Best New Music 2007.

[Keepcoolbutcare]

question...why does El-P have to ruin damn near every cd, ep and lp he's ever been on by opening his mouth and talking?

you. can't. rap. rhyme. sing.

So why oh why bother?

but those beats?

so ill. so very, very ill.

[stereosforgeeks]

Yeah I agree good album overall. Not spectacular, but solid. Favorits is still Long drive... though most people's is moon and Antarctica which is fantastic too.

i haven't yet really loved a Modest Mouse album, fact is my favorite release of theirs isn't even a proper album but instead the Building Nothing Out of Something comp. Solid throughout and at times spectacular, filled with what I think is Isaac's best writing.

of the proper albums, I'm a Lonesome Crowded West stan.

Actually that is my true favorite as well and the first thing I ever heard from them.

[stereosforgeeks]

question...why does El-P have to ruin damn near every cd, ep and lp he's ever been on by opening his mouth and talking?

you. can't. rap. rhyme. sing.

So why oh why bother?

but those beats?

so ill. so very, very ill.

I don't really consider what he does "rapping" more of a beat poet with beats. Anyway I dig the album.

[DDMAN26]

Anyone pickup the new Modest Mouse yet? Hopefully it's good.

[Brocktune]

hahaha!

good one!

[St. Alphonzo]

Andrew Bird – Armchair Apocrypha

Andrew Bird isn’t yet a household name, but an album like this one might change that. He’s a multi-instrumentalist who isn’t afraid to occasionally take a whistling solo. Hyper-literate lyrics combine with lush orchestration to provide a musical experience you can’t find anywhere else.

In time you need to learn, to love
The ebb just like the flow
Grab hold of your bootstraps, and pull like hell
until gravity feels sorry for you, and lets you go
As if you lack the proper chemicals to know
the way it felt the last time you let yourself fall this low

This isn’t a happy album. It’s full of images of crashing cars, apocalyptic desert-scapes and the desperation that can be modern life.

beige tiles and magazines
lou dobbs and the cnn team
on every monitor screen
you were caught in the crossfire
where every human face has you
reaching for your mace so it's
kind of an imposition
a fatal premonition

Oddly enough, it’s considerably more accessible than anything I’ve heard of his before (admittedly, I haven’t heard his Bowl Of Fire work, which Brock assures me is a total mind-fuck). This is elegant but vital music, and I fully expect it to be in my top 5 at years end. I’ve had it for two weeks now, and I can’t stop listening to it.

We’re only three months into the year, and I’ve already got two albums: Armchair Apocrypha and Arcade Fire’s Neon Bible, that I know I’ll be listening to for years to come.

You can grab a download of "Heretic" here:
Andrew Bird

[doglips]

Timbaland & M.I.A. - Come Around

I haven't listened to it yet, some say it's excellent, others are not so sure.

EDIT - It's terrible.

[doglips]

Anyone heard the new Kings of Leon yet?

[King Psyz]

I am really digging the Amy Winehouse record right now. I guess she sorta creeped to this side of the atlantic, and I'm pretty jealous we had to wait so long.

[tapehead]

The Grinderman - The Grinderman

Nick Cave - Boys Next Door, Birthday party, Bad Seeds
Warren Ellis - Dirty Three, Bad Seeds
Martyn P.Casey - The Triffids
Jim Sclavunos - Sonic Youth, The Cramps, Bad Seeds, The Vanity Set.


Early parts of the album are a hark back to Boys Next Door and Birthday Party - cranky, raucous, horny lyrics, hammering pianos and heavily distorted guitars. But there's no mistaking this is a more mature bunch at work, many of the fast and fervent fucked up stories about fucked people are reminicences without nostalgia, behind the ripping Stooges-style guitar work (much of it Cave himself playing) and fury there's humour and restraint.
Dazzling first single 'No Pussy Blues' is Cave angry and hilarious that he's not getting a fuck - "I read her Eliot, I read her Yeats, I tried my best to stay up late, I fixed the hinges on the gate, but still she just never wanted to... I bought her a dozen snow white doves, I did her dishes in rubber gloves, I called her Honey Bee, I called her love, but she just didn't want to... "
Ellis' whining violin through a wawaa on 'Electric Alice' counterpoints Cave singing about some ancient old girlfriend. The title track is slow psycho whiteboy blues, bastard son of much older blues (the album opens with "I've got to get up to get down and start all over again" delivered with sneering impatience) such as Cave cribbed from Waits and Cohen, made his own and passed on to PJ Harvey.
'Depth charge Ethel' belongs next to Deanna from his Berlin/Heroin era, stoyry of demented woman and out of control man in love, or at least in lust. There are more mellow and restrained tracks too, 'Go tell the Women' is Cave being world weary without resorting to balladry, riding on a slow groove with a snarky, arrogant monologue - really something new for him.
The whole album is pervaded by the horny, belligerent and cocksure attitude of a lost weekend of excessiveness with 'the boys' - the way, I imagine, the album was recorded in London last year. The doomsaying, gloomy "Prince of Goths", a tag that Cave has had wrongly applied to him, is nowhere to be found here. The mistake is made, regarding his body of musical work, due mostly to the drama and darkness of some of the Bad Seeds albums, Cave's love for and mastery of tragic, mournful ballads, and early, near suicidal lunacy of his "Release the Bats!" Cramps-inspired gothic play-acting. The closest thing to be found to a ballad here is the brief, enigmatic "Man in the Moon", which segueways into the album's two incendiary closers, the slow-burning "When my Love Comes Down" (you know, by now, what this is about), which never quite reaches a crescendo, though I imagine it will explode live, and "Love Bomb", which quotes Hooker directly "I went down to my baby's house, and sat down on the stair.." but also "I've been watching mtv, I been watching BBC, I been searchin' on the internet'. It squawks and stomps it's way out on a search for some new conquest, still not satisfied.

[Keepcoolbutcare]

"I read her Eliot, I read her Yeats, I tried my best to stay up late, I fixed the hinges on the gate, but still she just never wanted to... I bought her a dozen snow white doves, I did her dishes in rubber gloves, I called her Honey Bee, I called her love, but she just didn't want to... "

heh, it was at that exact refrain that the gf looked up and said, "dude, she ain't givin' you any".

nice review tapes, liked how you (and Grinderman) give props to JLH.

[stereosforgeeks]

The Twilight Sad - Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters. Wonderful guitar driven rock and roll filled with moments of scottish folk, swirling guitars, and some accordians.

Very much worth checking out.

[Fawst]

I am really digging the Amy Winehouse record right now. I guess she sorta creeped to this side of the atlantic, and I'm pretty jealous we had to wait so long.

Tickets to her show at the Paradise in Boston sold out, and the demand was so high that they changed venues and put more tickets for sale online. What's the common thread? I missed out both times, and now instead of paying 15 bucks per ticket, I can toss 30-40 per to some scalper. *sigh* Of COURSE my girlfriend had to go and find Winehouse on that idiot Perez Hilton's site. Now she is dying to go, and I better come through

[Flumm]

The Twilight Sad - Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters. Wonderful guitar driven rock and roll filled with moments of scottish folk, swirling guitars, and some accordians.

Very much worth checking out.

Cheers, thanks for the word, SFG.

[Keepcoolbutcare]

I missed out both times, and now instead of paying 15 bucks per ticket, I can toss 30-40 per to some scalper. *sigh*

save your $$ and get her into Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings post haste!

you can than spend the money you saved to purchase Keep Reachin' Up by Nicole Willis & the Soul Investigators, and then both you and her can pull the music snob card on the unjustly hyped, late to the bandwagon, only gettin' pub 'cuz she's hot and young and "edgy" Wine-O-house stans.

her meteoric rise has honked me off something fierce, not 'cuz the "retro soul" scene doesn't deserve the hype (it does!), but rather, as per usual in the music biz, the hype undeservedly goes to someone whose talent doesn't measure up to the less photogenic, older, "underground" acts that deserve the publicity.

[tapehead]

Wine-O-house

hehe she's such a drunk.
Locally I have Renee Geyer, who could literally sing Winehouse off a stage, knows her way around most of Stax and Motown's back catalogue, and has been at it since the mid Seventies.
She's also playing bistros and suburban 'Tabarets' - restaurants/gaming rooms/place where you bet on horse racing. If her voice wasn't enough to make you cry, the disdain she's treated with by all but the most discerning music fans would.

[Keepcoolbutcare]

Locally I have Renee Geyer, who could literally sing Winehouse off a stage, knows her way around most of Stax and Motown's back catalogue, and has been at it since the mid Seventies.

ooh, Aussie soul?

Expand my horizons, any albums/tracks you recommend that I may acquire on the internets?

I really want someone I can recommend to Oliver Wang @ soulsides. Man's done so much to further my appreciation of the genre that I want to give something back to him, assuming he hasn't heard of her already...

[Keepcoolbutcare]

The Grinderman - The Grinderman

fucking EPIC garage rawk squawk.

I love how at 50, Cave picks up a guitar (not really his forte, is it?) and cranks out an album of crazed energy that cats 25yrs younger can't even hope to emulate.

[stereosforgeeks]

save your $$ and get her into Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings post haste!

you can than spend the money you saved to purchase Keep Reachin' Up by Nicole Willis & the Soul Investigators, and then both you and her can pull the music snob card on the unjustly hyped, late to the bandwagon, only gettin' pub 'cuz she's hot and young and "edgy" Wine-O-house stans.

Checking this out now. Thanks for the rec.

[burlivesleftnut]

I am really digging the Amy Winehouse record right now. I guess she sorta creeped to this side of the atlantic, and I'm pretty jealous we had to wait so long.

I dug the album on the first couple of spins, but now I kind of hate it.

[St. Alphonzo]

The Grinderman - The Grinderman

fucking EPIC garage rawk squawk.

I love how at 50, Cave picks up a guitar (not really his forte, is it?) and cranks out an album of crazed energy that cats 25yrs younger can't even hope to emulate.

Aw shit yeah!!! This is one that'll be on heavy rotation for a good long while. There's not enough of this kinda stuff anymore: raw, frenetic and fun (and funny).

[King Psyz]

I am really digging the Amy Winehouse record right now. I guess she sorta creeped to this side of the atlantic, and I'm pretty jealous we had to wait so long.

I dug the album on the first couple of spins, but now I kind of hate it.

It hasn't worn on me yet I guess. I do hate when someone is pushed too hard, because it takes even enjoyable music to that annoying "not that song again!" territory.

I personally like wino's voice quite a bit, and while there very well is better artists out, she's still got something.

Just like there's probablly a large ammount of punk bands better than minor threat, doesn't mean that minor threat kicks any less ass.

[tapehead]

The Grinderman - The Grinderman

fucking EPIC garage rawk squawk.

I love how at 50, Cave picks up a guitar (not really his forte, is it?) and cranks out an album of crazed energy that cats 25yrs younger can't even hope to emulate.

Aw shit yeah!!! This is one that'll be on heavy rotation for a good long while. There's not enough of this kinda stuff anymore: raw, frenetic and fun (and funny).

He's very primitive with the guitar - which I love. I read a recent quote in local music press when asked if he enjoys strapping on the axe - "Shit yeah," he says. "Guitar you kind of hold and embrace. The piano you push away." I reckon he's played guitar before - the three note riff on Johnny Cash's 'The Singer' from the Bad Seeds brilliantly disorderly covers album 'Kicking against the Struggling Background Artists'.
They're also planning a tour (Australia and UK at least) later this year.



As for Renée Geyer, you might try the 'Movin' Along' album she did with Motown producer Frank Wilson in '76 (can't promise it's easy to find) it almost led to an R'nB career for her in America, until the stations playing her discovered she was white.
As you can see here, She has turned up in all sorts of interesting places.
After a pop career in the 80's here, and long stints backing Joe Cocker, Bonnie Raitt and others, she has gone back to soul, blues and jazz, but most of her recent albums are all covers of standards.

[stereosforgeeks]

Ive been really digging the Ola Padrida album lately. David Wingo (composer for David Gordon Green) creates wonderfully atmospheric accoustic country rock. Perfect for realxing ona summer afternoon with a beer, a book, and an expansive horizon in front of you.

[pomeroy]

I'm pretty excited for a new Silverchair album, personally.

Oh yeah, and a new Manson album.

Damn...my 90s influences are showing.

[stereosforgeeks]

Check out Mixtapes & Cellmates

[doglips]

Anyone else heard the new Interpol track yet?

The Heinrich Maneuver

Very similar to what has gone before for the first third, but they seem to have been experimenting with the production, Paul sounds good and they are still fucking tight. Can't wait for the album now.

[St. Alphonzo]

Has anyone heard the new Dinosaur Jr.? Is it worth my time and money, or is it just a pale imitation of days gone by? Are they at least trying to update their sound?

[Keepcoolbutcare]

The Twilight Sad - Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters. Wonderful guitar driven rock and roll filled with moments of scottish folk, swirling guitars, and some accordians.

Very much worth checking out.

Cheers, thanks for the word, SFG.

I'll gird up for third on the word.

Took a while for me to get past the brogue, but I'm glad I did. Grows on me more with each spin.

[Keepcoolbutcare]

c/o Side One: Track One

new, free, not gonna be on the album M.I.A.!

"Hit That"

lovin' it.

[TonyWilson]

c/o Side One: Track One

new, free, not gonna be on the album M.I.A.!

"Hit That"

lovin' it.

"tap tap tap that bed to the wall"

fuckin' excellent. Cheers, man.

[doglips]

Here's another one, a shorty but a goody - Boyz

[doglips]

New GO! Team track over at Pitchfork.

Like the accompanying blurb says, it's got a lot more studio sheen, not a bad thing but I hope some of the new album is still as rough around the edges as it's predecessor.

[stereosforgeeks]

DAMNIT I WANT THIS ALBUM NOW!

[godzillasushi]

My apologies for going mainstream today



Has anyone had the opportunity to listen to Linkin Park's new album Minutes to Midnight? I have yet to hear anything but the single. But I would like to hear opinions anyway. Anyone recommend/disavow this album?

[Brocktune]

well, i havent actually heard it yet, but where Linkin Park is concerned, my best advice would be to avoid it like the plague.

[stereosforgeeks]

well, i havent actually heard it yet, but where Linkin Park is concerned, my best advice would be to avoid it like the plague.

*shudder* agreed!

[doglips]

Hey Brock, you heard of Battles?

I've been listening to the new album 'Mirrored' constantly since I got it on Monday, I think you'll love it. Math-Rock apparently.

[Brocktune]

not heard em yet. although i am familiar with a couple of their personnel (john stanier, ian williams).

ive always kind of been on the fence with math rock. take don caballero for instance. like, there was a ton of genius stuff on the one record of theirs i had. but for every moment of brilliance, there was one where i went "ok, we fucking get it. you guys like to play in crazy meters!!!", you know?

but imma definitely check this one out. thank you for the tip.

[stereosforgeeks]

Hey Brock, you heard of Battles?

I've been listening to the new album 'Mirrored' constantly since I got it on Monday, I think you'll love it. Math-Rock apparently.

Isnt awesome! They played what was probably one of the best shows Ive ever seen last month, too.

I wasa huge fan of Lynx back in HS and if you ever see that record around grab it.

[doglips]

Yeah, it's a great record, so inventive and intelligent - it truly belongs on WARP.

Good video for ATLAS too......

[stereosforgeeks]

Nice. I rarely ever watch videos for music anymore, but it was a good one.

Its actually pretty close to how they play it live. Though it was faster live.

[Keepcoolbutcare]

if anyone's interested, Lil Wayne's DA DROUGHT 3 (third in his Dedication mixtapes, don't know why he changed the name) is available on teh webs for free.

It's Legal, I think...

rumor is he may be putting this out as a non-mixtape "official" release, but I'm fairly certain it's the same album that P4K just gave an 8.5 rating for.

Weezy frustrates me...not much content (but when he does drop content, ala "Georgia Bush", he's, as he claims, "the best rapper alive"), but he's in love with language, he's got one of the most distinct voices in hip-hop, and he's fun...sure, after 6months or so it sounds dated (like so much commercial hip-hop) but he puts out like 3 albums a year, so he always stays relevant.

not for everyone, 'specially south of the Mason-Dixon line rap haters, but, hey, it's free.

and you can nod along in recognition as every spinning rim, oversized SUV with tinted windows drives by blasting out your fillings with the booty shakin' bass!

[St. Alphonzo]

If you're at all into the Blues or classic Soul music you must, MUST I say, check this out:
Mavis Staples - "On My Way"
This isn't the best song on her new album, We'll Never Turn Back, but even so... it's damn fine Blues.

There's a video up at Pitchfork for an even better song: "Eyes On The Prize"

I just picked up the full album on eMusic last night. It's produced by Ry Cooder - and I'm just blown away by it. It's back-porch Blues updated for a new age. A Mavis Staples album with tape loops? Yep. This set is an eye-opener in much the same way Solomon Burke's Don't Give Up On Me was in 2002. An old-school artist with talent to spare, given new life by the right producer.

[Flumm]

Wells I suppose I'll have a slice o' that while I'm here, yes M'am.


I'll have to check out that record, see how it spins out, certainly.


Thanks for the ry'led up soul-croonings, Phonz.

Always a pleasure.

[St. Alphonzo]

Adult Swim has put out a 14 track free mix. And it's not just filler crap (mostly) either. TV On The Radio, The Raveonettes, Broken Social Scene, The Good, The Bad & The Queen, Amusement Parks On Fire, and a lot more.

Check it, but beware your volume level... music starts automatically

[Zarles]

Tim Armstrong from Rancid put out a solo album recently, and it's full of some great old-school rocksteady ska type stuff. Really worth checking out. Best part about it is that he distributed it on the internet for free for fans to download. Do a Google search for 'tim armstrong a poet's life' and you should be able to find it fairly easily.

There's a link out there with a zip file of all the songs, so if I find it, I'll post it here.

Edit: Found it! http://www.mediafire.com/?0u0p9z91mpt

[Conroy420]

Joel Plaskett Emergency - Ashtray Rock

This album came out a month or two agho now but dam is it fucking sweet.

Anyone heard of Joel Plaskett?

He's Canadian, a bit Tom Petty with a splash of folk music.

It's really great stuff, he has liots of albums under his belt but nothing has pushed him into the mainstream just yet.

Most albums these days are focused on getting singles out there. This album is really old fashioned that it ties one song to the other and when you listen to it all the way through you get a better understanding of each individual song.

It's really outstanding stuff.

[stereosforgeeks]

Ive been digging on White Rabbits - Fort Nightly lately.

There are just tons of layers of different sounds and styles that all merge to create something new and exciting. Really great stuff.

[doglips]

I'm listening to Kid on my Shoulders now.

Is that a fair representation of their sound?

( couple of links at the bottom of this review if anyone else wants a listen )

What did you think of The National's Boxer? I saw you've listened to it.