PJ Harvey is a subversive and uncompromising artist that rewards a deep immersion in her music. Her output generally defies easy categorization and straightforward subject matter. The Hope Six Demolition Project isn’t any different, although this time I’ve been struggling with the effectiveness of her observational presentation.
Vishnu Basement’s latest release is only three tracks long but Bulb is most definitely a full length due to album opener “The Mythic Rot” and it’s nearly 20 minute running time. Yep, strap yourselves in, this is one of those releases. Blending elements of free jazz, math pop, and prog rock, the expanded running time of the track is anything but wasted.
This experimental art-rock crew has built a solid following over the last six years with incredibly haunting tunes that range in style from the brooding, mobile squall of 2010’s debut Zeroes QC to the cold, bodily grooves of 2013’s Images du Futur, all the while incorporating the breathy, alarming moments of early 2000s Radiohead into an eerie palette of psychedelia, krautrock, and oddly driving rhythms. But only “Leyla,” from last year’s collaborative album with Jerusalem in My Heart, points towards the sparseness of Suuns’ newest LP, Hold/Still.
Valley Slander’s debut release How Animal is a brief and excellently crafted slice of modern no-wave influenced punk music with a distinct southern vibe. Valley Slander hail from Harrisonburg, Virginia; a small college-town located deep in the valleys surrounding the Shenandoah Mountain Range. Their downbeat, mid-paced, scorching brand of punk is equal parts doomed hardcore and southern sway that harvests inspiration from the rotten end of southern life.
When Brooklyn DIY venue Palisades announced that Mothers and Palm would play a show together there, I was confused about this pairing. Would the twisted, cerebral, dissonant music that Palm plays make for a proper warm-up for Mothers’ more hushed, obviously personal songs? After catching the show, though, it became apparent that both bands share a good deal of influence and technical prowess.
The Numerators have gone further down the rabbit hole with Strange, their official full length debut and the album closer is as good an example of that as any. Sure the Brooklyn-via-Austin trio are still noisy, ragged, and surfy, but the psychedelic influence has taken a hold and things have spiraled out into new dimensions for the band.
The Chicago Singles Club, a monthly web series showcasing local artists and consisting of original recordings, will run its last regular feature next month after three years of operation. We chat with CSC's Jeff Kelley and Kerri Hacker about the history of the publication, the desire to feature a diverse array of artists in Chicago and their future aspirations.
Black Norse and Big Mess are like seeing a comet (heading toward Earth for total cosmic destruction). You never know when you might get a glimpse, but when it happens... brace yourself. After a couple years of relative silence from the New Hampshire and Lowell, MA bands (respectively), they have returned together on a split cassette due out May 20th via Salty Speakers.
Outer Heaven sees Greys' ambitious vision fully realized. Longtime friend and producer Mike Rocha helped the band, who co-produced it, bring it to life. Where some of their previous efforts carried more obvious influences, the band weaves more disparate inspirations into a sonic world all their own that is both immediate and ambiguously serene.
The entire album flows fluidly and lucidly, transitioning smoothly from heavier moments of driving washed out post-punk to bright and jangly indie folk. The guitar and bass tones are situated expertly throughout the album to have just the right amount of ambiguity and just the right amount of clear expression.
by Niko Nygard (@hatsuneniko)
Still Life of Citrus and Slime is the debut album of CFM, the solo project of Charles Moothart. Some may recognize Moothart as a frequent collaborator with Ty Segall, and a mainstay in the west coast’s fuzzy-guitar-driven garage rock scene. For people familiar with Moothart’s previous output, Citrus and Slime is not exactly a surprising album: fuzz-drenched riffs abound and manic solos burst from static hazes on a regular basis. Of course, none of that’s necessarily a bad thing, you don’t play a certain type of music for as long as Moothart has without getting pretty good at it after all.
What’s more interesting is listening to Moothart develop his own voice, separate from that of his peers with whom he’s probably always going to be linked. Citrus and Slime was written fairly quickly-over the course of two months-and the result is a relative sprawl of different ideas within the same framework. There’s a certain degree of playfulness to it all, with Moothart leaping from idea to idea so quickly that sometimes that he doesn’t even allow a song to finish before beginning the next one. There are slow builders, frenzied riffs, and even a musical quotation from The Beatles tossed in for good measure; and, of course, the whole thing is awash in psychedelic fuzz.
Taken as a whole, Still Life of Citrus of Slime is more a series of bullet points than a fully-realized essay. Much like a still life itself, the album presents images and ideas without necessarily fleshing them out all the way, and while this may sound like a negative, I don’t mean it as such. Rather, the unbridled creative stream of different musical concepts is an exciting insight into what may be coming should Moothart continue his solo career. After listening to Citrus and Slime it’s difficult to tell where Moothart may decide to take his sound, but if there’s one thing we can count on it’s that it will assuredly be interesting. And fuzzy.
The international duo recorded their debut self-titled LP between the three cities of Berlin, Tampa Bay, and Palermo. Despite such a scattered-seeming recording process their effort comes out with surprising clarity and cohesion. Death Index is packed with well written and produced fusions of goth, post-punk, metal, and noise-rock.
Human Performance is a fitting title. Not because the band feels the need to affirm some archaic rockist idea of authenticity and distance themselves from popular electronic music, but simply because they've allowed themselves to fully expose their own flaws and insecurities instead of hiding them under the guise of devil-may-care nonchalance.
