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Filligar have quickly become one of my favorite groups from Chicago. Their album The Nerve has worked its way into my listening library ever since the first time I heard it.
The latest news from these fantastic guys is their new video shot by 2010 VMA winniner, Matt Hartzler. It’s for the track ‘Guilty Good Intentions’, the second track off of The Nerve.
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Formed in Georgia in 1996 and led by singer/songwriter Ben Crum, Great Lakes has made over a decade of music tinged in a range of stylings. The latest release Ways of Escape is leaning strongly towards the alt-country sound.
The history of the group is somewhat complicated. Members have floated in and out and their debut album wasn’t even released until 2000. But that’s what makes them all the more interesting. Ben Crum has always been at the center of it all, but members of other prestigious groups have come in and out joined by some of Crum’s closest friends.
Ways of Escape is a huge collaboration project to back the brilliant work of Ben Crum and his guitar and voice.
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Chicago based Archie Powell & The Exports are set to release their first debult LP Skip Work. With one EP under their belt, the group has already started to gain some great attention. I have no doubt that when this record gets released, you’ll be hearing a lot more about them.
Skip Work puts a great amount of attention to the songwriting. I hate putting on a record, and walking away from it not remembering a single phrase of what I’ve just heard. This doesn’t happen with this LP. Each song follows a fairly standard ABABC form but remains fresh and solid throughout.
The group has recently set out on a tour in anticipation of the release and will be stopping by TT the Bears (audio warning on click) in Boston this Tues. Oct 5th.
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All it takes is the opening track on Flags to have Brooke Fraser win you over. The catchy hummed melody, bouncy guitar and drums that lead you quickly into the perfectly layered hook pulls you right into the album.
This New Zealand artist took the opening track ‘Something In The Water’ straight to #1 on iTunes New Zealand. Rightfully so. It’s pop perfection while keeping an immense amount of artistic integrity.
Brooke Fraser put together an extremely solid record with her third release, Flags. Recorded in LA and self-produced, this record has everything from boombastic choruses, low key songs to sip your Sunday morning coffee over, and tracks that are too perfectly suited for an Apple commercial.
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Neil Young never seems to disappoint. With a career spanning decades, it’s hard to believe he still has it in him to write and play songs that sound fresh. Bust most importantly his playing and voice have stayed true to who he is.
Le Noise is a very special record. Daniel Lanois captured solo performances of a rock icon and made them sonically gorgeous. These are no early Elliott Smith recordings with hiss and pops getting in the middle of a man and his guitar. (although I do love those) These recordings will fill your speakers and throw you back on your ass.
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The second album from Murdocks is definitely a step in the right direction. All you can ask from a band is to (hopefully) improve on each new release they put out. The guys have definitely done this on Distortionist.
The album is catchy, powerful, and lyrically/musically passionate. You can tell the guys put a lot of effort into it but things still seem very off the cuff. The performances are tight but don’t feel contrived. As a listener that seems easy enough to accomplish but really isn’t when put into a recording setting.
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Neil Young has had a career most musicians can only dream about. His ability to write and perform quality songs over decades is absolutely stunning. I don’t always get excited to hear when old school musicians are releasing new records, but Neil Young doesn’t fall into this category.
His latest work Le Noise is…
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Two weeks ago I heard an exclusive track on A Heart Is A Spade by an unknown artist (to me) named Alex Kemp. This brilliantly catchy, perfectly produced , off the cuff gem of a song got me hooked and I had to find out more.
Alex Kemp’s website is a blast to visit, but can be tricky to provide the greater details I was seeking about him. So I did my digging and found what I was looking for.
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I always hear about the Hollywood Bowl and what an amazing venue it is. Needless to say, it gets a lot of hype. I guess it was overly fitting that the three bands I was able to catch on a gorgeous night in LA generally get thrown into the category of being overly-hyped.
Girls, Grizzly Bear, and Phoenix set the tone for what I would call a perfect night of music. If I were to guess,the roughly 18,000 others in attendance to this sold out show would most likely agree with me.
The venue in and of itself is something to behold and all three acts (even though the emphasis was clearly put on Phoenix) held up their end of the musical bargain. I wasn’t disappointed by one bit of the night.
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What I am writing about might be the best 7″ I’ve ever owned.
At a recent Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin show, I happened to catch Golden Bloom as the opener. Watching Shawn Fogel play with Golden Bloom (members who also play with Neutral Uke Hotel), I very quickly managed to fall in love at first listen.
When I saw that split 7″ sitting on the merch table with The Motion Sick on the other side, my wallet whipped out so fast that even Bruce Lee couldn’t have stopped it. (more…)
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Putting on The Runk threw me right into a full flashback of my years at Berklee College of Music. Makes a bit of sense as Sam Gilman (Hammond B3, Wurlitzer, Moog, Clav, Rhodes, and Mellotron) is a piano tech at Berklee. Otis Grove (audio warning on click) is a trio that is holding down their funk-ass sound REAL tight.
On their second record with Ropeadope, these guys hold true to what you’d expect from a keys lead trio but do it with a quality of the highest standards. They’ve had about 6 years and over 500 gigs to perfect this sound. This definitely comes through on The Runk.
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(written in collaboration/lyrical analysis with debcha, of zed equals zee)
It took me about 19 seconds to fall in love with Boxer. All thanks to the masterpiece of an opening track “Fake Empire”.
An album that is worthy of being called a classic is one that you can spot within the first few bars. Pet Sounds has this, and so does Boxer.
A swooping guitar swell, the tape hiss from the upright piano track, topped with the speaker-filling vocals of Matt Berninger’s voice. I was (and still am) floored every time I put it on.
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dysonsound is all about posting music I love. Röyksopp is not a band I love. But their video for ‘The Drug’ and their latest release ‘Senior’ is one I’ve grown a fond attachment towards.
Their album ‘Senior’ is one that’s actually grown on me and found a nice corner in my music listening library. This is not an album to change your mind on the world or musical genres. It’s an album to work to, one to put you in that place where you’re half paying attention and half getting your work done.’
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Aside from the fact that I love it, I have a really hard time putting my finger on the sound Inoculist creates. It’s some mix of folk, jazz, indie, rock, and dreaminess. All those things combine to create a very unique sound that I struggle to find any sort of band comparison with.
I have little knowledge of the group aside from listening to their debut LP ‘Spells’ on repeat for the past week or two. It’s definitely an album to set a mood. What sort of mood that is? Not a clue. But I imagine it’s different for every listener.
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I’ve gotta give it up for the folks working tirelessly to make music and stand behind every aspect of it. Beware Fashionable Women definitely fall into this category. Founded and lead by guitarist/vocalist Barak Shpiez, the group has been gaining growing attention with their irresistibly catchy songs.
Based out of Pittsburgh, PA, Beware Fashionable Women have been working hard touring and promoting their full length self-titled independent release.
The record is definitely one to satisfy many moods you might be looking to help play as a background to your life’s musical soundtrack. Catchy pop meets a touch of raw and rough production that will keep you bouncing and smiling throughout the length of the record.
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There’s no shortage of great music in Chicago. And to be more exact, there’s no shortage of great music all around the world. But Filligar shows us that Wilco isn’t the only band to come out strong from the amazing city of Chicago.
This group of three brothers and one long time friend have been playing together for nearly a decade and have released some amazing records. Their latest “The Nerve” is one of their finest. It’s such a cohesive, flowing record that takes you through the Led Zeppelin (although not the best comparison) style of putting a record together. You get the rootsy rockers, the short transitional tunes, and the low key slower tunes reminiscent of ‘The Battle of Evermore’.
Needless to say, “The Nerve” is a record very worthy of putting in your collection.
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The more I hear about new artists, the more I hear about them coming from Silver Lake, LA. Is Silver Lake becoming or has it been the west coast version of Brooklyn all along and I haven’t noticed?
Well, all I know is that yet again a new favorite of mine has come the way of Silver Lake. Armed with a stellar EP ‘Forming the Shapes‘ under their belt, Vanaprasta are gearing up to release their first full length titled ‘Healthy Geometry’.
The most exciting news for me? They’re offering 2 tracks available September 27th on 7″ vinyl. Bonus for you? You can listen to them below.
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The music and performances from of Montreal can at times be called “over the top”. And most of the time this is true. But describing it that way makes it sound like it’s too much to handle. Musically they’ve gone ahead and proven this wrong on their latest record ‘False Priest’.
Out of all of their records and EPs, I believe ‘False Priest’ to be the most palatable to listeners, yet never steering away from what makes of Montreal well, of Montreal. A lot of this seems to be due to the influence of Producer Jon Brion and the encouragement to make a sonically beautiful record that attacks you on both ends of the audio spectrum.
When Jon Brion is in the control room, you can always guarantee a quality record. And he didn’t disappoint with this one. Also I have to note that he was working on Punch Brothers ‘Antifogmatic’ in close time to this one. Amazing!
I am one man who writes (pretty poorly) about music because I love it. I study, play, produce, engineer, analyze, and obsess about music. Enjoy all the topics I can muster up to write about.
