From the early start, Mui Zyu aka Eva Liu showed that she has an excellent knack for combining electronic instrumentation with soft velvety vocals, bringing along lyrics that actually have something intriguing to say. She further strengthens the ties that bind these elements here, without overburdening her music.
Sometimes art is manifested in the toughest of times, when you find yourself at a crossroads. For Kazu Makino and twins Amedeo Pace and Simone Pace, Sit Down For Dinner was a child to darkness and hardship. In this momentary instance of suffering, they found refuge in creating music through the pain that tied and bonded them.
As NYCs alternative scene flourishes, MX Lonely rises with their early 2024 release Spit. The EP stimulates the brain as you can effortlessly hear the energy and attitude the band possesses. Their writing concepts, 90's grunge riffs, intriguingly spooky vocal harmonies, and dedication have curated an emotionally charged EP.
Finom come off more composed and thoughtful than ever before. Their sonic moves may seem random to us, but there is a greater confidence and determination behind them. That is the real upside of change despite the confusion: you may not see the path but moving along has never felt more comfortable. Finom have discovered this through their dedication to one another.
Off Beat Degradations - a four-piece punk project mixing elements of post-hardcore, early 00’s pop-punk, queercore, and speed punk - has been captivating crowds in basements since their inception in the summer of 2023. Their debut EP, Fluoxeteen, captures the young band in their rawest, most sensual, and energetic form.
As eclectic and esoteric as their work might seem from an initial glance the best way to describe the mesh of shard-like guitars, rumbling drums, and gripping vocals that make up Still House Plants is direct. Their minimalist setup hides nothing from the listener. If I Don’t Make It, I Love U is an album as blunt and heartfelt as its title.
Little Rope, Sleater-Kinney's eleventh studio album, is bursting with energy, Carrie Brownstein and Corin Tucker using the record to deal with loss and grief and manage tragedy within their lives. The album is dynamic, aggressive, and most of all violently cathartic, ready to fight through whatever challenges may arise.
Pardoner are a rock band, they play rock music. On Paranoid in Hell, out now on Convulse Records, it takes just four short songs to prove this point. Transversing the plains of the rock landscape, these tunes ebb and flow, or more like jerk and jive, through tempos, volumes, and vibes to show they can do what other bands do, only better.
On Shop Regulars’ self-titled record, the musical project’s ethos is laid bare on the album cover for all to see. It’s a bold move. This move could backfire easily for many artists, but the music presented absolutely lives up to the ethos they announce. They project it with beautifully crunchy results.
The debut album from Glaring Orchid holds nothing back on i hope you’re okay. Distorted and unsettling while simultaneously glinting on what sounds like a much needed release of emotion and energy, Glaring Orchid makes a sonically cohesive and face melting splash in the East Coast scene to no surprise.
The mirthfully macabre album art on The Dracu-Las recent 7-inch that evokes both arterial and ocean sprays provides a warm invitation for a certain kind of listener to sit back and enjoy the show, and the tunes on Fall Asleep When I'm Dead ensure that once those listeners tune in, they won’t be turning the station.
Frog Poems tracks the incomplete negotiations between childhood and adulthood that linger over time. Sam Goblin seems to be asking are there ways of revisiting the former without becoming entrapped by nostalgia? Neither life stage entirely subsumes the other with recollections of acquaintances, ambition, and crushes complicating any straightforward progression of life or time.
After taking some time off from touring, White met Anderson at the coastal town of Point Lonsdale, Victoria, on the southeast shores of Australia. This laid-back scenery pours into Swallowtail, a new set of improvised compositions where the musical possibilities between them merge with the infinite ebb and flow of the Pacific Ocean coast.
Beak> have played together long enough to develop a synchronicity in their performances, providing each other the space to adapt and the patience to explore. That earned sense of trust feels apparent in the progressions found throughout >>>>, a record in constant motion yet never seemingly in a rush to get anywhere.
Beth Gibbons seems to have that slow-evolving, meticulous songwriting and arranging process, scrutinizing every note, every word placed in the lyrics. For some artists, such a process makes no difference in the final result, but with Gibbons, as evidenced here, the results are no less than mesmerizing.
Winged Wheel have expanded to a six piece ensemble involving Cory Plump, Fred Thomas, Whitney Johnson, Matthew J Rolin. and in addition to the first album’s lineup, Big Hotel enlists Lonnie Slack and Steve Shelley. In an orchestra where each person is a conductor, these experimental imaginations melt into one conversation.
There's beauty found in the thoughtful details and careful choices made throughout Amy O's latest offering, Mirror, Reflect. Arriving almost five years after her 2019 album Shell, here lies a meticulously crafted album that arguably embodies a stronger creative ethos than anything of her previous work.
There’s a thread of tension between domestic life and the life of an artist running through the record, with much of Deep Sage dealing with the specifics of motivation: why continue being in a band when it does so much to stunt the rest of your life around it? Why live life when you can take the band on the road and escape?
