Deady - "Deady" | Album Review
Deady brings a fresh sonic expression of throwing a middle finger to the system through their lyrics taunting ACAB on one of the more punk rock albums to be released this year. Deady unfolds into further exposure of greed and blindness while also being an album you enjoy simply because of the hex-girl whining and electrifying strings.
ALBUM OF THE WEEK: Bad History Month - "God Is Luck"
Paper Bee - "Thaw, Freeze, Thaw" | Album Review
There’s a clear constellation of influence with Adult Mom, but Paper Bee are more pastoral lyrically, often blurring between the body and the earth. Even the rhythm of the title, its looping and returning, is reflected in the sweeping structures of the songs, and feels like a mirror of the natural world.
Mitski - "The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We" | Album Review
Subsonic Eye - "All Around You" | Album Review
All Around You finds its roots in the exploration of how to find light in a world that can feel, at times, dark, senseless, and devoid of meaning. From the ashes emerges a hopeful record that encourages listeners to tune in to the beauty that is all around us - if we can only find the courage to look.
Irreversible Entanglements - "Protect Your Light" | Album Review
Irreversible Entanglements are grounded in jazz, or if you want a more precise categorization, spiritual jazz, but this quintet has something that can also be labeled as an experimental post-punk mentality and approach to spiritual jazz. What they have brought to Protect Your Light is the musical experience they gained.
ALBUM OF THE WEEK: mclusky - "Unpopular Parts of a Pig / The Digger You Deep"
With ear issues seemingly on the men, it would seem mclusky are ready to reconvene their second coming, a handful of great songs leading the way. The band released as “double A-side” single, with subsequent “double B-sides” to boot, delivered via Bandcamp in order to raise money for international touring and hefty visa costs.
Patio - "Collection" | Album Review
Patio’s Collection offers a fresh and exciting expansion of their brittle post-punk by loosening the grooves and imparting a bit of disco inspiration into the formula. They still retain their tight connection and anxious tension, but there is a bit more freedom to explore new directions and challenge themselves to their benefit.
Retirement - "Buyer's Remorse" | Album Review
Released via Iron Lung Records, the West Coast purveyors of some of the finest anarcho punk this side of hell on Earth, Buyer’s Remorse wastes no time in uninviting you into its harsh soundscape, filled with diatribes against modern contradictions, life debts, paranoid anxiety, addictive decay, and traces of assorted human wastes.
The Jesus and Mary Chain - "Sunset 666 (Live at Hollywood Palladium)" | Album Review
Sonic Youth - "Live In Brooklyn 2011" | Album Review
The band’s document of near-impending implosion, Live in Brooklyn 2011, is perhaps the most giving and gracious accidental greatest-hits and entry point to Sonic Youth they could have asked for. It was given a digital release in 2020, but now is the first of any of those digitals to receive a proper physical treatment in this decade.
ALBUM OF THE WEEK: Tomb Mold - "The Enduring Spirit"
Tomb Mold have pushed boundaries since their formation. With The Enduring Spirit, they’ve decimated form in favor of exploration, from caustic prog to jazzy psych expanses, and dare we say they’ve done it without alienating metal purists. Their latest album favors an open mind, a collision of primal force and deranged technicality.
Perennial - "The Leaves Of Autumn Symmetry" | Album Review
The constant tinkering of their songs gives the impression of a restless band always reaching for something better than the last time, and in reworking an older batch of songs on The Leaves of Autumn Symmetry, they concede that the best that you’re capable of at any given moment is a shifting target.
Spirit of the Beehive - "I'm So Lucky" | Album Review
On their new EP, I’m So Lucky, blood-curdling screams over abrasive textures stir up dissonance and paranoia. As uneasy as it is to listen to, they make it worth every second through rich layers and dazzling samples. As the “Philly shoegaze” landscape and subculture begin to crystallize, Spirit of the Beehive continues to hold their own.
CS Cleaners - "Drolomon" | Album Review
Drolomon is CS Cleaners’ debut EP, concocting a hypnotic combination of classic punk, a la Black Flag, the art rock looseness of Tropical Fuck Storm, and the optimism of Sports Team. After their debut single “Income Pain,” a gritted teeth love letter to hardcore, the group planted their feet in warehouse floors sticky with beer and sweat.
Be Your Own Pet - "Mommy" | Album Review
Be Your Own Pet has reunited and released their third record, Mommy. Teasing another unapologetically piercing garage rock experience, the album opens with searing guitar solos and thunderous drum patterns. However, it’s in the second half of the album that the band’s experimentation takes center stage.
ALBUM OF THE WEEK: Earl Sweatshirt & The Alchemist - "VOIR DIRE"
Ratboys - "The Window" | Album Review
PAL - "PALS" | Album Review
PALS is a great example of what a debut record should do. It provides an introduction to a band that is clearly hungry to break out and show what they can do, while still being incredibly well produced, funny, catchy, and succinctly and tightly played. The musicianship and creativity here holds a lot of promise.