with artists like Pedro the Lion and Mineral. Intimate songs that are open about lost loves, doubts of faith, dealings with the darker sides of our inward beings.
Though they have arguably more in common with melodic post-hardcore bands like Pale Angels or Cave In than they do with Hawkwind or White Hills, it's difficult to talk about Polyon's music without lapsing into the kind of language used to describe the star-scraping riffs and psychedelia typically associated with the lauded purveyors of space rock, simply because of the scope and atmosphere of their sound.
a 10-track celestially atmospheric sonic collage of sludge, fuzz, reverb, and dream pop falsetto. Carefully gift-wrapped into an intimate and dreamy continuum, Bedroom Eyes offer a new take on grunge/shoegaze, blending pop accessibility with sonic intricacy for a record vague in delivery but specific in affect.
