Way back in college when I had the strength to pay attention to new
indie happenings my gay friend Dan aka Lil' D aka Dirty D aka Married
D, turned me onto a group that goes by the name of My Morning Jacket.
The album at the time, was 'It Still Moves'. Now Dan had made a career
out of turning me onto bad bands. Homeboy brought it to another level.
Sure my taste is shit, but he had a knack of describing a group,
getting me hyped, and then upon hearing the band completely bumming me
out. I don't know what he was hearing, but it most certainly was not
the same thing that I was hearing. I gave 'It Still Moves' half a spin
then tossed it into the large pile of cdrs that I had accumulated from
Dan over the years. I think I was kinda hyped cause it had a bear on
the cover, but dismissed it at the time. I appreciated the effort. In
highschool it was tapes, and in college it was cdrs. Gay D' once
downloaded this 9 disc Nirvana B-side compilation and titled and
burned the whole damn thing for me. Here I am talking shit. What a
doche I am. Anyway, I blew it, cause MMJ rules! Thanks Gay Dan! At the
time I thought, "Man, I love Skinnard and Neil Young, but I rather
listen to the real thing." Most of the bands you are listening to will
go away. They will be forgotten, and eventually will get day jobs, and
perhaps you might sit next to the drummer on the subway. Not My
Morning Jacket, you'll never sit next to them on the subway. You know
why, cause they rock! And they got staying power. You know why they
got staying power? Because they toured with Pearl Jam, and Pearl Jam
is old and still alive, and also did a rad cover of the Who's "A quick
one while he's away" with MMJ. Yeh. Pearl Jam's pudding is right on.
Cause they are still rich, and awesome, and old and all those other
"Grunge" bands are junk or broken up. That's the test right there.
They passed. They totally passed. Sometimes your rich and awesome and
old, but you die. Ed Ved is still here baby! (Note: Pearl Jam dudes
are not that old) Funny Jim James (MMJ singer) story. Gay Dan and I
went to go see that Neil Young concert movie at the Ryman, 'Heart of
Gold' on 14th St in Manhattan a few years ago. There was this dirty
hippy muppet looking dude behind us that seemed really on edge. Turned
out it was Jim James being sketched out by Mililani Lyle. Man, he had
muppet hair. i liked it. No more though. I got into MMJ when I heard
'Wordless Chorus' off Z. I guess he got into motown, and soul, and
R&B. Shit changed his life. That record is nice bro. I listen to it
all the way through. I watch the videos on youtube. My Morning Jacket
has been around for 10 years now, and have earned a place in rock and
roll history. They are gonna do lots of rockin' stuff, and soft pretty
stuff too. They are gonna make music is what I am saying. Lots of
bands claim they are making music, but that is something else. It's
like going to Mcdonald's and ordering a big mac, and when you get the
box you open it and there is a carrot. It's like going to the toy
store, buying a nintendo and opening it and there is floppy disc and
old baseball cards in it. Dudes tricked me. MMJ continues to sound
like themselves all the while evolving and touring with Pearl Jam.
Their new record Evil Urges is pretty darn tasty. Aside from the song,
"Highly Suspicious" which I can't listen to even jokingly, the record
is solid hook laden rock. The recording is a little slick for my
taste, but it's ok. It took me a couple spins, but I'm feeling it. The
critics are claiming it sounds like Prince, but I'd say it sounds more
like Ween. No white rock band can do Prince, nobody can do Prince. But
Ween comes close. And Evil Urges comes close to Ween which in my book
takes talent. Good on you Beavis and Butthead. (ML)
>> http://www.mymorningjacket.com

Apparitions of classic rock maneuvers take up residence in a dilapidated tenement, unruly drums stagger down flights of stairs with rollicking guitars giving chase, occasionally catching a shirttail. Bass lines fumble for keys in tight pant pockets as seldom keyboards whisper encouragements from a darkened corner. Everything is riddled in complicated syncopation as components meld into convoluted disjunct, each piece stumbling to find a harmonic partner. Strewn about or seemingly discarded riffs clamber in spatial diminution only to conjure ghostly rhythms that form a hidden relatedness that keeps the tangental aspects balanced and checked rewarding repeat listeners with new sonic avenues to wander. Vocals are focused yet rambling, populated with various chatter and emoted plain speak as lyrics are hushed and hollered like hot breath on cold windowpanes. Tone poems are written in the dissipating frost with a dirty index finger. Sauntering through seamy territories with a calculated self assurance Chicago's Singer leaves nothing to chance as the whole record is a masterpiece of sequencing, each songs highs and lows echoing it's predecessors tumult in breathless affirmation. As the record snakes towards it's closing moments elegiac and haunting these sorted and storied songs offer volumes in their aftermath, showing that lugubrious rocking and anxious reflection go hand in hand like a fist to a mirror. (DA)
>> http://www.dragcity.com/bands/singer.html

Some people see a pile of scrap wood in a construction site and never think of it as anything other than refuse to be discarded rather than pilfered. LAMPS take the musical equivalent of that scrap pile and after some cursory glances through the planks, gather a suitable bundle and proceed in trying to build a front porch. A place to hang out with some friends while blasting the stereo speakers through the windows; a place to relax, get drunk, and maybe start stomping your feet on. Each song is laid down with excitable toe-tapping punk riffs that are hammered in a ramshackle framework with the occasional rusty nail jaunting out to catch your ear on. Bouncing bass parts get a healthy shellacking of bristling fuzz as sawdust guitar parts fly through the air. The drummer manages a fair amount of the heavy lifting and often reminds everyone to keep the whole project on time and under budget. All three craftsman usually work as a team, with the intermittent smoke break. Sometimes the project gathers an impressive momentum. Sometimes someone stresses out and comes along and kicks around the loose boards, making the guitar and vocals reassemble, using a ripsaw to refine. Patching things together in a rough hewn that retains the lumbers primitive bark. Laboring through the day and keeping spirits relatively high, despite an aggressive undertone to the whole affair, everyone makes equal strides in the creation of right angles, making sure the bracing is sufficiently sturdy. And when all is said and done, the sun will set on the backs of these makeshift carpenters as they holler at strangers from their front porch. Offering you a chance to kick back and nod your unwashed head along with them. Or if you feel like it, stomping your feet in affirmation of the existence of modern rock and roll that could leave you covered in splinters. (DA)
>> http://www.thelamps.net/

Dude bro. Have the Japanese ever done wrong? Besides hentai and persecuting the Okinawans. I saw a Japanese rockabilly band called Shuji play U.H. today and they did nothing short of kick out the motherfuckin' jizzams. Made me wanna bust out some Teengenerate. Anyway, man I am bad at reviewing things. Smile, the latest and greatest addition to the ever growing Boris catalogue keeps on with the stoner art rock tradition. Boris is giant! Killing eardrums since 92' and never shitting the bed like a lot of their American contemporaries. Named after the famed Melvins' song, Boris has kept their amps at 11 and continued to reinvent themselves on every record. I heard that these guys use to do shit like release their albums only on 8 track or 45's and have it limited to 200 pressings. I heard a rumor that they once released an E.P. in Nintendo catridge format but you ain't heard that from me... mhmmn no sir. Smile is_________, How do I even review this record? It's good I'll tell you that much. It's so all over the place. The first track sounds like a weird Eminem Muppet Remix with random jamming over it. The album has some serious slayage, but it's weird cause songs just start and end. I don't even know if they mixed this sucker. It's hash, but perfect. It's got a lot of pretty noise, glitch, and even some acoustic guitar. I was grooving to this dreamy track and all of a sudden guitars and feedback come out of nowhere. I actually thought my itunes was flipping out. It was bad ass! This album is MC5 Shoegaze crackrock! Dig it! (ML)
>> http://homepage1.nifty.com/boris/

When I was in college I used to hang out with this hippy kid from the Big Island. He was pretty random, he would wear bandanas and make paintings with his jizz. Anyway, one day I was hitting the bong really hard in his dorm. I kinda spaced out on the bed for a moment. I was pretty baked, and didn't notice him put on some music. I started grooving pretty hard. I saw him in the corner of the room giggling. He was trying to be discrete about it. He kinda looked like how Garth from Wayne's World used to look when he was holding in the ha-ha's. I started to get really into the music and I asked him, "dude, what is this?". He started cracking up, and suddenly the singers voice started to sound really familiar. At that very moment it felt like I was falling into a rabbit hole. "Wait a second... this is Phish! You motherfucker!" He bursted into laughter. The dude got me. The dude... he got me. (For the record I don't smoke the weed anymore) Anyway, I demanded he take it out and put in something else. He popped in a tasty jointed called LET IT COME DOWN by a band called SPIRITUALIZED. Shit blew my mind. First spin through I was quite pleased with the sounds that were refracting off my tender ear drums. I went out and bought the Live at Royal Albert Hall and blasted that shit in my room while lying on the floor naked. If your a fan of Jason Spacemen then you have a slight idea of what to expect. The dude rules. His new joint which is not officially released until May 19th, 2008 is a tiny slice of heaven. It's dreamy Gospel Rock with the perfect amount of noise and string and horn arrangement. This guy continues to make really beautiful music that sounds like life. Long gone are the days of big Pink Floyd/Moody Blues type build ups. People wants instant gratification. They just want the chorus and hook splooged in their face. Good things comes to those who wait my man. Songs in A & E maybe one of Jason's best works. Man, I'm gonna go rent some scuba gear and listen to this bad boy underwater. I wonder what the guitar tone will sound like in the Pacific Ocean? (ML)
>> http://www.spiritualized.com/

Self proclaimed nihilistic sludgecore, these 5 Finnish doom punks whose name translates to "parasite" drag you through their brand of psychosis. The gatefold packaging adds to it, hand drawn inside and out, like the doodling of a mental patient. An Interesting mix of influences that even fans of fast music might find unexpected solace within Loinens' crawling depression. High pitch screams of agony and low throaty growls are layered under and trailing out, fade from a chanting moan. Droning strings, paced drumming, that blast into a manic blitz, like a game of underwater ping pong, wrapped up with a lumbering primitive black metal take on riffage akin to a One-Eyed God Prophesy part. There's hollow start-stops, like dropping a mud covered rock into a metal barrel while thinking about the sound of puke splashing into a bucket around your face, with vocals that crystalize those thoughts into a reality. Riffs plod on alone until you're reminded that there's never going to be a break from the agony of life, that these screams are covered in mud and finally overflowing in a steamy primal threatening swamp made of the outside world and more sunless glacial boiling mire of the inner world...Man I gotta stop smoking this shit. (JJJ)
>> http://www.blinddaterecords.de/

Detailing a day or perhaps a mere second in the dopamine mega-factory of a paranoid psychotic, Amherst, Massachusetts quartet Aerosols uses the 4 minutes and 30 seconds on their sophomore effort for YouthAttack to rage through 6 songs that are more cohesively thematic then their first release. "Medicine" lyrically engineers the futility of a fucked mind. An unrelenting medley of snare and open hi-hat, the drums do that thing that make most cringe. A blown out and compressed bass with the static of a quickening sludge. Persistent vocals along with impeccably swift guitar riffs that occasionally mimic the shrill chirps of a flock of small birds overrun by a steam roller fill out and glue the chaos together. “Suburban Blight (Vile)” is the longest song on the record, clocking in at a minute and 19 seconds, and gives the feel of a bonus track gem. Shortly after we leave that tin-foil lined, bug-light lit room, the first distinguishable tom is hit and given room signals in a bubbly earwig of a bass line. With the repetition of lines like “We’re from the suburbs, not from the city, we all hate you, we just don’t tell you” Aerosols confirm suspicions, this suburban college scene thinks you're a bunch of big city douche bags. (KG)
>> http://www.ihateyouthattack.com

Blank Dogs approach towards writing concise pop songs is greatly benefited by instantly establishing an air of intrigue by way of an insular fidelity, like if bedroom could be considered an instrument. There is a strength of vision and a breezy confidence where the odd recording touches blur the lines between sheer happenstance and meticulous technique. Filled with curious, fragmentary moments of murky bass that fumbles through the occasional high and dry guitar lead as the bare electronic drumming provides a skeletal landscape, peaked and ravaged by varying degrees of synth damage. Somber, oblique lyrics sung in a euphonious baritone that murmurs its way through it's small octave range, occasionally harmonizing and backing itself through brief jaunting verses that thrum and wobble toward unexpectedly catchy choruses that are most commonly a joyous refrain of each songs title. All of which is hung together through the aforementioned production values and an uncanny knack for proto-goth punk hooks. Resplendent with exuberant, unexpected melodies threaded with seemingly incongruous elements of eerie fractals of notes that become utterly proficient in creating a realm of aural paradoxes, where isolation and inclusion shake nervous hands with each other and decided that the feelings aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. (DA)
>> http://blankdogs.blogspot.com/

With a foundation of icy disco bass and tribal drum patterns, mechanized warbles careen and skitter in a cavernous tomb. A pulsating dissonance rings out toward unseen walls grasping for purchase amidst the blackness. Distressed and searing guitar lines like a massive metal rake scraping for daylight, sparking brief flourishes of color. There is pressure in this cave. As the workmanship of New York City's Sightings jostles and squirms there's a sense of being held within a sonically miasmic fug. A propensity for atonal grooves, tempered with combustible moments of sheer noise, noises akin to a congested subway tunnel can be found layered, echoed and doubled upon themselves to create a seismic racket that traverses its cacophonous dolor and reaches for the outside world. Which is why this record never collapses under it's own bombast. For all Sighting's clamor there remains a calmness and resolve. With well placed vocal crooning and the noise nearing its zenith you start to realize that the band has found within the catacomb a path not just to free themselves from their environs but for you to be able to enter. (DA)
>> http://www.ecsaticpeace.com

Portland's Lebenden Toten use static as a force. A force that envelopes the listener in a squall of feedback and tape hiss and is as near as a punk band can get to being on par with an electrical storm. Packaged in folded panels filled with collages of apocalyptic imagery and quotations from the lyrics, the 5 songs on this 45rpm 8" are both propelled and anchored by a hugely distorted bass, drums that are a continual battering of toms, cymbals and snare, that modulate the rhythmic bluster; partnering with the vocals that are machine gunned in a harsh cynical bark and a guitar that is a seething static sword that spindles and crackles. Creating a cataclysm of punk thrash that benefits from dark, nearly gothic undertones. The record gains your attention the way the first drops of rain to spatter atop your head would, signaling an oncoming torrential downpour and subsequent roar of thunder. Each blast is charged and filled with a hair raising propulsion of guitar solos, wah-wahing and vocal yelps that amass into an aggregate maelstrom of destructiveness. A cacophonous din seemingly hellbent on toppling you or at the very least blowing out your stereo speakers. With swathes of abrasive speed and rumbling dissonance there is a raw focused energy to this recording that despite it's brevity is an engaging listen. (DA)

Self-destructively anthemic and housed in a stark black,silver and black jacket with a lyric sheet printed in bold type the Seattle/Portland foursome WALLS 10 song long player sets a psychologically damaged mood in a cyclical pattern of lockstep drumming, overdriven bass and fuzz soaked guitar hammering that has the long breath of frustration and contempt for itself and peers being growled and yawped over by a seemingly solitary man who might just be more universal in ego then some people would be comfortable with. As each songs darkly propulsive beat is built upon with harrowing guitar stabs, rivers of molten bass, and ravaged vocal chords the components coalesce and become a singular force, forged on an anvil of mammoth proportions into solemn, totemic masses, which are stacked against each other until the accumulated weight creates a pressure that buckles, succumbs and crashes. What's most interesting on this record though are what WALLS does within the ruins of these huge riffs and that is to let you suck some dust and debris into your lungs and to contemplate just what exactly is bludgeoning your ear canals. Though they're quick to not allow much more room than for a sputtering cough or maybe a swipe of brow sweat before the process is resumed with a furious anger that is delivered with a precision nearly unmatched in todays hardcore scene. (DA)
>> http://www.painkillerrecords.com