04 February 2012
With all the mutations of rock music over the last couple decades, it’s admirable to see young bands that can pull off classic styles without sounding tired or worn-out. Middle Brother is somewhat of a folk-rock super group, comprised of three lead singers from three fantastic bands. The sweet and straight voice of Taylor Goldsmith [...]
03 February 2012
If asked what was the best metal band to come out of the 1980s one would have a plethora of worthy choices. Metallica, Megadeth, or even Dio are all valid responses, however, the correct answer (in this reviewer’s eyes) would be Testament. Their best offering being 1988’s The New Order. The follow-up to their major [...]
02 February 2012
Ishmael Butler: the Terminator II of the hip hop universe. Butler fought off waves of pseudo-gangster agro-rap as Butterfly in the region defining Seattle hip hop collective Digable Planets in the mid-‘90s, but then went into a fifteen-year period of obscurity. Then, the prophetic wordsmith rose from the ashes in 2009 to lead our hash-tagged, [...]
01 February 2012
It’s time for my first 2012 album recommendation and it’s rare that I find an album I like this much only four weeks into the year. Trust is an electronic duo from Toronto consisting of Robert Alfons on vocals and Maya Postepski (of Austra) behind the boards. Knowing the relation to the band Austra, who [...]
31 January 2012
“I thought ‘pop’ was a term of abuse, it seemed sort of insulting and lightweight. I didn’t realize how cool it was. Because some of the best music does have a lightweight quality, it has a kind of oxygen in it, which is not to say it’s emotionally shallow. We’ve had to get the brightly [...]
30 January 2012
I work a summer program for high school students. This year I got picked to help chaperone a trip to Boston, ostensibly for college visits. So, I hung out and listened to the pitch my group of two got from the charismatic tour guide at Berklee School of Music. It sounded good. Really good, to [...]
29 January 2012
In a musical world which is broadly defined by back-and-forth bickering between those camped in “indie” territory and those with their tents pitched within the boundaries of metal, prog and hard rock, it is often all one can do, if one is fortunate enough to harbor a love of both realms, to avoid forcing both [...]
28 January 2012
It’s intriguing to look at how Pure X depict themselves. Without even listening to their music, the band name is suggesting some kind of drug-envisioned fantasy with mind-bending hallucinogens. In fact Pure X is a shortened version of their original name, Pure Ecstasy, which is an even more obvious giveaway. Tie this in with the [...]
27 January 2012
Whatever Panic! at the Disco did to make themselves pop sensations with their debut release, A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out, they neglected to do on their sophomore release. That conscious decision made by the band to leave behind their commercially successful sound in favor of exploring new territory resulted in Pretty. Odd., an odd [...]
26 January 2012
If you look at music in the 1980s, a lot of what garnered attention from the mainstream was cheesy synth-pop ballads like “You Spin Me Around” or “I Ran.” Coinciding with the music of the time, a lot bands wore flashy and colorful outfits in an attempt fit in with what was trendy for the [...]
25 January 2012
Really pushing the limits of what constitutes an album on this site when I review a 3 song EP, but Lion Hat by Unicorn Kid has been getting a lot of play lately and is definitely a nice electro pop gem. Unicorn Kid is a producer out Edinburgh that makes some seriously danceable and upbeat [...]
24 January 2012
It’s hard to come by this record without the awkward feeling of familiarity when it comes to the artist’s name. Wugazi is a derivative of Fugazi with an addition of Wu-Tang Clan prefix at the head. To be honest I had never been the fan of either. I’ve heard a great deal of Fugazi and [...]
23 January 2012
Dear Mike Listens To Records, We have noisy neighbors who keep us up every night. What record should we play at six in the morning to even the score? Angry in Amherst Dear Angry, It’s hard for me to hear about noisy neighbors because I was one for years. My poor ex-landlords are still cursing [...]
22 January 2012
There are myriad reasons as to why Empyrium’s 1997 opus Songs of Moors and Misty Fields is such a spectacle as an album. It predates most music in its vein by a significant few years and bears few predecessors, though enough to see where the ideas came from. One would hazard a guess that the [...]
