Kingston, NY duo Rider/Horse ain’t no one trick pony, as they prove on their second album, Feed ‘Em Salt. The pairing of Cory Plump (Spray Paint, Winged Wheel) and Chris Turco (Les Savy Fav, Trans Am) have headed back to the swarm, to bring us their next chapter, one that is constantly rattled, repetitive, and eerily engaging.
Considering the band delivered their new album, Blue Rev, after multiple all-night sessions, just barely hitting their vinyl production deadline, and that it’s been five years since their last album, one might expect Alvvays’ third album to feel overthought. On the contrary, Alvvays have created their most surprising and rewarding album yet.
Ohio art punk quartet DANA like to keep things weird. It’s just more enjoyable that way, always has been. Following last year’s “Blueteeth” single, DANA are back at it with “R U Dead?” a song that finds the band very much alive. With their signature space-age theremin trails leading the way, the band dive into a jangly punk bounce.
Schwartz Provides is the third in the series of Schwartz releases from NY via FL artist Winded. The record is powered by a stark and often solemn beauty provided by Thrin Vianale's higher registered vocals and entertaining songwriting. Vianale manages to balance full throated emotion with a concealed intensity that pushes to be unleashed.
Across four tracks, Jobber set thoughtful lyrics to smartly-written pop songs with massive guitars, a potent combination that pulls as much from the locked-in power pop of The Cars and the catchy alt-rock of Helium and The Breeders as their more obvious guitar-worshipping predecessors in Helmet, Hum, and Failure.
Due out on November 4th via Hex Records (Still/Form, Multicult), Making Friends’ is dense and well… unfriendly music, revolving around deep low end, a primal sense of dread, and harsh rhythmic fury. They teeter between noise rock and grunge in a way similar to Helmet or Unsane, bulking up their scourge with sustaining melodies.
Brooklyn band Jobber’s love for wrestling coming through in their name, artwork, song titles, and lyrics. On their debut EP Hell in a Cell, Jobber adopt wrestling’s insider language to explore workplace discontent and the struggle to be a good person in a shitty world. It’s a gimmick, sure, but it works.
On Lemons, the third full length from Fake Palms, the band strips away a little of the density of their previous albums and sprinkle in a bit more cheer and brightness. Their songs still carry a bit of anger and anxiety within their clattering guitars and slower tempos, but the melodies just hit with more force and clarity than previously displayed.
The world is about to get more Smirk, as Nick Vicario (Crisis Man, Public Eye, Cemento) returns with his first true full length, Material. Due out November 18th via Feel It Records, the album is a whirlwind of twangy post-punk and raw garage rock, picking up somewhere between The Gun Club and a dizzyingly raw knack for basement punk.
For Squirm Records, a new label founded by the members of New York duo Gorgeous, the catalyst of the label is Anyhow, the solo project of Asheville’s Matt Giegerich. A screenwriter and USA Today bestselling mystery author by trade, Longtime Sunshine is Giegerich’s full length debut as Anyhow, due out November 11th.
DIY/riot grrrl veterans Christina Billotte, Kathi Wilcox, and Steve Dore—released The Casual Dots in 2004, apparently with little press or self-promotion, but still establishing a fan base through blog-era word-of-mouth. After an 18-year hiatus, last month the band re-released their debut at the same time as their surprise second full-length, Sanguine Truth.
Fans of bands such as Night Sins, Old Moon, and The Cure, assemble! One of Boston's best alternative bands, The True Faith’s upcoming LP, Go To Ground, is just around the corner in January 2023. "Feet Held To The Fire" immediately gives you a floating sensation and feeling of romanticizing heartbreak through Travis Benson's yearning vocals.
Mt. Surreal acts as an amalgamation of their previous work while journeying into something completely new. It’s an album of ambitious instrumentals and even more ambitious ideas. An album that wastes no space and never falters in its attempts to be what it’s trying to be, the best Disco Doom album yet.
Quagga is the project of Philadelphia’s Josh Mackie, a musician and artist best known as a member of Gunk and Dark Mtns, among a cavalcade of other increasingly experimental projects. In the past six years, he’s released over fourteen releases, and he’s got a new album, 77.7FM "The Spirit”, due out November 18th via Strange Mono.
On their third full length, Nicks and Grazes, Palm fully lean into expanding their electronic and dance urges while the conversational guitar skronkings and creative rhythm section embellishments bubble underneath. The flexibility that they continue to expand upon and the language they all speak between each other is astonishing.
London’s Shake Chain make “unhinged” music. That really isn’t up for debate, and the band prove it throughout their upcoming debut album, Snake Chain, due out November 18th via Upset The Rhythm. While the sound of their music is nestled snuggly within the energetic side of post-punk, it’s vocalist Kate Mahony that really sets the band apart.
“I want it to,” Eliza Niemi begins, little rattle, chucking her limbs to stay underwater–except the water is the present around her, its depth the curt end of her fingertips. Staying Mellow Blows is her third album; it is inside of her. She is a child the way Fiona Apple is a child: She is right. What she says is true.
