Posts tagged with "JULY/AUGUST 2012"

GUANTANAMO BAYWATCH

GUANTANAMO BAYWATCH Chest Crawl guantanamobaywatch.com Surf rock didn’t need Quentin Tarantino to make it sound badass. Long before Pulp Fiction, the genre’s best instrumentals paddled into pretty dark water, suggesting after-hours intrigue down at the shrimp shack. On its second album, the Portland trio Guantanamo Baywatch offers a particularly trashy take on this venerable ’60s sound, ripping trebly Ventures guitar runs with violent garage... 

ALBERT CASTIGLIA

ALBERT CASTIGLIA Living the Dream albertcastiglia.com On “The Man,” the kind of smirking anti-Wall Street screed every good bluesman is required to record these days, Castiglia sings about how gin or reefer might dull his pain. Said substances have been known to work, but so has music. “Freddie’s Boogie,” his cooking cover of the Freddie King instrumental, reveals a guy too focused on his guitar—here an instrument of joyful showboating—to... 

GEORGE MARINELLI

GEORGE MARINELLI Believe georgemarinelli.com As a sideman for the likes of Bruce Hornsby and Bonnie Raitt, Marinelli has learned to fold folk, blues, jazz, rock and light reggae into instantly likeable pop songs. With this latest disc, he does all the playing and producing, writes or co-writes every track, and even handles the graphic design. It’s essentially all Marinelli, and yet Believe never screams egotist or control freak. The lyrics are as... 

THE ROCKETBOYS

THE ROCKETBOYS Build Anyway therocketboys.com For those familiar with this Austin band’s backstory, Build Anyway will play like a concept album about the sextet-turned-trio’s promising start, subsequent hiatus and triumphant—singer Brandon Kinder hopes—comeback. Then again, “Marching to the Palace” and “These Are Hard Times” could just be about girls. Either way, Kinder and his two remaining bandmates turn bad feelings into big music,... 

LYNN TAYLOR

LYNN TAYLOR BarFly lynntaylor.com About a decade ago, Taylor quit the band Felix Wiley to focus on his family and landscaping business. By 2009, he’d started writing and performing again, and it’s fortunate he did. His solo debut is steeped in early rock ’n’ roll, R&B and mostly shuffling, summery country. Taylor is older and wiser, prone to singing sweet and insightful songs about his wife (“Stay With Me”) and kids (“Decatur Street”),... 

ROYAL SOUTHERN BROTHERHOOD

ROYAL SOUTHERN BROTHERHOOD Royal Southern Brotherhood royalsouthernbrotherhood.com No one is going to argue with the name. This super group features a Neville (percussionist Cyril) and an Allman (Devon, son of Gregg)—kingly names in Dixie circles—as well as celebrated blues guitarist Mike Zito and the ace rhythm section of bassist Charlie Wooton and drummer Yonrico Scott. What do they get for their shared pedigree and stockpile of talent? For... 

HAROULA ROSE

HAROULA ROSE So Easy haroularose.com Sometimes love is hard, like on “Only Friends,” the confused “Are we or aren’t we?” tune that leads off this excellent five-song EP. Other times it’s “So Easy,” as the Chicago-born, L.A.-based Rose sings on the title track, barely containing her joy amid an airy ’60s-pop backing. Either way, this singer and guitarist radiates hope and light, even on “Slow Dancing,” a moody (by this disc’s... 

A CITY ON A LAKE

A CITY ON A LAKE A City on a Lake acityonalake.com Written for a certain kind of 30-something—the type that spent the early ’00s in college listening to Coldplay, Death Cab for Cutie and maybe even John Mayer’s Room for Squares—this solo project from Brooklyn producer and multi-instrumentalist Alex Wong is an album about holding on. On “The Fighter” he likens himself to a bloodied boxer, and if that metaphor suggests a toughness and bravado... 

THE BLAKES

THE BLAKES Art of Losses theblakesband.com This Seattle trio cut its latest in the wilds of Maine, where the idea was to unplug from the modern world. Off went the internet, and on a handful of tracks, so did the guitar effects—more or less. “Black Carnation” and “Paralysis” are runaway rockers reminiscent of Dylan or the Kinks, and both give the impression of a band bashing away in a barn. Elsewhere, the Blakes try throbbing New Wave (“Narwhal”)... 

TORA FISHER

TORA FISHER Spilling Over officialtora.com It’s a familiar archetype, the angsty young female singer-songwriter, but more than most this native New Yorker has earned the right to write about pain, confusion, disappointment and the love that hopefully makes it all worthwhile. At 13, Fisher was the sole survivor of a plane crash that killed her father and stepmother, and if that’s not fodder enough for an album—or a lifetime—of soul-searching... 

EXRAY’S

EXRAY’S Trust a Robot exraysvision.com Do androids dream of electric pop? If they do, they might imagine a group like Exray’s, two San Francisco dudes who use drum machines, keyboards and guitars to create wonderfully low-key robo-funk tunes. Much of their third album moves at a plodding clip reminiscent of Trio’s “Da Da Da,” while the synths and muffled vocals place Beck at the helm of OMD’s Dazzle Ships. After instrumental opener “Something... 

CINEMA CINEMA

CINEMA CINEMA Manic Children & the Slow Aggression cinemacinemaband.com These Brooklyn cousins hit the studio looking to rage, and famed hardcore producer Don Zientara wisely let them. Over 80 challenging minutes, the drum-and-guitar duo unspools 13 sharp, tangled barbwire tracks. Is it cerebral bar rock or Hüsker Dü-grade avant-punk? There’s ample time to ponder.  Read More →

STUART DAVIS

STUART DAVIS Music for Mortals stuartdavis.com The “punk monk” tag is cute but limiting. Sometimes, Davis rocks like vintage Joe Jackson; other times, he’s more like Bob Dylan, Sting, Peter Gabriel or even ho-hum ’90s hitmakers Live. Regardless, this Buddhist singer-songwriter-comic thinks deep, plays hard and coats spiritual questioning with plenty of sugar.  Read More →

PRETEEN ZENITH

PRETEEN ZENITH Rubble Guts & BB Eye preteenzenith.com This side project of Polyphonic Spree main man Tim DeLaughter and buddy Philip E. Karnats is what you’d expect—whimsical, wide-eyed, way-out psychedelic rock—and yet somehow not. Erykah Badu guests on “Damage Control”—maybe the most uplifting indie song since the Flaming Lips battled pink robots.  Read More →

MARK BATES

MARK BATES Night Songs markbatesmusic.com This West Virginia native sees ghosts wherever he looks. Rather than get freaked out, the country-leaning rocker sits with these phantoms—exes, relatives and notions of simple living no longer feasible in our world—and works through their unfinished business. His conversations yield some remarkable songs.  Read More →

TIDELANDS

TIDELANDS We’ve Got a Map tidelandsmusic.com “En garde, touché, let’s fight with our words and guitars, it makes no mind,” sings Gabriel Montana Leis. He forgot strings, Moog, flugelhorn and whatever else he and partner Mie Araki use on these sweeping indie-prog jams. Political but never pushy, the songs offer sweet reassurance and even a little sex.  Read More →

DEFINING MOMENTS

DEFINING MOMENTS Photographer Danny Clinch captures the essence of music’s finest Danny Clinch’s unforgettable images have graced countless publications and album covers from Johnny Cash and Gregg Allman to Willie Nelson, the Fray and Bruce Springsteen (above, on a New Jersey back road in 2007). Before establishing himself as a premier lensmen, Clinch studied under the legendary Annie Leibovitz and Mary Ellen Mark. “These photographs are... 

ALANIS MORISSETTE

It’s a midsummer morning, and Alanis Morissette is enjoying some rare downtime in her hometown of Ottawa, Canada. Although she’s lived in Los Angeles since the mid-’90s, clearly there’s no place like home. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been here,” she says. “I used to come up three times a year but almost two years have passed this time. Today we’re getting all the cousins together—having about 10 kids in one place. I’m... 
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