Band: Smith Westerns Release: 1/2011
Label: Fat Possum
1. “Weekend” – [A]
2. “Still New” – [A-]
3. “Imagine Pt. 3” – [A]
4. “All Die Young” – [A-]
5. “Fallen In Love” – [A-]
6. “End of the Night” -[A]
7. “Only One” – [A]
8. “Smile” – [A-]
9. “Dance Away” – [A]
10. “Dye the World” – [A-]
Comments: Smith Westerns are a band that, like label-mates Wavves in 2010, benefited immensely from a bigger studio budget. The clarity and direction on Dye It Blonde is a thing of beauty. Stylistically, this is something of a neo-psychedelic or psychedelic pop record, quite a few LSD blotters more psychedelic than the trippiest offerings from Magic Kids, but not as pop-sensible as say former tour partner MGMT. One thing that persists from the start of the record is that clean lead guitar effect, which sounds good, but is a bit overused. “Weekend” and “Imagine Pt. 3” have qualities that immediately hit ‘ya, so with good reason these tracks were made available before the official release. “Dance Away” may be the album’s most experimental track, but in the strangest way possible: it’s the fastest, most accessible, and most randomly discombobulated recording on here. Sounds like it’s going for that Diana Ross “Upside Down” disco meets ’90s Ricky Martin feel. Anyway, this is a record to remember. Fuck, it ain’t even 2011 yet so to make any predictions about this being in contention for Best of 2011 would be wildly erratic and unbecoming. I will say it’s the best thing from 2011 that I heard in 2010. K?
Band: White Wires Release: 11/10 Label: Dirtnap Records
1. “Let’s Go To The Beach” – A
2. “Roxanne” – A+
3. “Did You Forget My Name?” – A 4. “I Can Tell” – A-
5. “Just Wanna Be” – A
6. “Be True To Your School” – A 7. “Popularity” – A
8. “Hands” – A 9. “Are You Mad? – B+ 10. “Outta My Mind” – A
11. “Summer Girl” – A 12. “Bye Bye Baby” – B+
Comments: Power-pop — like music of all genres — has a tendency to tell tales of romantic failings, hopes, and dreams. It rarely forms substance over being popular or “true to your school,” but on this record it does. “Let’s Go The Beach” is packed from start to finish with hooks and a story-line of “running away” to California. The hooks and catchy parts outweigh their less interesting counterparts on WWII and this is precisely why this is a great album. The drums and chorus during “Roxanne” bring us back to simpler times when just an easy melody and a few chords were needed for greatness. The intensity and punch, at least from listening to the first two tracks, is similar to that of Atlanta pop group Gentleman Jesse and His Men. All these songs clock under three minutes, but this doesn’t inhibit memorable moments. There is a mixture of pure hitters (“Hands,” “Summer Girl,” “Popularity,” notably) and slower, more melodic tunes (“Outta My Mind,” the instrumental closer “Bye Bye Baby”), but this variation isn’t too dramatic. In other words, what’s thrown at us is very likable music. Despite this coming out pretty late in the year, it sticks and will have appeal lasting into the foreseeable future.
1. “Black Thoughts” – A- 2. “Darkness” – B+ 3. “I Don’t Belong” – A- 4. “Upside Down” – B+
5. “Poison City” – B+ 6. “Now I’m Pissed” – B
7. “Killing Away” – B+
8. “Jeffrey Lee Pierce” – A- 9. “Panic Attack” – B 10. “Crawl” – B-
11. “Blast” – B+ 12. “Rat Trap” – B- 13. “Fuck People” – B
14. “Full of Shit” – B 15. “Broken” – B
16. “Peace In Hermosa” – B
Comments: This is the kind of record that you simply can’t review while doing something else. If you decide to go the multi-tasking route, which I did, you might just find yourself listening to the sixth track of the record while you’re under the impression that you’re still on the second. For long-time followers of punk rock, such a perception is child’s play. At any rate, I haven’t heard many hardcore punk songs…sad, I know. OFF! is the latest band of Keith Morris, a rather prolific person in hardcore punk (front-man of Black Flag, Circle Jerks). That’s that. The songs on this record are very good. You can tell these guys have been around for a while. Loads of recycled chord progressions and stuff like that. That’s kind of expected in any genre of music, but these kind of things seem to particularly stick out on here.
Band: The Liminanas Release: 2010 Label: Trouble In Mind
1. “Darkside” – B- 2. “Down Underground” – B 3. “Je ne suis pas tres drogue – B- 4. “Funeral Baby” – A- 5. “Chocolate in my Milk” – B 6. “Tigre du Bengale” – C+ 7. “Mountain” – B- 8. “Je suis une go-go girl” – A- 9. “Berceuse pour Clive” – B 10. “Tears” – B- 11. “Tigre du Bengale” – B- 12. “Got Nothing to Say” – A
Comments: To quote insound.com’s description of this album: “This LP has a very cinematic feel.” As a result, a lot of the songs feel pretty orchestrated and calculated. Don’t let some of the English titles fool you — this is mainly a French affair. Like I’ve mentioned in previous posts, my knowledge of French is very minimal. I don’t know what they are talking about, but that’s okay…I’ve never been all that good at/interested in interpreting lyrics anyway. “Funeral Baby” is the band’s first attempt at no frills garage-pop and the result is an awesome song. It reminds me of Davila 666, but from the South of France. As far as the rest of the record is concerned, it’s an all-together different approach to music making. There are some semi-instrumental tracks and other consistently weird rockers. Album closer “Got Nothing to Say” is a favorite from this. “Tu m’a dit que tu t’es “okay” — “You told me that you are okay” — is what I think is repeated, BUT this does not matter!
Rapper: Kanye West Release: 11/2010 Label: Roc-A-Fella
1. “Dark Fantasy” – A+ 2. “Gorgeous” – A 3. “Power” – A+ 4. + 5. “All Of The Lights (Interlude)/All Of The Lights” – A- 6. “Monster” – A- 7. “So Appalled” – A 8. “Devil In A New Dress” – A 9. “Runaway” – A- 10. “Hell of a Life” – B+ 11. “Blame Game” – B+ 12. “Lost in the World” – B 13. “Who Will Survive in America” – B-
Comments: My history with listening to Kanye West is brief and to the point. I bought The College Dropout in the summer of 2004. I really loved that album. It’s still pretty great. After that, I fell out of touch with West, not necessarily because he was gaining fame or anything (no such ‘indie’ mindset for a thirteen year old), but because…well, I don’t know. This album, along with man himself, has received a lot more hype in the past few months than I can ever recall before. Initial reviews have near universally dubbed this one of the best pop albums of all time. “Dark Fantasy” certainly gives these claims some validity. The beat. The lyrics. The chorus of “Can we get much higher?” is something that is overwhelmingly more luscious and “bigger” than most of the shit that gets played on Top 40 radio today. I think “Power” is one of the best songs of the year. I must say this was looking like something special by the end of “Power,” but ultimately fails to keep up that pace. He didn’t fail to jot down his thoughts on paper and get a bunch of great guests to spot on this record. As an all-encompassing work of art, this kind of album will be hard to surpass. To put it simply, it doesn’t (through-and-through because as I’ve mentioned there are some ace tracks) sound as great as it looks on Wikipedia. Realistically a top 30 album of the year. Top 10 or top 5? Definitely not.
Band: The Magic Kids Release: 5/2010 Label: True Panther Sounds
1. “Phone” – A- 2. “Candy” – A+ 3. “Superball” – A+ 4. “Hideout” – B+ 5. “Summer” – A- 6. “Hey Boy” – A+ [CLICK TO LISTEN!!!] 7. “Good To Be” – A- 8. “Skateland” – A- 9. “Sailin” – A+ 10. “Little Red Radio” – A- 11. “Cry With Me Baby” – A
Comments: The Magic Kids were rightly called the next evolution of The Barbaras. The Barbaras might just never play again: at least one member is currently in Wavves (Stephen Pope and maybe, just maybe, Billy Hayes) and the other three are in this band, The Magic Kids. Hayes certainly incorporated a bit of the Barbaras surf-pop sound in “Baby Say Goodbye,” which was penned by him and released on Wavves 2010 LP King of the Beach. At any rate, comparisons to the Beach Boys have been a plenty since the release of this record. The initial critical response to this record was that it was pretty average: Memphis is a nice attempt at ’60s surf, but it just doesn’t do anything extra. To an extent, I suppose that that may be true. Let’s not forget, though, that some songs are just 100% pop gems like “Superball” and “Hey Boy” and the rest are not too shabby…maybe even great. Perhaps somebody not too familiar with this kind of music would lump it in the “oh, this all sounds the same category.” Touche, touche! If you are sucker for it, it’s quite like bubblegum — sweet and colorful. Though this is quite a summer record — nobody is going to mistake “Sailin” for “skiing” — it pretty much screams nostalgia. Nostalgia for those warm and sunny days that became no more after October 28 (in the Boston area). So anyway, Memphis is a keeper.
1. “Coma Summer” – B 2. “Youth Haunts” – C+ 3. “Monday Morning” – C 4. “Monongah” – A- 5. “Landscape” – B- 6. “Age Class” – B 7. “Veil” – C 8. “End Times” – B+ 9. “Afterimage” – C-
10. “Untitled” – B
Comments: Slumberland is a hot bed for noise pop these days. Pains of Being Pure at Heart released a structured self-titled debut that definitely was more pop slime than anything else. Weekend’s music on this album, conversely, is more of a reflection of the kind of extended shoe-gaze that we just don’t to see much of anymore. The drumming, across the board, is really awesome. The bass lines are typically catchy, as well. The guitars — well, what do you expect? — are loaded with feedback and other sorts of effects that aren’t atypical of this style of music. “Monongah” is my favorite tune on here. For one, it is one of the shortest; we get more “song” than anything else. You’ve got to be a real noise-phile to love Sports ’cause I sure don’t! I like tennis. No, not that Tennis.
Band: The Parting Gifts Release: 11/2010 Label: In The Red Records
1. “Keep Walkin” – A- 2. “Bound To Let Me Down” – B+ 3. “Strange Disposition” – B+ 4. “My Mind’s Made Up” – B+ 5. “Shine” – A- 6. “Born To Be Blue” – A 7. “Staring” – A 8. “Don’t Stop” – B+ 9. “My Baby Tonight” – B 10. “Sleepy City” – A
11. “Don’t Hurt Me Now” – A- 12. “Hanna” – B+ 13. “I Don’t Wanna Be Like This” – A
14. “Strychnine Dandelion” – A- 15. “This House Ain’t A Home” – A
Comments: Greg Cartwright is an accomplished musician from one of earth’s top mecca’s of garage rock: Memphis, Tennessee. Cartwright — known as Greg Oblivian when he was in The Oblivians — has a knack for crafting solid oldies pop songs. This collaboration reeks of roots rock: old country, rockabilly, trash rock, etc. The verses on “My Mind’s Made Up” are virtual rockabilly re-takes on the verses on The King Khan & BBQ Show’s “Too Much in Love”. Credit to Cartwright and Coco Hames of the Ettes for dating this thing. Take the lyrics on “Born To Be Blue” for instance: “It’s a lonely stand/When a girl loves two and she must choose. Please understand/I still love you, but he needs me, too.” Classic girl group stuff, which re-appears on “Sleepy City.” Fans of everything that I’ve mentioned (and more), please check this out. It’s one of the best records that In The Red has released this year.
Comments: Let’s get it straight. “Fuck You” blew up on the Internet. Everyone was sending it to everybody and their grandmother and the rest was history. Of course, the clean version has substituted the rated PG “Fuck You” for the G “Forget You,” which is a million times worse than even “F U” because of the mere amount of syllables involved in saying that. The song itself is not special special. I’ve heard many special special songs in my life…and in the past two months. “Fuck You” comes nowhere near any of those. The rest of the material on here is sort of showtunesy soul and/or slow jamz. “Please” is of the showtunes variety, which reminds me of something culled directly from an action packed cruise musical. Same with “I Want You”. As a musical disciple of the psychedelic soul of Arish King Khan, I can’t say that Cee-Lo’s neo-soul does much for me. Cee-Lo’s tunes are sugary, for certain, but lack any real hooks. I mean, there are sucker hooks — hooks that’ll make the average pop fan smile — but as far as anything substantial…nah, not really. Sorry, Cee-Lo, bro, you are a one-hit wonder in 2010.
1. “Scott Mescudi vs. The World” – B- 2. “REVOFEV” – B+ 3. “Don’t Play This Song” – B-
4. “We Aite (Wake Your Mind Up)” – B- 5. “Marijuana” – B+ 6. “Mojo So Dope” – C+ 7. “Ashin’ Kucher” – C 8. “Erase Me” – A 9. “Wild’n Cuz I’m Young” – B- 10. “The Mood” – C 11. “MANIAC” – C- 12. “Mr. Rager” – B- 13. “These Worries” – C+ 14. “The End” – B 15. “All Along” – B-
16. “GHOST!” – B
17. “Trapped In My Mind” – C
Comments: Kid CuDi is practically the only rapper of the past year or so that I enjoy listening to. I really loved Man on the Moon: The End of Day. It was pretty tight top to bottom. This album sort of sucks, though. Lyrical content is pretty lame and the rapping just isn’t catchy. I thought End of Day added a nice mix of psychedelia, but the attempted psychedelia on here overstays its welcome. Fans of CuDi hit singles should reasonably be skeptical of this record. “Erase Me” is great, but what else is there? Anything? “Marijuana”??? It’s a chill song and stuff, but it will not blow you out of the water. Take “GHOST.” It is really dumb, but has a solid base beat. Overall, I am really disappointed.
Kids Like You & Me (KLYAM) 