Category: Reviews

Review: A Place to Bury Strangers – Hologram

Coming in with a new lineup (Oliver Ackermann – guitar and lead vocals, John Fedowitz – bass, Sandra Fedowitz – drums), a new label (Dedstrange), and a return to their early shoegaze roots, A Place to Bury Strangers‘ new EP, Hologram, is filled to the brim with pent-up energy created from a year of being stuck in the house and watching most of the world go at each other’s throats instead of coming together in a time of crisis.

The opening processed and live beats of “End of the Night” are perfect for your morning walk with the dog or your bad-ass strut into a dark club where you’re going to perform a hit. John Fedowitz’s bass line ignites the spark of Ackermann’s gasoline guitar while he sings about the end of friendships in his old band (“Now that the friendship’s gone, I miss it to pieces.”), taking a breath, and moving forward with his new one. The My Bloody Valentine influence on APTBS is undeniable on the track, as it almost sounds like it was left out in the sun to warp.

“I Might Have” has a cool 1960s garage rock feel to it, if that garage is on fire and located next to a busy railroad line while Ackermann’s voice echoes almost to the edge of incomprehension. “Playing the Part” reminds me of some early Cure cuts while Ackermann sings about life continuing after bad times have come and gone (“Who doesn’t enjoy the sun?”).

“In My Hive” could well be the theme for everyone who made it through 2020. We were all stuck in our own hives, sometimes busy as bees working to make any sense of the world and restructuring our lives. Ackermann was not only restructuring his life, but also his band / livelihood, and launch a record label. The track has a great driving, industrial beat throughout it, leaving one to wonder if Sandra Fedowitz is a cyborg. John Fedowitz’s bass is subtly in the lead of “I Need You,” with Ackermann singing a lovely shoegaze tale of loss that wouldn’t be out of place on a Slowdive album.

This new direction for APTBS is an intriguing one. The band is exploring loss and also embracing new avenues and possibilities. Ackermann and John Fedowitz, longtime friends, were formerly in the underground shoegaze band Skywave and have now come back together for a new venture. Only APTBS know where this will take them. We’re just holding on so we don’t fly off their sonic bullet train.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Dedstrange and to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Museum of Love – Life of Mammals

Part-krautrock, post-house, part-funk, part-art rock, part…I don’t know what, Museum of Love‘s Life of Mammals is weird and wild.

“Your Nails Have Grown,” for instance, starts the album with Pat Mahoney and Dennis McNany‘s mechaniker krautrock synths for beats and lyrics about someone lost to time, and the extended, haunting saxophone solo by Peter Gordon is outstanding. The title track brings in ambient synths to blend with funky bass and hand percussion beats. It’s a song about facing reality and casting out illusions (“It’s a shocking truth. You were raised by wolves, but never told that rabbits eat their youth.”).

“Marching Orders” is a highly danceable track (those killer beats!), with a whistled chorus and lyrics about retreating into stability and walking away from chaos and the rat race. “Hotel at Home” could be a song about touring or living in quarantine with lyrics like “Everything you’ve done is washed away. This room wasn’t really yours anyway. Curl up and watch. Lockup extended stay.”

“Cluttered World” is a sauntering, sexy track about cutting away attachments in hopes of filling up the space in our homes and heads with better pleasures. “Ridiculous Body,” with its swaying bass and tense drums, is a witty take on toxic beauty and the ravages of time. “Flat Side” has dark-wave elements in its synths and lyrics about patience in love. The guitar on it soars like a robot hawk.

“Army of Children” is a song about regret, and not being able to fix bad habits (“When we met I was a picturesque wreck hanging around your neck…Why can I ever seem to stick to the plan?”). The addition of country guitars and Edwyn Collins-like vocals gives a cool, bluesy feel to the track, even when dance drums walk into the room. Bold horns and bouncing synth-beats propel “The Conversation,” which tells the tale of a talk going out of control in rapid time. The album closes with “Almost Certainly Not You,” in which we hear the tale of a relationship in which someone claims they’ve been telling the truth the whole time, not the other. The song is punctuated by finger snaps and synths that feel like sunlight breaking through cigarette smoke.

A lot of the album sounds like that image feels: Mysterious, yet bright. Angry, yet cheeky. Stealthy, yet bold. It’s a winner any way you slice it.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Patrick at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Typical Sisters – Love Beam

Mixing jazz, house, and some post-rock, Typical Sisters‘ new album, Love Beam, is a cool record that keeps you guessing as to where it will go next.

Opening track “Water Plants” samples some women singing about New Orleans and bouquets (I think it’s from a film, but I can’t place it if it is.) while drummer Matt Carroll seems to stumble around his kit but is actually setting you up for his funky chops on “Well Done.” Guitarist Gregory Uhlmann plays likes he’s out for a good time and in no hurry. Clark Sommers‘ bass is the real backbone of the tune, even as synth chords and bloops move to the forefront.

“OEO” samples train station sounds that fit in nicely with Carroll’s motor-like beats. The band’s love of experimentation is prevalent on “Owl,” in which they bang on a colander and play an out-of-tune zither. Trust me, it works. Uhlmann’s guitar on “Recurring Memory” bounces around like a baby goat. Sommers is in full funk mode on “King Flipper.”

After the weird tree talk of “Clairvoyant,” the band moves to “No Evil,” which opens with more warped synths and brings in a lot trippy drums. Speaking of trippy things, “Oregano” is a quick, odd instrumental, and “Uni Lunch” samples women talking about lunch and coffee for about twenty seconds.

Don’t worry, because “Clamata” brings in some hot grooves. “Grains” has Carroll’s wife singing Danish folk songs while the band puts down a weird sound behind her, and the sound even gets a little creepy on the closer, “Ephemeral,” which blends some Dick Dale-like guitar with jazz rhythms for a mind-bending effect.

Love Beam is a wild record. It doesn’t assault you like some free-form, loud jazz, but it does shake you out of the fog in your brain now and then and makes you pay attention to what Typical Sisters are creating. We all need to pay more attention, and this is a good record to hear with presence.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Taylor at Clandestine PR.]

Review: Year of No Light – Consolamentum

In case you’re unaware, Bordeaux, France’s Year of No Light has been churning out some of the heaviest post-metal rock for the last two decades. Their new album, Consolamentum, coincides with the release of the Mnemophobia – a box set that includes twelve LPs covering the earlier parts of their career.

Consolamentum is a double-album and it takes its time to pile riff upon riff on you. The shortest track on the album is over seven minutes long. The opener, “Objuration,” is nearly thirteen minutes in length and sounds like a summoning ritual being prepared in a dark tomb by men and women in black robes, but they’re interrupted by heavy guitar riffs that sound like they’re played by mystic time-traveling warriors from a post-apocalyptic wasteland. “Alèthia” is the “short” track at seven minutes-thirty-nine seconds, and the guitars on it soar like birds over a vast ocean…on another planet.

Want some doom? Well, “Interdit aux Vivants, aux Morts et aux Chiens” (“Forbidden to the Living, the Dead, and the Dogs”) fits the bill with the title and the heavy, sludgy bass and guitars, the monster-walk drums, and the synths that seem to be the sound of an inter-dimensional door opening.

The bass on “Réalgar” hits like a war hammer swung by a frost giant, while the synths and guitars are the avalanche caused by it and the drums are packs of polar bears descending upon your poor fourth-level Dungeons and Dragons party trying to find shelter in the blizzard. The closer, “Came,” has a cool darkwave feel to it with the echoing drums and synths that float between uplifting and menacing.

This is an album that can transport you to another plane, or at least make the one in which you’re sitting seem tenuous.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Dave at US / THEM Group.]

Review: Splash ’96 – Summers in Anniston

Summers in Anniston, the new album by Splash ’96 (AKA Jason LaRay Keener), is a time machine turned into a record. It takes us back to a time when you could still hang out at the pool, mall, record store, or a friend’s back yard patio and not have to worry about as many killer viruses, angry political conversations, or everyone talking on their damn phone all the damn time.

The bright synths of opening track “CD Baby” are like a blast of cool air that hits you while walking into the mall vestibule from the hot July day. “Our Camcorder” has some classic-sounding processed beats that would fit in fine on a Janet Jackson jam. “The Video Store” is a loving tribute to something that no longer exists (apart from a lone Blockbuster out west and specialty stores here and there), and captures the background music of such a place and the constant looping of advertising videos played there.

“Pool Water,” complete with sampled splashing sounds, is a fun bubbly track perfect for the opening of an early 1990s summer coming-of-age comedy. “Waterbed Nap” is as relaxing as its namesake. “Local Radar” is the sound of the local TV station’s 24-hour weather channel that you watch like a hawk all summer to see if your ballgame, pool party, or trip to the beach is going to be rained out.

“Splurgin’ at the Mall” sounds like a lost Pet Shop Boys cut and has a fun, fat bass lick throughout it to accompany your spending spree at the hot pretzel stand, Spencer’s Gifts, Sam Goody Records and Tapes, and the arcade. “Quintard Cruising” is a straight-up mid-1990s house track (referring to a shopping mall in Oxford, Alabama), and so good that Splash ’96 should consider putting out a house record (if he isn’t already creating one).

“Late Night Drive-Thru” is a perfect song for late night drives with the windows open and three pals in the car with nowhere to go and nothing to do but enjoy the warm night air and listen to the cool new CD one of them just bought with the money they earned at the video store. The album ends with the mellow, slightly warped “Please Adjust Your Tracking,” a phrase familiar to anyone who has ever owned a VCR. I’m surprised the phrase hasn’t transformed into a version of “Step off!” by now.

It’s a fun record, and one that brings back a lot of memories if you were at least a teenager in the 1990s.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Splash ’96.]

Review: El Jazzy Chavo – Aspects of Dystopia

Combining jazz, hip hop, funk, and “atmospheric melodies,” El Jazzy Chavo‘s Aspects of Dystopia is a cool, mood-altering record that can be experienced in different moods, on different days, and through different listening systems all to various effects.

The overriding theme of the album is the day-to-day struggle of the lower class living in places with people (and buildings) who overlook them. “Futurama” is like the opening track to a film about a renegade graffiti artist in a totalitarian regime and a place where “the deep snow buries any sound.”

The groove of “Slap of Realism” is rooted in electro-bass and and processed beats that sound almost like they’re coming from the back of a bodega down the street. “Below the City” is surprisingly bright, as if you went into the sewers to hide from killer robots and discovered a vibrant colony of other survivors there. “Delusion” would fit well into a horror film with its simple synth stabs and ethereal chords.

“Where the Stars Don’t Shine” is the track that introduced me to El Jazzy Chavo. The wicked beats, sampled horns, and lounge vibraphone sounds hooked me right away. “The voice you hear is not my speaking voice,” a woman says at the beginning of “La Sirena de la Salva,” and then siren-like calls emerge from your speakers alongside smooth guitars and snappy beats. “Threshold of Sensation” has a neat warped sound to it that almost makes you feel drunk.

“Swallowed by Normality” has a neat switch near the end that shakes you out of your relaxation, but not in a harsh way. The sampled brass on “Hemispheres” is a great accompaniment to the vaporwave synths. “Return to Forever” is waiting for a rapper of mad skills to come along and use it in his next track. “Andromeda” has some of the best use of sampled raps on the record.

“Barefoot in the Storm” has a groove as relaxing at the title implies, and “Stealing in the Moonlight” is just as slick. The album ends with, appropriately, “Oblivion.” The track isn’t gloomy, however. It’s more of a blissful peace one finds as you fall into a well-deserved rest. The album ends with the sampled lyrics of, “I look out the attic window and watch the world go by. I feel like an outsider. I’m on a different wavelength than everybody else.”

He is, and Aspects of Dystopia will put you onto El Jazzy Chavo’s wavelength.

Keep your mind open.

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Rewind Review: Pat Dinizio – Songs and Sounds (1997)

Recorded with a different backing band (J.J. Burnell – bass and vocals, Sonny Fortune – saxophone and flute, Tony “Thunder” Smith – drums) than the rest of The Smithereens, Pat Dinizio‘s 1997 solo album, Songs and Sounds, is a fine display of his deep voice, suitable for crooning or rock and rolling, guitar work, and musical influences.

The short opening track, “Where I Am Going,” is just Dinizio and his haunting voice. “Nobody but Me” hits hard with heavy bass and crisp drumming while Dinizio sings about taking all the chances in a relationship. “124 MPH” is a great example of Dinizio’s love of “Mersybeat” / early 1960s Liverpool rock with a catchy chorus and backing vocals and fun lyrics about a gal too fast for Dinizio’s endurance.

“Running, Jumping, Standing Still” starts with sounds of a rowdy party (or a live gig) and builds to a Who-like crash of thudding bass, driving guitar, lyrics about being able to do anything Dinizio damn well pleases, and precision drumming. “Everyday World” has Dinizio proclaiming that he doesn’t want his life to be the same old grind with a gal who doesn’t want excitement. The added horn section on the track is a great touch.

“There’s no stopping us,” Dinizio sings on “No Love Lost” – a song that mixes good and sad memories about a relationship. Fortune’s saxophone solo on it showcases his jazz chops. It sounds effortless. “Today it’s you, tomorrow it’s someone else,” Dinizio sings on “Today It’s You,” which features a solid acoustic guitar rhythm layered with heavier electric sounds.

“Liza” is an acoustic ballad, the kind that Dinizio sings well – often channeling his love of Buddy Holly when he does it (as he does here). It floats into “Somewhere Down the Line” – another fine example of Dinizio’s songwriting as he chronicles a relationship that’s clinging to the hope of a vague, better future that probably won’t ever arrive. “You Should Know” is a good rocker, and the closer, “I’d Rather Have the Blues,” is a jazzy blues track suitable for a film noir or a shot of bourbon at two in the morning.

It’s a nice record. Dinizio was a fine songwriter, singer, guitarist, and performer until his untimely death in 2017 at only the age of 62. He left behind a lot of great music, however, and we could all hope to leave even half as much art and joy as he did.

Keep your mind open.

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Review: Alberto Melloni – Red Siren Remixes

Alberto Melloni‘s Red Siren EP was already a hot double-shot of house and trance music, and now two remixes of the EP’s title track have been released from Paradise Palm Records.

The first remix, by Berlin’s Local Suicide, bubbles with industrial bass and dark dance club synths. It’s the kind of track that will instantly awaken you from an early morning groggy state (as it did to me) and keeps you bumping and grooving.

The second remix is by Jacuzzi General, and is a great example of his poolside, luxurious, hedonistic style of house and disco. The synth-bass thuds are pretty much made for slow motion videography of glamorous women walking around, lounging in, and making out by a rooftop pool.

It’s good stuff, and Paradise Palms seems to be hitting everything up the middle for at least a double right now.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Aaron at Paradise Palms.]

Review: Evolfo – Site Out of Mind

Recorded in an attic in a house where an exorcism took place and inspired by science fiction and mind expansion via psychedelic drug trip, Evolfo‘s Site Out of Mind is a pretty groovy record. I mean, how could it not be with an origin story like that?

Opening with Cure-like guitar chords that mix with thick electro-bass and reverbed vocals on “Give Me Time,” the album instantly feels far more expansive than an attic. The crunchy guitars and humming of the first single, “Strange Lights,” will make you stomp the pedal to the metal. Evolfo goes from Temples influences to Osees within two songs, which is nothing but cool to me. The warped, wobbly beats of “Zuma Loop” are disorienting at first and then hypnotic.

“Towers rise, towers fall,” they sing on “Blossom in Void” – a song that seems to be about staying present in order to emerge from sorrow and end up in a place of joy. Jangly acoustic guitars and vintage psych-synths start the funky “Drying Out Your Eyes” – a top-notch groovy cut. “In Time” parts 1 and 2 are a nice psychedelic combo – like pretzels and curry. “Let Go” is a dreamy float down a hazy river.

“Broken Hills” has this neat, weird beat that I love, and the change to a trippy Yes-like sound for the end (complete with string section) is gorgeous. “Orion’s Belt” is appropriately spacey, with guitars sounding like buzzing UFOs. The closer, “White Foam,” reminds me of Psychedelic Furs by the end if the Furs were even more psychedelic.

It’s a nice record, and I’m curious to see and hear where these chaps go next.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Cody at Clandestine PR.]

Review: Alastor – Onwards and Downwards

If you’ve been thinking there isn’t any good doom metal out there right now, allow me to use a phrase I find myself saying now and then, “Meanwhile, in Sweden…”

In Sweden, Alastor have been crafting heavy, spooky doom metal for a few years now, and their new album, Onwards and Downwards, is about (in the words of guitarist Hampus Sandell) “…one person’s gradual slip into insanity. An ongoing nightmare without end. It also sums up the state of the world around us as this year has clearly shown.”

So, don’t expect a happy-go-lucky record. Expect skull / soul-crushing riffs and images of things watching you from the shadows.

Opening track “The Killer in My Skull” unleashes a fusillade of cymbal crashes, rocketing riffs, and vocals about questioning reality. “Dead Things in Jars” creeps around you like something in a secret laboratory you just found in a witch’s basement. Sandell’s solo on it is slick. “I hear them callin’, shadows are fallin’…There’s no denyin’, red eyes are cryin’…” Is it a warning or a lament? It’s probably both. The breakdown around the five-minute mark leads to heavy riffs suitable for something emerging from a cauldron.

I’m fairly certain I can hear a piano being pounded on during the rocking, reeling “Death Cult” – a song made for blasting out of the windows of your muscle car are you’re being chased (or you’re chasing) werewolf bikers. The bass groove alone is pretty damn cool. “Nightmare Trip” could be a subtitle for the year 2020. “Shadows like walls around me slowly closing in,” they sing with a slight edge of reverbed fuzz on the vocals that mixes well with the killer bee buzz guitars. The tolling bell at the end is a great touch.

Believe it or not, there’s acoustic guitar on the instrumental “Kassettband,” showing that Alastor aren’t a one-trick pony and could easily be a psych-band if they wished. The nearly ten-minute-long title track (complete with spooky haunted house organ) has vocals that seem to cry out from behind an ornate mirror that was formerly covered in a dusty crimson cloak. The guitars and drums feel like they’re rising up from the ground to become something you can’t escape (“There is no place you can hide…”). The song somehow gets creepier around the seven-minute-mark, especially with lyrics like, “Your dying heart is beating faster as you are pushing through the night.” The closing track, “Lost and Never Found,” is another heavy-hitter that further explores the descent into madness a lot of us were sensing for the last year.

It’s a heavy record, both in sound and theme, and well worth a listen. Yes, it’s about staring and walking into the abyss, but the riffs are powerful enough to give you the strength to emerge from it like a warrior.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Dave at US / THEM Group.]